To think that all those generations of women who battled for equality for women have actually achieved nothing!

[flixx]

All that has changed is that women are now expected to go out and work and well as still being souly responsible for the vast majority of domestic stuff and childcare.

Womens lives aren't better or easier, infact they are now so complicated that half of us are so stressed and knackered we don't even remember who we are anymore.

The role of a mother is less valued by society than it has ever been when we all know that it truely is THE hardest job ever.

Lol i see

I do believe we have come a long way. In the UK, equality aside, we now all (for the most part at least) have a free choice in what we do with our lives.

Open to all:

Free Education til 18
Financial assistance or loans for FE
Contraception
Any career
Benefits
Divorce ( or right to leave)
Sexual orientation
Own free choice of partner (realise there are sadly exceptions to this)
Right to earn (and keep) own money.
Bank accounts ( some restrictions but on income not sex)

There is no comparison to 100 years or so ago. We can CHOOSE if we want to work, or want to stay at home (finances permitting). We can choose who we want to marry and leave them without stigma if things don't work out.

I agree things are still not fully equal, but I don't agree that you CAN or should even WANT to have it all. There are only so many hours in the day. If someone wants to have children and have a career break, or if someone wants to have flexible working to help fit in with family life, then that is fine - and these choices should be available to BOTH parents (things are getting there though).

But we seem to have got into a scenario where we are all expected to aspire to be MD as well, otherwise we are "letting the side down". If this is what you want, then great, but I really don't think that can be achieved without a lot of paid help and something eg family life has to give.

Agree Fattipuffs

I would say it is "usually the woman's" career that takes a back seat because men are still paid more for the same job as women, in many instances. Also there

Therefore financially it makes more sense for the woman's career to tread water.

Also, DPs and DHs who are now in their 30's and 40's - were on the whole brought up at a time (in the 60s and 70s) when there weren't as many working mums as there are now, nor as many careers for women. Women got married younger and had DCs younger, divorce was a lot more rare and women were more reliant on men for money. So some of these boys who are now are DP's/DH's (and also our bosses and collegues) weren't brought up seeing women treated as equal therefore the old attitudes prevail.

I think it will take a good few more generations for the shift to be on a genuinely more equal footing.

As a good example. Women can now take up to 12 months on maternity leave. Men are offered 2 weeks paternity leave (AFAIK). Even accommodating for the fact that women need to recover from the birth, possibly breastfeed etc hence a decent amount of time is and should be offered - clearly it does not encourage or enable men to do more childrearing.

OMG!! ..."who are now OUR DP's", not ARE, good grief.

Pantofino - I think you make some really excellent points about how our society has changed FOR THE BETTER over the last 100 or so years.

Not entirely sure about your last point. Yes, there are some amazingly ambitious women out there - eg Xenia, who aspires to be the top of her chosen field in the UK - and good on her! But tbh I always feel from MN that she is the exception to the rule. Most women (and men) don't aspire to be absolutely top of the game. I see it more as an aspiration to have interesting and fulfulling paid employment. You don't have to be hugely ambitious to achieve that. And I think it's good that achieving it is seen as something that should be available to all.I think it's a really positive step that nowadays girls are seen as worth educating and training up for interesting careers!

'So some of these boys who are now are DP's/DH's (and also our bosses and collegues) weren't brought up seeing women treated as equal therefore the old attitudes prevail.

I think it will take a good few more generations for the shift to be on a genuinely more equal footing.'

You make a really good point here,
ladylou, and it's not just DH's, it's many of us mums too. I suspect my mother was fairly typical of her generation, bringing us up in the 60s/70s. She was an intelligent woman, but hadn't gone on to college (her parents didn't think it was worth it for a girl!). When I was in my teens, she did an OU degree, and she did various small jobs which fitted around school hours, but basically was under employed all her adult life. I'm sure she must have been hugely frustrated at times. But that was how things were - fathers went to work and mothers either stayed home or took a job for pin money. My relationship with my dad was never very close - not bad or anything, but just I suppose I never felt he was as much of a hnads on parent as he could have been.

But so many people were constrained by the roles foisted on them by society. Surely it's far better that these days many of those constraints have fallen away.

yabu

the difference is that women have choices now

the work is not finished there are many areas of the fight for equality that are far from won but we have moved forward and must continue to strive to do so

Absolutely anniemac. We need to get some perspective on this.

Historically, over the hundreds of generations, the proportion of women who don't return to work fairly soon after having a child is very small!

Of course, in the past, many of these jobs would have been low status and low paid.

The good news is that these days women can return to interesting, well paid jobs. A definite step towards equality I'd say....

Agree with that too anniemac!

anniemac, I think that in terms of widely available careers for women, as opposed to just "jobs", this is a relatively recent development in the 200 odd years since the Industrial Revolution.

It was seen as a sign of the lower classes for women to work after marriage and a lot of the work was jobs as opposed to careers. Yes there were some lady doctors, teachers etc - but even those women who had jobs beforehand, were expected to give up working when they married.

The issue is, that now women can have careers they still somehow end up caring the most about the family too, all those minutae details. I do feel that although it's liberating that women can choose to have a career if they want it, there is still more of an expectation on them to carry the can at home with regard to domestic commitments, more so than men.

