Brush up or it's bye-bye
By Sheryl-Lee Kerr
Well, it looks like Austria is the place for a married woman to be.
For those who missed the fun, laws have been passed in Austria forcing
men to do their equal share of the housework - to stem rising divorce
rates from miserable hausfrauen.
I am sensing it was possibly
time for a change: Britain's Sunday
Telegraph reports Austria's old laws, courtesy of the Nazis in 1938,
decreed women should “content themselves only with Kinder, Kuche,
Kirche - children, kitchen and church”. (Er, anyone who still
thinks the Nazi law was the way to go can be the one to tell Germaine Greer how she should be ‘contenting’ herself.)
But I digress. No more will Austrian men have to spend their spare
time carefully ensuring they don't spill their beer as the little
woman cleans around them. Now they must do half. (Or at least share
the couch.)
Still, I'd really love to know how one enforces a housework equality
law.
Do you get a sharp rap on the door from burly women declaring
themselves to be the Vacuum Police and asking the man of the house
to stand fast and present his Hoover callouses for inspection?
Maybe the blokes'd be put through the men's toilet-roll changing
time-trials? (This entails allowing 15 seconds to change a toilet
roll and an hour to boast about having done it.)
And how will couples, themselves, handle it? “I am sorry, dear, but
I am legally bound by Statute 12a not to take out the garbage ...”
a spouse could say.
Or maybe they'll divide the house in two - he gets
to clean his half and she hers. Guests would not even bat an eyelid if they see clean vacuum lines stopping in a straight line, right down the middle of a lounge room, with unvacuumed fluff on the other side. They'll just smile knowingly.
But as for lowering divorce rates, imagine Austrian divorce hearings
now: “Your honor, he did not change the toilet roll for three
years. Yet I ironed the his-and-her tea towels faithfully the entire time...”
Still, that's a better argument than what's been taking place in
Austrian divorce courts of late. Reports say one man recently
reduced his settlement to his wife because she took a part-time job and was then unable to serve him dinner on time.
And another man divorced his wife for refusing to use his favorite washing liquid.
The latter case proves: a, that's a man who badly needs a life; b,
that's a woman who badly needs a divorce; and c, that man is going
to be very lonely each time his new girlfriends find out he's divorced
because of Omo.
© Sheryl-Lee Kerr & The Advertiser, 10 MAR 1998.