I come from a line of women who, by patriarchal definition, “did not work”. And men who, by patriarchal definition, were “providers”. I am the first (among the line of my great grandmother, my grandmother, my mother) to “work” in the way that we normally define how men work i.e. long-term employment, outside the house, and get paid for it.

I remember, 20 years ago, splitting my first paycheck in half between me and my mother. I told her “We did it!”- like somehow some way we finally got paid for our labour. Because it doesn’t matter whether that labour was inside or outside the house- we should get paid for our labour. It was through my mother’s unpaid labour that my father became a “provider”, and I was able to get into paid labour. It was through the line of my foremothers’ unpaid labour, that every single one of my forefathers was able to become a “provider”. However, patriarchy still maintains that women who work at home actually “don’t work”.

One of the biggest lies we’re told about women’s labour is that, in the good olden days before the big bad feminists came along, women didn’t work. It’s the big bad feminists’ fault that women now go to work. The truth is this: women always worked- the big bad feminists made sure we got access to work that was paid. 

Our work at home remains unpaid. This is a deliberate strategy that is needed to invent the title “sole provider” and award it to men.

A few years ago, I came across an article titled “The myth of man the hunter: Women’s contribution to the hunt across ethnographic contexts“. It debunks the narrative that in the past, muscular, stone-wielding men were the hunters who bravely ventured into dangerous wildernesses to bring back calorie-rich meat for their families, while passive women remained safely at camp, gathering plants and nursing infants. Basically, it’s a lie that only early men hunted while women gathered.

The idea of a clear division that “men hunted and women gathered” is a total myth. In nearly 80% of surveyed foraging societies, women actively and intentionally hunted big and small game. Even when big-game hunting did happen, 30% to 50% of the hunters were actually women (analysis of 9,000-year-old burials in Peru confirms that early big-game hunters were often biological females).  Women also provided the vast majority of food processing in history. The reality of early human roles was much more egalitarian where everyone hunted/gathered depending on their skills rather than gender. In other words, traditionally, we had no gender roles (remember that the next time some Chad talks about his yearning to bring back tradition- actual tradition is equality).

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But for most of history, framing man as “the hunter” served a purpose: to portray man as the one who did the harder risky labour (hunting and killing prey for rich food) to sustain the family. This narrative framed man as the sole individual executing the hard labour required for survival. By extension, it cast him as the natural, primordial “provider”.

Lies.

You see that’s the tragedy of patriarchy; it’s built on lies upon lies. But when we believe those lies- it doesn’t matter anymore that they’re lies- because we give them the same structural power as truth. And they affect our lives the same way. And they pass on from one generation to the next- we inherit those lies as truth until they cement themselves in the foundation of our lives that it becomes almost impossible to see them as anything but truth. We resist facts that counter those lies because believing the facts means realizing the lives we built- the entire architecture of modern society (our marriages, economies, and self-worth) were built on lies. And just like picking out the wrong piece of block from a Jenga tower- the whole thing collapses.

But I’m inviting you to smash the tower because we can no longer ignore this reality:

The modern version of “man the hunter” is “man the provider” and both are inaccurate. I will go as far to suggest that men are not, nor were they ever, providers.

Women have always been the providers of the family. They provide the cooking, cleaning, childcare, and emotional labour needed to sustain a family. But patriarchy has never called that labour “providing” – it’s framed instead as a woman’s “duty” to justify it being unpaid. And it is unpaid to force her to depend on man’s income. Because if we realize that woman is the provider of the family, we realize that- actually- man is her dependent.

How women’s labour was stripped from the “provider” title

To understand how men successfully claimed the title of “provider”, one must examine the deliberate historical mechanisms that stripped women of that title. 

In pre-agricultural hunter-gatherer society (i.e. 99% of human history) the concept of a “stay-at-home wife/ mother” or “housewife” did not exist- as everyone hunted/ gathered and helped raise the children. There was no such thing as housework being “women’s work”. Anthropologists call humans “cooperative breeders“; mothers, fathers, grandparents, and neighbours shared the load. We had a village and thrived as community where everyone did the work. And this community didn’t mean women being dragged around to live with and serve their husbands’ extended families (that is patriarchal structure called patrilocal residence). On the contrary, it meant couples practiced bilocal or fluid residence– they moved freely between the wife’s family and the husband’s family depending on resource availability and choice, keeping early groups highly egalitarian. 

And then that community was torn apart.

