ARE you feeling calm, cool-headed and reasonable? Good, because I’m about to drop some sweeping generalisations that might even venture into stereotype territory; this may be dangerous but so is pretending that Scotland has an equitable division of domestic labours.

Societal pressure to have a clean home is nothing new for women, but now it needs to be green, too. Apparently we’ve added saving Earth to the “girl jobs” list.

A tough week for women as not only are they probably going to be tasked with ridding the country of rats and disease, we also had to make zero-waste packed lunches.

The climate emergency is accelerating – Kinlochewe hit 29 degrees two days in a row this week.

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We all need to take action to try to limit further human impact on the planet and its fragile ecosystems. Regrettably, the “all” part seems to be somewhat inequitably levelled at women (well, if we will insist on having periods).

There is an ecological labour gap (yes, I just made that up) whereby women seem to be shouldering more than their fair share (how original), stemming from a cultural expectation that women should be the drivers of ecologically-friendly behaviours – particularly as they pertain to the family environment.

Beeswax wraps, reusable sanitary products and nappies, breastfeeding, cleaning product swaps, family menu overhauls – all valuable ways a person can help reduce their planetary footprint.

Great, wonderful, peachy

Except it would seem that a lot of these things don’t fall to the man of the house (not all men).

Well, not all of them, but I haven’t seen households being encouraged to abandon bin bags in favour of putting the bins out by upending them and then washing them out. Just saying.

Death by matrimony THE world is finally waking up to the “mental load” and social labour that predominantly women (not all women) get to shoulder when they sign up for heterosexual, cohabiting relationships.

That is why you should always read the T&Cs – and Emma’s (different Emma) comic book You Should Have Asked.

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In heterosexual relationships, women also tend to do more of the routine chores (washing, cooking, cleaning) and men get lucky with, “which bin is it this week, love?”

Other intermittent/boy/way easier jobs include mowing the lawn, car-related tasks and maintenance work. My, my, look at how gaily we’ve jettisoned our traditional gender roles. Sigh.

UK-wide, women undertake 74 more minutes of housework each day compared to men.

That’s a full working day each week and the woke young guns are not much better.

Why is the ecological work also falling to women? I have enough to do. Not least trying to make up for my pension shortfall through looking after my children.

“We use reusable nappies on Milo.” Yeah, just like “we” sent a birthday card to your mother.

Some things you can do to reduce your impact on our ailing planet

Going plant-based: It’s well-known that the more you replace animal products with plants in your diet, the lower your impact is on the planet. Guess who’s delivering the good news to the hangry toddler that you’ve cancelled fish finger Friday.

Some 10.32% of Scots currently eat a meat-free diet – this is growing, but vegans are still much more likely to be women.

Leave the car at home: This is a bit trickier when you need to do two separate school drop-offs before hooning it into work on time.

Reduce, reuse and recycle: Sweeping generalisation but in my house it’s not my husband who’s sewing my kid’s Cubs badges on to a secondhand jumper.

Unfortunately, one of the worst things as a Westerner you can do for the climate crisis, is to make more Westerners. Very much adding fuel to the fire.

Do we expect women to be more ecologically-minded because they were the ones who cooked the bun?

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While it may not be representative of wider society, in my ecological activism work, it’s women who vastly outnumber men – that’s both sad and concerning. We are erring perilously close to ideas of original sin. Disposable sanitary towels aren’t what got us into this mess.

Me wearing a miniature sink plunger up my hoohaa isn’t going to mitigate against politicians granting new oil and gas licences.

Emphasising individual responsibility (male, female or non-binary) belies the effect of scale which decisive political policies could achieve.

Lastly, perhaps spending your “free time” laundering your reusable make-up pads precludes you from going out and doing the “sexy” visible ecological work.

Maybe I’d really like to go and do some tree-planting with the John Muir Trust but I’m tied up trying to get my shower clean using only vinegar and four-letter words.

Gents, consider this a call to arms. Get your bicarb out. The loo wants scrubbing.