Mumsnet in Sunday Times

[Xenia]

I cannot link because of the firewall but saw a reference to mumsnet - article about left wing people who send children to private schools.

one couple they referred to broke up their marriage because they could not agree on state or private schooling.

(When is it right to put family ahead of principle?

www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/news/focus/article1101910.ece )

Another point - many have talked about the importance of encouraging dcs into jobs where they can earn a lot and be financially secure, and this is often thought to therefore rule out a number of areas. But times are changing massively and to anyone with young children esp young daughters, I think the outlook looks much more positive than we enjoyed. Telecommuting has already made a huge mark on the working world - personally, I do a range of high status, reasonab;y well-paid work from home, communicating by email/teleconferencing rather than in person. I choose to teach part time, in the flesh, because I enjoy the social contact, but if I wished i could earn about the same teaching virtually.

Clearly, virtual midwives won't feature! but in many areas that have traditionally required a 9-5 in the office, these jobs are now available to work at least part-time from home and as the technology improves, that will free up our opportunities to work longer and in more types of jobs, in our own homes, avoiding the need for as much or any childcare and causing far less disruption to family life. People will be enabled to live where they like rather than within commuting distance; to shop locally rather than in out-of-town shopping centres with millions of other people doing the same on rainy Saturdays...generally a return, in some ways, almost to a pre-industrial way of life.

And as so much of what causes financial stress for 'ordinary' families these days are due to a) housing costs and b) childcare costs, the ability to live anywhere and reduce/remove childcare costs will enable people to live far more cheaply. Plus the revival of local high streets as people are able to frequent them again will allow people who work in face-to-face jobs like hairdressing or restaurants to work locally and avoid commutes too.

Also, thinking about it, reluctantly, i think ssd has a point and it is Xenia's personal experience of life that informs her opinions - namely the fact that she is a single mother with responsibility for providing for her children. I think in all the couples I know, both parents share responsibility for their kids and whilst the exact chores - whether they be earning ££ or cleaning the loo or playing with the kids - are not allotted on an exactly 50/50 basis because that is not usually practical and does not match the strengths/interests/likes/dislikes of the individuals concerned, the decision IS taken jointly and it is an equal partnership.

I daresay in our parents' day, there were plenty of women who got no say in the decisions (and probably some men too), women who were given 'spending' money, not allowed to work etc. But decisions about who works, how much money that will bring in, etc are taken jointly now by every couple I know.

From Xenia's perspective, being that much older and not within that kind of relationship, I can understand that she might imagine that women at home with children have been forced to be there and are 'servile' - because she would only have consented to that under duress!

But I hope I can put her mind at rest and assure her that actually, many women and not a few men actively choose to enjoy precious time with their children whilst they are young over having a 'top' career - and feel thankful every day for that choice.

I think Xenia is at least a decade older than wordfactory.

Time has also moved on, in respect that,there are no longer so many full time SAHMs.It looks like there on MN,but MN is not representative in that respect.How many full time SAHMs do we know in RL?Or have been in the last 10 years?I personally know virtually none.
So Xenias worry that there are vast numbers of SAHMs who are therefore likely to have mental health issues in her opinion, who are then doing damage to their own childrens early years mental growth,is way off the mark.

The bottom line is women earn a lot less than men all over the planet and are not in positions of power. That needs to be sorted out. Of course some men and women will never earn much and some will prefer caring roles but we still need women to make strides. In Tunisia they are going backwards. If we are not careful we will lose gains made. Even the new Saudi elections which may allow women to vote are a few years away.

Every flexi worker and part timer and every women working part time whilst her husband earns the big bucks makes the position of her daughters and other women at work all the harder.

The bottom line is that we all have one life to fill in the way that makes us, and our loved ones, happiest. Yes, I do feel a responsibility to other women (and men) generally, but am not convinced that it is my responsibility to earn as much as I can because if I don't some man somewhere might think that another woman couldn't hack the top jobs. If I am being forced by feminism to do a job I don't want to do, in what way is that better than being forced by a patriarchal society to do a job I don't want to do? It's just a slightly more gilded cage, as I said earlier.

Feminism should be about women's right to choose, and that includes the choice to work less hours if they wish. It should also be about men's right to choose to work less hours too. I agree with you 100%, Xenia, that women who want the jobs you aspire to for your daughters should be able to get them as easily as any men - but that is only part of the story.

I also want a word where people who don't want top jobs are respected for their contribution, where caring jobs are vlued for the contributions they make, not dismissed as men and Xenia have done for centuries. I want a world where men and women who work can take pride in their labour, whether they are midwives or artists, politicians or lawyers.

