268 Words on Why Men are Dirty Boys

So much more than sloppy is as sloppy does

By Jonathan Bender
Published: Apr 14, 2008

If a towel drops in your apartment, will anyone pick it up? Apparently, that responsibility falls to the lady of the household. A University of Michigan study found that men create seven hours more of housework for women, while being married actually reduces men’s chores by one hour.

The main culprit is laundry. Between undershirts and boxer briefs, men can fill a hamper in a week. After that, we just use the same method as the trash can, smashing down laundry to fit more until it becomes a mass that is impossible to remove. This seems to cause the hamper to magically empty and we feel we have broken its wicker spirit.

Keep in mind, the man that keeps a tidy house is keeping it clean for another man or grew up with sisters. Men don’t feel filth in the same way. It is a vestigial sense of pride that associates dirt with accomplishment. Even though men work in cubicles, they like to believe that grit under their fingernails is a sign of a hard day’s labor. In many cases, men are only motivated to spruce up the place when our inanimate trash gains legs and begins walking. The ideal is a guy like Ari Derfel, who kept his trash for an entire year.

Your best bet for balancing the equation is a modern version of the chore wheel. Men do well with assignments, particularly if the task involves a version of a gun (hose attachments, faucet sprayers, or a water gun full of Windex). When that doesn’t work, just feel free to turn the hose on them.

Jonathan Bender is a freelance journalist living in Kansas City, Missouri, with three ladies of three different species. http://web.mac.com/jonathanbender

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