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The funniest part is that they are not even jobless. They are full time content creators who earn loads of money telling other women why they should leave the money making to their husbands. And did we notice the how they use their sexuality in these videos. I have no doubt that they have a huge male audience. Not very conservative or traditional of them.

“To be kissed on the forehead by a handsome, unvaxxed conspiracy theorist.” Kill me.

My mom is a wannabe trad wife. She fully believes men deserve to be in charge of everything and should have final say. Thing is, in all her relationships she ends up miserable with mean man-child partners who at best are lazy and entitled, and at worse are abusive to her. And every single time she finally has enough and leaves them, and then STILL doesn't see the fault in her way of seeing things and the type of men she's picking. It makes me so sad. And of course she thinks I'm the miserable one because I have zero desire for romance and sex, and don't ever want to get married or even date. I love living alone and being single, and it blows her mind. She's convinced I'm sad and lonely, when she's the one who is both of those things.

The only unproblematic tradwife is the mob guy from that househusband anime and i think he's killed people

trad wives are so funny bc they’re like “let women go back to tending the home like they used to instead of working🥺💔” like women haven’t been in the workforce since forever. it’s only now that economic instability has gotten so bad it’s touching upper middle class white suburbia they’re like “what happened to living off of one income alone💔💔”

What's hilarious is that historically housewives have done unbelievable amounts of backbreaking labour. Even just laundry pre-washing machines was a grueling ordeal that took multiple days. This magical relaxed housewife fantasy is just that, a fantasy.

As eomeone who was was homeschooled on a farm: don't fucking do it ladies. Your work will NEVER end.

I’m a traditional stay at home wife. This is my choice, it makes me happy, I enjoy cleaning it’s a stress reliever for me. That being said my husband still helps with his own house work. He takes care of the lawn, garbage, cat litter, recycling and anything I specifically ask for help with. He is an attentive father to our baby, and a kind, sweet man to me. Here is the real thing though, NO ONE should be forced into this role. It’s not for everyone, it’s stressful and it’s a lot. Every woman should make that decision for herself.

I idolised my mother who would've fit into this tradwife fad, wanted to be just like her. But I realised that it burnt her out entirely. She also wanted to pursue a career but couldn't with 5 kids and a husband who all relied on her. I have nothing wrong with women who want to be stay at home mothers, but those who carefully curate content to make it look effortless and without cons are obviously lying to you to sell a fantasy.

Not to downplay the seriousness, but one thing this taught me is that if conservatives were more honest about their sexual kinks, we'd have less of them 😂

Staying means nothing if leaving isn't an option. It definitely sounds like some early tradwives were victims themselves, stuck between hurting others or hurt themselves

39:00 This hit hard. My grandma (rural VA woman married off at 13 to a 30yo man), used to clean houses and be a live-in housekeeper (in her childhood) and found the KKK outfit hidden in a closet of the lawyer she worked for. She told me this story in her 80s and still whispered like she was wary about said she flew out of that house and ran all the way back home. I was so confused because I thought being "white" protected her, but it's not true.

Funny how these influencers talk about how they love to homeschool their children, when there are a growing number of reports of how these kids are victims of abuse.

Whenever ⚪ people in the US go off about immigration... All I can ask: "So when are you going back to Europe?" I can demand this of them as I'm a *real* American. Reservation carded and everything.

I don't want tradwifes near my cottagecore 😤

at the ripe age of 16 my bf at the time was trying to push me into being a tradwife + he was racist but the gag is.. he himself was a minority 😐

Its bizarre that these people call the idealised version of my grandparents lives (which werent actually like that anyway) "traditional" when the parents of the baby boomers were living in a very historically distinctive time and considered the way they were living as HYPER MODERN. They saw their era as very much NOT TRADITIONAL, they were speeding towards modernity.

