The demonisation of single mothers.

[SantaIsAnAnagramOfSatan]

Hi,

I've ended up talking about this in various threads but have never dedicated a thread to it.

So, i'm looking for your thoughts. How do we see this in action? What are the views of single mothers? How are they propagated? Why are they propagated and why do they attract such demonisation?

I'd also like to hear about where you think the feminist vision saw single mothers, did it predict their would be more given the increased freedom women would have in their lives and their ability to leave male partners or choose to not have one without being financially or socially (though that hasn't held true entirely compared to 1960's it's at least possible to live this way) ruined?

Is women being able to have children alone a part of the feminist outcome - if women have more control over their bodies and reproduction surely it was an inevitable outcome? And is it in your mind a positive or negative thing in terms of feminism?

I'm actually going away for a few days now but hope this will attract lots of thoughts for me to read when i get back.

As for me, to put this in context, i am a single mother of a pre school boy. When i found out i was pregnant (unplanned) at 30 i decided that i was happy to be and wanted to keep the baby but that i didn't want to stay in the problematic relationship with the father. Therefore i've been a single parent from the outset.

I have framed this as about single mothers rather than single parents as it is my experience that single fathers are seen very differently, imo as heroes and glorified whereas single mothers get the demonisation treatment in popular culture.

Look forward to reading your thoughts.

"It's a horrible thought that a man might not be able to find a woman willing to get pregnant by him, isn't it"

When I was at university a few years ago I volunteered to help adults with aspergers syndrome and high functioning autism. Most of these people did want children and families of their own but a lot of them lacked the social skills to be able to hold down a relationship so there are men who probably won't have familys even though they might want them.

"how can a man have a child if there isn't a woman willing to be impregnated by him and to carry his baby."

"It's a horrible thought that a man might not be able to find a woman willing to get pregnant by him, isn't it"

And there I think you have the root of mysogyny. Men's dependence on women to procreate.

But tbh it's not more horrible than a woman not being able to find a man who wants to ipregnate her, is it?

I take the right to reproduce, as no state or organisation having the right to unreasonably stop a man or woman pursuing their basic human right to procreate - so a baby per se isn't a human right, but the right to pursue reproduction, is, IYSWIM. Just because you might not be able to find someone who wants to procreate with you, or you might be infertile, that doesn't take away the right to try to procreate, which is all we can ever have - no-one has the right to successfully conceive, of course, that's up to nature (and IVF now).

Of course, that right is suspended at times - eg, when you lock criminals up and they therefore don't have the right to have sex (though in some states, they do and prisons provide "conjugal rooms" to do so.

This isn't about individual's rights to have babies, it's about not allowing the state to pursue a policy of mass sterilisation against certain groups, as the Nazis did adn as Indihra Gandhi did in the seventies (and as the USA, Sweden, Norway, etc. did, in the thirties.)

Sorry that's all a bit incoherent. What I'm saying, is that the individual has the right to try to find someone with whom to reproduce, or a means to reproduce, without the state interfering in that, unless other rights are downtrodden in the process - so for example, renting a woman's womb would be a method of pursuing pro-creation tht the state would have the right to interfere with, as it infringes on the public right not to have a form of legal slavery.

HerBeatitude, I think you've expressed it very well. The right to reasonably pursue reproduction - yes, the right to have a child - no.

What's the difference between the right to have a child and the right to pursue reproduction?

HB yes there's the right to a family life or something like that. Fair enough. It wasn't clear what some of the posters meant though.

PSM, the difference is that you're not in charge of the outcome in pursuing reproduction.

The right to pursue reproduction doesn't mean you'll end up pregnant. It just means that the state (or the church, or the NHs or whoever) hasn't stopped you trying in the first place, by sterilising you or locking you in a harem where the man who owns the harem refuses to have sex with you but won't allow you to ahve sex with anyone else, or will send you to jail if your pursue sex outside a state sanctioned relationship or whatever.

LeninGrad- what do you mean?

