A Mom Totally Nails The Unfair Nature Of Male Hobbies vs. Female Hobbies

The balance structure is off when it comes to moms and dads and their hobbies. Golf widows know this all too well. It’s Saturday morning and instead of a fun, family day or a couple hours of relaxation for mom while dad takes the kids to the park, he’s out the door to make his 9 a.m. tee time. This is bullsh*t, and one TikTok mom is here to call it out.

Paige Turner vents about the unequal nature of male vs. female hobbies, noting that men get the sweeter end of the deal because of course they do! She also notes some pretty interesting factors between men and women’s hobbies, once again proving that moms are the default parents in most heteronormative family structures.

“Male hobbies typically take them outside of the home during the daytime during caretaking hours. Female hobbies often revolve around the schedules of their partner and their children and account for the domestic labor that they are handling and any kind of mental load that they carry,” she begins.

Turner notes that men’s hobbies include activities such as golf, hunting, rock climbing, and training for a marathon which take them outside of the house during the day, away from the kids and family.

Women’s hobbies, like gardening, painting, reading in a book club, even socializing with friends, can all be done in short spurts while the kids are present or in close view.

“We are able to and required to typically work our hobbies around the schedules of our families whereas men's hobbies take them away from that,” she notes.

The reason that men are able to go golfing for four hours on a beautiful Saturday afternoon is because of heteronormative social structures and archaic gender roles in which men gain free time and women lose free time when they get married because women suddenly take on the unpaid labor and mental load at home.

“So, men are able to leave the home for those extended periods of time during caretaking hours because they have a support at home. Most females do not feel like they have the same support when they would like to take on a hobby,” Turner says.

She then lays out the scenario of a role-reversal where a mom announces that she’s golfing in a women’s only league. She’ll be gone every Sunday, for four hours. Imagine the blow back!

“They may be met with a response that that is unfair, that takes them outside of the home that is putting too much responsibility on the other partner and that is not kind of equal division of labor, right?” Turner says.

She also notes that women may take up hobbies they don’t even necessarily have a huge passion for but rather lean into because of convenience.

She continues, “Like often people joke like, oh, women love flowers and gardening. They don't all love that. One of the reasons they might get into it though is because they can do it from their home with their children. So it's something they can do together.”

And people wonder why and how single women are polled to be the happiest!