Justine Roberts: When did mum become a dirty word?

[KateMumsnet]

In 2009, I was asked to send a Mumsnet blogger to join the media corps at the G20 summit. I immediately put the nomination to our online audience, who collectively chose one of Mumsnet's finest minds to represent us – a prolific poster who went by the name of Policywonk.

She was a smart cookie – highly educated with a particular interest in climate change. And, by all accounts, she had a high old time at the summit, rushing from one interview with a world leader to the next.

Afterwards, I quizzed her on what it was like. ‘Amazing,’ she confirmed. But there was something a little odd, she noticed. Whenever she introduced herself as a Mumsnet representative to a fellow member of the media corps, they would start speaking very slowly and deliberately. As if she were a child. But she wasn't a child, she was a mum – and that was the problem.

Over the past half-century in this country, women have made astonishing strides along the road to equality. Schoolgirls are more likely than their male contemporaries to apply to university – and to graduate with a first or upper-second-class degree. The gender pay gap has dropped from 45% in 1970, when the Equal Pay Act was introduced, to around 15% today. And feminism, which seemed to lie more or less dormant through the 1990s and 2000s, has reinvented itself for the digital generation via grass-roots projects such as Everyday Sexism and No More Page Three.

It is, in short, pretty much the best time in history to be a woman – until the moment you get pregnant, at which point all bets are off.

Leaving aside for a moment all the examples of real-world discrimination – and there are plenty of them – that women face when they have children, let's just consider what we've done with the word ‘mum’ itself. ‘Mummy’ is the first word in most children's vocabulary and, during their early years, arguably the most important one: its connotations, from our offspring’s point of view, are overwhelmingly positive. What happens, then, when we become mothers ourselves, and look at the word from the other end of the telescope? Why is it, when adults talk to adults, that we use it so negatively?

Read more of Justine's piece for the July issue of Red magazine here.

[bbcessex]

I haven't caught up with this thread lately.. it's a shame that it's taken a bit of a relay-bashing turn.

The original posts were talking about 'mum' being a dirty word. The majority of the posters seem to agree that that's not true - just bad journalism on a slow news day.

For what it's worth - I think being a mum is fabulous. It's being a drudge that is not fabulous. If you can be a SAHP, love it, be happy with it, and not be the chief-cook-and-bottle-washer, then bloody good luck to you.
I think I could very happily be a SAHM if I had staff .

[JaneParker]

We can certainly agree that press articles are just about always about how mothers manage - never men. We remain the root of all evil from what we eat in pregnancy, to our entrapment of man in the garden of Eden. You never see articles interviewing male workers as to how they cope with the guilty of abandoning their child and outsourcing their childhood and saying that men do not bring up their children because they also work. There is a lot of endemic sexism around still.

It is certainly more complex as man or woman to work and raise your family which makes life better and more interesting. So surely ilt's not unfair to say some men and women would not have the ability or capacity to work so hard or even are not physically well enough to manage that and others would. (I am not suggesting staying home is not hard work of course - I regard it as dull unpaid domestic work most of the time of the worst order which most adults seek to avoid - I mean here of course the time we had three under five - if you imagine a typical day with a 3 year old, 1 year old and baby and no cleaner and spouse out of the house 7 - 7pm and you are minding those three plus trying to sort out the house, washing, shopping etc).

I waited to be based from home until there were no small children around. I definkitely prefer my days in total silence with 5000 swuare feet to myself working here. I get much better and more work done than in an office. I chaired a course for a fee for 1.5 days this week in London (which is a bit like being "paid to sit", although I suppose they thought I add some gravitas to it and I did chip in when needed, filled in a spare 30 minutes when someone ended early and did all the introductions). Certainly yesterday working from here was better and I earned more money. In most professions you need to build up 7 - 10 years of experience and contacts before you know enough to work for yourself and in plenty of jobs even then because of the nature of the work (needing your patient on your operating table or appearing in court as a barrister although that is not every day) you cannot do it from home. Mind you many a parent with lots of small children sees leaving for work as a wonderful escape. I still remember now leaving the first gorgeous baby - she was the worst crier and cried literally every night from about 7 - midnight if we were lucky and 2am more often. It obviously passed although I think she is finding her insomnia in her 20s is in a sense a blessing as she is currently working hard. (I hope she has managed to get to her triathlon today which was in the balance due to work)

Right I have done two "nasty" work letters and now updating book stuff....No sign of the teenagers yet. That is the massive difference between sweet gorgeous but very hard work babies and in a few years' time older children.

[Bonsoir]

Retropear - that is indeed the problem with most jobs - long hours away from home. I used to do a lot of writing as part of my job and, while I needed to hole up at home with my computer for the actual act of writing, I spent a great deal of time away from home doing the primary research on the ground that gave me the material to write about. And then I used to spend a week at a time at a university teaching it. So it wasn't family-compatible at all.

[JaneParker]

It certainly sounds as if you have made a great success of writing.
I do agree with you about leaning in/working hard. I wrote 30 books (on my business topic). That was almost entirely about hard work - sitting down and churning out the words and meeting (or almost meeting) the deadlines.

Mind you I am on here rather than starting my first task so I'd better get off and do that. I'm doing the book after 2 work letters (much better pay) and I must do a bill to someone first. Without the bills we starve so I give them priority.

[TheWordFactory]

jane it's true that many writers don't make a good living from their writing.

And the sheer amount of time it takes up is absurd!

That said, when my first book took off, my agent advised me that I could make it work financially if I just leaned in. Which I did.

There are a gazillion writers out there who got a two book deal for jack all and were never heard of again. I was determined that wouldn't be me!

That said, I've recently forayed into Telly writing and that is much better pay, but Lord, the turnarounds are wild!

