Accompanying my 9-year-old daughter to take online classes, the English teacher led the children to review two units recently, namely “Family Activities” and “My Home”. In the class, many songs and pictures were interspersed in the PPT. In these songs and pictures, the grandmother or grandmother is usually feeding the fish by the fish tank in the living room, sitting on the sofa watching TV, the grandfather or grandfather is usually sitting on the sofa in the living room watching TV and drinking tea, and the father is usually in the study Reading a book or walking the dog outdoors, the elder brother or younger brother usually listens to music with earphones in his room and reads in the study room, while the older sister or younger sister usually vacuums the room and waters the plants. As for the mother, almost without exception, in the kitchen, wearing an apron, cooking, showing people with a faceless back.
When I watched it for the first time, I didn’t think there was anything wrong with it, but when these contents were presented three times a week for half an hour each time within two weeks, I gradually felt something strange. And when these contents were repeatedly presented in the form of various strengthening and consolidating knowledge points or topics, repeatedly eroding my eyes and heart, the feeling in my heart gradually changed from strangeness to confusion and anger: Why is my mother always in the kitchen? Appear? Why is her family activity always cooking? Why can’t she watch TV, read a book, listen to music, feed the fish or water the plants like the rest of the family?
Some girls will be taught at a young age to learn to cook, which can increase their competitiveness in the future marriage market, because being able to cook usually means that she can become a good wife and mother with good living ability. But I would say don’t listen to these stupid statements. If people don’t ask a boy to cook, they shouldn’t ask a girl to cook. The logical notion is that if a girl learns to cook, it’s because she really loves it and thinks it will improve her comfort in life, not because the skill is a marriage or family responsibility.
What if I’m a mother but don’t like to cook, I’m not good at it, or I just don’t want to? Keiko Nishihara, a famous Japanese cartoonist, gave a brilliant answer: don’t have the psychological burden of cooking. In hot weather, I have to bring my own bento. What should I do if I get food poisoning? If you cook at home, you have to go to the supermarket to buy the ingredients first, then go home and start cooking. When it is ready, you have to let the children eat it. If the children can’t finish eating, they will start to get angry, and finally they have to clean up the kitchen and dining table. Instead of this, it is better to buy some ready-made home-cooked dishes. These finished dishes are delicious and convenient, and the children are happy to eat them. In this way, the mother will naturally feel better and can use the extra time to work and make money.
Some people think that the most loving and the best meals in the world are the meals cooked by mothers who are busy in the kitchen all day. Jordan Peterson, a professor of psychology at the University of Toronto, told us that people are now more closely connected to 7 billion people around the world through the Internet. No matter how good you are at something, there are always people in the world who can compare you to it. Maybe you play the guitar well, but you’re not Jimmy Page and Jack White. You’re good at cooking, but there are plenty of great chefs out there. Your mother’s fish head rice may have been popular in her hometown, but it doesn’t compete in the age of whiskey ice cream.
So, makers of mothers in songs and pictures, let go of stereotypes and obsessions, and let mothers get out of the kitchen and do something else interesting.
