Can you be a feminist housewife?

TheReal I get what you are saying and broadly agree. One assumption that is being made though which I'm not quite comfortable with is that the choice is child rearing or "pursuit of career".

Some people (men and women) just like to work and career progression is not a priority. So the idea of stopping work for a bit then rejoining the workforce x year(s) later may not be as dismal as is painted - depends on level of ambition personally.

When I go back in c16 mths I won't be chasing promotion as I don't want more responsibility than I already have. I find it tough enough now.

Hear hear HerBe

I am very dismayed at the attitude of a lot of people which goes a bit like this.

'Well, when the kids no longer need you, you can go back to work and start again'

What they mean (whether or not they realise it is) that the year you have spent not engaging in the career have essentially been worthless and that when you, after 3/5/7/10 years are no longer needed as intensively at home you should go back and compete on the same playing field at this who did not. This is obviously impossible. Your salary will never be the same, pension payments lots during childrearing are lost forever, career progression at 45-55 is very different to that at 35-45.

And the time you spent raising your children is seen as a waste of valuable carreer time.

Am I explaining myself?

"oops I forgot to have children" career women

You can be a feminist housewife but if you are going to be one it'd help if you stopped labelling women (including yourself) in that kind of way.

Yes, of course you can.

You talk about how it would be an "awful waste" if your DH stepped down his career - but women are encouraged not to think in terms of the "awful waste" they are forced to undergo, when they have children, in a workplace which is structured to make it as difficult to function as a loving parent and a productive employee, as possible.

Not that I think SAHMing is an awful waste - it is valuable work which has to be done by someone, but it is an outrage that women are the ones who are forced into doing most of it by the structures of our society and that it is unpaid and unvalued and we end up poor because we do it, while men grow rich at our expense because what they do is considered more valuable.

If you're happy doing what you're doing, keep calm and carry on - making sure that you're financially protected if your marriage implodes. If not, talk to your DH about how you can reorganise your life as a family, but don't go from the negotiation starting point that his life, career, aspirations, hopes and dreams are more important than yours, and that a waste of his time and talents, is a greater tragedy than a waste of your's. Your thing of having a six monthly recap, is brilliant btw.

I certainly think so!

I am currently a SAHM and have been a feminist for as long as I could think (and was genuinely, naively shocked when I first came onto forums and discovered vast swathes of women so keen to distance themselves from the term).

At the moment, due to circumstance, I am a SAHM, and I must say it has reignited my allegiance to feminism more than anything I have done previously in my life.

I say circumstance, since we have recently returned (well I have returned; DH and the DC have emigrated) to my home country, and we're not in a position to have both of us working full time, what with a baby and a toddler. At one point it looked like I might have been able to take my old job with me which would have meant DH being the SAHP, but that didn't come off and at the last minute an equivalent role came up within his company here which he got. So, SAHM I am.

I actually really, really struggled with it initially and was making myself fairly miserable. To be honest, it's been coming on here and realising how much most of the pressure on me in this role was pressure I was putting on myself and pressure I was perceiving from society. There was certainly zero pressure from DH who has been nothing but a total rock. Once I began to see the wood for the trees and basically just chilled the fuck out, I became much happier and have since started to enjoy it. Thank God/whichever higher being you believe in for feminism.

Well, I enjoy it up to a point...! While this suits us well right now, it won't suit us long-term. I am definitely keen to get back to work for me at some point, and DH is totally supportive of that. We talk about setting up a business together since we are both in the same industry - a main reason being that we would hope to balance our family life around it, more effectively than being wage-slaves for other entities. We're lucky that we don't need me to work right now, when the DC need one of us at home more.

As for money - it's not an issue. DH's salary gets paid into the only account we have here in this country - a joint one in both our names. We both have complete and total access to it and there's no one party asking the other for money, cap in hand.

could have written your last post wigglybeezer
But yes you can be a feminist housewife - your role has value. Money does not equal worth.

As an aside isn't 'husband' derived from house also? Husbanding stock is another usage.

its your choice to make.but housewife is precarious position and dependent upon partner ability to maintain a certain wage. wage earner will determine where and how you live based on their job,salary

imo,it limits role models children see and does reinforce a domesticity based on someone else wage.

You cannot be held responsible for the fact that the choice was not free. that's part of the fight of feminism surely, not blaming the victim.

SQ: But it's not forever, is it? I don't know how old you or your DC are but if both they and you are young, you can take babysteps at least towards getting back into the wage-earning world as they get bigger.

OTOH my choice is not feminist as it was not free. I do not enjoy being at home with the children, I want to work, I should've carried on working, I didn't as the way things are structured meant that when it came to the crunch we slotted into traditional roles. So that is a cock up and I have definitely let myself down.

I think whether you can be a feminist and a housewife (not looking after children full time or even at all) is not the question.

But it links into our society's puritanical ideas about work and leisure and laziness and all of that stuff.

I think if you don't need to work and you don't want to work then don't. I know that some on MN have confloptions at the idea.

If you are feeling like doing something then do something - a course, more of your part-time role, a different job, charidee work, whatever floats your boat. Personally I do not think there is anything immoral in not working for money if you can, and so why would it have any impact on whether you can be a feminist or not? Going out and doing 21 hours a week min wage isn't going to make you any more of a feminist. Working for someone like Fawcett might but is that a genuine option? So I say do what you fancy and don't spare it another thought

Depends how you define "being a feminist" I guess.

In my simple view, if you take it as a politically morivated movement aimed at defining, establishing, and defending equal political, economic, and social rights and equal opportunities for women. Then as long as you feel you have the equal (to man) choice in your life and are happy with your choice then you are living the dream.

I'm going on mat leave after 20 solid years of career building and I am so excited. I'm very lucky I have the luxury of choice. Nobody (inc OH) expects me to give up work and they are supporting my freedom to choose. If I choose to not go back to work, or go part time I don't see myself any less a feminist. Both choices work or not gives value to the next generation if managed right - wonder what I'll do ?!

I don't think the OP was asking about being a feminist and a SAHM, rather being a feminist and a housewife, which is different.

A housewife may not have any children/young children to care for and may just 'keep house' for herself and her partner.

What SGB said

Don't know about being, but it is easier to feel like a feminist housewife (not nice word) when children are little and it is a job of work as well as maybe a choice or a necessity.

It is harder when they need you less to find your place as a feminist, as an example anyway, theoretically it's easy. I felt uneasy saying I wanted equality with men when I had children at school and I wasn't working and I could drink lots of tea. I never felt like, and never was, a burden for my man to shoulder financially, I just felt uneasy that I was not pulling my weight as a woman somehow.

Yes, you can be a feminist and a stay-at-home parent. But this means understanding and being sure your partner understands that just because you do not bring in money, that does not make the wage earner your boss/owner, and you should not be on duty for housework on childcare 24/7 in exchange for your bed and board, while the wage earner comes home from work and expects to be waited on.