[Retropear]

Sadly most jobs don't come with an hour a day,based at home,fits found your family option.

Word,no thanks.

[Retropear]

No Jane it's not about not managing but choosing what fits and suits their family best.

[JaneParker]

If I said I worked two hours a day above that is definitely not so. I would describe it as having been at my desk from 6pm to what is now 9.35pm with the breaks to collect and take the boys, mow the grass which yes I do take time off every week or two to do in summer. I don't think it's 2 hours a day that I work. However it's been very planned. I wanted an intellectually satisfying career which is high paid and I can own rather than work for someone else and that has paid off.

I work most days, certainly at least an hour a day even on the 2 weeks we take away as holiday, so that's work over 7 days a week not 5 which suits me very well as I like the work.

I have rather lost the thread of what people are talking about here. Some women cannot manage work and homelife presumably because they cannot bothered ior aren't organised or don't want to or it is against their religious principles to work or their husbands won't let them or they cannot find anyone to employ them or a whole range of reasons. Tomorrow in theory anyway will be getting on with a new edition of one of my books (I am not a writer but I do a bit of that in my subject area) which is late and not well paid so always goes to the bottom of the pile.

Anyone who writes will warn other mothers not to write for money. Most writers earn hardly anything. The few who do are very rare. I pay various writers each month for my publications and in their specialist areas some are not too badly paid but it's still not a great thing to pick if you want a secure career. The women who earn £1000 a day thread we had a while back had good ideas for careers for women who did not want minimum wage jobs.

[TheWordFactory]

Ah bogqueen Mantel must have been paraaphrasing in Giving Up the Ghost.

[TheWordFactory]

Well retro you'll excuse me for not bowing to your knowledge of the writing life here, I'm sure. Let's chat agin when you've written as many books as me. Actually, let's chat again when you've completed one! Or 10k words even!

[TheBogQueen]

"There is no more sombre enemy of good art than the pram in the hall."
Cyril Connolly

[Retropear]

But many wps work just a few hours a week and lead lives very similar to sahp,some are sahp all day and do a shift at night or in the evening,most sahp will be wp at some point.Which is why the belittling of sahp is ridiculous.

[TheWordFactory]

retro I think you're waaaaaay overcomplcating this.

A working parent works. A SAHP doesn't.

A writer is a working parent.

If you're a writer, you're not a SAHP!

It's very very simple ...

[Retropear]

But posters say wp do everything sahp do and work.

Also you are saying what defines a sahp and sorry I think like people they differ.Circumstances differ hugely and they ebb and flow as families grow and mature.

[TheWordFactory]

retro yes peopel write and have another job. They essentailly have two (God love 'em).

But the whole point of being a SAHP is that you don't have a job. If you have a job, you're not a SAHP any longer! So if you wrtie, you're quite simply not a SAHP.

When you're a writer, as opposed to being someone who writes for a hobby, then it's a job and you simply can't do all the things a SAHP would do, even with the best will in thw world. It's not something that just slots in...

[TheWordFactory]

Ha ha bogqueen !

And what was the Hilary Mantel quote? Something along the lines of When a pushchair arrives in the hall, a writing life goes out of the window?

I think because everyone reads, many think they can write. I was probably the same ...

But once you actually start, there is simply no denying the sheer commitment of time and energy and head space it needs to make a good job of it.

For me it has been a wonderful career and has been relatively flexible and family freindly. But it has required a hell of a lot of juggling!

[Retropear]

The bog I have a crumbling,wooden playhouse at the bottom of the garden but no room of my own.Just given my study to dtwin2.

[Retropear]

manage

[Retropear]

But working parents can and do.It's just sahp that couldn't managed it.

Guess what we're all different and I suspect no two sahp are the same.

Yes being a sahp has been best for my family and is at the moment but we could do with a big more cash(we want to do some travelling with the dc). I also think I could just about fit a part time job in if I could find a job that will enable me to do all the things I need to do.You weigh up the benefits and drawbacks of both and evaluate.

I was actually a wp for 4 years in the middle so I know what the impact would be.

[TheBogQueen]

"A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction."

[TheWordFactory]

As for writing as a way to bring in money - well it can! You could be lucky.

I make enough to lose my personal tax allowance, so don't do too badly.

But obviously these things are somehwat out of our control. Most writers make the square route of fuck all. Which must be awful considering the sheer amount of graft that goes into it.

[TheWordFactory]

Well I'm lost now retro.

Upthread you were saying it's much better for your family if you're a SAHP. That you don't do it because it gives you pleasure, but because it's better for all concerned.

Certainly, Bonsoir and morethan have said many times that they think it would be dreadful for their families if they worked...

My point is simply that writing is work. It isn't a hobby, akin to going for walks, or having picnics. It's work and takes up the commensurate time and commitment.

SAHPs who think they can write and carry on as normal are deluding themselves.

[Retropear]

Really!I didn't know that.All sahp are the same with the same families,circumstances,kids,pre-kid jobs and personalities.None want to work.Wow!I thought most sahp work pre kids and will probably work again with kids at some point.

This sahp has been kind of busy the last few years but now has all kids in school and a few hours free each week.

This sahp is looking for a part time job that fits in round her family- Jane's sounds ideal.Or maybe instead of job hunting and working part time I'll look at just focusing on writing,wouldn't bring in any immediate cash or any at all though.

[TheWordFactory]

madrigals yes many writers write and do other jobs and bring up their families...

Tis the nature of the beast.

But that's serious juggling. I mean serious.

And the hwole of point of being a SAHP is that you don't want to juggle! That you think juggling work and family is bad for family life...or that seemed to be the thrust of this thread.

Being a writer is like any other job. Of course you can do it and bring up a family. I have!!!! But if you think having a job is bad for your family, then being a writer is just that.