Pearl - A New Type of Modern Women： The Swedish ＂SOFT WOMEN＂

00:00:00.000 now sweden has a new trend that really i think shows the difference between the genders men

00:00:06.160 understand that when they go to work it is a job not everybody gets the privilege of being

00:00:11.040 passionate about their job not every most people in life do not get the privilege of loving their

00:00:16.560 job most people show up because there is a job and it needs to get done or it's well paid

00:00:22.560 unfortunately we have a tendency to take lower paying jobs that we're passionate about and often

00:00:28.720 don't have a future i'll give you guys an example i don't see a lot of men getting gender studies

00:00:34.720 degrees and if you look at the data it's primarily women why because that's something that the women

00:00:39.440 are passionate about and you see this in the current trend that is going on in sweden so there is a soft

00:00:44.880 girl trend that celebrates women quitting work sweden has a global reputation for championing

00:00:51.680 gender equality so why are young women embracing a social media trend that celebrates quitting work

00:00:58.560 vilma larson 25 previously had jobs at a grocery store a care home and a factory but she quit work

00:01:04.960 a year ago but to become a stay at home girlfriend and says she's never been happier my life is softer

00:01:11.200 i'm not struggling and i am not very stressed her boyfriend works remotely in finance and while he

00:01:16.560 spends his days on his laptop she's at the gym out for coffee or cooking the couple grew up in a small

00:01:22.880 town in central sweden but now travel a lot and now are spending the winter in cyprus so again you

00:01:29.840 know we fought for this equality and you know oftentimes i think the men they they get together

00:01:36.240 and they say are they sure they want a man's life are they sure are you guys sure you want these jobs

00:01:41.840 we don't love them we just do them are you ladies sure and then we come out and we say please

00:01:47.120 please please let us do the jobs that you do please we're dying to we want to go in the military

00:01:53.600 can we go into corporate america please we want to do it they roll their eyes and they say all right

00:02:00.480 have fun go go at it we don't want to hear you guys complain so fine and then we go into a man's

00:02:06.400 world we get treated like a man and oftentimes we don't like it as you see in this case right here

00:02:11.120 every month he gives me a salary from his money that he made but if i need more i'll ask him or if i

00:02:16.800 i need less i just save the rest she explains she shares on her lifestyle on instagram youtube and

00:02:22.960 tick tock where she's amassed 11 000 followers some of her posts have almost 400 000 likes although she

00:02:29.040 says she's not making an income from her content she uses the hashtag hem flick van and hemafru

00:02:35.840 swedish for stay-at-home girlfriend and housewife and describes herself as a soft girl an identity that

00:02:41.200 embraces a softer more feminine way of living rather than focusing on a career the soft girl

00:02:46.400 lifestyle has been micro trend on social media in different parts of the world since late 2010

00:02:52.400 but in sweden with five decades of policies designed to promote dual income households behind it the

00:02:58.560 concept's recent popularity has sparked both surprise and division now one thing i noticed as i'm reading

00:03:05.200 this is all of the things she says that she's doing with her free time do not benefit the man right so

00:03:11.440 she's getting coffee i guess you could say the gym maybe right and i'm not saying she's not i don't

00:03:16.800 know but what i've noticed is oftentimes when i hear women you know claim to be traditional or that

00:03:22.880 they want traditional outcomes it's just to avoid working it's not to avoid working for the husband

00:03:28.720 right or to work hard so his life is better it's i just don't want to do the hard things anymore okay

00:03:35.840 sweden's largest annual survey of young people first put the national spotlight on sweden's

00:03:40.800 embracing the soft girl trend a year ago after the popular choice when 15 to 24 year olds were

00:03:46.160 asked to predict trends for 2024 another study this august suggested it was even becoming an aspiration

00:03:52.560 among younger school girls with 14 of 7 to 14 year old girls identifying as soft girls you know

00:03:59.360 it's interesting they will identify as soft girls but when you pull that same group of women on where

00:04:04.720 they rank men in their priority list it's still seventh it's like they have traveling above men

00:04:09.520 it's about leaning away from this boss girl idea that we've been seeing for lots of years where there

00:04:14.560 are very very high demands for success in every aspect of life there is no official data for the

00:04:20.000 number of soft girls quitting work altogether and living off their partners but it is likely to be

