In The Times today: Blind feminism has hurt our children

[twelveyeargap]

Blind feminism has hurt our children

Fox yes it's London! of course, where else.
I plan one day to get an actual job and even insist that DH moves out of London to the dreaded provinces. But he really wants to keep the London work, he's always been ambitious (which bears out a lot of people's points on this thread re. gendering and men not quite getting it, I suppose). With me not earning for a while my ambitions seem like more of a pipedream, so I feel I can't really inhibit his by suggesting he leave his work (just yet...)

bk who is the author of how the dead live?

Beloved is in there- but mostly it's memoirs (Rachel Cusk et al) cos I am trying to focus on newer less-known stuff (less chance someone else already said it all...)Also Michele Roberts and Carolyn Steedman (Landscape for a good woman -really excellent book if you haven't read it. But you will probably cry buckets.)

charlieq i want to read your phd thesis

sorry dissertation, thesis would be the italian word

it's by will self - but don't worry it is really good anyway

good plan to concentrate on the lesser known modern authors. i tend to avoid modern memoirs e.g. rachel cusk.

btw - dh is a university professor so i have seen phd angst at second hand anyway.

good luck

he specialises in post-colonial and holocaust - lots of memoirs actually.

oh fhs! literature! he specialises in post-colonial and holocaust literature!

franca, no, thesis is OK

Aefond's point is good. The other countries he mentions have lots of women in work and loads of childcare and happier children and families but OJ, blinkered misogynist who presumably if he has a wife has her tethered to the kitchen sink using emotional blackmail obviously enjoys blaming women for everything. The univeral wqhipping boy for the last 2000 - 5000 years.

By the way apropos some of the other comments on the thread I have often preferred work to children. I don't mind admitting that after 22 years of children and interesting work. Why can't women and men say that if they want? And I don't see why men and women can't both also feel the opposite. We're human beings, not as gender divided as people like to make us out to be. Interesting I was speaking to a man whose wife left the family and haardly sees the chidlren which is in effect what my children's father has chosen to do. There should be no different in how we view my ex husband and his ex wife but I bet people view that differently. Sexist to the core this country. I will have to move abroad I think.

"Why can't women and men say that if they want? And I don't see why men and women can't both also feel the opposite."

Well I'd agree; if they want. Different strokes for different folks. But you are a statistical anomaly (I don't mean that in a perjorative sense, you probably know you buck a trend or two already) in that most women do choose to care for the children. They wouldn't choose to give up their lives to do so, but take a bit of time while they were young to be there for them. In the past women didn;t have a choice, they were chained to the house for a lifetime. Now if you buck the trend you can be as successful as a man. But if you are battleing against an instinct (which you say wasn't a battle for you) then it is going to be costly psychologically. So vive la choice.

I accept more women than men are wrenched crying from their child or can't leave it at all. in Sweden they found that full time stay at home fathers found leaving a child at nursery for the first time as gut wrenching as stay at home mothers do here; whereas those who had worked since the children were born were just interested in practicalities such as did the creche have good safety procedures etc.

In other words the attachment arises from the care just as if you have a spell at home or with a relative or a foster child or your mother to live with you in old age your attachment to that person grows. I think that's true of parents and children as well and isn't a male/female issuse but that as many more women than men spend the first 6 months full time with a new baby we never get a chance to study the differences between men and women who spend all their time with a child to see if there are differences. From 1 April men can take 6 months paternity leave (I think possibly only after the mother's taken it but not sure) so may be there will be a massive change about to happen but as long a women marry older men who earn more and like that status of "not as good as" a man which feeds his ego as provider and more successful person in the relationship which seems to be the model which suits most couples we won't even then have neutral decisions taken about who stays home.

almost didn't read this cos of 'feminist' bit but i turns out not to have much to do with faminism at all.
I though the biddulph book was v interesting on the subject of early years childcare and its effects on young children, especially the stress tests and the way that very stressed out kids would appear not to be. he also said that northern european countries now hardly use nursery care for their v young children, which is not the impression lots of people here seem to have.
one thing oliver whatisname has got right for our area at least is the waste of money sure start nurseries have been. our area has lots of empty buildings, beautiful, really nice spaces but, to generalise, working class parents don't want to put their kids in them. maybe it's just economics, I don't know, but that money could have been better spent on paying those mums to stay at home and provide one to one care for their kids.

