New feminist... ?

[lollyhop2girls]

Hi There,

I stumbled across this board today and I need some advice.. info.. about feminism.

I really have never considered that I am a feminist. I dont really know anything about it at all, I am not uneducated or ignorant, just dont happen to have had the issue raised around me before. Ive never been inclined to research it either until recently.

I saw a series on TV the other day called 'Women' it was looking at a different subject each week. First I think was Women's lib, then motherhood. I think the next part is on tonight actually if anyone's interested.

I found it fascinating, particularly the motherhood episode. It looked at the way different families work and the different roles that women play in the home.

I am a full time working mum of a 4 year old girl. I live with my boyfriend and for half of the week his 10 year old daughter.

I have always had strong views on how I am often judged for working full time. I get angry at articles in newspapers about how because I work my children arent having the right start in life, I am selfish, I dont feed my kids properly, they watch too much TV blah blah blah. (none of that is true in my case actually and if I think of all the mothers I have known over the last few years; the ones who stay at home with their kids actually are more likely to turn to frozen ready meals, day time TV and hours on the computer - not wanting to generalise, just speaking from my own observations)

I also have strong views on women who infantilize themselves be it financially, independance etc

I also hate when people say to my daughter 'when you grow up and get married' or when they constantly comment on how pretty she is rather than how clever.

Also, my step daughter is obsessed with dieting at only 10 years old. Her mother very openly diets and agonises over her apperance with her daughter. I mean, christ does she WANT her to grow up thinking she can only be succesful and happy if shes thin? (Her mother also tells her that school isnt really important because shes so pretty she'll probably just marry someone rich and not have to worry... arghhhhhhh)

In fact I think I may be an out and out feminist but still not really sure what that would mean..

Anyone got any advice.. comments..?

Sorry, I must sound a be naive. I would just like to know more because most of the time in the world we live in I feel quite alone sometimes.. if there was a group that had the same ideas etc as myself I would feel less so.

Thnaks.

Thanks both of you- it's something I've been mulling over so I'd love to hear what you think on the matter.

ElephantsAndMiasmas - a very intelligent post - what you say makes the women only aspect of the group seem completely understandable, and desirable. Actually, I find myself completely clamming up around articulate men - even my DH can take the wind out of my sails very quickly. I find it very hard to keep my side of the argument up under pressure (damn social conditioning!).

I found the Reclaim the Night march very powerful.

Embarrassed to admit the last post by the way - but sadly true. I so admire women who can SPEAK their thoughts in public situations.

I don't have that social conditioning. I went to a fiercely competitive girls' school, and don't recall suffering sexism at university or in the workplace. For me it's a domestic/childcare issue. My dh supports my career. He doesn't do any housework at all, but he is happy for us to pay other people to do it all - he doesn't think I should do it. Or he does a bit maybe, but I tell him to get stuffed and he shuts up. But somehow I feel responsible for the minutiae of the kids' life in a way that impacts on my career. This is not the case for my dh. Why is this? (My dad did housework/ironing/childcare - there was never any suggestion that he was helping my mum).

Btw I also love nice clothes and high heels. I think they look nice and I don't feel like I'm objectifying myself. Very interested to know what you think about this though.

'research shows that men are heard a lot more in group discussions, and women's voices could become unheard even in their own movement. '

ah this reminds me of something that happened when I was an undergrad.
The college chaplain (bless him) used to run an interdisciplinary book study group on a range of books (not religious) - one term we did Hoggart The Uses of Literacy, another term The Nation State and Violence.
I was one of about 2 women who attended regularly, compared with 10 men.
Then we did Lynne Segal's Is the future female? The demographic completely switched - a roomful of women with 2 men.
And guess who dominated the conversation.....

I can hardly believe that. It's pathetic "actually, I find myself completely clamming up around articulate men - even my DH can take the wind out of my sails very quickly. "

So why are you like that and I'm not. I'm nothing special. Is it your enviornment? Do you know less than the men about the topic?

