House chores, should boys be involved?

It is fast becoming old fashioned allowing only the girl child to do the house chores while the boys play football or other games. A biblical phrase says, train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old, he will not depart from it (Proverbs 22 vs 6). House chores […]

It is fast becoming old fashioned allowing only the girl child to do the house chores while the boys play football or other games. A biblical phrase says, train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old, he will not depart from it (Proverbs 22 vs 6).

House chores are the regular or daily light work of a household which include washing the dishes, sweeping, dusting the furniture, weeding the environment, washing clothes, the bathroom among others.

However, most parents seem comfortable to lump the bulk of house work on the girl child alone rather than sharing the responsibilities between her and the boys, even if as a learning process.

A a free online community debate.org survey on the topic ‘Should Women do All the Housework?’ had 78 percent of respondents opposed to leaving the house work to the girl child/women alone.

Though there is a dramatic change in gender norms in the last few decades, the assigning of house chores has steadfastly refused to record appreciable shift. Boys that have not been thought to help with one thing or the other in the home grow into men that add little or no support for their wives.

Our reporter who sought the views of some people on the issue, found that women are now trying all they could to raise boys that can compete with girls in that area.

Mrs Chioma David a residents of Lifecamp, Abuja and mother of four, said whether boy or girl, children should be thought to handle one chore or the other in the home, adding that irrespective of gender, she trained her children to support each other.   

The mother of two boys and two girls said, she believes in the statement, that what a man can do a woman can do better and vice versa, adding that her first child, an 11-year-old boy can comfortably make some fast food and take care of the house whenever she was not around because of what she has put him through.

“I don’t have house help, we all help ourselves. Even my six-year-old knows what to do at home without anybody telling her. It is good to teach the children so that when they grow up what they learnt will help them, especially the boys,” Mrs David said.

A teacher, Aisha Yakubu, said she does not believe that work in the house should be left for the girls alone, though they might have the largest share of the work done because girls/women are naturally endowed with multitasking ability, adding “that is how we are created.”

“Leaving the whole work in the house for the girls alone to do is teaching the boys to be lazy or making them to pose superior to the girls. All children are equal and we must let them realise it right from childhood,” Aisha opined.

A father of three in Utako, Mr Femi Babalola, said it is good to teach the boys to handle some tasks in the house along the girls as it will be of help to them in the future. “For example, some young men have problem with cooking when they are in the higher institution because they are not used to that at home, while some boys rooms in the hostels are unkempt because they don’t know how to put things in order. If they have this knowledge from home it will help them.”

Babalola, who said he was grateful to his mother, explained that they were all boys from the same parents and that they were all thought housekeeping chores, including cooking and it has paid off well for all of them.

A computer operator, who gave his name as Charles said though there are lots of issues surrounding feminists today but “we must understand that it is the girl or woman that can do the house chores better, adding that the “boys should not compete with them in this area.”

“No matter how good a male is at putting the house in order or preparing the meals, the female will still do better but it is good for the boys to support them. Even in training the children, it is the women that people look up to,” he posited.

He added that though with equal rights and opportunities, the girl child should be encouraged to stay more  in the home so that it will help her when she becomes a full grown woman.

“We should all understand that from childhood, women have the natural trait of being loving and caring by towards her beloved ones and her family. Therefore, the household chores are more suited to the girls while the boys learn more tasking skills.”