In his response, the Ethicist noted: “I’m not sure marriage is the right arena to fight the many genuine inequities in the system of rewards you’ll find in the university, and in our larger society. … But you have no obligation to edit your husband’s papers, and you’ve come to experience it not as part of a mutually supportive relationship but as part of a larger pattern of exploitation. So you should feel free to bail. It isn’t really a gift if it makes you grit your teeth.” (Reread the full question and answer here.)
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Your response to the wife/editor makes my blood boil! Women have been subtly (and overtly) coerced into doing this type of supportive, unpaid work for far too long. She only benefits from her husband’s success if they remain married. Her time, expertise and energy goes into supporting his career, and it’s highly likely that she also does more than half of the domestic duties. Societal pressure to be “good wives” and “helpmates” has kept women from flourishing throughout history. Time for that to end. — Anne
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The letter to the ethicist, and his lukewarm response, illustrate a much deeper issue with our understanding of marriage. Should a spouse do unpaid work to support the partner whom they claim to love above all others? In a word, yes, and without counting the cost. This has literally nothing whatsoever to do with the numerous unfairnesses in contemporary academia. — James
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Academia has a long history of male faculty benefiting from, and even depending on, the unpaid labor of their female partners. If the letter writer needs another reason to stop performing this unpaid work, consider the message that it sends to her husband’s trainees. The male postdocs are learning that they should expect a partner to do this editing work for them, and the female postdocs are learning that they will be expected to perform this free labor for their partners. — Beth
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Why shouldn’t her name be added as one of the co-authors? I am a female scientist and agree that sector is dominated by men. What the letter writer is doing is very much necessary, yet under appreciated, much like background support has been over the years. I think adding her name to the list of co-authors would provide equivalent compensation and, more important, recognition of her efforts. — Maureen
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As a former state university professor, I’ve witnessed time and again the exploitation of adjunct lecturers, and acknowledge that we benefited by the fact that they lightened our own teaching workload for pennies on the dollar. With that in mind, I recommend that you do your own work and let your husband do his. Editing one’s own papers is part of the writing process and therefore part of his job. Yes, working for tenure is grueling, but I don’t know anyone who used an editor. — Greta
