Feminism and SAHM

[samoa]

Can a woman be a feminist and a SAHM by choice?

Oe of the central tenets of feminism is the notion that bringing up children and working inside the home should be recognised as work and paid accordingly.

So there should be no question of a husband 'paying your way'.

Feminism does not, IMO, mean living like men have lived/are living. It means having your work, whether taht's paid or unpaid, based int he home or out of the home, being as valued as men's work.

That is beautifully said FlamingoBingo I actually wish I had said it!

'We are interdependent, not dependent'

brilliantly put

I expect you'd have typed it better, though, gorionine!

OP the answer is in your question 'by choice'.

yes can be feminist and sahm.its attitudinal set beliefs/values.if someone chose sahm after weighing up pro/cons and their circumstances fair enough.we all do what we have to,what we individually think is right

but sahm isnt a job and shouldnt attract a wage.we are all mums we all nurture and love our children irrespective of whether work or sahp

Well Flamingo if you have read more than one post written by me you would be totally reassured that I would definitely not have! and as I sometimes struggle to understand my own posts due to typos + bad spelling + poor grammar.

As an aside, how long did it take you to bold those two long sentences!?

Seconds, you only * before first and after last word nowadays

in ye olde days when people said we done that already,search the archives,mn going to the dogs,i'll get the popcorn

you had to use befeore and after * every word

omg you are right -and it works

it were all fields round ere when I were a lass

it works!

hahahahaha how much easier is that!?

I wonder if it works with italicising too?

and striking out

cycling crist,when i think i used to use the occasional wee BOLD bit as i couldnt be arsed doing all the footery asteriks. hell now i will be bold all over the place.gratuitous and frequent bold dis and dat

oh what a novelty

really,one could go awn and awn aw roond the hooses and back again with the bold thang

And now look what I've started!? this is meant to be a serious thread!

so jumping Jehovah does it work for strike out too

oh my giddy aunt when i think of how i used to avoid bold, strike out and italics because of the faff

im loving this lark.big time

Yes. I think it's an example of a feminist choice to stay at home rather than to do some shit job just for the sake of it.

It would be good if more SAMH's engaged with feminism so that there were people with more time to dedicate to activism etc.

I certainly had less time for feminist activities when I was working.

It's anti-feminist propaganda that feminism and being a SAMH are somehow opposed.

Oh you guys with your formatting! :)

So I am a WOHM and DP is a SAHD, sounds feminist, but I didn't really have a choice from an economic point of view. So I'm not comfortable with the "feminism gives you choice" perspective.

My family unit had the option to have a female breadwinner, which in some societies it wouldn't have, but as an individual I didn't really have a choice. (Not that I would have chosen differently, and neither would my DP.)

"Choice" between WOH and SAH IMO is an economic issue.

I agree with Flammers.

SAHMing is work and should be recognised and valued as such.

But if sahm-ing is work, then who is the employer?

I do not think being a sahm is a negative thing at all, but I've a gut feeling that it is not a feminist thing to do, I cannot expand upon this at the moment and would like to hear views that support this viewpoint as everyone here is basically agreeing with one another and I am the sole 'naysayer' here- or at least the only one who is saying that they've doubts on a gut level.

Self-employed.

marantha - you're saying it's not feminist because lots of non-feminists wouldn't recognise it as such. That is true, but doesn't mean it isn't feminist.

if feminist ideals were only the ones recognised as such by non-feminists, we'd never make any progress.

Trillin is right - you are self employed as a SAHM.

Oh, and in fact, that self employed thing raises a good (feminist) point: you are a feminist SAHP IMO if you are self employed. If, however, you are "employed" by your partner, then you are not self employed and I'm not sure that you are living a feminist SAHP lifestyle.

What I mean is that if the parent at home is given tasks, chores and responsibilities by the parent working, then he/she is not getting the choice and control that I would expect in a feminist relationship. I have a friend whose DW does not work and he cannot understand why she (and I) object to him giving her a list of chores before he leaves for work in the morning.

My SIL didn't manage to get a decent job after uni and had a dead-end job in a call-centre. She had her first baby in her mid-20s and frankly was able to exercise far more self-determination and use her skills and talents far more as a SAHM managing the home than she could in her job.
She is now arguably more employable as a result of having grown in confidence through her years SAHMing and developed skills through having to organise stuff herself rather than be a cog in a machine, than she would have been had she stayed at work.
I struggle to see how her choice was not the feminist one.

I also think it doesn't make sense to fetishize earning money when the jobs women do are so often the low-status poorly paid ones (and often constitutes a bunch of women doing the bidding of a male hierarchy in service of male values).

Marantha, I suspect you have internalised stereotypical views of feminists as career women and this is where your 'gut feeling' comes from.