To ask why women financially dependent on men are viewed as morally superior to those dependent on the state?!

[Primarkismyonlyoption]

Just that really, my experience and something I see everywhere.
Having a baby on benefits? Irresponsible. Single mums? A drain on society raising kids without fathers who are growing up to be uncontrollable. A government document citing such women as raising the 'psychopaths of the future'. Women to blame for a cycle of poverty which never ends.
What scroungers. Lack of morals. Less so than married women whose husbands work. Why?
Why are women in relationships where men provide financially known as SAHMs but single mums are just that. Implying thay staying at home is only a morally acceptable choice if you have a partner. The single parents are pushed to find work by baby aged 2. Housework for them isnt seen as work at all but sitting on their arses all day.

Instead of the moral segregation of women based on their relationship status why can we not view their lives as equal in the case of any woman whom cannot be financially independent in their own right, and start to look at how more women can become independent of both men and the welfare state?
And to stop double standards as if mums hide what money they have in order to claim money for their kids they are done for benefit fraud.
If men do it by hiding capital in court for maintenence or divorce, the woman is still gets judged for having to live off benefits whilst men get off scot free and go on to impregnate more whomen whom may or may not stay together. Worse, imo, the judgement of women recieving welfare assistance is doubled if there are more than one father, the children are mixed race, the more children there are or the fact the woman dares to have a sexual relationship with another partner whom she cannot afford to live with because most men cannot or won't take financial responsibility for children who aren't theirs just because they love their mum. And why should they?
As it happens I had babies on benefits and have fucking grafted to get to where I am. I work equally hard as I did then but in a totally different way. Yet the difference in how I am treated is astounding.
AIBU to ask for your views on this and what can we do to change it?

And of course, every single person in the UK completed that survey? Did you complete that survey? I didn't. I absolutely hate that surveys can be done and then the tiny results are applied to the population as a whole.

But we're supposed to accept your personal in-depth knowledge of 200+ families? That's more reliable?

Why are you so insistent on perpetuating this bullcrap? Is it because you 'got out' of skid row and you don't like the idea that, however far you may have come, it isn't quite as far as you prefer to think?

That's a genuine question. I've noticed this attitude in a lot of people who came from a crap background, worked hard and improved their lot. It doesn't make them correct.

Unfortunately, as "non PC" as it is to say this, the type of person who has children fully expecting the state to support them, tends to be following in the footsteps of their own parents and grandparents. There are many families in the UK, who for generations have never worked. It is just expected, that a life on benefits is the only way. And yes, some do have more children to increase the benefits they can claim.

This group could better be described as perennially underemployed rather than never having worked.

You have to have lived a fairly sheltered life to think that the nearly all or even most benefits claimants are striving mightily to sort themselves.

Whatever private arrangements a mother and father have between themselves regarding the division of work outside and inside of their home is none of anyone's business. They make a joint decision to share children; they make a joint decision as to how to raise them.

Where your children are your own and you share them with no one, it's your responsibility to do everything.

Where someone the father has deserted the family, the government should logically be charged with recovering money on behalf of the remaining parent the mother with the same vigour that they pursue council tax, for example.

Margo - I would argue that a marriage is a mutually dependent relationship though. I'm sure my husband could have done what he's done as a single man, but he couldn't have done it and brought up 4 children at the same time! We each bring something to the marriage and if we couldn't depend on each other, then what would be the point?

And of course, every single person in the UK completed that survey? Did you complete that survey? I didn't. I absolutely hate that surveys can be done and then the tiny results are applied to the population as a whole.

😂😂

They didn't 'use a survey' to try & identify workless families ffs.

Fair enough, g1itterati, but neither you, nor I, nor your DH will never know the answer to that, so it is just conjecture. As a single working parent, I have a slightly different perspective but appreciate that it is just anecdotal, rather than evidence based.

I think there is a separate debate about what is the point of marriage that is different to whether or not a SAHM paid for by a DP/DH is morally superior/inferior to a SAHM paid for by the state.

PoorYorick No, I have always worked and was lucky enough to have a good upbringing. I was in a role for 5 years that took me to work with these families, and nothing could have prepared me for the families that I came across in that 5 years. The utter depravation was shocking. And no, most people that we worked with had never worked and would never work. Lots of drug use. Lots of neglected children (think no food in the fridge, no bedding, shit smeared up the walls, drugs lying all over the place). You don't have to believe me. I wouldn't have believed it either. Until I saw it.

My one concession to the OP is that I think that extended/lifetime SAHM-hood is very bad for women as a whole and accounts for the majority of the so-called wage gap (here I'll duck and run out the door).

I absolutely believe you saw some shit. I don't believe you have in depth knowledge of 200+ families with generations of worklessness and are a more reliable source than a professional study by the JRF.

There is no such thing as society.

• M Thatcher

I actually think that many people miss the point that due to being married they are trapped in a situation where it is almost impossible to work! No help with tax credits or childcare

Bollox. Utter bollox. You don’t have one clue how the benefit system works, save what you read in the Daily Mail or your equally misinformed friend told you. Single parents get the same support from the system as a couple on a comparable income. The same. There is no such thing as ‘single parent’ benefit, no additional support with childcare over a couple earning the same, no married person’s tax breaks, no two personal tax allowances etc. As such, a single parent earning, say £30k would be worse off than a couple where both earned £15k each. The discrepancy is worse when it comes to Child Benefit where a single parent earning £60K can’t claim but a couple earning £49 EACH can.

There are two people to deal with drop offs and pick ups and two people to manage illness and injury.

Does a wife with a husband who is earning get financial help should she wish to study or retrain? Compare with a lone parent

Student loans are means tested on household income. So again, depending on income, a couple and single parent will receive the same.

