Motherhood and equality, what does Eutopia look like?

[Bumpitybumper]

I accept that I'm incredibly slow to the party, but a few threads and specific posts that I've read have really highlighted to me that motherhood lies at the heart of feminism. Whilst I wouldn't say the battle has been completely won for women prechildren, statistics around earnings and education do look promising, however it seems all of this drops off a cliff once kids arrive. I think this is related to lots of factors, some of which are within women's control (eg choosing to be a SAHM) and some not (eg not being able to afford the childcare required to work).

In this context I have been pondering what equality looks like in a post children world. Personally I think it would involve society viewing an individual's career as a lifespan with expected peaks and troughs. It is madness that the peak decades for building your career are also the decades when women are fertile. I think there should be a greater acceptance that when someone has kids it is natural and normal to want to spend time with them and this probably will not be compatible with working long hours and doing lots of travel for work. This should all be a standard expectation of men and women with young families so things like flexible working should be encouraged and time spent at home should be viewed as a pause on a career, not a termination of a career. The big pay off for such an approach would be that as kids grow and parents are able to refocus on their careers, nobody would be too heavily penalised for gaps in CVs or a few years on the career slow track. This would make it much easier for women and men to close any gaps that may have opened up. It also doesn't ignore the reality that parents with young kids simply do not have the flexibility and time that childfree employees have to devote to their career without effectively never seeing their children which is unacceptable to many.

Is my view of equality post children Eutopia in line with what others think? I can see a shed load of challenges to making mine work, but it doesn't seem beyond the realms of possibility.

Yy, I don’t specifically mean this WILL happen with YOUR DH.

I’m clumsily trying to make the point that women shouldn’t be dependent on agreements made with men prior to PG.

My dad explicitly says he felt he needed to do that because his anxieties about filling the masculine role adequately were increased by the responsibility of having children.

From that I have drawn that people can only think themselves out of socialisation/cultural expectations around gendered roles to a certain extent and the hugeness of having children in many ways is a watershed moment for men as well as women in this system.

I.e. it is not easy to change for individuals, it requires structural change.

My dad explicitly says he felt he needed to do that because his anxieties about filling the masculine role adequately were increased by the responsibility of having children.

Yes, I've had this talk with DP before - that he feels pressure to bring home the bacon, and that's why he works so hard, and me pointing out, that him being out all hours like that, actively prevents me from doing my own work to take off that pressure! We've gone an unusual route I think - we're working like demons for the next couple of years, we've chased jobs by moving around a lot, working all hours etc. BUT that means we'll be in a position to semi retire after that couple of years - and have all the time in the world with the kids.

We also agreed all this stuff. It still didn’t quite work as we planned

It’s been very hard to stick to mainly because of external expectations. It is very, very easy to slip into a housewife dynamic on maternity leave and then carry it on as a default when actually you want to work.

(Of course if sahm is your choice and freely made that’s up to you.)

I think to some extent in this current system SAHM cannot ever really be a freely made choice because it comes along with so much baggage that women don’t discover until too late.

That is not to say that no woman should ever care for her own children which is something I have found to be prevalent thinking in women’s groups.

I tend to think more about why SAHM is so hard, how it is hard and whether each element of difficulty is inherently hard or artificially constructed to be so, which parts of the construction achieve things which may be of value to society and which are really about perpetuation of patriarchal capitalism...

Lack of intellectual stimulation and feelings of contribution and therefore value I think are the crux for many women. I don’t think these things are inherently attached to child rearing... even the name ‘SAH’ I have difficulty with because it is so explicitly complicit with sexist thinking. I think these things being attached to child rearing and enforced on women who are child rearing are largely artificially constructed or the consequences of other constructions.

Some women choose SAH because of compliance with particular patriarchal standards, some because of values related to child rearing (as with waged work). No woman, working, child rearing or anything else chooses to be considered lower status or to operate within a world that considers them to be so, even if their choices and values are shaped by patriarchal ideas.

