In an interesting post on how the American perception of Europe is perhaps off from reality, there’s this interesting exchange in the comments. The post had this statement in it:

“leftists who are committed to gender equality should be very troubled by, for example, the regulations on shop closing hours that Deneen likes so much”

A commenter quoted that line and then said:

I don’t understand.

To be honest, neither did I. Henry, who wrote the post, responded:

the problem is that shortened shop opening hours presuppose and reinforce a family structure in which one family member is able to shop during working hours. It’s not hard to guess who this family member is supposed to be (and what implications that has for their employment prospects).

It’s the little details sometimes that reinforce our social structure. I’m not sure people do this intentionally, nor do I really know much about these early closing policies to comment further, but the idea that this reinforces gender roles is intriguing and makes sense on its face.

(found the post via Atrios)