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.

Upwind - you have neatly explained why I feel about the position of upper/middle-class women in the past. My grandmothers had higher education but no-one expected them either to WOHM or to bear the full burden of domestic chores.

These days, it seems as if nearly all women, however highly educated, have to work very hard indeed. Maybe there have been improvements for some segments of the population - but not for all.

RE the general uselessness of men around the house; it is obviously not that my husband is incapable of locating the hoover or cleaning the loo, but that he does not think it is in anyway important. So, the domestic resposibilities that I take on because my mess/ dirt tolerance is far lower than his. I think much of the domestic pressure is self inflicted, certainly in our house, so if DH ran the world, the house would muddle alone messy and grubby, and no one would iron. He has a point, these things are not important in the scheme of things and life is too short etc. However I personally am happier and calmer in a tidy -ish, clean-ish house. So we compromise, he takes the kids I blitz the house. I dont enjoy house work but I enjoy the results, he hates housework and could care less about the result.

I find more interesting, the pressure we put on ourselves, and the amount men often rely on their partners, to maintain social relationships. In Dh's brave new world there would be no gifts apart from for me, no cards, no thankyous letters etc etc. I got so fed up with doing it as he has a large family, that now he does his brothers' gifts(or doesnt depending on mood) and I do my SILs. When I stop to think about it this is because if I didnt buy gifts and send thank yous to the SILs it would be seen as significant, whereas between his brothers there is far less pressure. There seems to be a general gender difference in the amount women invest in their social network. Having said that I take a huge amount and comfort and support from this social network which I suppose DH does not seem to need as long as he has me.

I do think there's still a lot to achieve for our DDs but I can't get too het up about who does the dishes or puts on the tea.
-domestic violence
-enforced marriage
-pay gap
-lack of good quality affordable child care
-trafficked women and children

This is stuff that really pees me off.

i'm amazed as a man to see that so many women (practicly all on this thread) don't think that there is equality in soceity now.
bit of an eye-opener really. and while i may not agree with the sentimet it's amazing that so many women can still feel marginalised in an equal soceity.

I think the biggest threat to women is other women. I see this ALL the time. For example, my two SILs. One is very career-focused, hated staying at home (as it really wasn't for her), but is working herself into an early grave and her children into therapy. Other SIL stays at home, has ALWAYS wanted to stay at home, never wanted a career. SIL#1 continually attacks her over this, tells her she's wasting her life for not having a career. You don't see men doing the same thing. Thank GOODNESS women don't run all the governments, military etc., because it would be complete carnage.

we should never have been in a posistion where we had to fight for equality.

Anna, I agree, and also think it is in many ways harder for professional men now too. Not only do they have to work, often long hours, but they are also expected to take responsibility for domestic chores and childcare.

Somehow equality for women has meant households must allocate a great deal more time to earning a living - and what is it all for? How many of us have jobs where we can make a genuine contribution to society?

Upwind - I couldn't agree more that the number of hours that households devote to earning a living has increased massively.

We very definitely have taken a decision in this household not to lead that lifestyle. But we are immensely fortunate to have the choice, and to still lead a very comfortable life.

Well done Clara! You have won me over to the view that women are and should remain second class citizens by the force and clarity of your argument. Gosh, if it wasnt for hearing about your sisters in law, I may have continued to think that women are just as capable of "running governments, military etc" and may even bring a welcome new perspective. Silly me! I'm off to make some scones now. I know my place!

that's true clarabella...women can be their own worst enemy.

drying to drink like men, act like men..we can't!

we are different, we have different strenghts & weaknesses.

clarabella - are your SIL not just envious of each other? Both would prob prefer to have time with kids AND some time at work but have had to compromise because of society.

I think we have a long way to go but I think plenty of younger women don't realise this. It becomes much clearer when you become a mother.

And for those people saying women who are not mothers can have it all - I'm not sure that's true either.