The structural shift began during the Industrial revolution. Industrialization moved work from communities and into factories. Families had to move to follow shifting factory jobs severing ties with their communities. Patriarchy ensured factory owners paid women less than men. This gender wage gap forced families to prioritize the man’s income for survival. So, men left to earn wages. Women were left behind- isolated in separate households and doing the domestic unpaid labour. This economic isolation solidified the modern version of the ‘nuclear family’ and birthed the archetype of the dependent housewife and male breadwinner. Science confirms that our brains have not adapted to the structure of the nuclear family. Research now shows that the lack of support contributes to women’s postpartum depression, chronic anxiety, burnout, and autoimmune diseases. But back then, when our foremothers complained they were diagnosed with “hysteria”, silenced, and punished to be put back in “their place”.

To further ensure we were tethered to domestic work and stripped from the “provider” title, men aggressively codified laws and social taboos to bar women from the public sphere. This includes the doctrine of coverture (under English common law which heavily influenced global legal systems) whereby a woman’s legal rights were subsumed by those of her husband upon marriage. She could not legally own property, sign contracts, keep her own wages, or sue for divorce. Her economic existence was legally erased. Throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, formal “marriage bars” were legally enacted across Europe, North America, Oceania, and parts of Asia and Africa. These policies mandated that female professionals- particularly teachers, clerks, and civil servants- be summarily fired the moment they married. To date, there are still 18 countries where women cannot get a job without their husband’s permission. Until the mid-20th century, major banking institutions barred women from financial independence. In the United States, for example, women could not reliably open a bank account or secure a credit card without a male co-signer until the passage of the Equal Credit Opportunity Act of 1974. And yes, there are still a few nations where legal frameworks still allow a husband to control his wife’s ability to manage assets or open bank accounts independently.

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The manufactured dependency of women on “male providers” was not a natural evolution of biological capability; it was a highly organized, legally enforced structure. Men did not out-provide women; they legally disqualified women from competing in the market, locked them inside the home, and then claimed the title of “provider” by default. And although women did technically “provide” unpaid labour- the fact that it was unpaid served to keep women dependent on men’s income and stripped women from the title “provider”.

Why isn’t housework seen as real work?

Housework isn’t “real” work. You’re just sitting at home doing “nothing”. Housework is “women’s” work, men shouldn’t be expected to “help”. Housework is something women do because they’re nurturing and loving and it’s their duty to their families.

I’m sure you’ve heard one or (many) more of the above lines (read: lies) in your lifetime. Those are solid blocks in the Jenga tower of patriarchal lies.

Why does patriarchy refuse to classify housework as real work? The answer is really simple. If the daily acts of cooking, cleaning, managing a household, and rearing children were recognized as the “real work” they are, women would hold immense structural leverage. Because once those acts are recognized as “work” (not duty or love) then there would be no reason to justify why we aren’t paid for them. And we can get paid a shit ton. If our unpaid care work was paid, just at minimum wage, it would amount to an annual $10.8 trillion globally (more than three times the size of the global tech industry, and larger than the annual GDP of Japan, Germany, and UK combined). And that’s just estimated at minimum wage!

And in a world where being a provider means bringing in “money”- women who work at home (and get paid for it) will have to be recognized as providers too. Where does this leave men as traditional sole providers for the family?

I want you to sit with this thought for a minute:

Women aren’t paid for domestic labour so that they won’t be named as “providers”. Because if they’re providers then they must be paid. And if they get paid, they won’t depend on men. And if they don’t depend on men- then how can men hold power over women? Literally- if women were paid for the labour they perform at home- a man’s career and wage would be unnecessary for the survival of the family. And the foundational building block of patriarchal power would dissolve

How do men balance family and career? 

The short answer is; they don’t.

Still, I love asking men that question- not just because that question is always directed at women and never at men, but also because every now and then I like to remind myself how often men lie. They almost always answer with some variation of “I have really good discipline” which we all know is a very strange way of saying “I have a wife”.

Men do not balance family and career. They have a wife who manages the family so they can focus exclusively on their career. Men can “have it all” because they have a wife who actually “does it all” for them.

The myth of the self-made, hyper-productive male professional is an illusion built entirely on the backs of women’s unpaid labour. Behind every corporate executive, political leader, or acclaimed academic who boasts of an 80-hour work week is a woman providing a seamless, hidden infrastructure. She handles the sick children, coordinates the home repairs, manages the calendar, buys the holiday gifts, maintains social networks, and prepares the meals.

Women do not merely provide domestic labour; they literally provide men with their careers. 

I want to emphasize this structural mental shift:

Men’s careers don’t “provide” for women working at home; women working at home provide men with careers.

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Even in the 21st century, when women enter the paid workforce in record numbers, the underlying structure stays stubbornly patriarchal. When both partners work full-time jobs outside the home, women are still performing the “Second Shift” handling the cooking, cleaning, and childcare the minute they walk back in the house because men won’t. Studies consistently show that working wives perform significantly more hours of housework and childcare per week than their working husbands. This contributes to what sociologists term the “motherhood penalty“- the systematic stagnation of a woman’s earning potential and career progression due to the structural demands of domestic care.

