It’s wild how many people seem to think that teachers and nurses are easily replaceable. I think there’s a sense that these are “girl jobs” that anyone can rock up and just…do.
Even if they were jobs that didn’t require years of training as well as a particular constitution, the people who do them would still be valuable. We aren’t required to treat workers as fungible. But this way of seeing feminized jobs as easy is leading us to a long-term crisis.
We devalue care work so much that any job that involves it, regardless of what else it involves, is seen as “easy,” normally by cis men who think caring is women’s work, and think they’re only bad at it because it’s beneath them. But they’ll never admit it’s our greatest need.
It’s also wild because care work is among the only type of work that can’t be easily automated. It’s in capitalism’s interest that we devalue it. Nursing and teaching are not only care work, they’re highly skilled in a huge range of ways. Just like lots of jobs!
The best people at almost any job are good because they are carers along with whatever else they do. Software engineers, mechanics, administrators, retail managers, people managers, editors, infosec professionals—the best folks at many jobs are the best because they also do care.
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