I think that women who are in positions of power could do far more for women in general- Margaret Thatcher didn't do anything.
I can't see why me working part time and my DH working full time makes it harder for other women-it merely shows that you can choose. Sadly I don't think that women do get the choice these days-they mostly have to work, even when they don't want to.
What sense is there in DH staying at home, and climbing the wall, and me going to work, entirely miserable, because I want to be at home? A couple are a unit-how they want to arrange to earn money is entirely up to them.
I only have DSs, but I think that I am a great role model. They have seen that DH turns his hand to anything-and so do I and they don't have the hang up about roles that Xenia happens to have.
I find their friends very refreshing too. Young women can do anything these days-and do.
What, personally, are you doing to help women in Tunisia?
Any positions of power mean giving up a lot of personal freedom-I admire those willing to do it-but it is not for me.

"Every part-timer etc etc ... makes the position of her daughters and other women at work all the harder."

Nonsense Xenia - maybe they bring the gradual acceptance of flexible, part-time and family friendly working just a little closer for us all ?

As B&B says perhaps it promotes women's right to choice in life which is what feminism should be about.

It might bring it closer to men too.
The world is changing, there is no career for life, people can have changes of direction, flexi time is more common, so is working from home. Many people don't work out what they want when they are 18yrs but they can do it later. They can work up the corporate ladder and then decide to get off, open a restaurant, make pots do whatever they like. I know a very successful lawyer who now owns a boat and does upmarket charters around the Med - his wife sails the boat and he cooks the meals - life is just as they want it.
I think that you need to get out if the narrow box- unless it suits you and then don't assume that it is desirable for everyone.

exotic, that is precisely the point that I made earlier, that the world is changing and you need to be adaptable, and try to think of the implications of your choices. No-one has a crystal ball, but you can see that opening a restaurant/beoming a midwife/mime artist etc may be very satifying but is also extermely hard work and unsocial hours and not well paid. By all means make that choice -i am not suggesting oterhwise, but understand that it will restrict your options in other ways.

Xenia, the thing I think you really don't grasp is that some women like spending time with their children. They prefer to look after their own children rather than handing them over to someone else to look after. And they're prepared to make sacrifices to their own career to do that.

But it's not something you did, and you seem to have made that decision without a moment's hesitation. Until you realise that very many women are different from you, and that they don't want what you have, you'll never do anything towards achieving liberation or equality for women.

Most adults, male and female, enjoy being with their chdilren. I adore mine. I have had loads over many years and have spent more time with them than just about any mumsnetter as I am in year 28 of being a parent. I get the mum snet trophy for most contact time with children I suppose.
However most of us want that to be part of a balanced working life and just a few hours a day. that is the best balance as I am sure many men (and a lot of women) would agree.

Xenia,if the trophy means so much to you I will give you the trophy.
But I do ask one thing,that you do not forget or run down foster mums on MN who spend zillions of more hours with kids when some will not be their own.

The second paragraph is rubbish.

Xenia I don't think you have a clue as to how you come across to people, your constant bragging is awful and the way you look down on people is very unpleasant. You always choose controversial and interesting topics but you only ever seem to have one very self serving view.
You claim to be a feminist while criticising and belittling other women.

We can easily afford to send my DC's to private school and we choose not too. We have also never paid for any extra tuition or bribed my DC's to work hard, they do it because they want to. DC1 is studying medicine. The other two are doing equally well.

I have three DC's, average private school costs are [[http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/9228953/Private-education-what-price-excellence.htmlmultiplying.a. multiply that by the number of school years, I make that over half a million pounds we have saved! DH (yes, Xenia I have 'married up' ) is on 50% tax so that's a cool million we have saved. According to you we are not good parents. .....really, how can you write such crap.

I know from other threads that you had an acrimonious divorce and I wonder if this has made you less tolerant of other peoples beliefs and feelings.

I would love it if you mentioned to the next nurse you come into contact with that you think her career choice is tantamount to failure .

Sorry for link fail.

Meant to say that average private school costs are 14k p.a. here

I would love it if you mentioned to the next nurse you come into contact with that you think her career choice is tantamount to failure

I would also like you to answer my question -which is along the same lines.

So women who let others look after their own children don't like spending time with them, eh hackmum?
It's a great pity that in this day and age we are still having to listen to outdated crap like this.

