Matricentric feminism - the need for feminism to recognise the experience of mothers

This is an absolutely crucial subject for debate.

Motherhood has, for me, been far and away the most empowering role of my life. So many decisions to make, which of course implies so much research, analysis, evaluation, discussion. And, very often, swimming against the tide and defending that which I know to be true against people with vested interests in trying to force me down another path.

Haven't rtft! - but will because it is so interesting

Just wanted to chime in agreeing with Offred on this

"Personally, and I think this is actually true for all mothers, caring about the child’s experience is how women are trapped by motherhood. Women only get trapped into it because they care about what happens to the child"

And then terfulike's post about SAHFs is also really relevant to this.
In general, SAHFs just do not do the same job as SAHMs. They don't do remotely as much work, and they don't do it remotely as well. This has a huge knock on effect on the well being of the child, unless the WOHM picks up the slack, which she always does, to her own detriment.

I don't see any way out of this impasse because the men who are doing this just literally don't understand what work they are not doing. They just don't get it and they get angry about it whenever you get close to explaining it, because understanding that would ruin their easy life, with their sense of themselves as a good guy.

Pensions.

You get credits for the state pension for children under 12 if you don't work - you just need to be the recipient of Child Benefit.

It’s an ideological choice to impose and enforce these values as they are often actually very expensive.

I guess the solution is difficult and would chain women to the fathers of their children, we used to have married allowances didn't we?

I'm not talking about careers I'm talking about jobs. The pressure to return to Tesco on the checkout in order to pay a nursery to barely care for your infant.

Yes. Universal Credit requires even single parents to work - or spend potential working hours looking for work - as soon as a child is three years of age. There is no point in leaving your three-year-old at a childminder so that you can go to a minimum wage job.

The system is based on punishment of not working for a wage by not working for a wage leading to social stigma and enforcement via state structures e.g. eviction, starvation, social care. The value attributed to a whole person is based on how much money they make/have.

I think this is why for many women the default feminist stance is socialist. We all need support at some point during our lives. Mothers are producing the next generation. We can choose to not see that as a drain on the system.

I've never understood the "feminist" choice of paying someone poverty wages to look after young children to go and earn poverty wages

Pensions.

That's because men don't take maternity leave, when we had our babies my husband took two weeks off every time, his career was uninterrupted.

it can make sense to work for peanuts sometimes.

Just an obvious enough side point - when there is a working couple paying for childcare, all too often it's still thought of as the woman working for peanuts.

I'm not talking about careers I'm talking about jobs. The pressure to return to Tesco on the checkout in order to pay a nursery to barely care for your infant.

I'm sure there are some incredible nurseries but I think they're a poor substitute for a loving parent.

LaSqrrl Mon 28-May-18 00:39:38
I remember the old school radfems using. They were pretty much told that their struggle had been to get out of the home into the workforce and now that battle had been won it was time to talk about another, new issue. Which turned out to be sex work.

Never radfems supporting prostitution - it is still very much a radfem area of concern. Perhaps it was just confusing the way you wrote that? Or do you sincerely believe radfems ever thought that way?

Sorry, I wrote that fast and didn't realise it was unclear. The radfems were told that sex work was the new frontier, by libfems.
I didn't add 'by libfems' because every time I've done that I've been jumped on.

Posie

I know what you mean about the poverty wages thing but I think it is hard for a lot of families to survive on one wage, and even if they can, some working mothers are thinking long-term financially.

If the mother goes back to work I think you receive more maternity pay. So overall you might be better off.

Another factor to consider is that you often need to keep your knowledge up to date and remind people you're still around. If you go back to work parttime then, with childcare costs, its not really financially beneficial as you say. But later on, if you have kept your career trundling along this allows you to focus on your career again when your kids go to college. You will be financially rewarded then so overall, longterm, it can make sense to work for peanuts sometimes.

On the other hand, if you are out of paid work for a decade or so it is extremely common to reenter the workplace at a lower grade. This is not right but it's what happens.

I've never understood the "feminist" choice of paying someone poverty wages to look after young children to go and earn poverty wages

Or why the state requires that of single mothers, even of children of pre-school age, via Universal Credit.

