Link: Emotional Labor

Olivia K. Lima summarized the amazing MetaFilter thread on Emotional Labor. Thank you, Olivia, for your labor in putting this together.

Summary: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bx-xbuASOkWccFk3ekRzcmZSajg/view?pli=1

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED! I read parts of the original thread, but didn't have the emotional energy (hm!) to read all of it. This summary is still 63 pages but was easier for me to take in.

Reading, I viscerally realized that I've had several fortunate escapes in my life. Something in me rebels at having my emotional labor taken for granted, and I've always had enough privilege to walk away.

Most recently, a male friend would sit expectantly at my table, and, puzzled, I would say, "The food is in the kitchen" (as usual). I'm happy to cook for folks, but they have to serve themselves. There was a related story in the summary, and I realized, oh, it's an automatic expectation of being served. Wow, patriarchy oozes in everywhere.

Respect

A quote via the Emotional Labor summary of these words of wisdom: "A great explanation of why 'be respectful' especially across unstated power dynamics fails."

Sometimes people use 'respect' to mean 'treating someone like a person' and sometimes they use 'respect' to mean 'treating someone like an authority'

and sometimes people who are used to being treated like an authority say 'if you won't respect me I won't respect you' and they mean 'if you won't treat me like an authority I won't treat you like a person'

and they think they're being fair but they aren't, and it's not okay.

That resonates like a big clanging bell.