The book "They Were Her Property" by Stephanie Jones-Rogers is a beginner friendly, yet very in depth look at the role of white women as slave owners before and during the Civil War. Would highly recommend to anyone looking to learn more about white women's role in white supremacy. super light reading! /s

"...black man has the chance to be a war criminal..." line made me laugh. Then a little bit sad. Well done.

Holding hands is so normal…i deadass held hands with my friends if we walking through a crowd or crossing the street 😭

Trad wives have always been very Daughters of the Confederacy to me. I'd suppose there are a lot of overlap in those groups.

Babe wake up Shanspeare has posted

this is also so reminiscent of the handmaids tale. the society in the book was able to succeed partially because their wives made their movement accessible and appealing to the public. in the end, though, the wives ended up nearly as repressed as everyone else.

Your early points about the WKKK remind me of probably one of the most chilling realizations of my life. In my work, I've handled robes from the KKK. They were a man's robes obviously, but his name was hand-stitched inside them. We can pretty safely assume he didn't do that himself. A woman in his life did that. When we talk about the contributions of women in the labor force, we have to consider invisible labor, and I think that was the moment I understood on a visceral level just how integral women are to bolstering white supremacy and other systems of oppression.

I can’t help thinking that this whole obsession with Submission is just then not admitting they are into kink and doing it in the worst way possible.

Funny thing about all those tradwive influencers on KZfaq is that the successful ones have pretty much all tripled down on their content creation since getting married and having their first child. You'd think they wouldn't have as much free time now that they have a husband and child to care for, but the more their channels grow the more content they push out... almost like they were prioritizing their KZfaq careers over their tradwife lives!! 😆

"by placing the bars on your own cage you become the most prized ornament" I love that quote so much, I will definitely not be abe to stop thinking about it.

While doing research for a college class I fell down a Stormfront rabbit hole in 2016. Stormfront is an older discord server for people who proudly identified as white supremacists, even though men were the majority of members they did have a “women of Stormfront” tab. I lurked and while the women weren’t calling for violence as much as the men they were still horribly gross and racist. Most of the posts revolved around talking shit about the women of color who dated white men these ladies had a crush on. The women also had the most hateful things to say about children. The men didn’t ever mention kids they seemed to forget they existed, but the women spent half their time in the discord insulting biracial children. Shit was horrifying and they’re passing those attitudes onto their kids.

I am a SAHM, homeschool my child(ren), love to bake bread, Christian, pro vax, pro gay, pro choice, feminist who hopes to one day live on a farm and grow all our own (vegan) food. I have such a fear of being lumped into the tradwife group in peoples minds. But hopefully my tattoos & piercings balance out the long skirts and dresses that I wear for comfort. 😵‍💫 As always, love the content & love the approach you take to these hard topics.

6:10 I went to the African American museum in DC. In one floor discusing slavery, one thing that struck me interesting (and very disturbing) was the whips on the display that were specifically made for white women to use. The WHIPS were freaking gendered. Like that wasnt going to cause the same amount of damage onto enslaved bodies.

what im most concerned about is the lack of financial planning for the tradwives. like yeah they are in their mid 20s now and their partners think they are hot right now but what about when they are in their mid 40s, 50s? when they have given their everything for their families and now their partner gets bored of them, leaves them or even worse what about abuse? how are they going to get back on their feet? what about retirement? they have done decades of unpaid hard labour for their families with nothing to fall back on. but as soon as you remind them of this very possible problem you either get "my husband would never. i know how to chose a man" or the "your boss can fire you whenever he wants and you will be unemployed as well". Which regards to the first one: do you think these women willingly chose men who turned out to be abusers or leave them with nothing in the end? of course not. everyone thinks this will never happen to me but it does happen. regularly. enough so that our old grandmas and aunts have warned us about it. and to the second: finding employment after being fired with an up to date resume and constant work experience is a lot easier than finding employment after decades of nothing on your resume. its a shame but sadly its the reality that domestic work doesnt count in the workplace as experience unless youre a teacher or work in a daycare. and also if you have worked for decades you were most likely able to save and invest some money for hard times/ the future which trad wives dont have. if anything in their "perfectly planned out life" will go wrong they will be at the mercy of their husbands and the court system. And the husbands know this.