Majority of women have limited choices to choose in the first place TBH

(I understand why it is genuinely radical to believe no woman should ever care for her own children though)

You WOH, you WIH (money earning defines work?) or you SAH... just the language... it’s a bar in the cage IMO.

Bowlofbabelfish and Offred but what I'm saying is that these discussions and agreements had nothing to do with raising children, but about lifestyle & work life balance. We decided on this plan before I was pregnant (which was far from a certain outcome as I was 36 when we started trying and have Endometriosis).

The biggest hurdle to our plan will be the inequality in the workplace that is likely to prevent DH going part time, due to gender stereotypes which still expect and assume men want to work full time, and spend their extra money on material possessions for their families, rather than time with their families. There is equality in the workplace going both ways, it is just less obvious, as within a capitalist society money and possessions are used as a measure of success and who has it best.

I think having a living wage of £10 an hour plus an eradication of bullying in the workplace would be my Utopia. We are a long, long way from this.

Yes totally. We make the choices we do within the framework of our own restrictions (and those of wider society.) very few women have total choice - I suppose only those who are independently wealthy with no need to work.

I have spent a lot of time in expat communities and there are lots of very frustrated trailing spouses. Usually a two career couple where one has had a massive promotion and needs to move countries, and it’s not worth it/childcare issues/will move again soon so the wife stays home. I also know a few women who this works really well for but they’re not in the majority.

It’s possibly also an issue we will face in a few years if DH continues to advance.

I know only one couple where the husband is the trailer. It’s the inequality in distribution that’s part of the issue.

I think Finland (could I be wrong?) pays parents to stay home for a few years? There needs to be recognition that child rearing is important - but as you say it’s ‘womens Work’ so devalued in society.

eryri hopefully it will work for you. We have found it a real challenge to push against the external issues like work for example. Even though we as a couple are committed to equality. It’s been harder than I thought.

*inequality not equality in the workplace...

The biggest hurdle to our plan will be the inequality in the workplace that is likely to prevent DH going part time, due to gender stereotypes which still expect and assume men want to work full time, and spend their extra money on material possessions for their families, rather than time with their families.

YY, patriarchal capitalism. Please don’t consider the things I am saying as a criticism of you or your DH or a ham fisted attempt to say ‘ah yeah well you think that but it’s not going to happen cos menz and I know better’!

It is intended to be a criticism of said patriarchal capitalist system which both men and women operate within and an attempt to make an analysis regarding how these structures are maintained and why the majority of choices seemingly made by individuals end up propping up the system no matter the intentions or values of those making choices.

I totally agree that the culture of gender roles in work and therefore approaches of employers and peers in work are a massive problem. They are a mechanism of enforcement IMO.

I also agree not all people conform or acquiesce to these standards/expectations and plenty of men choose integrity to family, and to values pre-existing family, over partriarchy/work AND that this is hard BUT that having a child is THE watershed moment where people have to put these into practice. In lots of ways these choices are highly limited in ways that are unseen.

I think the when the ‘setting out your stall’ talks and agreements happen they are frequently in good faith from both sides (I don’t agree the sentiment or values are always lacking from the men), and frequently include issues of life balance other than family, but that the intensity of internal and external pressures brought about by having a child is a watershed moment for both men and women where the tracks of their lives will change in many ways.

That women come off worse shows you that it is partriarchal IMO.

I suppose it is an attempt to say many men and women will share these values (equality, only taking what you need), they will be values that apply outside ‘having children’, they will only become really important in terms of shaping the trajectory of people’s lives if a child happens because that is largely when the focus on how you put values into practice happens.

Often post decision justification happens too.

Personally I think it is important to remember that though women’s lives are the ones limited in effect this is not necessarily because their male partners are liars or don’t genuinely share those values. It is definitely because society is shaped around patriarchal capitalist values and their is a cost to insubordination or lack of ability to comply.

It doesn’t mean betrayals of agreements re equality should not be criticised or condemned either.

