Toby Young - women don't want most childcare either

[Xenia]

Toby Young in today's Sunday Telegraph magazine Stella argues men do not want even more boring mindless childcare. Well nor do women. So the answer is have good careers as women and then you can avoid that dullness. It is not a gender issue. Clearing up sick is as boring for women as men. Lower earners may well be shunted into that dull stuff and to keep the higher earner man they have to do it but Mr Young needs to know plenty of women don't want to do more childcare either. I always thought two hours a day was pretty good including weekends. Too much more and you'd rather be doing other things.

It seems there is a theme here of women without partners urging other women to not do the boring bits of motherhood.

Which ironically ends up with other women on the whole doing it, with the men doing absolutely nothing at all.

Xenia is anything but bitter, judging by her posts here

I don't think that Xenia is bitter- I can't see why she would be- she has the life she wants. Her only problem is thinking it is so good that everyone would want it, when some of us would hate it. She lets it spoil her message, which is basically quite a good one and if she could phrase it differently I could agree with much if it.

On a different tack I don't think that small DCs are interested in material possessions- the one thing they want from parents is time- just time- and not quality time where they are sandwiched into a busy schedule. The bizarre report that some DCs of the rich are having elocution lessons wouldn't be necessary if they were spending a lot of time talking to the parents.

"[Xenia] has the life she wants."

No, I don't think she does, if you read all her posts going back years.
But I am fed up with contributing to Xenia's hijacking so will contribute no more.

I seem to be happy and healthy. As that is so I like to spread the word to other people as to how to achieve that and I do by the way write about what achieves that including eating and sunshine and things which cost nothing.

I do have the life I want. Now the years of my parents being ill and dying etc are over and the children easier and older it seems if life could continue as now forever I would be very lucky indeed.

I am just as happy to write about how you can seek to balance seratonin levels in your brain as women working.

I don't think young children are interested in material possessions either. Most full time working parents give their children time in just the right balance. We all work a balance which suits us. Obviously women who earn a lot and pay someone else to clean for them and do the washing and perhaps earn in an hour the weekly minimum wage which I think I do ensure they have much more time for their children than women in minimum wage jobs or for whom becoming a teaching assistant is the pinnacle of their low paid career aspirations.

I never like the word bitter. It is like driven and other words often used only against men and women who are sexist. It is never applied to men. A man who works hard is admired. A woman who works hard is like a witch circa 1500s whom people want to burn at the stake because she actually earns her own living and is a threat to women who think women should depend on men for money and men who want all women kept at home. It is one of those words mostly applied to women

So now teaching assistants lack ambition? Or what is your point?

You are happy in your life, a teaching assistant may be happy in hers, but because her life doesnt involve large sums of money it is looked down on by you.

I am trying to get it Xenia. And I do, to a point, but then you make a nasty comment about a low earning woman and I begin to wonder if your view of women isnt actually worse than a mans view.

It seems there is a theme here of women without partners urging other women to not do the boring bits of motherhood

Actually if you don't have a partner, you do all the boring bits. And all the fun bits. And basically everything .

Xenia.
Sigh.
A woman can work hard and not get paid you know.
I think I work hard.
I am a sahm of 2 young dc,one of whom has sen, care for a frail parent and I do voluntary work.
But, as far as you are concerned what I do has no value or point because I dont get paid for it?
How twisted is that? His sad that you (and many others) feel that way.

...oh and my dh works away at times too so I do it alone at those times.
I guess I could set up my own little sweatshop for myself and work through the nights....

health is a matter of luck Xenia.

I don't think there is anything wrong with someone being a TA - after all - schools need TAs.

but what is very wrong, is that most low paid jobs, like being a TA are performed by women. for this to change, more women need to aim for higher paying jobs. and if needs to be more acceptable for men to earn less and perform more caring.

A teaching assistant is the ideal job for some lifestyles. They just work the hours you are payed for, they get breaks, many get home at lunchtimes to walk the dog, they often don't do the full school day, they don't take work home, they have the school holidays- they get low pay but it is a trade off and worth it to many, especially as the work is varied and interesting. Lots of teachers work as teaching assistants to get rid of the workload, I certainly know solicitors etc who take time out as a teaching assistant because it gives them the family life they want.
As a SAHM I did lots of voluntary work - you don't get paid but apart from that it is challenging and interesting.
It is sad when worth and success are just measured in terms of money.

A teaching assistant is the ideal job for some lifestyles

but why is it not the ideal job for more men's lifestyles? why only women's?

Only the couple can answer that. In my case it would be because I would be the one who wanted time to do other things and walk the dog etc. I can't speak for others.

I personally think Xenia should stop considering herself a feminist since she appears to spend so much time belittling other women's life choices. Whatever happened to the sisterhood?!
There is gender bias in the world and many men are considered weird if they want to go into more caring/nurturing roles, which is weird considering there was a time when make teachers were held in higher regard than their female counterparts. Heaven forbid a man should want to be "just" a nurse and not a doctor, but in Xenia-land nobody should want to be "just" a nurse.
After taking almost 4 years to be a SAHM with my 2 DCs (most of which time I felt that I should be making excuses for not having gone back to work, even though I studied for a degree and then worked part time during those years) I am making a career change and becoming a maternity support worker with the view to entering midwifery once both children are at school full time. This is my ambition. Is it lacking? Should I want more? No, it isn't and I don't. I want a career that feels worthwhile, yes a good wage would be nice, but I want to come home from work and tell my children what I have done that day. I wish to do this with a sense of pride, something I would not have had if I had stayed in Logistics (I was a well paid transport planner before I did my degree but the utter mind numbing boringness and lack of any sense of achievement left me a bit dead inside).
Worth is measured by each individual in a completely different manner, and what I am worth is more than money will show, thank you very much.

andie - I am not commenting on an individual's choice of work life balance...