I'm afraid i think this is pathetic too

"He doesn't do any housework at all, but he is happy for us to pay other people to do it all - he doesn't think I should do it. Or he does a bit maybe, but I tell him to get stuffed and he shuts up. But somehow I feel responsible for the minutiae of the kids' life in a way that impacts on my career."

Why do women exist like that? We alwaysbought in al ot of help with housework but I would not have lived with a man for one day if he wasn't down and dirty with nappies nad child aare. Why would anyone accept a man like that and tolerate that attitude. I just can't believe it. I want to understand it? Why wouldn't someone on the very first day the sexism manifested itself do something about it? Is it because you're with a man who earns more or you think you're very lucky to have him so the power balance is wrong?

Romanarama - I went to a very competitive girls school too - I'm possibly just a different kind of person. It is only around men that I tend to clam up though - my women friends wouldn't describe me as shy. In fact some of my friends find me 'competitive' and I can be difficult. I have had some dark experiences which my account for my lack of punch around men - but I tend to see these as my fault.

I love to look glamorous, although rarely find the time with a full time career and a two year old

Xenia - I'm just being honest. I'm sorry you find that pathetic. Maybe I do know less - I do read a lot but still find it difficult to make an argument.

I'm disappointed. I didn't expect an attack. Oh well.

It's not as if I'm proud of it by the way - it annoys me. Like I said I admire strong women who can speak their thoughts.

It's not quite that simple though Xenia. We met, funnily enough, without any children. We were expats, we ate in restaurants and had hired help to do chores. It would never have occurred to either of us to do them ourselves. Our relationship had a rocky patch for sure when dc1 arrived, and dh clearly assumed that the childcare fell to me. Worse than that in fact. We were on holiday - in a rental house wihout any hired help - with dc1 aged 4 months, and one day dh got really furious with me because his shirt wasn't washed. I was truly livid with rage. He wouldn't set off on that track again.

But the problem is more his social conditioning than mine. I have no intention of being anybody's domestic slave, but I can't make him do housework. If he says that he's paying someone else to do it because he doesn't want to and nor do I then that'll have to be good enough.

Mygoldennotebook just practise. These things are a question of habit not gifts that you have or don't have. Practise makes perfect.

Sorry, I just astounded on mumsnet sometimes at what women tolerate. If you earned 10x what he earned would that change things? Is it about money and power?

Ywes but make sure you don't do any. I don't do huge amounts as we haev someone in every day (now although for many years when we couldn't afford that we shared it very equalyl but was that just because I earned more or was it because he had had his own house and done his own washing and because I was always the sort of person who would not have stood up for unfairness - I remember on a very early date we talkeda bout childcare and he said if one of us had to give up work he'd look after the children if we couldn't get a nanny; I remember making it clear I would always work; I remember seeing his washing systems for his shirts at his house).

Fine if you can employ someone to do it but even I employing someone a lot of the time that person isn't there. So when they aren't just go on total strike and see how he feels about that.

May it was simply that I took 2 weeks off to have a baby on femniist grounds and because that was best for this family so we never had a sexist period when I got better than him at childcare and we hired a nanny together. Obviously I breastfed but for years he had 100% total charge of all washing and at one point that was 3 children still in cloth nappies at night. I just find it suprising some women tolerate sexism.

Coo Xenia you don't pull punches do you. I can see why posters might take offence at being called "pathetic", and I can't agree with you that if people are not as super-confident as you then there's something inherently faulty about them. But in a conversation about women getting shouted down I can't help but cheer at your indomitable tone.

Roma - does he organise the housework being done, or is that by any chance your job too (hiring cleaners, paying them, making sure they have a key etc)? That's totally shitty about washing his arsing shirt. I'm amazed you didn't tear it into ribbons, tie him to a tree with them and leave him there.

Lots of people hate confrontation, especially those who have been through traumatic times, plus girls IME are not usually taught to compete - not with men at any rate. So unattractive!

