Let's talk about cognitive dissonance ...

[colditz]

My relationship with my children's father broke up because he lied about money and hit me, and I finally, after many years of misery, refused to tolerate it. But why did I tolerate it for as long as I did when I was miserable?

I believed that children need their parents to stay together and that I would not cope alone. The facts were that children do not need one parent to be abusing the other, and that my life would have been easier without him merrily fucking it up.

The stress caused by the gap between my own personal beliefs and the reality of my situation was causing an uncomfortable feeling, often described as cognitive dissonance.

Is this the reason that people who consider themselves fair minded nevertheless perpetuate an unfair system? Intelligent women who do all the housework and childcare 'because he goes to work' must see the difference between theirs and their husband's exhaustion levels - why do they accept it, and decide that 'going out to work is really hard' when they surely must remeber the time when they went out to work and had no home responsibilities as being a darned sight easier than the life they live now?

I think it's bcause cognitive dissonance is a very uncomfortable state of being, and if you cannot change your situation, you must change your way of thinking to bring it in line with your situation or suffer the misery of inner conflict.

Which brings me to the rejection of feminism.

Why do so many women reject feminism when it would clearly improve their lot to be treated fairly?

Is it because they cannot easily become fairly treated individuals, not without huge conflict and arguments in their home and at work, so they decide, unconsciously, to believe that they are already treated fairly? And therefore feminism is defunct in their minds.

Intersting.

Also have completely selfish reasons because DD would attend a couple of afternoons a week as well, which will be lovely for me. The creche will actually be in what was previously our bar/games room - like we actually need such a thing at work! - so only 2 floors down in the same building.

I very much agree with Lenin.

Taking time to look after small children isn't just about the daily grind, it is also about dependence, equality and relationship dynamics.

Larry, looking after small children is both fun and rewarding and tough and often boring at the same time. The cooking, wiping, tidying, cleaning, clothes washing, etc.. that comes with family life is just a treadmill of stuff that has to be done. I think only someone who has done it (for more than a week or two here or there) can really understand what an invisible grind it is.

Hence why many men don't see it and slip into treating their wives as servants, whilst simultaneously suspecting that they do fuck all. Mostly men aren't particularly aware that they are doing these things. They are doing them from a position of male privilege where they aren't encouraged to analyse how it feels to have the way the world sees you and treats you totally change on having a baby.

Broadly, having children changes women's lives much much more than men's. Men get to carry on pretty much as before whilst enjoying having children - women embark on 20 years of 'trying to do it all, keep my head above water, try to hang onto a semblance of relationship equality, accepting compromises, and being told they're are lazy and do FA'.

Women of school age children who do not work pay a heavy price in terms of financial dependence and often by consequence equality for their 'easy' lives. It is not easy to get a job which allows one to have all school holidays off and finish at 3.30 every day. Many of these women would like to work but are making the best of it (this is what cognitive dissonance is). They accept that it is a nightmare (for a woman) to try to work and have school age children so they settle for being ladies who lunch and pick up other people's dirty pants.

On a slightly different subject I found having one child completely different to having two in terms of the pleasure of looking after them. Why? In a word squabbling.

Playing educational and fun games with one child is a whole different ball game from the constant squabble mediation that parenting 2 children is. The mess seems to multiply by 10 with each additional child too.

This idea that 'children are a delight and women should think themselves lucky to have washing machines' is actually silencing a discussion which is on an entirely different (and much more interesting) plane.

Lenin Grad - Dont worry in hindsight I wouldnt have a child when I was in a position where I couldnt have any maternity leave. Was a bit of a silly idea but nevermind. Your partner can still go to work and change her situation if it would make her happy.

Once my daughter is at school she will start breakfast and after school club as they start from 7.30am until 6pm every day. There are loads of them here as we are in a low wage area so most schools do them and there are loads of private settings that offer this.

I know mums that put the kids in to go down town shopping and have a bit of a rest. It is never too late to change things so do what makes you happy as everyones different.

