Is choosing to be a SAHM a feminist decision?

"Maybe women who are career driven will want to go back to work and put their foot down with their partners, but would you really want to share mat leave if you had a min wage job with poor conditions?"

And we come back to the question of why women are often the secondary earners - even before kids? If you earn the same or more than your husband you might well consider sharing leave as much more practical / desirable.

Never mind assuming that all SAHMs have been off developing skills left right and centre - if we could just stop assuming that time at home equates to a person turning into an unemployable vegetable who has mostly spent their time watching daytime tv would be a step in the right direction..! As you say user, perhaps if that happened, women would feel less pressure to try and invent all sorts of skills that aren't actually that relevant to the workplace to fill the gap.

I genuinely have learned and am learning new skills as an indirect result of being a SAHM, because I've had a chance to pause, take stock, and dedicate some time to developing them. I honestly will have new, relevant, useful things to add to my cv - and, if my plans come to fruition, a portfolio that showcases them. Are those skills going to be worthless, because I'm acquiring and using them around snacktime and nappy changes? Are all the other skills I already have from before this career break suddenly irrelevant? I bloody hope not. But reading some posts on here (referring to the wider forum, not necessarily this thread!), you'd think that they may well be dismissed because they come alongside time at home with a child. I certainly worry that they will be. In fact, my goal is freelance work because I don't have high hopes of finding employment. Would I be an asset to an employer? Yes, without meaning to sound bigheaded, I would. But I don't have much confidence about that being recognised. That is surely a feminist issue?

Perhaps that factor is smaller these days but I still think our society places different expectations on women from a young age

"and women don't grow up expecting to have to be the main breadwinner"

I knew people would get annoyed at this , but I was generalising to make a point. No one argues when you say that men DO grow up with the expectation they will have this role. Of course there are loads of ambitious women and girls myself included who would always have planned to get a job/career capable of providing for their own family.

Why? And surely anything which advances the feminist cause and promotes women's value within society is a good thing?

I don't think it would help most women because I think what would be best for women would be to be able to genuinely choose either being a SAHM or being a WOHP.

Being a SAHM, for most, would give them a great big hurdle that wouldn't otherwise be there when returning to work, but when someone's got to do it it's invariably the woman who is expected to.

Making being a SAHP appear more valuable in society wouldn't encourage more men to do it I don't think, because they can see the hurdle it gives women and are pleased it's not something they're expected to do.

It might, however, encourage more women to do it, which would mean more women struggling to get back into work, more women falling behind in their careers, fewer women in top positions etc....

So obviously I think being a SAHM is a perfectly acceptable choice for the individual and can be extremely valuable to families, to society, to children and to the individual women involved. I think women who choose this difficult path are commendable - I couldn't do it! - and I bet most men couldn't do it either. I'd like it to be seen as valuable and worthwhile etc. .... I'm just not sure it's massively valuable to feminism.

I'm just speaking off the cuff here, I really don't mean to cause offence (although I know I will eek!)

Because unless you have renovated a house etc most of the skills are simply normal life skills.

That was just one example. There are many others. Women who SAHP have varied expertise and contextual experience. In order to support them is not to make any assumptions based on the fact they have spent some time being a SAHP.

Obviously some would, so definitely a good thing, but most I think wouldn't.

Why? And surely anything which advances the feminist cause and promotes women's value within society is a good thing?

Why is mentioning relevant experience weird

Because unless you have renovated a house etc most of the skills are simply normal life skills.

With choice, I mean feminist decision.

In the uk as things stand at the moment, being a sahm cannot be considered a real choice for majority of the women/couples involved. If we had affordable childcare options and women generally had more equal career and earning potential, then I would say yes it can be a real choice but not at the moment.

Doing your own finances(for example) isnt relevent to the workplace
If you have looked after an elderly relative and become interested in Care of the Elderly -looked at current practice etc it is
Likewise gardening -doing a course etc
Basic daily life skills are assumed-sometimes wrongly

I just think implying that being a SAHM automatically means you have effectively paused the development of any skills or capabilities that are relevant to the workplace is very damaging and misleading.

I don't mean to imply that, but equally I think it's reaching to say someone will have definitely advanced their skills.

The starting point for me was that lilting had said several pages before that if we can raise the perceived value of SAHP then that will be good for women looking to return to work afterwards, because employers will value that experience.

I was just saying that actually many women who had a career or even just a nominal level of word experience prior to being a SAHP would be unlikely to benefit from any increase in perceived value. Obviously some would, so definitely a good thing, but most I think wouldn't.

I just think implying that being a SAHM automatically means you have effectively paused the development of any skills or capabilities that are relevant to the workplace is very damaging and misleading.

