to worry that the feminism of the 1970's is erradicating feminitity...

[MrsTwinks]

Im fully prepaired to be flamed... but the other thread reminded me of a conversation I had with my stepsister and cousin a while ago.

Both were career women of a sort before they had their kids and became SAHP, and were talking about how guilty it made them feel, yet SS said she loved being a mum and it was all she ever wanted. It seems to me that the attitude of our mothers (all mad feminists in my fam i'm afraid) got so engrossed in trying to have a fantastic career and being the perfect mum they lost sight of the truth that you cant have both.

I remember my mum feeling that she had to go out and have that wonderful career she was told she was entitled to (not that she wasnt dont get me wrong) contantly trying to find something that made her has fulfilled as being a homemaker because she was made to feel she was "letting the side down" by not going for a career and being a mum. Ironically shes doing the same to me now, as is being done to alot of my generation (in my fam and friends at least), we are being made to feel guilt because we DONT WANT to be career women. Homemaker has become an ugly word and makes you lazy/stupid/scrounger or whatever.

Add to that the likes of Newsnight last night where we are told putting girls in sparkly and pink clothing (nevermind cut or item or whatever) and telling them to kiss daddy goodnight is tantamount to sexualising children?!!!?? what next.. Im all against revealing clothes and all that, but seriously.. how is a little girl wearing pink sparkly clothes and kissing daddy goodnight bad?? and yet our mothers generation of feminists is telling us that its wrong. It appears to me they are telling us that being FEMININE is bad. What is wrong with the way we are made??

ok rant over, but it REALLY gets my goat that (to me) all these women are telling me its bad to want to be a STHP who has a home made dinner ready when people get home and a clean house, and whos life is more about her kids than her high powered career because I have a brain. All I wanted to be when I grew up was a mum and now Im supposed to have a new dream because someone tells me mine isnt enough and I am pandering to masocism or some such.

Please tell me i'm not the only one? or was i really born decades too late

other thread....

Good post Sunshine

However Im not going to ever do a relgious thread again they turn into nothing more than Christian-bashing stenches. All I ask is people dont judge every Christian on the actions of the high profile ones.

The faithful are individuals.

No-one likes to be told they are "x" because of their gender
Why should a Christian feel any different to be told they are "y"because of their faith?

"Why are you having a go at me for generalising but not at the OP? Big hmmms at you."

Ahh- I said frequently I wouldnt lay the blame at feminists but society

Strangely, Coco, I feel insulted because the OP is precisely linking all Christians in together in defiance of actual facts, which ignorance also seems to abound in her generalisations about feminists and the historicity of feminism.

Yet you and she do seem appalled at generalisations?

Im not on that thread LineRunner. Maybe post this on there

garlicbutter and a few others, I think you are right, my mother was an extreme Greenham Common, boiler suit, man-hating feminist. I love her to pieces and it doesn't really matter now, we have cleared up any resentment but I am very aware that my opinions on 1970-80s feminism are very biased. I also wouldn't want to meet Germaine Greer face to face, unreasonable I know but being forced to attend Eunuch book reading group from the age of 10 has left me with a passionate dislike for her, along with Citroen 2CVs, Wimmin posters and anyone who is a fan of rebirthing. By the way, they used to use two of the sofa cushions to represent the vagina and the naked body would be squeezed through and they would all clap. This is the same and only sofa for sitting on. Yuck!

OP, I think you are rebelling against your mother and her peers. Many of us do do that.

In your case, however, you are completely denying and dismissing her feminist views. That is a huge mistake on your part.

Yes, yes, yes, MrsTwinks. I agree. I think our mothers must have known each other.

YANBU.

Hushedtones that post has many levels of wrong, I strongly suspect that Dittany is going give you a much better explanation as to why however, my two pennies.

We are nowhere close to being able ignore injustices against women, be it experience of violence, judgement of life choices, or structural inequalities......racism has never been countered by white people 'politely' ignoring you are black like a bad smell.(I speak as a black person).

I am glad to see this thread still active. I have heard this sentiment from other women over the past couple of decades or so and it's always irked me, and I think I can finally explain why.

Other women who don't make the same choices as you are not oppressing you. They may not agree with you, but they are not oppressing you. In fact, the instances of actual gender-based oppression in this world from rape to sexual harassment to lack of equal pay were brought to you by the patriarchy -- by men.

So if every other women does not stand up and emit a great universal cheer that you have chosen to buy into the (very Victorian) notion of the Angel in the Home well, that might just be because they're too busy trying to make their own negotiations with the power structure that would be the patriarchy -- to make their own lives work. And not incidentally, other posters have pointed out, a fair few of them over the years have also chosen to fight so you can HAVE the choices you now enjoy.

Yet for some reason you're blaming "feminists" because you have the vague feeling that not everybody thinks you're as perfectly swell as you wish they would? Huh??

Here's a thought: Ask not what your sisters can do for you. Ask what you can do for your sisters.

MrsTwinks - Good for you for joining in the other thread. Everyone here has said anything I would say, but if someone were telling you what you should think or do based on your religion, you'd think hang on a second, I know my faith and give it back/cut them short based on that. So why not the same with feminism? Just because you don't agree with your mother's view of feminism doesn't mean you cannot have your own view and reconcile it with your own life choices does it?

Cocoflower Sat 11-Jun-11 00:24:14
How odd you fight agaisnt the discrimation of one group, yet willingly dicriminate agaisnt another. How very, very hypocritical.

CocoFlower - a fundamental element of discrimination is an immutable aspect. People cannot (or v rarely) change their gender, race, (dis)ability etc. Because religion is so historically entrenched in society and for a lot of religions being born to parents of a certain religious persuasion means you ARE that religion whether you choose it as an adult or not or are active in that faith, it has also become protected from discrimination - mainly because as a form of tribalism it has led to a lot of violence and war throughout history (the break-up of former Yugoslavia being a tragic point in case) and so people needed to be protected against that (see European Convention on Human Rights and the debates behind that). I've yet to see atheist on faith based violence on such a large scale as inter-religion violence engenders but happy to be given an example. However, I would argue that for many, a change of faith is much more possible than a change of race or gender or ability.

SAF, she said "the ultimate feminist goal". You misquoted. I would have thought it is the ultimate feminist goal that be no further need for feminism?

Hushed you say that you are not apathetic to violence, etc.
It is a fact that in the years prior to the 70s, the men running the country (politicans and all areas of the law) WERE apathetic to domestic violence and rape. The feminists of the 1970s enabled women today to feel safer, and provided escape routes from abusive relationships. They also provided us with unimagined opportunities, equal to those of a man. Of course it is our choice if we take advantage of them.

I can't see how anyone can feel apathetic about the amazing changes that have occurred in women's lives over the last 100 years. The most important change of all though, is the choice to do what you want.

Hellatwork, thats true but I've gotten myself into trouble many times by arguing my point with minsters/priests/nuns/DH if i think the stance is hypocritical, which i do here for reasons stated.

I got attacked a bit for staying it before but i do have a rather strong personality in that regard, but i know so many women who bend alot easier than I would, especially to the strong willed women in their lives. Surely having a matriarch who makes you fell inferior/dumb for making a choice is on par with a patriarch who refuses you the choice. Its much easier for men these days should they make the choice to be a SAHP, in my circle we wouldnt question it, but a woman its immediately when will you go back to work etc. And I'm sure I'm not the only one that recognises that reaction.

MrsTwinkle, its a complex subject. No reason for anyone to flame you.
I will have a go at it when I have moret time. Bless