Perhaps there is a reason why men are more likely than women to remarry after divorce; men need a provider- women are the providers. Furthermore, women more often than men have primary care of children after divorce and don’t want to involve another partner- i.e. they don’t want the burden of another dependent. The remarriage gender gap is a fascinating reflection of where the real labour lies.

When a man does not have to spend a single ounce of mental or physical energy wondering who will watch his children, clean his clothes, or organize his life, he is operating with a profound competitive advantage. He is not an independent earner; he is a heavily subsidized dependent whose success is actively manufactured by the woman at home.

What do women bring to the table?

A question asked time and time again. But it isn’t a question per se- it more of a rhetorical jab meant to minimize what women bring into a family. Because our understanding of what women bring to the family has been completely warped by patriarchy. For centuries, patriarchy has inverted reality, convincing us that women are weak, natural dependents who rely on the heroic provisioning of men. But when we analyze history without bias, look at the archaeological records of our ancient ancestors, and calculate the trillions of dollars of uncompensated domestic labour keeping our modern world afloat, the illusion shatters.

Women are not, and have never been, the dependents of men. They do not need to justify what they bring to the table because they are the table.

Women are the foundational providers. They provide the life, the care, the emotional stability, and the invisible labour that makes human civilization possible. While man is expected to “bring the bacon”- it is women who make it edible. The man working a market job is not a solitary pillar of support; he is a dependent who relies on a woman to maintain the entire visceral reality of his existence. And yet he is the one who gets paid, while she doesn’t.

We must demand change.

Reflect on this; if it was men who did the bulk of domestic work, wouldn’t it be paid? For it only takes a man to cook dinner once or “babysit” his own children to be seen as performing some kind of noble heroic praiseworthy deed. He wants a gold star, a standing ovation, and maybe a blow job for taking out the trash. All evidence points to the fact that men won’t, systemically and collectively, do housework for free. And if we can justify that for men, then why not for women? If you hire a cook, a cleaner, or a babysitter- you’re expected to pay them for their labour. But when women do that labour for their family, it is done for “free”. So, it’s not that we don’t value the labour women provide; it’s that we don’t value the women providing it.

If you are a woman that does unpaid labour at home (whether it’s your only shift or second shift) while your husband puts his feet up- I urge you to put your foot down. Calculate your hourly rate and demand compensation from his salary to go into your own personal bank account. Eventually, collectively, men will have to put the pressure to demand that compensation from their employers- because ultimately, you’re also working for your husband’s employer- every day you’re using your labour to feed, fuck, restore, and recalibrate his employee for free. The wage-earning workers cannot show up to a factory or corporate boardroom unless they have been fed, clothed, emotionally regulated, and recharged by the unpaid labor waiting at home.

The possibility of compensating domestic labor is not a fantasy; it has already been implemented in 2023 by a UAE based company whereby a direct monthly ‘salary allowance'(equivalent to 25% of a male employee’s basic pay (which isn’t much but definitely a start in the right direction) is paid directly into the bank accounts of their stay-at-home wives. The company’s leadership explicitly stated that the unpaid domestic labor of these women was the essential foundation keeping their corporate workforce productive. If a private corporation can calculate, recognize, and pay for the vital infrastructure of domestic labour, governments have no excuse to treat it as a cost-free resource.

A question that I get asked often on this topic is that: wouldn’t calling for paid domestic labour push more women to work at home and create a larger gender gap between private and public spheres? But I invite you to entertain another possibility: what if paid domestic labour encourages more men to work at home? What if it creates a world whereby, as our early ancestors, the division of private and public labour is based on skills rather than gender? What if it allows us to rebuild community that we lost? The definition of what it means to work at home would change because it is officially part of the paid workforce- you would be a “provider” whether you work at home or outside of it.

We live in dangerous times for women’s rights- where “tradwife influencers” glorify women working at home unpaid (ironically while they earn income as social media influencers) and where governments globally (from America to Afghanistan) are calling to pushback women into staying at home. Why? Because we’re the ones providing the immensely valuable work for human survival- and more importantly, doing it all for free. If this essential labor were legally recognized and financially compensated, the systemic push to trap women at home would instantly vanish- because patriarchy would finally have to pay for the foundation it stands on.

My heart aches for all my foremothers, who have lived and died, believing they “did not work”. Women have been working- domestic invisible emotional mental physical unpaid work- for centuries, while men have been collecting the pay for it under the guise of “providers”.  

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Farida D. is an Arab gender researcher and poet, studying Arab women’s everyday oppressions for over a decade. Check out her books!