Why Feminine Technologies Matter, part e (I was wrong on the last one)

I think that the point of this section was to point out that even technologies that don't seem, on the surface, to be feminine, might have embedded in them the work of females. The example used was the change in men's collars and how they were a cultural shortcut to determining a family's respectability. Before washing machines graces most middle class homes, the existence of certain collars denoted that a man was well off enough to employ servants (washerwomen) or, later, commercial laundry facilities.

It was sort of a meh section for me. I don't disagree that the fashions purported to reveal something about the man and the family. But the author again threw out some statements unsupported in this chapter (although supported elsewhere, not that she directly footnoted anything because the statements were rather vague). Also she ended with "Although our culture generally applauds cleanliness, we are made uneasy by its pervasiveness. How can we tell whose homes our children can safely visit? Who can we trust in front of our classrooms?..." Maybe it is because I live and work in Silicon Valley where how someone dresses is seldom related to their wealth what with the casual dress code of most computer/Internet companies. Maybe it is because of a greater awareness that even those families who look pristine on the outside can hide ugly secrets (um... have I mentioned that I read a bunch of brain candy books - Jodi Picoult and the like among them). In fact, when I think of being made uneasy by the pervasiveness of cleanliness, I am more apt to go to the weakened immune systems aspect than the unable to make social judgements place. It is these little throw away lines that annoy me the most about this chapter. Say it and support it or don't say it at all. Or admit that you are just trying to find provocative things to say regardless of how reality-based they are.