To be WILD at the news at 10 wording 'mothers who chose not to work'

[NotanOtter]

who are hardest hit by benefit cut

How bloody condescending...

Nip round here any day and 'choose not to WORK' looking after my kids

thatta girl!

sadly am alternating MN with the business banking and discussing other such fun developments at work as due to my choosing not to work childcare commitments I cannot work in normal hours

You have a drink for me though

People can only not do paid work if someone else does paid work to support them.
Should nonrelatives be supporting these women?
I do think if you choose not to do paid work you should ensure you have enough money to support yourself and not be relient on strangers aka benefits.

They should stick to factual descriptive language o n the newsand not use phrases that imply value judgements, 'women who are not in paid employment' for example, 'choose' is a very loaded word and inaccurate when being used to describe a very disparate group who are not in paid work for many different reasons.

so yanbu.

2rebecca but if you do do paid work you are by inference entitled to 'benefits'?

YANBU

It is quite a judgemental statement.

I never quite know where the label SAHM ends and housewife begins....when all your children are at primary school or secondary school or left home?

Some SAHMs work extremely hard, some use it as a ticket not to work forever (fine if someone other than the tax payer is HAPPY to support you). It is grossly unfair to make a negative judgement about all SAHMs though with a statement like that.

i think they're probably trying not to offend by using housewife - sahm probably isn't in their vocab

Quite often it is NOT a choice they make it sound like they are sitting at home being fanned by a hunky bloke whilst the cleaner cleans and the nanny looks after the kids....

probably the daftman person who wrote this peice for the news at 10 has never looked after fighting kids all day, then been told its his choice not to go to work

"mothers who choose not to work" is an outrageous phrase.

SeaTrek - how about "retired SAHM" for life at home after children?

YANBU. It is insulting in two ways:

1. I do not 'choose' not to be in paid employment, I would love to go back to work but childcare costs make it impossible.

1. SAHM is the hardest, most craply paid job I've ever had, it is DEFINITELY 'work'!

by my 'choosing' not to work, we are not claiming the childcare element of WTC, so therefore must be saving govt money somehow.

it's as irritating as the phrase 'full-time mum' IMO.

Society doesn't see childcare as of value, innit?

I am choosing to go back to paid work part-time to minimise the risk of loss of financial independence if our household income changed in the future.

However, I am doing this because I believe that children should be able to spend time at least one parent for more than one hour in a day on most days of the week, not because I think: "sod this for a lark, I've had enough of working"

My husband requested flexible working so we could share this work - but his work (traditionally male) made it difficult and mine (traditionally female) made it easy, so here we are.

Huge issues here, really.

changes ((shakes head at inability to proof-read))

arses - I think that phrase makes an assumption that is a lot worse than that. It assumes that delegating childcare and housework is a teeny-weeny issue that is easily solved and that the financial and material implications of doing so barely bear consideration.

it really isn't that bad a phrase...if they had to think and rethink who on earth might get a bit tetchy over the words they use they'd never bloody get round to reading the news! It is just a question of semantics...seriously i think you're missing the bigger issue here which is what is happening to SAHM with the current CB cuts. THAT is something to get sweaty about...not the 5 or 6 words used to describe SAHM.

I find the phrase 'mothers who choose to work' more annoying actually! I would much rather stay at home with DC however, in order to ensure that there is a roof over their heads and food on the table I have to work. DH works in an industry that is up and down with the economic climate so often we rely on the little that is left over from my wages after childcare.

I think often SAHM and working mothers get on their high horses (my included!) as we find it insulting that people feel free to label us and criticise us.

I know some people who do choose to stay at home and some who choose to work as they prefer it over the other option. Most of us have little choice either can't afford to work or can't afford not to. No one every criticises Dads who decide to work/stay at home!

Poogles - I don't think it is a gender issue.

The real issue is whether, in two parent families, quality of life for the family overall is best served by both parents WOH or by having one WOHP and one SAHP. Many, many families find that the financial benefit of having two WOHP is nil (because of the cost of childcare) and that having one SAHP greatly relieves stress on the family as one parent is available to do all the chores and errands of family life.

btw, ITV news is terrible anyway....if you want factual reporting try CH4 or BBC1...ITV is like the sun (minus the nipples...sometimes).

YANBU, although maybe a bit pedantic. We all know that they mean paid work. And whilst I accept that being a SAHP is hard work, much of the stuff a SAHP does is also done by parents who work outside of the home (particularly parents with school-age DCs).

Anyway. "Choose" pisses off those who had no choice. Then those who choose to work rather than work through economic/career necessity feel a bit that there might be an insinuation that they've chosen work over their children.

The worse thing is "mothers" though. Like there are no SAHFs? I don't kow if I live in some kind of egalitarian feminist Utopia or what, but I know plenty of 'em. And as the recession deepens, there will be plenty more.

Unless the point they were getting at was that women are being disproportionately affected I guess.

"much of the stuff a SAHP does is also done by parents who work outside of the home"

Although not mine. My house is a bloody disgrace

I think the main issue with the cutting of CB for me is the loss of pension protection. I'd like to know what they're proposing to do about that.