Xenia, I know you're getting a bit of a bashing here, but sorry, there's just one more thing I need to respond to

you wrote
"Every flexi worker and part timer and every women working part time whilst her husband earns the big bucks"

you have a fantasy going on in your head which involves a woman married to a guy earning big bucks and having a nice cosy part time job, which her husbands big bucks enables her to have, and her living in a priviledged bubble whilst crushing any career hopes she ever had

life for most of us isn't like that out in the real world beyond mumsnet with its high earners with cleaners and nannies and ocado deliveries

most women I know aren't married to a high earner, they are with plumbers/butchers/bus drivers/guys working shifts etc etc...and the women work part time hours around their dh's job, depending on the childcare they can cobble together and if they can actually find a job

...they work together with their dh's, they dont live subservient lives, spending their dh's big bucks and crying into their gin at night over their lost lives...they are too busy making ends meet

Karlos, there are only a finite amount of hours in the day and unless you work as a childminder, then by definition the hours you are at work you are not with your children.There is nothing morally wrong with choosing either option, but it is silly to pretend that choosing to spend time chasing a high powered job does not mean also choosing less time with your kids. Unless your job involves inventing time, that's just a fact.

You can do that, and still like spending time with your children.
In fact, having time apart means you appreciate time together all the more, which personally I think is a lot healthier than spending all your time on parenting, for both parents and children.

I think that you do what suits you. I liked spending all my time with them when they were little - it wouldn't suit everyone. It is not superior, it is not inferior either- just personal choice.

I would still like an answer from Xenia. If you are dying and have the money to have a team of carers in your own home would you not rather have dedicated, intelligent women who have chosen it as a career even though they could have had other choices, more acceptable to you? The same if you were in hospital or a hospice?
Would you be quite happy for them to be looking after you because they couldn't do anything else, they were unintelligent, couldn't talk to you on an equal basis, or they were just earning money as a student? Would you be happy to have a man doing all these intimate things to you as carer ' because women shouldn't get left with with the caring roles'?

Since I have asked twice before, and you haven't answered, I suspect that you would want the very best that money could buy and yet still despise them for not aiming for surgeon and think they were 'making the position of their daughters and other women at work harder'- ignoring the fact that if they all followed your instructions you wouldn't be able to get quality care, however much money you had.

Obviously I gree with KKK and women of all cultures and at all times (and of cvourse 99.9% of men) go for that too. Evemn when they don't work Victorian women had servants for childcare. Roman women used slaves. Childcare 24/7 is low grade housework. Most of us adore playing with our children and a few hours a day is the best compriomise and a lovely well paid career.

If I were dying what am I being asked? I have said load of people don't have the IQ or work ethic or inclination to be at the top of anything so of course lots of men and women will have low paid jobs any of us could do.

I have never every said I despise anyone and it is fascinataing the views being put on to me presumably because housewives feel inferior. They probably need therapy. I respect all people. However I encourage girls to get out there, exceed men, succeed, earn a fortune and pick work you adore. It is by far the better life and mix. I also know that the average wage is £20k or so so most couples are not woman like I am not working living on pay of £200k a year man. Although a good few do that including on mumsnet. Of course I know that most men and women work because they choose not to be on benefits.

Why woudl I despite someone who cares for me when I'm dying? Despise is totally the wrong word. I respect people who work rather than don't work although morally you can make out a position that if the stae pays you to do nothing and if you think children syhoudl be with parents 24/7 then the best moral choice for a man and his wife is never to work and be with the chidlren 24/7. that is the logical extreme of attachment parenting and should be applied to mother and father. If mummy woudl be bad if she worked then so is daddy and if mummy shoudl be one to one with baby then when baby 2 comes along daddy shoudl give up work too and live off the state's beneficence.

The motivations behind why people work would not affect my views on who cared for me when dying. People work for all kinds of reasons. However I have never accepted that a leading female surgeon was any worse than a minimum wage NHS carer of the dying. There is no extra halo you get if you accept low pay as a woman. It's more - more fool you, someone else will get the higher paid job, probably a man and your chidlren won't tahnk you that you picked low paid work.

It isn't often words fail me, but they do in this case.
Thanks for at least replying.

Sorry but I didn't see any posts claiming you despise people but you clearly look down on other women.

You said
yes i would regard nursing as very low pay and tantatmouint to failure

This shows what a patronising and condersenending person you are and how you truly have no idea as to how you come across to other people. The fact you think people disagree with you because they feel like inferior housewives is laughable. They disagree with you because you talk a lot of nasty rubbish.

The general idea that girls should be equally encouraged to do their best and not to limit their aspirations is, of course, 100% correct but to continually insult women that are in low paid jobs is tedious, insulting and belittling. I don't understand how you can't see that.

Xenia, I doubt that you could do my job well. Just as I couldn't do yours. That doesn't make either of us worse people, just different, and just as important.

I'm not in the least jealous of you, I actually pity you. Its very sad that all your drive, qualifications and money can't make up for a lack of empathy and likability.