I have no relationship with my dad. This is his consequence. I understand what drove it. My female socialisation says I should reach out to heal it. I will not. The consequence of pandering to his anxieties about ‘being a man/father’ is that he doesn’t have a relationship with me. That is fine with me and him being sad about it does not compel me to do anything to fix it.

Great thread bumpity - desperately trying to read the full thread before the nap is over..... but I very much agree with this I think there should be a greater acceptance that when someone has kids it is natural and normal to want to spend time with them and this probably will not be compatible with working long hours and doing lots of travel for work. - yes both women AND men (DH always frustrated that his female colleagues get greater flexible working than he does when they have babies - he wants to spend more time with his babies too).

Also very much agree with Offred that I think to some extent in this current system SAHM cannot ever really be a freely made choice because it comes along with so much baggage that women don’t discover until too late.

My experience: gave up a fairly well paid fairly cushy government job to SAH because after having DC1 I was the only one entitled to well paid mat pay. The decision to SAH for the first year then lead into the decision to SAH after that when DH offered a good job abroad.

DH thought he would be bored at home too. I, of course, am bored by the lack of intellectual stimulation of being a SAHM (that's why I spend naps on MN feminism chat rather than cleaning the house) but sex role stereotypes came into play here I think without us realising. Someone once said on another thread that it's the "frog in boiling water" thing. You don't realise it's too hot until too late. Having not experienced inequality in the workplace in my 20s, I didn't believe the stories about the impact having children on your career. Recently applied for and offered a job very similar to my old job at 7k LESS than I was paid before I had DC. I'm the same person with the same qualifications and the same experience, but now I've had children.....

Ineedacupoftea I think that your family's situation is very common. Although men can be seen as having it all as they get to have a family and retain their career, I think there are high levels of dissatisfaction amongst working fathers about working hours and expectations. Also think your tale of being so heavily penalised for being a SAHM is also sadly very common. I think it's a form of discrimination and does need legislative intervention.

Cup - reading FWR board during naps is a great example of one of the things I hate about the loadedness of applying ‘SAHM’!

I’ve had zero choice about having children, caring for children being a ‘SAHM’. I chose one of my three pg but this was within the context of my husband’s desire for children and my already having two and not wanting to be limited to child rearing forever. I had twins that pg 🙄

In the time I have been ‘SAH’ I have, successfully battled through a vexatious family court case for three years, gained a-levels, provided care to family members and friends, acted as an advocate when necessary, set up and run a campaign group which gained (a tiny amount) of international attention and been interviewed on a national broadcaster, chaired political meetings, chaired multi-disciplinary patient reference groups which actually shaped care, been a representative on health boards and parent groups that shape policy, helped design and run research into maternity care and childcare provision, volunteered at CAB, done canvassing/leaflet drops for a political party, run a debating club, spoken at the faculty of public health conference, earned a degree, done an internship that was so successful people have asked I continue etc etc etc and obviously all the stuff associated with raising children and having a house.

I have done anything but SAH.

Right now I am the most SAH that I have EVER been and that is because of my newly diagnosed disability and the system failing my disabled DD (something which by default falls entirely to me).

SAH is so unbelievably not all that women caring for children can do or do do.

Just writing down the things I have done here makes me feel much better about myself in my current situation and realise just how problematically dehumanising ‘just a SAHM’ is.

SAHM is a statement regarding women knowing their place IMO.

But you know I am variously (depending on the motivation of the person applying a value judgement) ‘sharp elbowed privileged middle class’ and ‘feckless benefits scrounger’ and their perception is total for their own purposes.

In reality I am a person. I have elements of the material reality of both.

I'm mostly disappointed that so little appears to have changed since I first started to engage with these ideas, some forty years ago. Partly that was the benefit of youth thinking i had all the answers but still...

Other parts of employment have improved, with diversity programmes and women-only introductions to technology as corporations become more and more desperate to grow their skilled workforce.

I have started to wonder whether the problem holding back progress is that we keep on having children, regardless, even though the deal is certainly not getting better. How many years of drastically reduced birth rates would it take, before the ability to have children became highly prized and generously rewarded ?