Motherhood and equality, what does Eutopia look like?

Yes, rogue yes please to all of that.

Especially the parts around women's clothing, which in my experienced tends to be policed / rewarded much more by women amongst themselves, than by anyone else.

rogue yes to all that.

There would be generous state pay for both parents of under 3s. Enough to have a decent quality of life. The treatment of parents of under 3s is scandalous. The norm of one parent, especially the mum spending five days of the week mostly on her own with one or more babies is horrendous. Often isolated and largely unsupported doing an extremely important 24/7 job of caring for a tiny child while often iron-deficient, depressed and usually very sleep-deprived , yet unpaid and under valued; what sort of a way is that to treat parents?

Child-birth and caring should be paid in accordance with its value. Though I don't know how you would legislate for large families. There would be problems if payment was restricted to say, 2 children. If this generous pay was state funded and didn't cost employers anything maybe women would be penalised less for taking time off work and more parents would actually enjoy the experience and not want to work full time to escape the boredom/drudgery of unsupported life with a baby.

Part time jobs at all levels would be the norm. I really don't see why most senior positions (more likely to be done by men) have to be 5 day a week positions. I suspect it's because most men either don't want to spend time at home doing childcare and housework ( because they have been socialised to expect 'more' for themselves) and their male managers are comfortable being surrounded by other men like themselves who won't be expecting to have flexible working or to ever be the one who stays off with a sick child etc)

It seems so unfair that so many jobs are all or nothing. Very ambitious people with favourable circumstances, high energy levels and a lot of ambition would have more than one job but it would be more normal for both parents to work approx 3 days a week.

Breastfeeding would be normalised and celebrated. Bf skills would be taught well and in great depth and would be part of our mainstream culture.

Women would not feel the need to be more groomed and show more flesh than working men typically do. It would be normal for women to throw on a shirt, trousers and jacket. And high heels would not be allowed in the workplace. The concept of looking professional would include being clean and smart. End off.

Domestic task and the running of the household would be shared equally by men and women. Men would take pride in doing a good job of sharing the running of the household and taking responsibility for thinking about it. The terms husband and wife would drop out of use. Spouse or partner would be the norm. There would be no 'wife-work' anymore if there was spouse-- work.

There would be equal representation of women and men in films, music and literature. The norm of male-dominated entertainment would be overturned. It would become unacceptable to revel in a diet of violent films and tv where most of the women have subsidiary roles, unless they are very attractive, and even then. People who watched mostly media like this would be seen as dinosaurs with dodgy preferences.

The problem of male violence would be recognised, researched and dealt with.

Dependence on income tax is ridiculous when the majority of the wealth does not flow through wages.

Also because low wages mean only the top ten percent of earners pay more than they use. This is another problem.

It’s dependent on immigration because immigrants pay tax and use fewer services and people are living longer/surviving more often and having longer periods of ill health needing care which drains resources.

We are dependent on immigration now, the low birth rate and ageing/surviving population means there is a time bomb.

Yes it’s about 1.8 and it should be just a bit above 2.1.
Our economy is dependent on immigration to maintain population growth.

Of course unlimited growth in a finite system is not sustainable

The stuff with welfare dependency also applies to the sick and disabled too. So many ways people are punished for not being valuable within very strange standards of what is valuable...

Would I have been adding more value to the world working in a sports shop (as before I was pregnant) or have the things I’ve done while being ‘just a SAHM’ actually contributed more?

Ha ha! Thanks!

Being a mum is also the most comprehensively difficult thing I’ve ever done.

I can’t imagine how difficult international moves and learning new languages is! A LOT of the things I have been able to do which I have felt added value to me (and others) have been predicated on operating within systems I understand and using a language I speak.

I’m not complaining about my children either. I never wanted children but having them has enriched my life in many ways that I would not have considered. I learn things every day from having children and they have taught me that thinking about things, learning things and using knowledge to improve things is something I get really excited about. I may not ever have discovered that without them.

The stuff about status and judgements and stigma and the circumstances through which they came into being are all separate from the things having them has given me.

Nurses/bankers is exactly it. It’s the cultural value of intrinsically important ‘shitwork’ (women’s) vs materialistic capitalism (men’s). Bloody idea of ‘wealth creators’... wealth may be a means by which things can be achieved in capitalism but why do we never look at how the wealth is used. Why is stockpiling tokens for resources considered a good thing?

The pensions and tax free allowances thing is interesting. I do think though that the main problem with ‘becoming dependent on the state’ is that benefits are administered in a patriarchal manner. No-one thinks money paid to charities (I have issues with charities though) is ‘pathological state dependence’ because people think charities ‘do good’ (very simplistic analysis but common). People see value by and large in state funding for lots of things but almost NEVER for raising children, this is entirely seen to be an individual responsibility and ‘failures’ are always the mother’s.

