Deprogramming

[TheSparrowhawk]

This is a thread for feminists (not our regulars who like to hang out here and tell us how pointless feminism is) to address the ways in which growing up and living in a patriarchal society has affected our thinking. Essentially a self-help thread.

I have struggled with addressing my relationship with my parents. For years I blamed my mother for their total emotional neglect of me. It's only recently I've opened my eyes to the fact that whatever parenting I got, she did it, while also working full-time and doing most of the housework. My father did little or nothing. But I expected a lot more from my mother and so blamed her more.

I'm in the US, Geraniumred. It's definitely a thing here too.

Ah, OK. Maybe it 's from the media then. By the time they are 16 or so it seems to be a bit more free and easy with styles. But the amount of hard staring she's had in public has been quite surprising - including women in the Ladies toilets.

Hair has gotten longer in the last ten years or so. I blame celebrity culture with all the TOWIE girls and Cheryl Cole with what are clearly extensions all over their heads. I had what I believe is termed a "page boy" from 11-18 and a bob before that. So did lots of girls, it wasn't uncommon. I then grew it at uni for thrifts sake and have had long and short styles since but have noticed when I've had short hair and bobs in the last few years that I'm in the minority. Depressing. As it happens I have quite long hair again now but that's young kids and being poor. I much prefer a shorter style.

Agree with Buffy about the emotional work that needs to be done to fight this. Just been on holiday with my family. My Mum has very old fashioned views about gender roles and really does not approve of my marriage where DH and I both work PT and do the housework (for information our male cleaner cleans the toilet). Her disapproval consists of ignoring DH and constantly criticising me for being lazy and selfish, it's really hard work to try and rise above it. We live a long way away so it's only for a couple of weeks a year at least.

some boys and girls were making fun of her choice to have short hair

My daughters have had this and they've got bobs FFS. And never mind the abuse they get if they dare to wear trousers to school (allowed in the rules, but breaking gender rules according to other pupils). DD1 is a mini-feminist with the brains and sarky attitude that means she can come up with good one liners to put the boys who come out with this shite down but DD2 finds it really upsetting, she's young in her class and really wants to conform at the moment even though she knows it's all rubbish.

I hope girls don't get bullied for having short hair. Dd is desperate to get hers cut into a short bob (will cut it next weekend).
Really hoping she doesn't get any crap for it.

She's dreadful for conformity herself though. Constantly talks about long hair being only for girls (she's 5). So I point out two of her male friends who have long hair and her grandmothers with short hair. She gets it then - but one week later we are back to square one "boys have short hair" I guess the vast majority of the boys she knows do have short hair but not all of them.
It's enough to drive you mad.

My dd also had a short bob at 5 - no bullying then - round that time she also spent a few years wanting to be a boy and dressing in boy's clothes only. No teasing at all.
Short hair at school is just easier - hers is very thick. But there is definitely an age when girls are starting to be self-conscious and wanting to fit inthat long hair is the only accepted style.

This is a really interesting thread.

I am a big fan of a (comedy) podcast you might like that features a lot of this "how your socialisation undermines your ideals" side of feminism.

www.guiltyfeminist.com/

I also love the guilty feminist podcast.

I would also like to say to women: by having a baby you are doing a wonderful, difficult thing. You are not an inconvenience to men's lives. You do not have to do everything and be everything to everyone to the detriment of your own health. You deserve your own life and leisure time as much as anyone else.

^^ this got me in the chest. Thank you for writing it, I needed to read it.

One of the things I struggle with is being a very high achieving kid and twenty year old, being brought up to think a career was the be all and end all and then making the decision to step off a career ladder which made me hugely unhappy in order to have kids and work part time in a decent but non-career type job. I love being a mum, I'm good at it and I like my current job.

What I find really hard is my parent's attitude to what I've done and the other family adults around me. DH has a glittering career and there's much interest in that and none at all in the work I've chosen to do. My mum, a self declared feminist, doesn't value my almost-SAHM status and finds the whole thing hugely awkward. It's like she thinks I'm not being a feminist by walking away from the high profile job, when in my mind its feminist to have whatever choice I make accepted.

A lot of things on this thread are resonating with me. Particularly the posts about cleaning before guests come. Dh thinks people have come to see us and should ignore any mess, but I am very aware that there are minimum socially acceptable standards (even for people who claim not to care about what our house looks like) that we fall short of. And I'm aware that even if we're OK with that most of the time, visitors judge me (not him, even though he works fewer days in a less demanding job than me) if they arrive and we're falling short of those minimum standards. We've employed a cleaner, (16yo dd1 because she's finding it difficult to find a proper Saturday job) but that doesn't solve the issue of friends coming over and nobody has done last night's dishes, cleaned the kitchen/bathroom or hoovered for a week. So when friends/family come over I spend a couple of hours getting the house up to minimum standard. I don't particularly want to spend that time doing it, but it's better than dealing with the comments/helping out from DM/mil or seeing the looks on friends' faces when they spot the mountains of stuff that have built up.