00:04:24.880 a small proportion but it's nevertheless becoming a major talking point in sweden from opinion pieces

00:04:30.880 in broadsheet newspapers to panel discussions at edalen a huge annual cross-party political event

00:04:37.760 and on swedish public service television the co-founder and former leader of the sweden feminist

00:04:44.400 party says she's taken part in recent debates on the issue she believes women living off their

00:04:49.920 partners is very dangerous and a step backwards for gender equality let me get this straight

00:04:55.840 she didn't say quit working to have kids she said quit working to live a soft girl life i don't know i

00:05:02.400 think it doesn't sound too dangerous to me fellas in the chat put a one in the chat if you know you

00:05:08.560 could you could do a soft man life you know gun to your head you're forced to get coffee go to the

00:05:16.480 gym could you guys do it she also thinks there's a lack of awareness about life in sweden before

00:05:21.680 it embraced policies designed to promote gender equality such as heavy subsidized child care and

00:05:28.480 shared parental leave young women today don't carry the history of how hard women had to fight to get

00:05:34.960 their rights the right to work the right to have a salary and the right to economic independence okay

00:05:40.960 at the other end of this political spectrum the swedish democrat party has always been positive

00:05:46.000 towards the soft girl trend i think that people should get to decide their own life and if you

00:05:50.720 have the economic possibility of living off your partner then good for you we still live in a

00:05:55.200 country with all the opportunities to have a career we have all the rights but we have the right to live

00:06:00.960 more traditionally aside from ideological debates discussions have focused on the social and cultural

00:06:06.880 aspects that could be influencing young women to quit work or at least aspire to softer lifestyles

00:06:12.320 sweden has a reputation for work-life balance most employees get six weeks holiday with less than one

00:06:17.600 percent working more than 50 hours a week still research suggests that rising stress levels amongst

00:06:23.840 young people and believe soft girl trends might be an extension of the recent global work trends such

00:06:30.480 as quiet quitting which encourages employees not to over extend themselves meanwhile the gen z age group

00:06:37.120 are making and being influenced by social media content that celebrates leisure time rather than career

00:06:42.960 goals work doesn't really feature that much if you look at lifestyle content on social media today it's

00:06:48.880 more about exercise and wellness and if that's the picture young people have of what a normal life looks like

00:06:54.400 then of course you're not going to be excited about spending eight hours a day in a office but perhaps the

00:07:00.880 biggest talking point is whether the trend is a response to the limitations of sweden's pioneering gender equality

00:07:08.080 policies sweden has the highest proportion of working mothers in europe yet government stats suggests that

00:07:13.360 women and heterosexual couples still do a larger share of the house work than men oh my gosh i can't do

00:07:20.160 this anymore i just can't i cannot hear about how hard housework is when we have dishwashers

00:07:29.440 roombas i mean i even saw a roomba mop we have air fryers and we're complaining because we have to

00:07:36.640 do 10 percent more housework than men could we just say thank you for running the whole infrastructure of

00:07:42.320 society thanks for inventing pretty much everything statistically i'm really tired of this feminist

00:07:49.440 talking point i just want it to stop please god please end it they also take 70 percent of state-funded

00:07:55.360 parental leave and are more likely to go on sick leave for stress meanwhile the income gap between

00:08:00.480 men and women remains lower than the eu average of 12 and it has stalled around 10 since 2019

00:08:07.200 miss larson who wants to have children in the future says her decision to be a stay-at-home girlfriend is

00:08:12.560 partly watching older women struggle to juggle a career in home life you know it's so interesting to me i

00:08:18.880 always hear these ladies say they struggle to juggle a career and home life and i just wonder how

00:08:24.240 they would have done on the farm like 150 years ago you know i'm not trying to say it's not a lot

00:08:30.880 but when we have state-sponsored daycare you don't even have to watch your kid anymore you can send them

00:08:36.080 off to school at like three now so okay the first three years you're busy maybe like your career takes

00:08:41.840 a hit but i mean are we really i'm just i'm thinking out loud here i'm thinking out loud are we really

00:08:48.080 gonna say that the farm work a hundred years ago was easier than your assistant job i'm just saying

00:08:56.080 the the housework they did a hundred years ago what i watched a day in the life of the amish and that

00:09:01.760 i mean they were scooping poop i'm like you guys want to do that i don't know i might pick the assistant