Your suggestion is that women are treated differently because men may behave badly and not support their wives. So, what you are advocating is income for the person. This is fine but you must realise that it would also apply to me as a single parent moving in with a partner, regardless of what my partner may or may not earn or indeed, may or may not share with me.

A colleague was living st home having split with her baby's father. She had a new partner but didn't want to move I with him because she would lose her 80% childcare subsidy

Because the single parent in this case is on a low income. She would not receive 80% as an average or higher earner.

You all seem quite determined to cast single parents as nothing other than scrounging, benefit scum. No change there, then.

Women should stop having children. It would become society's problem again quickly enough.
Atm women are expected to bare the costs of continuing species. It doesnt seem possible in a civilised sociwty but oh yeh thst doesnt exist!!

This is a great thread OP. And a great question to ask.
I personally think there is no difference.
A mother with small children is generally dependant on someone. Simply because kids cost money and limit earning potential and a woman cannot physically be in more than one place at once.
She may be dependant on a man, dependant on extended family or dependant on the state.
If she works she is likely "dependant" on tax credits for childcare costs. If she's a high enough earner not to get tax credits then she's "dependant" on other workers in her organisation to support that high wage. She may also be "dependant" on nannies, nursery staff, child-minders, cleaners to keep things running while she's at work.
Actually everyone is dependant on everyone else. As someone up thread said- you would need to be earning £95K to be paying more in tax than you are drawing out.
Having children just brings that interdependence and vulnerability home to you. Just as children depend on us- we must depend on the people around us, and society as a whole to help us bring them up.
Dependence and interdependence is a fact of life. There is no moral distinction to be made. Its simply a question of how to organise society around that basic fact.
Traditionally women have had to rely on men but one look at the relationships board will show you the disadvantages of this arrangement to women.
I personally prefer for mothers to be supported by the state. Whether that's by subsidised childcare, tax credits or state benefits.

I agree with wise poster up thread who commented that rather than being happily unemployed a lot of single mothers are under employed. A lot of mums here have discussed how hard it is to get back in to workplace, and that is when any money earned is extra to the household.
Try getting back into the work place when the same people judging you wont employ you and you need to earn more than minimum wage or you will lose the roof over your head.

People's ignorance is astonishing. The patriarchy has convinced women that women are to responsible for pregnancy, burdens, costs, sacrifices..

Society doesnt exist?
It does and it is patriarchal. And capitalist. Which leaves women holding the baby and blamed for holding the baby.

*There is no such thing as society.

• M Thatcher*

In fairness, that's a very selective quote. The full context was:

"And, you know, there is no such thing as society. There are individual men and women, and there are families. And no government can do anything except through people, and people must look to themselves first. It's our duty to look after ourselves and then, also to look after our neighbour."

Dependence and interdependence is a fact of life. There is no moral distinction to be made. Its simply a question of how to organise society around that basic fact.

Great post unlimited.

So why do we all pay for roads and healthcare but maintaining the population is done at women's cost.

Hon3stly women should stop having children. Governments will have to provide childcare freeing all to work and not disadvantaging mothers so much more than fathers

Dependence and interdependence is a fact of life. There is no moral distinction to be made. Its simply a question of how to organise society around that basic fact.

Agree with all of your post unlimited, especially this part.

She may also be "dependent" on nannies, nursery staff, child-minders, cleaners to keep things running while she's at work

Yes, dependent on their services, but the dependency we were talking about was financial.

Does anyone know where I can get a rich man so I can look down on all you plebby single people?

Scratch that, there isn't enough money in the world to make me want to live with a grumpy arsed man again.

Oh I just gave that example to back up the poster that said sometimes the decision to sah is financial due to lack of help with childcare.
I was all set to return to work after the birth of my first the but as mg job was fairly low paid with a commute it reply was not worth it. Had help with childcare been available than I may have returned to work.

Incidentally I have no problem with single parents either staying at home and receiving support or receiving tax credits to enable them to work.
I had a choice. I could have worked for no financial gain or stayed home. I chose the latter.

A lot of the examples given of single mothers talk about them deciding to fall pregnant on their own, surely that is a very small minority.

I live in a different world to the rest of you.

In my world, DH is judged pretty harshly by others for concentrating so hard on his career while I stay at home.

His family have gently but frequently suggested that if I went to work part time, we would have more money so he could dial it back a bit and ‘actually see his kids’.

DH is unusual among our friends and family as most fathers have at least one week day where they look after their kids. Friday playgroup I’m a rare female face among all the dads.

I don’t see this SAHMs are put on a pedestal thing at all IRL

Exactly coyocan a tiny tiny percentage.

The reality is that women are left holding the baby when the relationship is unworkable or the woman is left with all of the responsibility even ''in the relationship'' and if the relationship breaks down then VERY often she's left with significantly more than half of the responsibility and funding significantly more than 50% of the costs of raising a child.

The society which allegedly does not exist is tolerating this and perpetuation this situation.

Fathers/Men (some men, men as a sex) go out there and earn a lot of money with ALL THEIR FREEDOM and then resent the fact that their taxes are directed in part towards mothers left raising the next generation of tax payers on their own.

Women can control their own contraception. It's free and abortion is legal. Nobody has to have a child, it's a choice.

Yes relationships break down but sadly some put more thought into what top to buy than they do deciding to have a chid or if the man is the best father. Many don't even know who the father is

Looking at finances, cost of childcare etc seems an alien concept to many. They just pursue their wants not caring that somebody else has to pick up the costs.

It's not superior to be kept by a man rather than the state, it just costs the state nothing as long as the household isn't claiming top up benefits.