non working mothers

[lorcana]

are non working mothers betraying their sex ?

who is 'you' though, rhubarb?

a couple of people clashing on a topic has to be seen as, well, a couple of individuals clashing. I'm hardly going to take personal responsibilty if someone else is being a bit of a cow. Nor am I going to wade in everytime as that can often be stirry behaviour, and before you know it it's all cliques and aaargh my free speech is being bullied.

Who is 'me'? What do you mean?

Yes of course you get all sorts on Mumsnet, but this thread was in active convos so I started reading from the beginning and saw some horribly aggressive posts directed towards one poster in particular. I hadn't realised the thread had moved on quite as much as it obviously has.

I don't see how criticising aggressive posting styles is bullying your right to free speech? As others have said, it just serves to stop the debate in its tracks as posters are too intimidated to post with their opinions and the thread becomes a bunfight between individual posters.

It often spoils what can be a good debate.

clashing is a different ilk to a poster resorting to what can be easily construed as insults though.

I try and pick the relevant point out the post and answer that, and ignore the rest. But I have a Teflon hide. If you are more emotive about your stance you get involved and it doesn't look good, and I think it does stop people posting for fear they will be in a minority.

Its like people who refuse to post on the Feminist board at all? Why? Actually people who post, then get disagreed with by a poster and respond "I knew I shouldn't have posted here" really really annoy me

Honeydragon, most Mumsnetters post reasonably and whilst debates can get heated, I personally have learned a lot from such debates, had my eyes open to other people's pov and have even changed my stance at times. But a minority of posters do take either the passive aggressive stance in trying to patronise you into submission or they are just downright aggressive and belittle you into humiliation and a hasty retreat from the thread and for newbies, from Mumsnet altogether.

If it gets to that stage, any argument is lost. I do think that aggressive posters probably aren't convinced of their own argument or pov anyway.

I'm with you rhubarb.

Very very well said.

read your post before mine rhubarb. You constantly refer to 'you' doing this or that. I'm pointng out that we're individuals posting and not responsible for other peoples' posts, obviously.

Oh you mean this "Even if you disagreed with what was said, you wouldn't be downright rude and patronising surely?" where I referred to 'you' all of, erm, twice?

And I shall elaborate, the 'you' here is general and I were being completely grammatical correct I would say 'one'.

But to put it another way, if one were to disagree vehemently with an opinion held by another poster, one would surely find a means by which to debate the point without needing to resort to rudeness and patronisation which merely serves to end the debate and render any useful point invalid because of the aggressive tone of the posts.

And no, we are not responsible for other posters at all but as you did state, this is a free country given to free speech so thankfully we can have an opinion about posting styles of other posters and can debate the merits and criticisms of such styles.

we're on the same page rhubarb re abrasive posting styles. Often it obscures perfectly valid points.

But a clash between 2 posters or indeed someone being an utter cow is not a reflection on everyone else. How can it be, in reality?
It isn't fair to say 'Rude person constantly posts on feminism/recipes/aibu/fishnet. Just goes to show how horrid the whole board is.' Because it doesn't.

Damn, typed reply and Mumsnet went down! What I was going to say is that my post was directly entirely at this particular thread, not realising that it had moved on quite so much (which is why I said to Honeydragon that my point was kinda rendered invalid) and not a comment or reflection of the posting style of any group of people on any particular type of thread. I am surprised that this could be read into what I posted as I don't believe it could.

fair enough Rhubarb - it looked so to me, but we'll just disagree politely and move on

Do men who choose to assume the role of full-time main caregiver to the children while their partner goes out of the home to work let down their gender?

Sorry if anyone has already said that can't be arsed to read whole thread.

Yes Wallaby, it's been said, but the op ignored it, and maintained waffle about how each woman should be in the workplace challenging men , I think the existence of the SAhD has been ignored by the op.

Have discussing this with ds as he is off with a disgusting cough. He has pointed out two things that have made me

That although Dh and I both had cool jobs. Dad's the better for other people, as the more time he has to make money for it the more people come to work for him. This is actually true, he is a British Manufacturer and the majority of the stuff sold is used with the UK.

He has also said that I have become "more interesting" . We certainly do discuss a lot more, if the news is on in the morning we discuss it on the school run. DS is also a lot more independent now, as he has more freedom than he used too. I quite like that he sees me as a person now, not just his Mum.

