Speaking of Chores
Erin has a great post today linking to an L.A. Times article about some Christians trying to live a simplified, hospitable lifestyle in a communal living arrangement (several families in a house, sharing chores, pooling finances, living without excess, opening the house to the needy). The article offers readers the opportunity to comment, and many have done so, mainly to scold, criticize, or express skepticism of the motives of the subjects of the article.
Personally, I was pretty troubled by the attitudes expressed in these comments. The readers seemed personally threatened, angry, and even defensive--just because some other people had made different lifestyle choices, as if this alternative lifestyle offered some implicit criticism of their own. The people in the article never stated that everyone should live as they did, nor even that they thought they should live this way their whole lives--only that they wanted to try a one-year experiment.
But the readers of the article--whew! They're vicious. One man wrote, "God . . . [is] probably wondering what it was you did with that beautiful thing he gave you called your BRAIN. Your poor children. I hope they don't grow up to be one more damaged soul in this wolrd [sic] someday because some stranger you let live in your house molested them." Somehow, it sounds like he's hoping for the opposite--to be proven right by the community's disastrous failure.
I'm not looking to move into a communal arrangement, but I can certainly see some real value in doing so. I lived with two other women when I was in seminary, and although our intentions were nowhere near as radical as those of the people in the article, we lived a simple life out of necessity (grad student poverty--I think I used to make about $650/month), enjoyed sharing in and contributing to the hospitable culture of the seminary folks, and had to negotiate many of the same questions about how to share space, chores, and values.
What strikes me as amusing--and irritating--is that many of the comments on the article insisted that such living was unrealistic and impractical, particularly if you have a family. Hello? Isn't marriage a much less realistic and practical endeavour? After all, it's not a yearlong or at-will commitment, and it's not to a whole group of folks who might as a whole be able to come up with solutions. The article pointed out repeatedly (as evidence of the community's problems) how many tears some of the women had shed over their frustrations at "who had scratched the coffee table" or whose turn it was to mop the floor or cook dinner. It's ridiculous--not those women's concerns, but rather the readers' insistence that such concerns are unique to this kind of communal living arrangement and unlike common family life.
Personally, I was pretty troubled by the attitudes expressed in these comments. The readers seemed personally threatened, angry, and even defensive--just because some other people had made different lifestyle choices, as if this alternative lifestyle offered some implicit criticism of their own. The people in the article never stated that everyone should live as they did, nor even that they thought they should live this way their whole lives--only that they wanted to try a one-year experiment.
But the readers of the article--whew! They're vicious. One man wrote, "God . . . [is] probably wondering what it was you did with that beautiful thing he gave you called your BRAIN. Your poor children. I hope they don't grow up to be one more damaged soul in this wolrd [sic] someday because some stranger you let live in your house molested them." Somehow, it sounds like he's hoping for the opposite--to be proven right by the community's disastrous failure.
I'm not looking to move into a communal arrangement, but I can certainly see some real value in doing so. I lived with two other women when I was in seminary, and although our intentions were nowhere near as radical as those of the people in the article, we lived a simple life out of necessity (grad student poverty--I think I used to make about $650/month), enjoyed sharing in and contributing to the hospitable culture of the seminary folks, and had to negotiate many of the same questions about how to share space, chores, and values.
What strikes me as amusing--and irritating--is that many of the comments on the article insisted that such living was unrealistic and impractical, particularly if you have a family. Hello? Isn't marriage a much less realistic and practical endeavour? After all, it's not a yearlong or at-will commitment, and it's not to a whole group of folks who might as a whole be able to come up with solutions. The article pointed out repeatedly (as evidence of the community's problems) how many tears some of the women had shed over their frustrations at "who had scratched the coffee table" or whose turn it was to mop the floor or cook dinner. It's ridiculous--not those women's concerns, but rather the readers' insistence that such concerns are unique to this kind of communal living arrangement and unlike common family life.
posted by Tara | 11:56 AM
6 Comments:
Great point about the parallels with regular family life-- getting mad about the scratched coffee table, etc. Just yesterday I put Dr. G's leather wallet through the wash. He had to exercise some real forbearance.
Hmmm! I'm seeing a lot of 'cleanliness' themes here in these most recent posts! (even with the separation of peanut butter and jelly in jar)
Is someone entering a nesting phase, perchance?
;)
Erin, I'm glad it's not just me with the shamefaced confessions to the husband.
Kate, yeah . . . or at least theorizing about it!
It would of course depend rather critically on the people, but note the Biblical precedent, Paul stayed for extended times with various homes, Mary visited Elizabeth for several months, people were expected to take in itinerant preachers (3 John I think) and so on.
Jesus sent out the disciples to stay in people's homes, it was just part of the culture then--but Western individualism is rather different, "fish and company stink after two days" being the rule.
I guess they had better preservatives back in those days, or maybe people were a little more salted...
Lee--wise and wonderful as ever!
It's always difficult to truly see another point of view. If people are feeling threatened by the one year experiment, they may feel that precedence is being set for a future that could mean less "independence". Think about the scorn and outrage that civil rights, women's rights, gay rights have been pelted by throughout the years. It all started with one person realizing, "hey, that lady can do some math, just like me and I even have a penis"...and remember the opposite happens so much more easily. They aren't like us, we must persecute to preserve. I think it's great that a group of people have decided to try living that closely with one another for a year. I know i wouldn't be able to survive a year, but there are many people who couldn't survive a year taking public transportation. To each his own, and may we each be able to see the other's own....even if we don't choose it for ourselves.
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