Xenia, maybe the point is, no matter if male or female, if you were at home for your child you may have a different kind of connection...not sayin gthat stands completely for sah or working parents...I think, again, on boht side there can be either, the one that finds it hard to let go and the one that is happy too....it's all about personallity, and what the family wants, but that is what it should be...it shouldn't be necessarily what soceity wants, etc....

Mass employment ie going away from one's home and infants to work for pay, is pretty damn recent in human terms, and the nuclear family/50s crap is not only a recent "ideal" but one that barely worked at all, ever!
The current long hours culture is ludicrous, too: on the one hand there are people doing devalued jobs for hours just to make up enough momey to survive, then there are the people a rung or two above spending hours in offices, doing f*all actual work but not daring to be the first to leave, for not very much money either. And it's still the same that work designated as 'women's' gets the least money: childcare workers earn next to nothing, care workers who look after the elderly or the adult disabled earn nothing, and women who don't "work" ie don't get a taxable wage work the longest hours of all. Because if you're an unwaged SAHM, as far as Hubby's concerned it's your job to wipe the bums and shovel the shit and get up in the night 24/7 because he "works".

Oh, and before I forget, a genuine apology. I'm sorry for referring to stupid bigoted people as "retards" and will endeavour to find some more colourful but less actually discriminatory term for stupid bigoted people in future. Honestly, sorry to anyone I upset. That was actually verbally lazy and thoughtless of me.

cheers madamez- appreciated.

hmmm read the article and the OP but not the whole so apoligies if I'm repeating other posters points.

Its plainly untrue that Labour have done nothing to promote flexible working - what about the flexible working legislation of 2003 - soon to be updated. This has enabled me to work and also spend time helping in my children's school (which is what my oldest wanted me to do).

Most women work for economic reasons - and if housing and the cost of living wasn't so bloody expensive then less women would have to work.

I agree childcare is not always adequate - we have the worst and most expensive childcare in Europe (worst re. availability anyway) and I personally agree that children under two are not ready for a nursery environment. But I have used childminders for both of mine since ages 6 and 12 months respectively and hasve two very confident well adjusted children who excel at school, have loads of friends etc. There xcan be lots of benefits to good quality childcare and the article seems to be pushing a dogmatic and bigoted line that women's place is in the kitchen.

Of course working class women have always worked. And rich women have always used wet nurses, nannies and boarding schools.

The difference now of course is WIMMIM have choice (though often not an economic choice).

Feminism is not a dirty word IMHO - look at how women's rights have been transformed regarding equal rights, domestic violence, rape within marriage etc. Now labour is trying to address the pay gap.

And if it wasn't for the labour party - illegally as it happens - getting all those women MPs elected in 1997 through WIMMIM onky shortlists we wouldn't have had some of the legisltaion we're now enjoying.

Agree sure starts have been a bit of a waste though - although individual sure starts have funded some excellent local projects.

ooops WIMMIN only shortlists - not wimmin "onky"

It is a shame men don't have that choice too.
Yes, putting a child in a creche can be stressful. Of course stress is sometimes good for us. I personally think if you can arrange your child to be looked after at home or with a childminder up to age 1 or 2 that's better but I don't think we should criticise fathers and mothers who choose group care. I think we should debate it however.

What I don't like is how all these articles are all about women - women should be at home; women should be at work. They hardly ever criticise men. They never say you're a low earner and your wife works full time - it's disgusting you choose to pay most of your salary in childcare costs - your place is in the home and you're damaging your children Mr Smith for taking the work option.