Dh would say that we do the housework equally, and a few months ago I would have agreed because when we list chores or lists are pretty equal. Recently I've started to notice the hidden differences, like me doing cm drop off/pick up every day means he has more freedom than me, he can finish whatever job he's doing at work before leaving/go to the gym on the way home/impulsively pop to the pub with mattress but I can't because i have to get to the cm by a certain time. Or he does the supermarket shop on his day off in the week but if he has a deadline and needs to work that day then he doesn't do it and it becomes my job at the weekend. Or the fact that when I'm on holiday (I'm a teacher, so have more holidays than most) all of his chores automatically become mine , even on his day off. Now I've noticed these inequalities we're working on them, but neither of us had even noticed them before.

I'd find it pretty hard to impulsively pop the the pub with a mattress. I can just about manoeuvre a mattress around on my own but it's a bit unwieldy, isn't it? And you'd have to find a table with plenty of spare space around it. :o

Lol yes, I'd find it difficult too. I suspect if he had some mates he'd take them instead.

:o

I would like to see a complete change away from the idea that having children is some sort of annoying side project women indulge in while men go out and do Real Things and have Real Success. It is absolutely mad that the entirely essential occupation of growing, birthing and raising the next generation of the human race is seen as something that has to fit in around more important things like shuffling money around accounts and painting walls. It makes me extremely angry and sad to think of women, who are giving such an incredible amount of themselves, both physically and emotionally, to safely bring new life into the world and nurture that life, are made to feel worthless, pointless, isolated and ignored.

looking after children is given very little value in any context- whether it's done by mothers or by other women being paid peanuts to do it.

Which is why you often hear women say that they did not become feminists until they had children.

It's interesting that child rearing has never really been part of the discourse of feminism except, I suppose, in terms of workplace crèches. It's a real sticking point. I sometimes wonder if it's just too difficult to address.

Marking my place.

When you say you wonder if it's too difficult to address what do you mean Bertrand?

I have been known to rant at people who even allude to the idea that maternity leave is damaging to businesses. Generally this rant is along the lines of women not reproducing just to entertain ourselves and that men have just as much of a stake in the success and happiness of the next generation as women, and any company that believes that reproduction is an inconvenience is absolutely kidding itself considering that almost every single one of their employees will at some point have children if they haven't already. It's infuriating, the idea that children are an inconvenience.

I think it relates in some way to the present giving and house cleaning though. Social cohesion, nurturing and social / emotional bonds are considered to "belong" to women. Men are "allowed" to be selfish.

One might say that childbearing and childrearing is difficult to address because although producing new people is a public matter, it's also deeply personal. Nowadays we say it's voluntary, but even if that's true, it's only true until a child is born, and then you're stuck with it. If we made it more of a public matter throughout, then people would be sure to resent an intrusion into their lives.

And what's the value of love, worthless or priceless?

I agree about the difficulty of the division between public and private Tei but I think it's not difficult to get around that with a bit of lateral thinking. It's accepted across all industries in the UK for example that everyone needs to have a certain amount of rest in the week and certain amount of holiday in the year. That's simply accommodating the reality of human functioning. Because the workplace has been built up solely around men, the fact that some workers gestate and give birth to babies is seen as a tack-on, an addition to 'standard' allowances. Had women been in the workplace from day one, that wouldn't have been the case, IMO - it would just be accepted that at some point in most people's adulthood they will need time off to give birth/look after babies (and that would apply to men as well as women).

I'm not sure what the 'value of love' question is getting at?

The work place hasn't been built up solely around men. Women have always worked. During the industrial revolution many women worked - the majority of working class women in fact.

The issue is that 'women's work' was not valued. Nursing, caring, teaching we do it for love not pay. Value = money.

some workers gestate and give birth to babies is seen as a tack-on, an addition to 'standard' allowances.. I think you're right there.

It's odd, the feelings around caring for children and valuing that work. I am a SAHM, my husband is very supportive and insists that I am working hard and doing a good job. I have never had a job that would allow us to break even on paid childcare so it makes sense to care for them myself financially as well as emotionally. However, I still struggle to believe that I'm contributing to our household. It's hard to shake off the pressure from society that dictates "success" is about working at a paid job for as much money as possible. I don't earn at all, so must therefore be a failure? I don't think that of other parents who don't work, so why judge myself in such a way? It's very confusing.