Sorry if I'm being dim

Sakura Sun 05-Dec-10 14:46:03

BillHicks, women work in more dangerous jobs than men. The two most dangerous jobs in the world? Nurse and prostitute.

Childbirth is a fairly dangerous occupational hazard too.

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How about Front Line Infantry and Police Officer?

Want to compare the amount of SOLDIERS killed in WW1, WW2, Vietnam, Iraq or Afganistan yearly to the amount nurses killed on the job in any single year of any one of those conflicts?

How about the numbers on say police officers killed compared to nurses? Hmmm... Do I even need to get the figures? Or is it clear men routinely work in more fatally hazardous occupations?

Your job isn't just a paycheck, it's also about options. Flexible hours, pay goes down. Routine shifts, pay goes down. Comfortable conditions (no high voltage electricity, dangerous seas, drug dealers or enemy soldiers to contend with), pay goes down. My dad ticked none of those boxes and his pay reflects it.

He can get called up at 3AM on a Sunday and be driving FIVE hours to a job in the country to attend a site for five minutes to a whole damned night. He can be doing anything from climbing through roofspaces in an Australian summer or working on electrical cables that could electrify an olympic swimming pool. Does he deserve to be paid less than my mother who has flexible hours, a comfortable workplace and routine, predictable shifts?

I've done factory work with dangerous chemicals and office work on nice ergonomic chairs in air-condition buildings. Factory work paid shitloads more alot of the time but it took alot more out of me. Having done office work since my last factory job at age 18, I'd much rather get a few bucks less an hour.

Is anyone actually reading Billhick's long, irrelevant posts?

I agree with your points HB about the right to have children. And in answer to your last question, no I'm not. Not remotely interested :o

BeerTricks

HerBeatitude Sun 05-Dec-10 17:30:18

"how can a man have a child if there isn't a woman willing to be impregnated by him and to carry his baby."

"It's a horrible thought that a man might not be able to find a woman willing to get pregnant by him, isn't it"

And there I think you have the root of mysogyny. Men's dependence on women to procreate.

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You're right, you DO have the right to reproductive choices as a woman. I just want to know why should I pay extra taxes for someone else to exercise a right I myself do not possess?

LeninGrad Sun 05-Dec-10 19:25:41

Sakura, the biological imperative is huge, absolutely massive culturally, which is ironic in many respects. Interestingly there was a lot of 'helping out' by male family friends that went on before, during and after the war, prior to the advent of the fertility industry.

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You mean cheating hussies across a nation backstabbed their husbands as they fought and often died to protect them from the german blitz. No one bats an eye at this, it makes me sick to my stomach.

Because the continuation of the human race is a favour women are doing for the whole human race BillHicks. In of itself, it is a Good Thing. To not believe that, is to be a misanthropist, ironically, as well as a mysogynist.

ROFL at BH's outrage about "cheating hussies".

What is the male equivalent of a cheating hussy, Bill?

Oh, so I take it that Britains's brave squaddies absolutely did not shag any French/German/Italian/Greek Polish girls whilst they were out there?

HerBeatitude Sun 05-Dec-10 19:30:39

Because the continuation of the human race is a favour women are doing for the whole human race BillHicks. In of itself, it is a Good Thing. To not believe that, is to be a misanthropist, ironically, as well as a mysogynist.

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You know back in the day people used to have like 6 or 7 kids, what's the bet alot of men added several years to their working lives raising them? Their lives are so meaningless to you that you have no pity, no compassion for those men at all? Women are historically the gender who sent their men off to die while they fucked every service man in sight for a pack of cigarettes.

HerBeatitude Sun 05-Dec-10 19:32:40

ROFL at BH's outrage about "cheating hussies".

What is the male equivalent of a cheating hussy, Bill?

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The asshole who jumps in bed with someone else's wife. Generally though, the husband doesn't come back lying about how long he has been pregnant so you can see why I'm not quite as harsh, ey. Nowadays women can choose and still often nominate the incorrect father knowing they can be tested and have results quick fast. Except nowadays, women can garnish someone's paycheck on her word alone.

I take it this is an example of someone a bit threatened by feminism?