Isn’t the birth rate already below replacement and has been so a significant amount of time? As I understand it it is one of the potential problems with the ageing population and one of the reasons our economy is so dependent on immigration (never acknowledged publicly by politicians).

How many years of drastically reduced birth rates would it take, before the ability to have children became highly prized and generously rewarded ?

In an ideal world when the replacement rate falls below the level to keep the pensions pyramid scheme up and running.

In reality? Well I assume you’ve read the Hamdmaids Tale? :(

Offred you sound amazing. Being a mum is the hardest I've ever worked, with very little time off. I've managed two international family moves, navigated a country where English wasn't the language - included learning a new language - done loads of voluntary work (PTA and other stuff)). I do all the paperwork for the household. I've done a lot more than a nanny would while doing the job a nanny does (and in the early years getting not much sleep). I'm not complaining - because I suffered from infertility and children are a blessing - but I do wonder why it's not really recognised in any way how much WORK children are, if you want to raise them well.

Why are bankers paid more than nurses? Caring of any kind is just not valued by our society. Arguably cracks are beginning to show. Fewer people want to do caring professions. There are more people (older population) needing care and we're discouraging those immigrants who used to pick up the slack (largely because their pay in ££s was a lot in their national currencies). The NHS is beginning to creak at the seams. Nursing homes are closing. Nurseries can't afford to look after kids at the amount the state pays. This will only get worse as younger generations have to pay extortionate housing costs and caring work just doesn't pay enough.

One thing I think should be done is that if a parent gives up paid work to care for children, their tax free allowance should be transferrable to their spouse and it should be a requirement that a pension is paid into for them out of that tax free allowance. In the long term I bet it would help the state because women who gave up work to care for children may well end up a burden on the state if they divorce and have no pension.

Also, more job shares so both parents can work part time.

I'm mostly disappointed that so little appears to have changed since I first started to engage with these ideas, some forty years ago. Partly that was the benefit of youth thinking i had all the answers but still...

Other parts of employment have improved, with diversity programmes and women-only introductions to technology as corporations become more and more desperate to grow their skilled workforce.

I have started to wonder whether the problem holding back progress is that we keep on having children, regardless, even though the deal is certainly not getting better. How many years of drastically reduced birth rates would it take, before the ability to have children became highly prized and generously rewarded ?

But you know I am variously (depending on the motivation of the person applying a value judgement) ‘sharp elbowed privileged middle class’ and ‘feckless benefits scrounger’ and their perception is total for their own purposes.

In reality I am a person. I have elements of the material reality of both.

SAHM is a statement regarding women knowing their place IMO.

Cup - reading FWR board during naps is a great example of one of the things I hate about the loadedness of applying ‘SAHM’!

I’ve had zero choice about having children, caring for children being a ‘SAHM’. I chose one of my three pg but this was within the context of my husband’s desire for children and my already having two and not wanting to be limited to child rearing forever. I had twins that pg 🙄

In the time I have been ‘SAH’ I have, successfully battled through a vexatious family court case for three years, gained a-levels, provided care to family members and friends, acted as an advocate when necessary, set up and run a campaign group which gained (a tiny amount) of international attention and been interviewed on a national broadcaster, chaired political meetings, chaired multi-disciplinary patient reference groups which actually shaped care, been a representative on health boards and parent groups that shape policy, helped design and run research into maternity care and childcare provision, volunteered at CAB, done canvassing/leaflet drops for a political party, run a debating club, spoken at the faculty of public health conference, earned a degree, done an internship that was so successful people have asked I continue etc etc etc and obviously all the stuff associated with raising children and having a house.

I have done anything but SAH.

Right now I am the most SAH that I have EVER been and that is because of my newly diagnosed disability and the system failing my disabled DD (something which by default falls entirely to me).

SAH is so unbelievably not all that women caring for children can do or do do.

Just writing down the things I have done here makes me feel much better about myself in my current situation and realise just how problematically dehumanising ‘just a SAHM’ is.

Great thread bumpity - desperately trying to read the full thread before the nap is over..... but I very much agree with this I think there should be a greater acceptance that when someone has kids it is natural and normal to want to spend time with them and this probably will not be compatible with working long hours and doing lots of travel for work. - yes both women AND men (DH always frustrated that his female colleagues get greater flexible working than he does when they have babies - he wants to spend more time with his babies too).

Also very much agree with Offred that I think to some extent in this current system SAHM cannot ever really be a freely made choice because it comes along with so much baggage that women don’t discover until too late.