00:09:07.360 job i mean am i wrong for asking this man i don't know okay so sweden's state-funded gender equality

00:09:14.720 agency peter winstrom head of department for policy analysis and monitoring believes the soft girl

00:09:22.800 trend can be viewed as a rational reaction to the perceived demands experienced by young women

00:09:30.160 i mean the demands again you know ladies i don't want to i don't want to harp on us too much i used to

00:09:35.600 sell at one point in my life i sold plumbing tech you know i worked for this guy he had a startup

00:09:41.520 really really cool guy and he invented this plumbing system and i knew nothing about plumbing but i i

00:09:47.760 tried to sell this system and i would go to these plumbing schools and we would you know i would book

00:09:52.800 the meetings and we would go there and show them how to use it okay i didn't really show them i just

00:09:57.200 booked the meeting but but you know and they worked really hard at those plumbing schools and i would see

00:10:04.880 one woman in the whole class so i'm sure she worked really hard you know but i just i can't say that

00:10:12.320 assistant like when one of our one of the most female dominated industries is assistance which no

00:10:18.800 hate i'm not saying it's like i'm just saying comparatively right if if i had to pick you know

00:10:24.320 going into the sewers unclogging poop putting together a house i think scheduling meetings would be a

00:10:33.120 little easier i don't know is that and i do think that we can go home and make a meal for three

00:10:39.920 people and maybe do 60 percent of the dishes i think i think we'll make it i don't know an economist

00:10:46.880 of one of one of sweden's largest pension funds says she does not believe enough swedish girlfriends

00:10:53.280 or wives will quit work for it to have an impact on the country's economy yeah i would agree and all

00:10:58.720 the trends will tell you that this is kind of what's happened the last 50 years so the ladies said

00:11:04.080 we said please let us work we want to work you know let us let us go into the workforce we want to do

00:11:10.880 it and the men said you're gonna hate it and we said no no we're gonna love it you guys get to wear

00:11:17.280 suits i want to wear a suit jacket let us go let me i'll be a plumber you guys have the cool hats and

00:11:24.320 the men said are you sure you want you want to do the military we said yeah i love camo and they're

00:11:32.320 like no you have to do what camo they gave us they said all right ladies go ahead go ahead go do the

00:11:40.320 jobs and we did you know we went to work and now 50 years later we're like oh this is kind of hard i'm

00:11:47.440 going i don't get to really see my kids you know but this is this has been tough but we're ready we're

00:11:53.600 ready to go back to the kitchen we're ready and the men are like what you guys have just on us for

00:11:59.440 a deck for 50 years you guys have all these tattoos statistically you have all this debt i'm not paying

00:12:07.840 this debt you guys aren't even in shape good luck and that's where we get the what do you bring to

00:12:13.520 the table conversation they're like what what can you bring me now oh and then you know then we make

00:12:18.720 up words that mean nothing right then that's what i would notice i would do the shows and we would

00:12:24.160 ask what do you bring to the table and i would hear peace and i'm thinking what woman has realistically

00:12:29.920 brought peace ever i mean even the best way like you don't think melania trump brings drama to trump

00:12:35.600 even the best of the best the a-level women do you guys really believe they just bring pure peace really

00:12:42.960 they would say that i make a house a home and i would think i mean how do you do that what do you

00:12:47.760 what makes a what makes a house a home and they would describe to me do you know what they would

00:12:53.200 describe to me guys they would describe to me decorating i mean i'm not saying decorating is

00:13:00.480 unimportant you know this backdrop you know shout out to my producer it does wonder what a great backdrop but

00:13:07.120 the men are much more i can live with it i don't need it right and so i don't know if we're really

00:13:14.080 gonna have this wave of ladies that at a young age before they're fat debt ridden with tattoos

00:13:20.800 are gonna say yes i want to be a wife and a mother and i'm ready to have more than a kid yeah it could

00:13:27.120 happen i'm not saying it can't but yeah they said they bring a kid from another dude yeah all right guys

00:13:33.120 make sure you like the video on your way out subscribe go to the audacitynetwork.com too to

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00:13:48.640 video subscribe thank you guys so much for watching i love you guys bye

Pearl - December 10, 2024

A New Type of Modern Women： The Swedish ＂SOFT WOMEN＂｜ Pearl Daily

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