Agree with beachcomber...but luckily (that word again) judges do now recognise that the SAH partner has contributed equally to the marriage.

Just a bit sad that it's a divorce that shows the other partner the value of having backup. As of course this backup enables them to WOTH, and filfil their own ambitions.

fulfil

Gettingagrip,

I think you are confusing me with someone else. I never mentioned "lucky" WRT modern appliances.

Personally, I think you have done fantastically, but not really sure what your point is?

Beachcomber,

Your post is a mass of trite generalisations about men and women. "Most" men don't get this and "most" women "settle" for lunches out. Many choose it and genuinely enjoy it. And, as I say in my first post, that is where the idea of "cognitive dissonance" is dangerous. You will say that they have not really chosen it but are suffering from a psychological disorder. I think adult women know their own mind and make their own decisions.

And as for your last sentence about the discussion silencing a discussion on a different and more interesting plane. That is your opinion. Plenty of people are having an interesting nuanced discussion without reverting to axiomatic spiel about a patriarchal society.

I wasn't making a point as such, I was just interested in your opinion of 'spoilt' 50s women who have done their duty and beyond, and are now free. I know it wasn't you who said we were spoilt.

But you have seemed to be comparing our lot with that of our grandmothers with regard to 'modern' appliances, and saying that we don't work as hard as they did because of these appliances.

Certainly when I look at my life in comaparison with both my grandmothers, who I did not really know...one I only met once, and one who died when I was quite young...GM no 1 farmed her children out to her own parents to work in their business from age 14. GM no 2 had many children and it was the older children who looked after the younger ones.

I think one of the results of the feminist movement is that women thought that they COULD do everything. They thought that they could work like a man with children, whilst also thinnking they could look after their own children, and so on. But really, in times past, women didn't do this. They had help...either purchased or family.

And GM no 1 left her husband (E European country) and went to the West in early 1900s. So this is not a new thing. Women have been muddling through for centuries.

I think everyone should read the book 'What mothers do when it looks like they are doing nothing' to see the importance of a constant caring person in the early lives of children.

Sorry all a bit rambling and disjointed thoughts, but a very interesting thead.

A lot of this stuff is very insidious and underlying - that is part of the problem with it.

Generally it is much more obvious to the person who is manoeuvred into the compromising/supporting role (generally the woman) than it is to the carry on pretty much as before person.

My DH could not do what he does (career wise), and have children without me.

I manage to do what I do career wise because I went to the extent of setting up a bloody business in order to be able to work from home and plan my schedule around our children.

When I go away on business trips there is a mammoth organising task for sorting out the children - the slack to be to taken up by my absence seems to require a whole team of people (DH, MIL, neighbours, school canteen).

When DH goes away the only thing that changes is I bath the kids instead of him.

The fact that I as a feminist working woman accept all this and carry on as though it is perfectly acceptable is cognitive dissonance. And I don't need feminists or feminism to dictate to me that that is so - I just need to step back, take off the patriarchy blinkers for a second and apply a little critical thinking. (Add empathy if you are a man).

Lucky old me - I have a washing machine. DH, however, is much much luckier because he has me.

This idea that 'children are a delight and women should think themselves lucky to have washing machines' is actually silencing a discussion which is on an entirely different (and much more interesting) plane.

Oh goodee I get to point out yet again when somebody claims something that was never said.. and this time they even used quotes for this nonexistant statement! Quoting whom exactly?

Gettingagrip.

It wasn't me talking about grandmothers! I know that won't wash, even in a modern dishwasher :).

I am out of work currently and sharing in the childcare of a 15 month year old boy. My wife probably does 70% and I do 30% (but I do all the financial stuff, household admin, 70% of the cooking). Anyway, it works for us and I have no intention of justifying it. We are having another one in 2 months and I assure you, post the birth, I will no longer be on here.