I'm a nurse and that elderly woman at the start with the 911 phone call telling the police people had been shot broke me today. The sheer numbness and grief in her voice and you could hear it wasn't her first brush with it. I'm from upstate South Carolina. My heart broke for people when it happened. And it still breaks.

Tradwives are basically actors, their husband and children (if any) are their props.

My cute, almost college graduated, black ass almost thought I wanted to be a tradwife. I just want to demolish the current system. Queen Shan strikes again

This reminds me of the time I was presenting in a grad school class and to remind a whie woman that they were allowed to own property in the form of slaves. She started to make teary eyed excuses, I continued my presentation while other white women were comforing her.

I’m a 25 yo African American (dad from Congo, mom from America who is black) and this video made me realize my mom is a outright tradewife. She refuses to work, she’s anti vax, she believes in building a wall, she doesn’t believe in government help or taxes, she’s blames women for being abused or r*ped bc of how they dress, she didn’t like Obama for many reasons but she never expressed her disdain for any other political leader, she homeschooled all 8 of my siblings and says she’s Christian but she now doesn’t believe she’s married to my dad and lives as a single women after 27 years of married… which is completely against the Bible. I’m scared af now

“Liberation is not solved by individualism.” 🙌🏾 Girl, speak the word!

I have a hunch a lot of this “traditional wife” crap would fall apart as soon as they are requested to do laundry the traditional way-by hand with a tub and a grate, no washer or dryer. Double so when you take away disposable diapers and they have to wash cloth ones-by hand.

I thought I wanted a "tradwife" life. I kind of have one. I'm happily married, we get by on one income with some inherited wealth, we live in the country. I don't HAVE to work. And it about put me in a psych ward. Becoming a mother didn't fill me with purpose and joy. I was miserable. It wasn't until I got back into art and started working with it and making it into a career that the misery lifted.

The Church shooting hit me in a way nothing else really has. I'm a white atheist that grew up in a Baptist Church. I will always have a little love for churches, the community, the love, the sense of safety. I can only imagine those things are even more important in a black church, some of the only safe places for many black people throughout our history. I cannot fathom how horrifying this was for black Americans. I'm so sorry that this kind of hate crime is still a real threat.

Honestly, I feel like the concept of a “traditional wife” can’t help but carry patriarchal baggage and it’s important to acknowledge that in the way we approach relationships

It’s crazy how some women will look at the past when a lot of women were treated like objects, had no rights, and suffered greatly to get said rights be like “I want that life, why can’t we go back?”

I am a Cis Hetero Asian man, I like watching these video essays to learn about topics outside of my usual sphere. this was an interesting video. good job 👍🏻

I find it so ironic when some tradwives take on 50s vintage style as part of their aesthetic. They don't appear to realise (or wilfully ignore) that the modern vintage community, while not perfect by any means, is a proactive inclusive space filled with people of all races, gender identities and sexualities. In a way, it's a subculture which is the direct opposite of the conservative tradwife mindset. The hashtag #vintagestylenotvintagevalues exists for a reason. Thanks for this great video Shakespeare 💕

My SIL is rapidly going down this pipeline and it frightens me. My brother has narcissistic tendencies and a submissive wife is the last thing he needs. I fear for my nephew's wellbeing.

I’m sorry but “Here comes Billy-Bob” took me out 🤣. As a black person, I’ve gotten really used to white t*rrorists only getting a slap on the wrist for LITERALLY THREATENING DEMOCRACY so all I can do at this point is laugh and try not to lose too much sleep over it. (I do other things in my daily life by being very selective where I spend money and making sure I vote and such, but other than that I have enough to worry about already).

as someone who likes vintage/antique style clothing, thanks for the clarification. I don't want to associate with racists and people who try to force their preferred way of life down other people's throats. Vintage clothing, vintage/antique stuff? Yes. Vintage/antique ideologies. No. Oh and you look awesome in that blue dress.

