to think the washing machine has liberated women more than the pill?

[bettybosseye]

I'm serious, think about it, there are alternatives to the pill but only one to hours spent every day hand scrubbing and wringing piles of washing.
The pill is held up as something that gave women control and this is undoubtedly true but the humble washing machine has emancipated us from hours of drudgery every day and like i say it is unrivaled. The washing machine rules!

So it's not the rhythm method itself, but other factors influencing birth rate.

A lot of factors will influence the birth rate, number of children and birth spacing. I don't think it is solely about the rhythmn method.

I still think I'm missing something because men know that sticking their dick in a woman's vagina is bound to get a woman pregnant, so why do they insist on doing it? And if they are determined to do it when they know the woman isn't keen on having a baby right now, then what does that say about them as people ?
And seeing as women don't orgasm through intercourse alone, and can orgasm effectively without it, then why the obsession with it, knowing [as they well know] what the consequences are for women?

Haven't read the whole thread but there's a very strong argument that labour-saving devices have not saved any labour at all.

When people didn't have washing machines they wore far less clothes. In fact, in the Victorian period, you might have one winter dress and one summer one, and wear even the same undergarments until they wore out. Even in the twentieth century a man might wear the same shirt all week and just change his collars. So there would be far less washing and, even though it was a horrible chore, you could get away with one wash a week. The fact we have washing machines means we all wear millions of things and spend probably the same amount of hours washing, drying and ironing them.

Not that I do any ironing, of course

I think that's what I was trying to say about housework expanding to fill the time available. It was something I read once which struck a chord but it's overstating the case and more to do with standards.

Ironing, well... there's never a argument for that unless it's shirts for work and I wouldn't want to put people who are paid to do it out of a job

takethatlady
Most of us have been talking about the hard work and time that washing by hand created in the 1960's, 70's and 80's. I can assure you people did not just have 2 or 3 sets of clothing that they wore for a lone time.

I think adults probably do change their clothes slightly more than when all washing was done by hand. But in 60's and 70's babies nappies were virtually all fabric ones that had to be washed by hand.

Also these were the days when children played outside for large chunks of their time. So it was common for children to come home after playing out, with muddy and dirty clothes.

Don't know how often my dad changed his shirt for work, but he didn't have detachable collar - which were used to reduce the frequency of washing.

And there is no way the hand washing my mum did compared to 1 wash a week. Also ironing seems to have been much more commonly done then. Of course clothes weren't treated to stop them getting wrinkled, so they probably did need ironing more. But I know loads of people now who say they don't or rarely iron.

Sakura - maybe women like penetrators sex too?

Milly - yes I see birth rates go up and down due to cultural, historical context - up thread there was an argument that 'natural family planning' is 99 percent effective and that women doing this typically had 2-3 children. This contradicts my (limited) experience- friend, youngest of right, MIL youngest of five, another two friends one of seven and eight, all Catholic background. But maybe their parents intended large families.

Sorry youngest of eight

My phone is killing me

Fertility rates came down in industrialised countries well before the introduction of hormonal contraception. Fertility rates per woman in Bangladesh and the Philippines are currently 2.3 and 3.1 respectively (down from 7ish in the 1960s according to the World Bank) and I'm damn sure they're not all on the Pill.

But surely today this is because wealthier women can afford contraception?

I've never used the pill so I can't comment.
As far as washing machines are concerned, I'm waiting for them to invent a machine that loads itself, pegs the washing out, sorts it, irons it and puts it away in the correct place.

My Mum had to handwash nappies for 3, and dry them in front of a coal fire as they had no central heating. She always said
'Abstinence is the best contraceptive I know of!'

well speaking as someone who has a long term health condition which is made significantly worse when pregnant, and having been advised for my own health to stop at 2, and wanting to see my own ones grow up, i would wash clothes for 8 hours a day if it meant i could do that

in my head i cannot understand why people can make vast claims about labour saving devices being better for women as a mass group when we all know there are hundreds of thousands of women dying in childbirth each year across the globe. women for whom pregnancy isn't an option, who can't afford contraception, or who are so disempowered they literally have no choice about the matter at all.

words fail me that some of the posters on here are so narrow minded that they can only see their white, middle class westernised view of what is or is not good for "women" as a group. maybe YOUR segment of women, but not for all of them. please remember this when making sweeping statements on behalf of 50% of the world's population - unfortunately not all women share our life experiences, views and opportunities.

the pill has not made much of a difference to women who live in extreme poverty, in less developed countries, because they simply can't afford it. Nor can they afford washing machines. So the question is sadly irrelevant for that group.

if you want to help them, do what you can to improve access to contraception and sex education, where it is most needed

what would make the most difference is empowering women so that they are in a position to make choices about their own lives

frgr So we can't talk about things that changed the lives of women in this country because it hasn't happened universally?

Household electrical goods, ovens, washing mahines etc. The pill destroys my day to day health and has more advantages for my husband than it does me! I took it for just over a year and a half and I will never again it is awful. Not to mention it isn't foolproof. Only real way of keeping safe and pregnancy free is not to have sex. The legislation against marital rape which came in in the 90's has done more for women's lib than the pill.

not at all, OTheHugeDaffodils. do not pretend i said any such thing. i purely mean that people should reconsider making such sweeping statements about the whole of womankind, as if their own position in society reflects the norm of what life is like for 50% of the world's population. it doesn't. pretending "oh isn't it jolly good that we can choose to not get pregant by just avoiding it, har har har" - well i'm sure i hear the women of Yemen laughing along with some of you

and what are you doing to help the women of Yemen?

(besides being patronising towards the members of a UK-based parenting forum?)

"The legislation against marital rape which came in in the 90's"

Was that really so recent?

telling them they should feel better about so many of their sisters, mothers and daughters dying in childbirth because they don't have the worries we have here in the UK (i.e. washing machines vs. hand scrubbing).

on a more serious note, i've had my eyes opened to my own narrow view by looking around the feminist forum here. frankly, i've been shocked at some of the stuff i've read in the last 2 months there - a lot of which (re: the rates of mortality in some countries) is related to the pill being accessible (or not as the case may be). time to start actively getting involved in donation or volunteering for relevant activist/pressure groups - you bet!

frgr - but if Western women were still chained to their houses and their scrubbing boards, they'd hardly be in any position to help women in the developing world, would they?

The fact that some women don't have access to the pill or washing machines is neither here nor there. Obviously it would be better if they could have both. But it's not access to these things they need, it's the basic right to govern their own lives.

I think the discussion we've had is a valid one. Equally, a discussion on how we can use our more advanced state of liberation to help them is a valid one. But not necessarily helpful to confuse the two issues on this thread.

Contact lenses. I thank the spirit universe for them every day. OK they are unisex - perhaps I digress...

ooops, sorry. think I've accidently wandered onto the wrong thread..don't mind me

Contact lenses and / or glasses would have made the difference in years gone by between being able to earn a living or not because extreme short-sightedness is a real disability.

When I think about the Holocaust and people being deprived of their sight as well as everything else that was going on...