...but it does seem odd that overall women make one set of choices and men another.

.... and that women's choices leave them doing lower paid work.

agree with you fasterstronger.

Being a TA is obviously an important role. But it's going to be hard to be the main breadwinner on a TA salary and you just don't know what's round the corner. I see women of my age whose husbands are leaving them and they didn't prioritise their careers, probably quite rightly for them at the time they made the decision, and now they are left utterly stuck with children to support, a house to maintain, and very little income.

I think there is a point for women in thinking about this that goes beyond the immediate pressure of childcare. It's also about the future that you cannot predict. My friends who gave up work to care for DCs - some are ok but some are completely stuffed as a result of divorce or bereavement. I'm in my 40s so I am seeing this a lot at the moment. Ten years ago no one I knew was in this position - now a number of close friends are.

And it's perfectly in line with feminism to raise this flag. Yes women have choices and all their choices are valid, but some of them may leave you with much less choice in future if things don't work out as you planned.

The way society talks about lone parents of different genders is depressingly telling.

My male cousin was 'saddled with the kids' after his divorce.

His ex wife is labelled a bitch for never having done any housework, cooking or cleaning. It got to the the point the girls missed days of school because they didn't have uniform to wear. They slept in the parents room because they didn't have sheets on the bed etc. So yes, she was a neglectful and nasty piece of work but to hear my family talk he is to be pitied because he was being neglected as well. No one likes it when I point out that he is equally responsible for the children's well being and should have stepped in to sort it.

After the divorce he did finally step up to his responsibility and take the girls and raise them (he does the best he can and I cannot fault him) but to hear everyone go on about it you would think no one had ever been left a lone parent with little or no support from the other parent. He is lionized and praised to the heavens in a way single mothers never are. In fact single mother's are more often vilified than lionized.

Sorry about the last post - think I missed the final page when reading the thread and now it is an entirely random post!
It made sense somewhere after page 7 or 8 I think......sorry

made sense to me thinkaboutittomorrow!

It is not random Think. It's at the heart of the thread and feminism - that men expect women to clear up after them as virtual servants and that if they work just a few hours a day for pin money and women are conditioned to think it's wonderful if their highest aim is the lowest paid of the lowest jobs leaving men to be the ones who own the logistics company ... although I laughed at that reference because it is that famous female logistics company owner who I think is on the Apprentice. There does not have to be anything dull about owning a logistics company, nor about being one of the many Heads on over £100k in the press today in the state schools who perhaps like their work as much as being a teaching assistant on 6 hours a day in term time only at £6 an hour.

Very odd that women choose careers which are low paid and men don't, that women end up shunted into TY's kitchen keeping the children quiet whilst the great man writes rather than vice versa.

I am sitting here doing some work for a wonderful lady who has built up a business in a male sector and good for her. Women are doing very well andthe more their consciousness is raised so they understand being home and earning little is not fun and not a wise choice and does not even benefit children a lot of the time the better. If these threads achieve that purpose they are worth having.

Surely though there is a bit of a problem with the way we value work?

It's hardly new to point out that 'women's work' is massively undervalued. 'Cooks' are female and low paid, when it becomes a male job it is a 'chef' and can be quite highly paid. The value isn't really all that intrinsic to the task (both involve preparing food) but to the perceived skill level. It amazes (and distresses) me how men have turned a 'female' task into an art form and managed to make it a 'macho industry'.

Also as many posters have said the value and importance to society of child rearing is not the same as hoovering. In countries where it is fully appreciated nursery nursing it is a job requiring a degree in child psychology and men enter it as a career far more than they do in the UK

women in minimum wage jobs or for whom becoming a teaching assistant is the pinnacle of their low paid career aspirations

Oh, dear lord. Any good points that you try to make, xenia, are completely undermined by statements like that. I worked fucking hard to get my qualifications and to get my job but it doesn't pay much at all.

There is no actual way for all women who want to work f/t to be either a) solicitors, b) consultants, or c) entrepreneurs, for example. The world doesn't work like that.

You genuinely don't live in the real world if you think that hard work alone is going to get you into a high-paid career. The number of careers/jobs that pay over even £50k a year is a tiny minority.

By all means encourage women to do what they want, especially in relation to work v childcare and challenging traditional stereotypes. Stop doing it by slagging off every women who is too 'lazy' or 'unambitious' to earn over £100k a year. Try getting your head out of the sand and see what the real world is actually like.

Ha! I earnt £100 per hour in the late 80s doing freelance systems work. I now earn £8.70 per hour as a TA. Which do I prefer? TA of course! A job with meaning and satisfaction as opposed to working 24 hours a day tinkering with 'important' and 'urgent' code that no one in the real world actually cared about. (Apologies to current IT workers and to DP who is still in the field, it wasn't always bad). Xenia you should be damning the situations where women don't have choices not damning the choices that they make. I know this is alien to you but money isn't everything. I had the choice of returning to IT after choosing to be a full time SAHM for 10 years, but I chose a brilliant job that was perfect for me. Sometimes I feel sorry for you not being able to see other people's points of view.

"meaning and satisfaction" but don't want men want those things as well?