Neither of these points have any validity to this conversation, but I was pleasantly surprised by his take on having a female SAHP.

When I was a sahm I felt very depressed, very trapped and very down. Many sahms are fine with it but for me personally, it sapped away my self esteem and I just felt so lost and out of place.
When the roles were reversed - we had moved to France, I found a full time job and dh stayed at home with them whilst he was looking for work, he suddenly discovered how hard it was. In fact a friend of ours came to visit and dh was telling him how much of a struggle he was finding it, how isolated he felt and depressed and our friend said "What so pretty much what Rhubarb was saying before you left to come out here?"

For some individuals it works, for others it doesn't, but to hold women responsible for the wellbeing of other women? That's a pretty good insult in itself!

Rhubarb, when Ds was born I was a SAHM because I thought I should be. Then to continue trying to be one I started working nights, but I felt like you mostly. I went back to work pretty quickly.

I am really enjoying it this time, and it is working. I think it's different this time because I'm happy with WHY I'm doing it, and I'm not trying to kid myself I am doing as an equivalent to a profession. It's a whole different kettle of fish.

Lets face it, I've too sick children, I'm not a nursemaid. I am dipping in and out of mnet while they stay warm and watch tv

Thing is people say SAHP like it's always the same thing, without taking into account differing circumstances.

A broke lone SAHP of dc with some sn and no support is a different thing to a well off SAHP of school age NT dc with an equally involved partner and loving grandparents around etc.

People recognise that jobs can differ greatly depending on circumstances, even if the job title is the same. People move jobs all the time looking for better conditions & atmosphere (as well as the tangibles such as better money of course).
I don't thin k they are as quick to accept it about the childcare/housework combo.

In answer to the OP no, I am not betraying my sex.

TheRhubarb - do you think it would have made a difference if the perception of being a SAH was different, ie, it was what society considered valuable?

I am sure that the reason why some women find it so hard is because we live in a society that only seems to recognise financial remuneration as an endorsement of how hard we have worked. Bringing up children is really hard work, particularly if the intention is that you do it properly, by stimulating your children, making sure they eat properly; are clothed nicely; that they have friends and lastly that they end up balanced and are able to make a contribution to society themselves.

If you think about the skill-set involved in being a parent you are basically looking at: research; management of people and organisation skills. I am hard pressed to think of a job that requires all three of those skills. The best SAHPs I have come across are those that gave that glittering career up.

Perhaps onelittlefish, but for me personally it was the isolation. I missed having adult conversations and of being in adult company. I missed not having set tasks to do and felt at a complete loss. I also felt out of control. At work I knew what I was doing and I knew what the procedures were, at home with a baby I didn't feel in control at all, I felt frightened and I most certainly didn't know what I was doing!

But yes, there were presumptions made by other people about my staying at home - both men and women. I had sarcastic remarks made about all this spare time I had idling about doing nothing which made me pretty mad.

Maybe I was lucky in the support I have had. Also, I am naturally quite a solitary person so for me a baby 24 hours a day was actually enough company.

I find people always make comments about my lifestyle - DS1 is now at nursery 3 mornings and I do a little voluntary work (nothing major) and also amateur music which I am hoping to use as a stepping stone to something paid one day. Once I have included these things into my day I am sure I work as hard as anyone else - it is just that for some reason people assume I am sat twiddling my thumbs - I wish I could.

I found that it was when I became a mother that people started to make comments about my life and what kind of a person I should be/what I should do/what the baby needed/what was best for us as a family/how I would cope/what kind of child I would raise etc etc etc. Funny how they never thought to include dh in their judgements.

Equally though it's not uncommon for some people to think that motherhood gives them automatic superiority over the ungeststed

Looks

There are a lot of interesting posts here - need to spend some time digesting them. One poster commented that I should have asked about stay home men too - but staying home for a father represents something quite different in my view and was not particularly what I was interested in.
Further into the thread ( well not that much further actually ....) I was struck by the hostility,abuse and anger from some of the posters and that intereted me too.lots to think about but have just come in from work so forgive....

I love being SAHM

Loved BasilRathbone's post about footy playerst penetrating prostitutes and Solidgoldbrass's about people whiling away their lives on woo and / or special brew.