Did you know that as more married upper class and upper middle class women became employed during the 70s there was a dramatic uptick in demand for domestic labor?
They do not demand their husbands pick up the slack when they enter the workforce, instead building their “liberation” on the backs of working class women, usually working class WOC.
As well 19th century Bourgeois feminists were only horrified by working class sex workers because sex work was easier and paid better than being a scullery maid, thus making it harder and more expensive to get domestic labor. They set up caring courses (read: Training and recruitment courses for domestic laborers) and crusaded against sex workers to make sure their supply of domestic labor was unthreatened.
You’ll note bourgeois feminists never demonize or rail against domestic labor the way they rail against sexual labor. This is because they have no use for sex workers and all the use in the world for domestic workers.
No, being a sex worker isn’t “easier” than being a maid. And let’s please not forget that having a Victorian era husband bring home syphillis or other STDs to infect his family might have also had something to do with it.
The real story is that factory work was much, much more likely to be luring women away from domestic servant jobs than prostitution in the 19th century.
But yes, class and race need to be a part of our understanding of misogyny. Bourgeois women shouldn’t build their places on the backs of other women.
Madeira Darling is a snarky mystic, devout Satanist, serious Marxist, laughing dominatrix, and writer from San Fransisco where they live with their boyfriend in a house full of altars to their various demons.
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