[AceJohnny2]

> neglect them until they become a larger problem, since the alternative is taking them on by oneself and growing increasingly resentful that your coworkers don’t prioritize [stuff]

Tangentially, this is a common problem in relationships. "You never do the dishes", "you never do the laundry"...

My headcanon for these mismatches is that people have different thresholds of activation. In a relationship, it's useful to state these explicitly ("Oh I only do laundry when I'm close to running out of underwear") before resentment sets in.

[jancsika]

Translation here may help:

> "You never do the dishes"

means:

You ignore how much more difficult it is to get rid of those little pantry flies, roaches, and/or ants once they find a food/crumb source vs. consistently blocking the impetus for that class of problem to manifest itself. (Or, depending on your locale, perhaps just minimizing that problem as much as possible.)

Moreover, your philosophy of free agency doesn't take into account the resulting increase in your stress level from clutter and lack of clean utensils, and how that increased stress-- probably paired with a reluctance to acknowledge and deal with common stressors generally-- ends up confining your choices in ways that become frustratingly predictable over time. That's not to mention your attempts to hide your disgust when you pick up a dirty plate to reveal mold or wiggling pantry fly eggs, as if denial of an emotion negates the existence of that emotion. And finally, there's the effect that disgust has on your general mood, and even subtle though detectable changes to your opinions given we feeble humans process both physical and conceptual disgust in the same part of our brains.

> "you never do the laundry"...

means:

Pleasant odors and shared work tend to have positive affects on a woman's libido.

[jkhdigital]

My childhood household had a pattern where the dishes would be done within an hour or two of eating dinner, sometimes a bit later, but of course always before everyone goes to bed.

My wife sometimes does most of the dishes before she even starts eating. If I followed the customs of the home I grew up in, my wife would end up doing the dishes every single meal before I even get to the sink. Obviously I have learned to adapt to the situation, but my point is that it’s a bit unfair to characterize every mismatch in expectations as evidence of abject filth and slobbery on the part of the husband.

[LostLetterbox2]

Second paragraph is restating that different people have different standards. Different people have different triggers for disgust and those that have the most sensitive might have to choose between an emotional tax or executive function theft if an agreement can't be reached.

I have no idea about pleasant odours but can see how not having ones standards respect could be a libido killer; just part of the complexities of a relationship/cohabitation.

[a_puppy]

> when you pick up a dirty plate to reveal mold or wiggling pantry fly eggs

You're describing a hypothetical man who thinks dishes should be left in the sink until they grow mold and attract pests. Obviously mold and pests are bad, so this hypothetical man would be in the wrong.

But, most real relationship conflicts don't fit that hypothetical description! For example, last year there was a discussion on HN about leaving a dirty dish by the sink: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31000658 There was no mold or pantry fly eggs in that situation; the wife was upset about any dirty dishes being left by the sink at all, even a once-used glass of water.

And that's a much more complicated situation. It's common for different people to have different expectations for cleanliness: a husband might think it's OK for an empty glass of water to be left on the counter if he might drink from it later, but the wife might think that's "dirty". These are different points of view, and neither one is necessarily wrong.

Sometimes people try to frame this as "the husband is sexist and trying to make his wife do the chores" (or "he's inflicting executing function theft on her") but I don't think that's a correct or helpful framing. Like writeslowly and AceJohnny2 wrote above, this is a case of different people having different standards. That doesn't necessarily mean the one with lower standards is committing "executive function theft" on the one with higher standards.

[likeclockwork]

> That's not to mention your attempts to hide your disgust when you pick up a dirty plate to reveal mold or wiggling pantry fly eggs,

Eggs don't wiggle. Those are larvae. Maggots, baby.