I think we don't revere the creating of babies by mothers because that would leave men feeling inadequate. Our bodies are amazing and we should all be in awe of them. Men's bodies can be fun I suppose .

We do - we are the generation that has it ALL:

Full time work (sometimes less pay though)
Look after the kids (most of childcare responsibilities)
Look after the home (bulk of housework)
Bills/money and general family worries to sort out
Looking after our and DPs parents in old age (we know our kids will probably be living the other side of the world when we get old so will end up in a home)

And still expected to be pretty and not too smart.

Great. Thanks alot Ann Oakley

Being a mother is not the hardest job ever. Sorry but it isn't even a job. It's just what you do when you have children. And it certainly isn't any harder than being a father unless you, unlike most feminist campaigners, beleive that only women can parent

We have made 'mothering' into a job because otherwise we feel undervalued. If you have spent 20 yrs building a career and then stop to look after children, it makes it less difficult when we call it a 'job', we read how-to manuals and angst over every nappy change and developmental stage. And we want our hapless infants to do things better/quicker than everyone else's and god forbid if the teacher doesn't recognise his/her genius! If being a parent is really all that hard it's because we've made it hard. No-one thinks they are good enough unless they are following some parenting-creed or movement or spending a fortune on baby accessories.

And FWIW I don't beleive that Emily Pankhurt for eg took her stand in order to make life 'easier' for anyone. She wanted us to have choices and chances denied to us simply because we lacked that vital thing, a penis!
What women chose to do with those chances is up to them.

no, being a mother isn't the hardest job in the world, but when you've been up all night with a crying 6 month old, and in the morning you have to get ready for a full days work (dropping baby off at nursery first) it's exhausting!

i know women have always worked, but not as many as now, and i doubt many women with babies worked.

Nothing clever or interesting to add just wanted to say I agree absolutely with Upwind. Our generation is obsessed with having a certain standard of living which generally requires both parents to work and run homes, and are we any happier as a result ?

Poor women with babies did work. I listened to a fascinating programme on Radio 4 about an old mill and they had breastfeeding holes cut out in the wooden wall so that someone from the house could bring the baby to the mill for the mother to feed it. Apparently they worked right up to the birth and were often back within 48 hours afterwards.

I try to think of this when I feel hard done by.

I don't agree that being a mother is the hardest job ever, but for the rest I completely disagree with OrmIrian.

I look at all the mothers around me every day, and the totally different ways they parent - and lots of them are truly abysmal parents, frankly, because they are on automatic pilot and haven't thought about how to bring up their children. They repeat the mistakes of the past/their own parents unwittingly and make horrid mistakes.

I think mothering/fathering/parenting consciously is quite a lot of hard work, to be honest. And the difference between even average parenting and really good parenting can make massive tangible differences. We have just had DSS2's first term report from secondary school. It was massively much better than DSS1's first term report at secondary school. And it can all be attributed to better parenting.

Poor women have always worked. My Great Aunt used to have her baby taken to the cafe she worked at so she could breastfeed him. That was in the 1920s.

Really anna?

I look around me and am amazed at how well most people bring up their DC. What kind, considerate and generally decent sorts their children turn out to be. They might not be going to set the world alight but they will be good friends, spouses, neighbours, parents, good human beings in short. Not because they parented 'consciously' but because they treated their children with respect and love and did the best they could. And I intend to repeat great big chunks of the things my parents did with me and my DB because I happen to think they did pretty well.

yes but the difference now is most women work...so over the years more and more women have actually taken on more & more..parenting and working outside the home....that to me is not equality.

equality is being able to vote,
being paid the same as a man for doing the same job,
being allowed to have a bank account, ... etc

And do you also disagree that feminism is not all about making life easier? Washing machines make life easier. Cars make life easier. Feminism was trying to do a little more than that I think.

OI - then maybe it just depends where you live.

But given that there are huge issues with underachievement and delinquency in much of the Western world, in all classes and segments of society, I don't think parenting is as easy as all that.