I don’t even think there was ever a time in US history when the “ideal American nuclear household” even existed. My grandfather (born in 1940) has 6 sisters and all of them worked their entire lives, and both my grandmothers (born in the 30’s and 40’s) worked their entire lives too

I got mad at the Candace Owens clip again😂 Platonic intimacy is so insanely valuable and beautiful!! Holding hands with my friends is the best feeling!! Snuggling with a guy friend without sexual tension makes my heart happy. She mad cuz she dont got friends, she got people around her and thats it.

All I think of when I hear the term 'tradwife' is that my grandmother was a working mother of seven in the 50s and 60s and she could kick Girl Defined and Transformed Wife's asses despite being dead for a decade.

So many tradwives seem to think they can wear pretty dresses while doing farm work. And so many don’t seem to understand how much manual labor is involved in agriculture. And how much of a financial gamble farming can be.

I am a stay at home wife and if anyone is looking for a welcoming community of SAHs, there is the Reddit community r/homemaking. A little while ago, there was a discussion on the "Trad Wife" community and how many of us who don't fit into the rigid Trad Wife construct (be it the person is LGBTQ+, a person of color, or male) have found comfort and acceptance in r/homemaking.

As someone who has been a SAHM, I can never understand someone WANTING that much stress and pressure put on them day in and day out. I’m a working mom now, and I enjoy life SO MUCH MORE. I feel like an actual human being that gets to participate in society instead of just someone’s mom stuck in a tiny box on the endless scope of the internet.

All the way in Africa 🙋🏾‍♀️... I saw this trend and immediately saw the white supremacist code due to that harking for a long gone past, that would definitely not work for Black People who have always been forced to work. Trad wife means something different in different communities in Africa. In Africa, women worked to produce food and trade. But there are clear cut roles.

I, the son of a white middle class american woman, would like to inform u theyre weirdly obsessed w tennis if they play sports lol

I spent some time as a stay at home gf bc me and my partner were trying to see if that worked for us, and I literally became insane. I think that theres a lot of negatives about the lifestyle that is ignored completely by all STHM influencers because it doesn't fit the image they are trying to sell. Maybe I wasn't cut out to be a stay at home partner, but I refuse to believe that at least half of these women do not have severe cabin fever.

The fact that Shan is under 25 with this level of intellect gives me such hope for the future.

Each time I hear any racist ideology, I think of the Bill Nye Science Guy video where he explains why humans have different levels of melanin in their skin and remind myself that the people that believe these ideologies need to touch grass (and that is putting it lightly) 😅

This "tradwife" stuff is honestly hilarious to me as an Indian woman, because the only Indian housewives who are free, relaxed and unburdened by work are upper middle class and rich women who dont have jobs outside the home AND enough resources to hire one or more domestic workers (usually poor migrant women from the rural areas) to do the cooking, cleaning and childcare. Rural and poor women(so most indian women) often perform back breaking labor from sunrise to sunset. They dont wear pretty dresses and frolic in the fields with a full face of makeup, they're too busy making sure their families and communities don't fall apart. This tiktok trend is so classist it's actually insane.

I've seriously thought about moving to the woods and wearing long dresses and making butter and just living the homesteady life. The main thing that's stopping me (besides reality) is these damn tradwives ruining the whole aesthetic.

When I was a teenager before I realized im gay I had a boyfriend that tried to get me into this shit. I've considered making a video about it and the tactics used by alt right groomers several times but I never got around to it as it's too intense for me. I think the "older racist pedophile young pretty white girl" relationship that's EVERYWHERE in alt right spaces (especially with "pretending to be dd*g but the girl is actually a minor" tacked on) needs to be talked about BADLY but i haven't seen it done yet

In my books that’s called a fasicst. No matter if she’s in a dress and has babies.

