In The Times today: Blind feminism has hurt our children

[twelveyeargap]

Blind feminism has hurt our children

SM - tend to agree.

Perhaps societal cohesion is important too? Not just in terms of incomes, but also attitudes? There isn't a raging fear of strangers, paedophiles etc. in those countries, there's a more homogenised view of what is the right way to go with regards to public behaviour, childcare etc. So less room for doubt, agonising about whether you're doing the right thing, therefore more certainty about life - maybe more certainty for children as well?

Sending my children to daycare is one of the few things I don't feel guilty about

I think the fact that the divide is getting bigger, and will continue to do so means that more and more children will suffer in childhood. But do you know what, i have absolutely no idea what the answer is, and it breaks my heart.

God, I advise every young person I meet to flee the country as soon as they can.

Exactly. I don't think it's the daycare that does it. I think it's the poverty, the paucity of humanity in the home and wider environment, lack of value placed on children, the wider education system etc etc. the point about polarity between rich and poor is very very interesting.

caligual you just said what I wanted to say

I'm under no illusions that mine will stay here, Caligula .

even really simple things like pay as you go taxation on cars will punish those worse off and will deepen the divide.

Yes I still shudder at one son getting lost and distressed at the one o'clock club while i was obliviously chatting with a friend. And trying to settle them both into a shit playgroup with nasty staff because i didn't trust my instincts that it wasn't good enough was a big mistake. And more recent stuff i have got wrong wrong wrong sometimes too. But i honestly think that on the whole they have a nice enough life. And I was in day care from 3 months and I honestly think I'm well adjusted enough too, apart from my binge drinking when with mumsnetters habit. I think it's all ok because me and mine basically have a lucky enough loving enough fun enough interesting enough time. Life is much less fun for others and that's little to do with daycare and parenting mistakes per se, imo.

but crappy stuff happens to us all and effects our kids but there is balance for most of us, there is some form of security, normality, loving home environment. You only have to watch the news to see how many children simply don't have any balance, some of the south london housing estates that Aloha talks of are like another world they are so far removed from anything that most of us consider to be normal. yet there are people on these estates desperately trying to break the pattern, they bring their kids up with the same love and hopes and dreams but within the environment of violence which exists on those estates it is practically impossible for the kids not to become involved to some degree.

I wholeheartedly agree with oliver james in this article. now off to read rest of thread.

blu. whether children are left in group care or one on one (or two or three but the caregiverremains the same) is not minutiae

No...I didn't say it was. i was saying that we are not afraid to face up to the things we get wrong, and that, in fact, we all seem to spend hours worrying about even the minutiae in order to make our children as happy as possible - rather than simply leaving them in pens with strangers and walzting off in search of affluence and wimmin-ness.

I just don't read that article in that way. he is arguing for parents isn't he? strongly imo. the thing he is giving a kicking is a government policy that makes it almost impossible for most parents to share the care of their children until they are 36 months old or so....which study after study after study shows as the ideal. He is not knocking people that can't achieve the ideal he is kicking governments for making it nearly impossible to do so, and society for utterly devaluing parenting in favour of economy building via working outside the home.

yes, that's how I read it sophable- and agree with him.

hi jimjams

I don't think anyone is arguing against the 'gvt kicking' bit...it's the other bits and the way he does it that is being questioned. My comments were in relation to something Aloha said, not directly to the article.

I hate the internet sometimes...you know my tone of voice is smiling and in conversation with you not having a go don't you? it is!

sorry if i misread, or didn't read closely enough.

i disagree about the 'other bits': i don't see them....

have i missed something? but i find

"Oliver James is a prat anyway, but what lovely comments from retards his piece has attached. "

incredibly offensive.

i haven't even read the article yet as this bugged me before i could click it

I think, as has been said below, that this article is mostly about Oliver James trying to sell his book about a made up condition, which seems to be in essense a massive projection of his own worst faults onto a whole section of the British population. I can't think how a fame hungry person of distinctive appearance such as he who is not short of a bob or two has the gall to come up with this affluenza thesis, tbh. Unless it is a work of overt self analysis in which case i applaud his insight but wish he had kept it for private consumption, not least to prevent a relapse of his affluenza.

Soph - yes

I think whether you see "other bits" there depends on whether you like OJ or not.

how on earth is it 'mostly' about that? it is one sentence! and i agree that is irritating, although i'm not sure I entirely disagree with his hypothesis.

i don't really have an opinion on him as a person, have never seen or heard him interviewed...but i think 'they fuck you up' is a great book and very very well referenced.

and he seems to be a lone voice arguing from a psychotherapeutic point of view, not on the massive short sharp fix CBT bandwagon and for this I commend him.

Mamazon: possibly you misunderstood. I was not referring to any MNers as retards (whatever I might think and indeed say about certain MNers on occasion) but, having read the OJ piece and the comments from other people (readers of Times Online rather than MNers though boviously there may be a crossover) the first two or three were/are complete retards. The "put women back in the home, feminism is a failure, women need to know their limits" sort of retards. FYI.