I am aware of the "grind" element and I know it will only get harder with two but I still think it is an appalling mindset. Children (male and female) pick up on it. We chose to have children, we know it will impact our lives. But, I am also very excited about it. We made our decision as a couple and we will live with it as a couple. I have a strong independent wife who has chosen to be mainly a SAHM, although that may change later on, and I am very proud of her for it. I hate the idea that because she has made this choice she is suffering from a disorder.

I sometimes wonder whether I am imposing the same shitwork situation onto my husband (he's the SAHP). He's followed me halfway round the world for my career (long story about how I ended up being the main breadwinner), and now that we have FT home help, I sometimes do struggle to understand how he's so tired, why he's complaining about being bored. But then I'm the one up with DD every night (stopped sleeping through just after we got here, up 2-3 times a night) - and I feel the immense burden of having to earn, have sleepless nights worrying about fucking up by job, landing our family in the shit. I worry, worry, worry all the time.

As mentioned way back when above, it's not about comparing our lives to our grandmothers', it's about comparing our lives to our husbands.

Larry..sorry if got wrong person! Ths thing is that you don't sound as though you are suffering from that sense of entitlement that kills marriage.

I hope to god that my son doesn't turn into an entitled dinosaur if he is lucky enough to find a woman who would like to have children with him.

All it takes is a bit of respect. That's all I used to think in my marriage. If I just had a bit of respect. There was alot more wrong with it apart from that, but that was the fundamental issue.

I think on the one hand...girls are educated to expect autonomy in careers etc, and when they have children, and leave work, it's a nasty shock that they have no money of their own etc. On the other hand, the extreme reaction to that is well don't educate girls. Why are they educated anyway? If all society wants them to do is the grind work, what's the point? Let's do what they do in Afganistan.

But then of course there is the waste of all those brains, and all the other arguments against that stance.

So what to do?

Comparing my life with my husband's makes me want to cry, even though he's the SAHP.

That's a very interesting perspective, TheBossOfMe.
Some people here seem to be suggesting that shitwork is only the drudgery of household tasks, I would counter that lying awake worrying about providing for the family is pretty shit too.

Why are you the one up in the night with DD, if not BFing?

Oh grow up footlong.

I am not quoting anybody (if I was I would cite them). Are you not familiar with the common usage of the short hand of inverted commas in a phrase to show a poster is referring to a general idea or stereotype that that individual poster does not hold?

Larry in my posts I am talking about myself and women like me. I know that I didn't choose many elements of the path my life has taken. I know that I engage in cognitive dissonance. Nowhere have I said that anybody who does this is suffering from a psychological disorder. People do this because societal expectations and cultural norms exert pressure on them and influence them - this is perfectly normal, sane human behaviour. I know many women who feel the same way as I do, in fact all the women I know do.

There may be plenty of women who are lucky enough to find that their wants and desires in life coincide exactly with what the patriarchal model demands of them - lucky them. I don't seem to know any however.

Sorry, my answer was to your post of 10:56, TheBossOfMe.

Gettingagrip,

It sounds like you had a tough marriage.

I think you have come to the crux of the problem. Everyone cannot have everything but they are led to believe they can. It is a modern disease.

Seen through academic feminism, the problem is the patriarchal society. I think there is some truth to it amongst the less well educated. I see no truth to it amongst the (well educated) people I know, with as many men getting the raw deal as women.

I think education is about so much more than earning money, though. Education is an end in itself and we are clearly better parents if we are better educated (ceteris paribus).

Personally I do not think that there is any shining camelot where everyone is happy in a totally gender-neutral society. There are some things men are better at (physical work for instance) and some things women are better at (breast feeding, for one!). It is such a personal thing, though. As soon as one starts generalising about what men and women should be doing, one is dictating to individuals how to live their lives. Some feminists believe that the rights of the individual should be subsumed to the greater good of woman-kind. I just do not see that. I think a society where everyone is equal in law and can take responsibility for their own decisions is the best compromise anyone can get.