My experience: gave up a fairly well paid fairly cushy government job to SAH because after having DC1 I was the only one entitled to well paid mat pay. The decision to SAH for the first year then lead into the decision to SAH after that when DH offered a good job abroad.

DH thought he would be bored at home too. I, of course, am bored by the lack of intellectual stimulation of being a SAHM (that's why I spend naps on MN feminism chat rather than cleaning the house) but sex role stereotypes came into play here I think without us realising. Someone once said on another thread that it's the "frog in boiling water" thing. You don't realise it's too hot until too late. Having not experienced inequality in the workplace in my 20s, I didn't believe the stories about the impact having children on your career. Recently applied for and offered a job very similar to my old job at 7k LESS than I was paid before I had DC. I'm the same person with the same qualifications and the same experience, but now I've had children.....

It doesn’t mean betrayals of agreements re equality should not be criticised or condemned either.

I have no relationship with my dad. This is his consequence. I understand what drove it. My female socialisation says I should reach out to heal it. I will not. The consequence of pandering to his anxieties about ‘being a man/father’ is that he doesn’t have a relationship with me. That is fine with me and him being sad about it does not compel me to do anything to fix it.

I suppose it is an attempt to say many men and women will share these values (equality, only taking what you need), they will be values that apply outside ‘having children’, they will only become really important in terms of shaping the trajectory of people’s lives if a child happens because that is largely when the focus on how you put values into practice happens.

Often post decision justification happens too.

Personally I think it is important to remember that though women’s lives are the ones limited in effect this is not necessarily because their male partners are liars or don’t genuinely share those values. It is definitely because society is shaped around patriarchal capitalist values and their is a cost to insubordination or lack of ability to comply.

The biggest hurdle to our plan will be the inequality in the workplace that is likely to prevent DH going part time, due to gender stereotypes which still expect and assume men want to work full time, and spend their extra money on material possessions for their families, rather than time with their families.

YY, patriarchal capitalism. Please don’t consider the things I am saying as a criticism of you or your DH or a ham fisted attempt to say ‘ah yeah well you think that but it’s not going to happen cos menz and I know better’!

It is intended to be a criticism of said patriarchal capitalist system which both men and women operate within and an attempt to make an analysis regarding how these structures are maintained and why the majority of choices seemingly made by individuals end up propping up the system no matter the intentions or values of those making choices.

I totally agree that the culture of gender roles in work and therefore approaches of employers and peers in work are a massive problem. They are a mechanism of enforcement IMO.

I also agree not all people conform or acquiesce to these standards/expectations and plenty of men choose integrity to family, and to values pre-existing family, over partriarchy/work AND that this is hard BUT that having a child is THE watershed moment where people have to put these into practice. In lots of ways these choices are highly limited in ways that are unseen.

I think the when the ‘setting out your stall’ talks and agreements happen they are frequently in good faith from both sides (I don’t agree the sentiment or values are always lacking from the men), and frequently include issues of life balance other than family, but that the intensity of internal and external pressures brought about by having a child is a watershed moment for both men and women where the tracks of their lives will change in many ways.

That women come off worse shows you that it is partriarchal IMO.

*inequality not equality in the workplace...

eryri hopefully it will work for you. We have found it a real challenge to push against the external issues like work for example. Even though we as a couple are committed to equality. It’s been harder than I thought.

Yes totally. We make the choices we do within the framework of our own restrictions (and those of wider society.) very few women have total choice - I suppose only those who are independently wealthy with no need to work.

I have spent a lot of time in expat communities and there are lots of very frustrated trailing spouses. Usually a two career couple where one has had a massive promotion and needs to move countries, and it’s not worth it/childcare issues/will move again soon so the wife stays home. I also know a few women who this works really well for but they’re not in the majority.

It’s possibly also an issue we will face in a few years if DH continues to advance.

I know only one couple where the husband is the trailer. It’s the inequality in distribution that’s part of the issue.

I think Finland (could I be wrong?) pays parents to stay home for a few years? There needs to be recognition that child rearing is important - but as you say it’s ‘womens Work’ so devalued in society.

I think having a living wage of £10 an hour plus an eradication of bullying in the workplace would be my Utopia. We are a long, long way from this.

Bowlofbabelfish and Offred but what I'm saying is that these discussions and agreements had nothing to do with raising children, but about lifestyle & work life balance. We decided on this plan before I was pregnant (which was far from a certain outcome as I was 36 when we started trying and have Endometriosis).

The biggest hurdle to our plan will be the inequality in the workplace that is likely to prevent DH going part time, due to gender stereotypes which still expect and assume men want to work full time, and spend their extra money on material possessions for their families, rather than time with their families. There is equality in the workplace going both ways, it is just less obvious, as within a capitalist society money and possessions are used as a measure of success and who has it best.