It’s a capitalist con posie! It’s the same reason the poorest women are the ones who don’t claim maintenance from the dad.

It’s ‘a matter of pride’... all a big con...

I think a lot of women feel a pull to care for their DC when they are small. I wonder how much of this is biology and how much culture. I wonder if men would feel it too if the culture changed. I know some men do and some women don’t.

The problem is with the expectation that women do because it’s a woman’s job to and that men don’t because it’s a woman’s job.

I think it is hugely common for men to have massive anxiety and cling tight to their gender role after a baby in an irrational manner. I wonder how much of that also happens with women.

I've never understood the "feminist" choice of paying someone poverty wages to look after young children to go and earn poverty wages
.

When I had my children I had a deep urge to look after them myself while they were babies and I loved it.

Now I work ft and DP works from home and gets them ready for school, makes lunches, arranges appointment.

In Scandinavian countries where there are supportive policies in place - women are still opting to stay at home for a period with their children.

I was reading Patti Smith on Sunday. She was talking about how she stayed at home to look after her babies and was criticised fir that - yet that was one of her most creative periods and it was something she wanted to do.

Yes, I know I did touch on that upthread. However infant feeding is only one aspect of child rearing. Motherhood is not synonymous or interchangeable with breastfeeding, but breastfeeding remains an exclusively female experience and, with a tiny exception re wet nursing, an experience which is exclusively one of the mother.

Offred but there is a biological fact.
Women breastfeed.

And the biological "morm" is to breastfeed for years, not months.
Combine that with several children then that effectively means that a woman is out of the workplace for years.
I breastfed for seven years.

I think ‘children are the mother’s job’ is incredibly damaging to society and a massive hurdle to get over.

It makes no logical sense. Every single person in society is inherently invested in every child’s quality of life. This is where individualism is at it’s most irrational IMO because it is actually impossible to pretend any person really is only concerned with themselves.

I don't think mothering is intrinsically oppressive, but the way it is structured by patriarchy is.

And the last 50-100 years particularly, where there is no wider (intergenerational) support network, it isolates mothers to basically cope on their own.

This other model is the 'community model', aka "it takes a village" and more about collaborative effort - with everything.

YY to all of this. Also, in matriarchal society, work itself would look different. The norm wouldn't be Monday-Friday, 9am-pm. And career progression wouldn't be linear by default.

The state nurseries is common, lib fems, communists lots and lots of times I hear that one.

I don't think mothering is intrinsically oppressive, but the way it is structured by patriarchy is.

Correct. And the last 50-100 years particularly, where there is no wider (intergenerational) support network, it isolates mothers to basically cope on their own.

Offred
I’ve been folly eyed at feminist speakers who believe the answer to oppression is to entirely do away with motherhood and put all children in state nurseries from birth. I’ve been rolly eyed at the circular logic of individualist feminist circular logic of what matters is women choosing and everything’s women do is a choice.

It seems you are talking about liberal feminists, who only want to reform 'the system' a little here and there, and everything will be rosy. Radical feminists want to overhaul the entire damned system, which also means exploring different ways of doing things. Some matrilineal cultures more or less 'share motherhood' in groups, and not all who have given birth are involved necessarily (some women really are not cut out to be mothering types). The 'shared motherhood' usually has the older generation of women looking after the children as a group, and the younger women doing the more physical work. Dramatic cultural shift from the patriarchical west, where it is the ownership model. This other model is the 'community model', aka "it takes a village" and more about collaborative effort - with everything. I think this model has a lot of merit.

Radical feminists have traditionally focused on male violence against women. That is because they know there are women being beat up and raped every week, or even every day.
I don't think mothering is intrinsically oppressive, but the way it is structured by patriarchy is.
i agree that because mothers are often the ones literally left holding the baby, then most want to do whatever they can to make their child happy and meet their needs.
I agree that it is astounding how much issues like incontinence are just accepted as normal. I also suspect that a substantial proportion of women with postnatal depression are actually depressed because of the physical situation they are in i.e. sleep deprived and doing nearly all of the work with a baby.