Tag: Tradwife

The Tradwife, or Traditional Wife, is an online female persona that’s been resurrected by influencers.

Some show the women venturing into their backyards, tending to their cottagecore gardens free from pesticides and other corporate contaminants. Institutional distrust notwithstanding, the vibe of the videos are peaceful, cozy, blissful even, emulating a sense of ease and simplicity. The women are graceful, beautiful, stereotypically feminine.

Keeping Score: Court Blocks Student Loan Relief Plan; Former N.Y. Cop Sentenced 10 Weekends in Jail After Child Rape; Trump’s ‘Tampon Tim’ Jab Backfires

In every issue of Ms., we track research on our progress in the fight for equality, catalogue can’t-miss quotes from feminist voices and keep tabs on the feminist movement’s many milestones. We’re Keeping Score online, too—in this biweekly roundup.

This week: Kamala Harris reaffirmed her candidacy for president at the DNC; Republican-appointed judges strike down Biden’s student loan relief plan; a new law bans women from speaking in public in Afghanistan; working moms earn just 71 cents per dollar earned by dads; understanding the orgasm gap; gold-medalist boxer Imane Khelif fights back against racist and sexist abuse; new reproductive rights bills signed into law in Illinois; and more.

The Tradwife’s Catch-22

How is it that an independent business executive goes from a full-time position in the C-suite to a full-time position in the kitchen, out of submissive devotion to her husband? If you’ve recently spent time on TikTok or Instagram, you may have wrestled with this question.

Tradwife influencers are right to point out the emptiness, precarity and dissatisfaction of neoliberal life, and the appeal of the alternative they offer is clear. But much of the rosy picture they paint exists only on our iPhones and not in reality. Domestic labor is neither slow nor peaceful.

Why the ‘Tradwife’ Life Is More Dangerous Than Ever Before

They were soulmates. At least that’s what Olivia thought—and Brad said. When they reconnected over a decade later, it seemed like fate.

Brad was charismatic. Within a couple years, Olivia was pregnant, and Brad wanted her to stay home. “He didn’t use the term ‘tradwife’ but that’s what he wanted,” she said, referring to the social media trend glorifying the traditional wife of the 1950s who tends the home and has no financial independence. “I felt like a slave. He expected me to keep the house clean while caring for our baby. … If I didn’t wear makeup and have my hair done, he would ask why. … The only thing with my name on it was a joint Costco card.”

After he cheated multiple times, they got divorced and she got no alimony. Brad lives in a comfortable home thanks to his well-paying job. Olivia lives in a trailer.

“If you refrain from building your own success, it’s very dangerous,” she said. “Being a ‘tradwife’ is like playing Russian roulette.”