Totally agree Xenia - I earn 2.5x what DH does so I have to work! When I have this baby, he'll be staying at home, but I'll still have to put up with the crass comments from people!

Oliver James isn't alone. The attached book called the 'two income trap' places the blame for increased house prices on the fact that women work.

I couldn't disagree more with the article, but it reminds me of what women are up against.

\link{http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3079221/THe Two Income Trap}

I hope it adds to the debate.

Oliver James isn't alone. The attached book called the 'two income trap' places the blame for increased house prices on the fact that women work.

I couldn't disagree more with the article, but it reminds me of what women are up against.

The Two Income Trap

Second time lucky?

Xenia, I don't think it's a question of women or men not wanting to work (or not wanting to admit that they would like to work). It's the fact that 'work' often means hardly seeing your family at all and there are plenty of people (male or female) who would like to have a better balance between working and family.

Attachment does arise from care, yes. But women do have, on average, more of an instinct to mother than fathers do to ?mother? if you see what I mean.

Women can?t have their mothering instincts ironed out of them by culture. Some women don?t have a very strong mothering instinct and in this day and age, if you have the resources, you can get others to do that for you. I?m not making a moral judgement there. If a woman doesn?t feel very ?motherly? then the children are probably going to be cared for better by a person who does, even if they are getting paid to do it.

So it?s about as much as a male/female issue as you can get. There aren?t many real divergences between the sexes except when it comes to parental investment.

To think that women will stop finding status and access to resources attractive is missing the point again. Women are still the ones who get pregnant. Think about what we had to do thousands of years ago. A woman is supremely vulnerable during that time and needs protection; and after the infant is born and is dependent on the mother for survival, so to is the mother dependent on the male partner for survival. These things have their residue in our psychologies today. Millions of years of evolution can?t be wiped away but they can be worked with.

Cloudhopper I haven't read your link yet, but women working ft and their income being taken into account by mortgage companies did result in a rise in houseprices, purely and simply because the housing market will expand to what buyers can afford within the constraints of what lenders will lend.

Obviously, the more incomes you have pooled together to buy a house, the higher the house prices can rise. So if you have the phenomenon of 4 friends pooling financial resources to buy a house and en masse, people start buying houses in groups rather than as individuals or couples, then house prices will rise to be geared towards 4 incomes, not 2 (or 1). That's just basic capitalism, isn't it? I don't think it's a question of blaming anyone.

The housing market adjusts to what people can afford. So now that no-one can afford to buy houses at three times one income for a 25 year mortgage period, we have the situation of couples buying at 5 times their joint income over 25 years, 4 friends buying at 3 times their joint income over 25 years, or individuals buying 7 times their income over 50 years. Whatever the buyers are willing to buy and the sellers are willing to sell. (And now we can all buy at 10 times our income over 100 years and pass the mortgage on to our kids. Whoopee do! Anything to keep those prices high, god forbid that the basic cost of housing falls.)

But it's hopeful overall, the UK, the world. The position of women improves all the time. More and more women earn as much as or more than their man which gives them choices.
Most people could if they really wanted to live in a much smaller flat or much cheaper area, economise and have one partner at home if they aren't materialistic. Many people choose and manage that. It would not be my choice but I think the issue on house prices etc is more a question that too many people watch TV programmes which hynotise them into thinking they all have to have this particular life - the affluenza OJ writes about whereas a perfectly morally decent life is clothes from Oxfam and growing your own potatoes in the garden.

But this is nothing to do with men and women as sexist writers make it. It's about men and women's choices which ought to be sexually neutral. Some couples choose that they both work part time where there is that choice. I don't necessarily agree that working long hours is a bad or damaging thing at all but that is a different issue.

When my mother qualified as a teacher in about 1948 it was not long since you had to give up teaching if you married (as a woman) and when women were paid less for exactly the same job as men because they didn't have families to support. She was one of the first women to try to claim the married man's tax allowance (she supported my father through medical school). That is 58 years ago. It took to 1970 to get the Equal Pay Act.