In the past, women were constrained by it being harder to have a career as opposed to a job, and earn serious money, however they had more time to run a home and bring up children really well.

I do feel there is still a subtle pressure for women in particular, to run a home and bring up children really well, yet in having a career at the same time there simply isn't enough time in the day to do it all.

Sometimes I think that "Having it all" is actually more like "Doing it all" and in a way women have ended up boxed into an even tighter spot than before!

PS How many men really care or remember completely off their own bat regarding a present and card for DC's friend's birthday party next week, and what's more, actually goes and buys it, and what's more than that, actually knows what present to buy?! Remember that the cats need booster jabs? Know that DD has grown out of her school tights and remembers to buy some more, or knows when DS needs new swimming trunks? Sews on (without prompting) swimming badges? Actively arranges play dates for DCs, not just dropping off/collecting duties? Buys and writes a thank you card after a special event? Etc. Etc.

Of course there are some men who do some or all of these regularly - but I would bet it's not 50/50. And those that do are prompted or asked first.

Technofairy - good point re now wanting to swap lives with women of 1908, 1928 etc - but how many women will add "Or 2008" to that list when it's 2048??!?!

We've come a long way - there's a long way to go yet....

NOT wanting, FGS, can't spell tonight!

I agree with the OP. We have all these rights, and all these duties and responsibilities, but they are in ADDITION to being a housewife, and being responsible for the domestic stuff. Most men will just simply not do anything domestic, and they know their wives will do it, due to duty and responsibility.

So, we have achieved additional toils, and lost the courtesy men would bestow upon us, such as opening doors for us if we have our hands full, offering to lift a heavy bag off the conveyor belt in an airport, and just generally expect us to get on with it, while THEY stride on empty handed and without a care.

Maybe male domestic laziness won't disappear an entire generation of people grows up with their parents sharing chores 50/50?

So really, our contribution to Feminism could be to encourage our DHs and DSs to pull their weight around the house, for the sake of our great-great granddaughters. We will be known in future as the Home Guard of the feminist movement. The Mums Army. There'll be a TV series about us.

Flixx, I completely agree with your 17.21 comment, whilst simultaneously agreeing with Miyazaki's 17.23 one too.

It's great that this debate is going on at all...it matters. Women who died for the vote still matter, women who struggle every day to get things done matter too...

Something that surprised me was finding out this week that a man I know has been refused a year's 'maternity' leave to be the primary carer for his child because he is not female... (his partner wnats to be the 'breadwinner' and he wants to be carer - I can't believe this can be legal - because apart from being wrong, surely it forces people into roles that they do not want??!!

I also agree that this IS the hardest job in the world - but would add that it is also THE BEST job in the world.

Littleladylou - yes I agree there is still a long way to go, but it isn't that long ago that my working class male ancestors had much fewer rights than their wealthier counterparts.

But yes, women always had the shitty end of the stick and still do to some extent. But - we're no longer the property of our husbands, we can inherit in our own right, we can leave and end unhappy marriages, we can prosecute violent & abusive husbands or it can now be done for us if we are too scared to press charges, we can work in jobs other than just domestic roles, we are no longer considered to be intellectually inferior to men, we have free access to contraception and if we put our minds to it we can do just about anything we bloody well want.

It all depends on what we mean by equality. My OH never remembers when his Mother's birthday is or when the cat needs a booster jab. I accept that because he's a bloke and is useless at that kind of stuff. They are the things I sort out. Tonight we bought a new washer dryer. He is installing it because I'm useless at that sort of stuff. Same goes for the outside security light and new kitchen tap. That to me is a partnership. We have different skills and strengths and use them accordingly for the benefit of the family. I don't feel unequal because I can't install a washer, light or tap or because I sewed badges on swimming trunks or got a card and gift for his Mum. Get real - what would make me feel really fucking unequal would be having 9 children by the age of 33, living a life of domestic drudgery, and dying of TB at 38, the day before my youngest joined me, because my husband and I were too bloody poor despite working like dogs to have a decent standard of living.

Yes, there are still improvements to be made but my God we've come a bloody long way so far.

thewomen who died for the vote - died for rich women to vote.

poor women can vote becuase men women and children faught for it, died for it - for the Vote for all - not just women, and it devalues THEIR lives to get the story wrong.

The wartime government was forced to reluctantly concede the vote for propertied women over 30 and those women voted for the first time in 1918. The government feared social unrest if they did not make concessions.

Full suffrage wasn?t granted until 1928.

look up peterloo and the disenfranchisement of the poor in the north.

"All that has changed is that women are now expected to go out and work and well as still being souly responsible for the vast majority of domestic stuff and childcare."

it has always been soo - WORKING CLASS PEOPLE HAVE ALWAYS WORKED AND DONE CHILDCARE.

THE CHILDREN WORKED!

somepeople need to read up on the industrial revolution.

custardo, FioFio - I am sure you are right.

The benefits of the feminist revolution and economic progress are probably greater when viewed from a working class perspective (ie those women whose great-grandmothers, grandmothers were poor) than from an upper/middle-class perspective.

Both my grandmothers went through higher education - one to Cambridge University, the other to art school in London. They had lots of opportunities in life, travelled and were very well treated by their husbands. Sometimes I feel a bit of how comparatively easy their lives were (but then I pinch myself because by my age they had lived through 2 world wars and lost many loved ones).