I wholeheartedly agree.

Constantly
Perhaps they should put "managed staff "
Dont all pile on me -Im joking !

I just wouldn't expect them to take this weird approach on their CVs.

Why is mentioning relevant experience weird?

My opinion, it depends on whether you believe in individual rights or collective group rights and group obligations that trump the individuals liberty. Old fashion enlightenment liberals tend to believe in the individual, communists and fascists on the far left and far right are all about their collective (the workers in the case of the left and the race or nation in the case of the far right). I’m reminded of the ‘grid girls’ debate on GMTV. There were grid girls who were made redundant on who were clearly intelligent and knew their own minds claiming that they didn’t feel exploited and had now been prevented from doing something they wanted to do. There were some feminists on the other side of the debate saying that it really didn’t matter what those women wanted for themselves, they were the leaders of feminism and had hence decided what was best for women as a group or a class, and since grid girls was bad for women as a class it had to be banned regardless of what the grid girls themselves wanted. What do you think feminism is about? Empowering women to make their own choices and live their own lives as they see fit? Or organising women as a class to get roughly equal outcomes with men, as another class?

I was challenging the idea that looking after children,managing a household and managing a household budget are all "skills" that should be referenced at interview.
These are life skills that one would hope an adult can undertake as part of normal life .
Of course (as I said) if the SAHP develops an interest in a particular area and develops this -great.
I wouldnt expect to see "managed household budget"on an application ,I wouldnt bat an eyelid if someone said they had been a SAHP/carer for a few years but I would hope they had researched prior the needs of the workplace.

Rat, this would depend entirely on how long you decided to SAHP for and what you did during the time. If for example you bought a wreck of a property or several and project managed their renovation from your home, you would still be 'keeping your hand in', unpaid in order to advantage your own family. You would gain / retain contacts and also have to keep up to date with current legislation.

all adults budget equally well in a domestic setting is obviously untrue looking at the state of the nation's personal finances so obviously somepeople are better than others at this

I don't think anyone said everyone budgets equally well just that everyone budgets.

Also, the difficult bit of the budget process in a professional setting is getting the inflow correct. How much is coming in. The costs management bit is the easy side. So domestic budgeting (by anyone) is pretty irrelevant.

Again, it just makes people look naive. Sure there is a slight overlap, I guess, between making sure you have enough money in the right place for the bills and making sure you've allocated correctly for staff costs and overheads. I can't think of any domestic budgeting aspect that touches on predicting the market activity in your industry over the next 12 months to get as near as possible to an accurate prediction of sales activity and pipeline.

Not at all saying this can't be learned by people (SAHM or otherwise) who haven't done it before but if you think that running a household budget is at all analogous to running a departmental budget then I'm sorry but all that tells me is you have no idea about business budgeting.

Just as a sign-off, I feel like I've landed the wrong side of the argument here because I am a big fan of employing returning mothers. I just wouldn't expect them to take this weird approach on their CVs.

If you’re in the position to offer sound advice to sahm get out there and do it. Offer placements and returnships. Set up working groups to see if you can stop women leaving the workplace in the first place. Speak to hr when you see women being discriminated against due to maternity, having children or having the potential capacity to have children.

Completely agree with these practical steps to supporting women.

It isn’t radical feminism to dismiss sahp as an irrelevance. It isn’t a feminist position to look at women trying to get into the workplace/ return to the workplace and tell them the last x years of their life were a waste of time as they were essentially doing fuck all.

I’ve sah for a few months and I’ve done loads of stuff. However I’m easily dismissed as a mumpreneur or a middle class yummy mummy playing at business whilst being bankrolled by my dh or one of those silly women who sell craft stuff on Facebook and everyone laughs at them. It’s not easy to get back into work as a sahp and so many women including myself did not put themselves in that difficult position because they made an uniformed choice.

Work and being a sahp is a feminist issue. If you’re in the position to offer sound advice to sahm get out there and do it. Offer placements and returnships. Set up working groups to see if you can stop women leaving the workplace in the first place. Speak to hr when you see women being discriminated against due to maternity, having children or having the potential capacity to have children. Punch up not down. It must be wonderful to have a successful career that has not been effected by dc, try and analyse that to help others rather than being self congratulatory that you didn’t have to make a bad choice.

liltingleaf

Sorry but I still don’t think people are being derogatory about the role of sahp (though maybe people are being quite blunt).

I know a sahp who hires a cleaner, gardener and a dog walker. I would love to see her face if I suggested that this should be talked about in a job interview. She’s wanting to get back into work and is undergoing additional training.