I have never clicked on a video essay so fast. I've always felt there's something so insidious about how radical/racist/xenophobic white women get a sort of "free pass" because it's so easy for them to hide behind the way louder and way more violent men. Really excited to absorb this information, thank you for your hard work. ♥

"You want a life where you don't have to work until your bones break." Louder for the people in the baaaack!

Okay but as a white, female hockey player, that call out made me laugh 😂 On or a more serious note, I loved this video. The trad wives are hugely recommended on my instagram and this history is so important to be aware of.

These wives act like they're so happy in hatecentric homes. Like you said, one wrong move...

FYI: white women play so much field hockey. They eat that shit up. Saying this as a white girl who was so gay growing up that she only wanted to play goalie.

Oh my goodness, i feel the joy of opening a new book whenever i get to learn from your videos. thankyou so much for sharing, i'm sure this video is going to be amazing

This may not be related to the topic but I like the use of music in these videos. It doesnt distract while also filling the silent space behind the vocals. Perfect volume/usage

Thank you for all the very hard work poured into these videos. Amazing as always.

Congrats on the Hbomberguy shoutout, I've been watching for a few months before that because I've been looking for more black video essayists and you have some of the best editing and research I've seen of a lot of essayists in general. Keep up the great work 😊

It's crazy how much of tradwife content is kink when you get into the less regulated parts of social media (there's some crazy shit on tumblr especially).

Wow this was so good, thank you for making this piece. That end bit about cookies burning was perfect.

I love Shanspeare video essays…But man the color composition in this is fantastic. The blue dress, pink throw and orange couch just really pops.

The homemaker community is a loving place. I'm in a large homemaker group on Facebook and absolutely no hate speech, politics, etc. are allowed. (Religion is only allowed in the form of holiday decorations, holiday recipes, etc. I'm a Wiccan and other Pagan homemakers have liked my holiday recipe posts.) Tradwives aren't allowed to spread their venom in our community. ✌️

Every time I see a Trad Wife/RightWing Woman whining about feminism or enforcing a Trad Wife lifestyle, I remember that one scene in Vice (2018) where Amy Adams (Lynne Cheney) was leading antifeminism marches. I already know that Candace Owens clip is of her raging because Taylor Swift is 34, unmarried and is holding hands with her friend. She's so unserious. The Triad Wife Influencers/Right Wing Women making content when they aren't doing it themselves. They make money off of telling other women not to make money. Every tiktok video, every fox news interview, every GRWM clip.

Excellent work as always! I learn so much watching your videos, thank you!

Thank you for this video! Phenomenal work!

I love your videos. You seem like such a nice and smart person. You remind me of the meme "Girl, you have done it again. Constantly raising the bar for us all." You are awesome! Never stop making these videos.

it’s crazy how shan NEVER misses

Thank you for educating me!

Firstly, let me just say usually it takes me a few “audition videos” for me to decide if a channel is worth the subscribe. This is the first video I saw of yours and easiest subscribe I ever made. Secondly, I think that the conversations around tradwives and their behavior and the question about why they would say/promote things that we all know will be used against them in the future relates so heavily to those in the queer community who do the same (i.e. LGB movement and Log Cabin Republicans). There’s this innate “If I show I’m one of the good ones I wont be put in the crosshairs” mentality that goes with it. Also, wanted to throw in that I myself am a bit of a house-husband. My husband goes to work, I stay home and cook, clean, take care of the fur baby, do the shopping and general day-to-day maintence/tasks. We still have equal say over how the money gets spent and there’s no sense of who is doing more for the house and it’s worked out well for us so far.

honestly, it's very sad that this has got to be argued at all. i think people should be wayy more ashamed of defending or being associated with racists. it's very disheartening to see people trying to debate this at all.