Sorry you find it hard to keep your end up in an argument MGN. Not sure whether or not you want to elaborate on your "dark experiences with men" but I can assure you with 99.9% certainty that whatever it was that happened to you, it wasn't your fault.

Thanks Elephants - I think I might take Romanarama's advice and practise. I've been getting more and more interested in feminism over the years - ever since I studied women's writing for my MA. I was genuinely very excited to see this new thread. I'm going to keep popping on.

The organise thing is a key one. I think couples need to divide tasks rather than share them. Eg I didn't take a child to the dentis for 17 years, he always did and I did our tax returns always. Each to their own. I plaited the girls' hair and did school bags . he did the washing. if you know you're 100% responsible for a task you do it. Same at weekends. If you need 3 hours off to feel sane as I do then ensure you get that if he has 3 hours off to play golf. Never for a second even early in a relationship tolerate the inequity.

The organisatino of things even if you hire people in is something that can easily be done by a man as a woman. The cleaner is leaving. he can find another. He can interview them. He can deal with it if she doesn't turn up one day etcetc. You take to nursery, he collects. it's just about confidence and fairness. I adore debating subjects with men. It's the nicest bits of interaction apart from sex. It's huge fun. Perhaps girls need to get more chance to do debating at school. But then I've always wanted to be the best at my work in the UK. It may be as simple as I'm an eldest child and some of the other posters on the thread aren't or I have more testosterone or whatever. Fascinating stuff. Or that my mother and I am sure her mother and her mother were feminists even if they didn't use those terms.

"I adore debating subjects with men. It's the nicest bits of interaction apart from sex" haha, totally agree Xenia. I am unfamiliar with the sensation of being overawed by someone's supposed great intellect or whatever, and just have at them.

Do practise MGN, feel a bit afraid or tentative, then just try saying what you really think and see what happens. The world won't crash down around you and you may be amazed at the results 9 times out of 10 you can win if you keep your cool and listen for the inconsistencies in their argument IME. Men are just women with a bit of chromosome snapped off after all MGN - what's scary about that?

Lol elephants, they are often women without the self-awareness aren't they? A bit less sophisticated.

A colleague quoted me a stat the other day about how men need to hear praise 2x to believe it, and women 50x. I think centuries of just about everyone knowing that women were inferior to men intellectually, and not competent to pursue professional success, still affects the assumptions many men and women make about themselves and others.

MGN write yourself a list of all the things you're good at. Your "successes". They can be little things. As many as possible. When you're speaking to a crowd, imagine that all your successes are there rooting for you. Remember that the people there want to hear what you have to say. Be concise, and don't use mitigating speech ("i think", "I might be wrong, but") which makes you sound diffident and weakens your arguments. There's nothing as helpful as getting an honest opinion from somebody as to what you sound like. Otherwise it's quite difficult to know what your particular weaknesses are and what you need to practise correcting.

Xenia we've had a full-time live-in housekeeper almost all of the last 11 years that we've been together, so literally the only housework we might do if inclined is put the plates in the dishwasher on Sunday. I completely agree with your points though - why do women aim so low? Similarly my employer drives me mad with the 'interim target' of 25% women in senior management, and the 'ultimate target' of 37%. I have pointed out over and over (to the all-male board) that this is deeply offensive.

Sorry ElephantsAndMiasmas just came back on here.

I'd love to tell you what I think of your post but I feel a bit out of my depth ha ha. Im so pleased you pointed out the arguments for why the marches and groups should be women only.

I have never had a violent experience (bar one during one very short lived relationship that I got the hell out of quick sharp) or been seriously discriminated against so Im not scared of men in anyway. But I can understand those that are, and why they prefer all women. Who can blame them.

When I've been marching on e.g. Million Women Rise I feel it's all too easy for passersby to write us off as a load of lesbians/manhaters/commune-dwellers who want to eradicate the Y chromosome altogether. It's easy because there we are, all women together.

I wonder too if a lot of people feel that only women who have experienced violence or similar would be angry enough to be an active feminist and march and therefore write their actions of as something cathartic?