Honestly it's so concerning how we (as in the general public) have been romanticizing the tradwife/SAHM lifestyle. Obviously you should have the freedom to choose what you want to do in life, but I feel like we've done a 180 from that general stance into completely glossing over the flaws (for lack of a better term) of being a stay-at-home partner. Lately I've been seeing so much content completely ignoring those aspects and romanticizing total submission to your partners' whims. (And god forbid this happens but what if you have to leave the relationship one day, for whatever reason? Unfortunately we still live in a capitalist society, you should be able to have some sort of safety net/financial security to fall back on even if you don't have a career) Maybe it's because I'm Indian and I've seen the effect being a stay-at-home wife can do to several women in my family, but I am always a bit...skeptical of these posts and people who push the trad wife rhetoric without acknowledging the mental/physical/financial harm it can put someone in

i’m so glad you have a platform! your videos are extremely artistic and creative yet informative and comedic

Shanspeare, thank you for once again connecting puzzle pieces through time and helping others see the patterns too. Your vast intellect and hard work make my life better. Truly. Thank you ❤

in the first seven minutes of this video re-framed the last 5 years of my life I was in high school when all those events happened. I grew up in a rural town in Maryland with not many people who gave a shit about me. I was black fat and mentally ill with maybe two friends. I don't think I have given past me the benefit of the doubt that I was scared I was going to be hate crimes cause of my skin. Idk those years were so hard on me I stopped being able to go outside. Thank you for reminding me to give my past self grace cause I was only a kid.

I found you yesterday while recovering from surgery in the hospital. Your voice is so smooth that it helped me fall asleep despite the anxiety. Much love from one enby to another ❤️

This was a great video! Really interesting and also its super clear how much effort you put into the design of the video/the shots/the editing. Thank you for continuing to turn out great content!

YES, please, and thankyou! Fantastic work on this increasingly complex topic. So relevant now, and then, and always. I appreciate the way you speak on this.

Don't be fooled though, they hate the tradwives just as much as regular men, lol.

A great video. Thank you for your hard work!

"liberation is not solved by individualism" you put it so much better than I ever could omg

Instantly going on Instagram to make sure none of the homemaker/stay at home mum’s I follow are tradwives. Thank you so much for educating!!

Way back when I was but a dumbass teenager, I got sucked in by the tradwife aesthetic. I had already been into cottagecore and baking on tumblr at the time, and had a very sexist and toxic family, so the algo pushed me towards that. I ended up then getting sucked into the anti sjw rabbit hole, and it wasn’t until I was watching Sargon defend race realists that I started having doubts. Once I became an adult and entered the workforce, I realized that that it was all fucking bullshit and I had idiotically wandered into this disgusting worldview (i “woke” up lmao). This kind of content is so fucking insidious, it took things im genuinely interested in, and combined w my background (white, poor, American) sucked me into the extreme right, when I was like 13-14. It’s disturbing, and the social media companies really need to take that into account when tweaking their algorithms, because what if I hadn’t gone straight from hs to a profession dominated by women? I probably would’ve ended up married at 19 to some violent racist and had 3 kids by the time I was 25. Gross.

Incredible video! I'm so glad that you popped up in my feed ❤

This is really well paced and researched, especially for such a heavy topic. Great editing too.

have you read nikky finney's poem, "miss polly is akimbo underneath the mother emanuel collection table"? i love nikky finney, she's an incredible poet and absolutely inspiring. i got to meet her about a month ago, she was at a poetry thing near me and i got to shake her hand and hear her read a poem. the poetry she's written about real people is simply beautiful, she humanizes people who have been turned into figureheads, focuses on them as individuals, i've never read a poem of hers without sobbing.

Do you plan on talking about the religious aspects of tradwives? Their antisemitic, anti-LGBT interpretation of biblical text definitely plays a role in their beliefs. I was raised conservative evangelical (now I’m a queer agnostic, oops!) and I am super interested in that intersection with the alt-right