My personal feeling is that I would love to have an additional annual protest where men and boys could join in. Couples could march arm in arm, teenage boys could walk with their little sisters, whole families could stand up and be counted together. My dad would come, and my brother, and my DP

This sounds like something I would want to be involved in yes.
I have come across many men who are almost proud of their sexist nature. Making 'humourous' comments about womens driving, 'hot' lesbians, women should be at the kitchen sink blah blah blah - you're hilarious. Maybe if they could see lots of other men standing up and being proud to say their wife/ colleague/ daughter/ mother is their equal it may become more accepted.

• I should also add that although I have on many occassion screamed 'pathetic' to myself in regard to women who are scared to stand up to men or take the role of a 'kept woman' or whatever. I dont think it's promting the right attitude to use that term out loud. If someone feels oppressed, shouting at them 'YOU ARE OPPRESSED' is probably not the right way to stop them feeling it. There is always going to be a route cause. That's what has to be tackled surely.

And that is why I feel so strongly about sending the right message to children, boys and girls.

'Interim target' JEEEESH! What are these people on? Oh how wonderul of them to give all us little ladies the chance to play their big boy boardroom games with them.

My director told me in all seriousness once that he was very proud of me for not having taken any time off to look after my daughter that year. He said they did have their concerns when they 'took me on' that as a mother I would be expecting all sorts of consessions but I proved them wrong. Oh what a proud day it was for me to receive such high praise. cock.

It seems in the workplace that men pretend they don't have children and women apologise for them. It's such a load of crap and totally unnecessary. My dh and I take turns doing child-related things in office hours (if we have to - school play, meeting with teacher, something important at the doctor or whatever) depending on who's less busy that day. That should be the norm and there's no way I'm apologising to anyone for it.

You're so right Romanarama. It does seem to be commonplace that "men pretend they don't have children and women apologise for them"

My daughter's biological dad had the arguement that I was her mother so I should pay for her childcare if I didnt want to stay at home and look after her PAH!

Well..I'm a feminist, but a different kind to Xenia.
Xenia's type of feminism regards male values and qualities as supreme and women's values and qualities as inferiour. To leave a newborn at two weeks old, you have to have bought the notion that men and women should both be as cut-throat as each other in the workplace, and that staying at home to nurture a baby is inferiour work.
Society deems nurturing and care-work as inferiour, but as a feminist, I do not. I would go so far as to say that caring for babies and being responsible every day for sustaining the life of another human being is by far the superiour work, more important than most of the made-up work that men do.
But here is the problem: society deems this care work as being the shit-work and it is therefore paid accordingly (i.e not at all), which leaves a huge power imbalance between men and those women such as myself who place value on this work.

Feminism needs women like Xenia to push women into all spheres of society: law, banking, business, politics. But I don't think this is 100% the way forward or the only way.

In my fantasy utopia we need to live in a society that actually rewards women for the incredible work they do and we need to place real value on their contribution. Real monetary rewards for looking after your baby.

I'm with Xenia on the housework though. There is absolutely no reason for a man to think that he's "helping" a woman by cleaning up his own mess. I also think that outsourcing the work to a cleaner basically doesn't tackle this issue either unless the leftover housework is still divided equally i.e there's no point paying a cleaner to do the bathroom if its the woman who wipes down the kitchen every evening.I also agree with Xenia about it being unecessary for women to put up with men dominating group conversations and other such sexism. YOu can't change men who think that what they say is more important than what women say, but we women shouldn't collude in their fantasy that what they are saying is more important than what women have to say!.

There are so many other aspects of feminism that I'm sure all women agree on, for example the mumsnet campaign to lessen to sexualisation of young girls in advertising; tackling sexual violence etc.

Oh, and reading your OP more thoroughly, I realise you say you are judged for working full-time, but I want to say that you will be judged whatever you do. I am most certainly judged harshly for staying at home rather than working. People think I'm wasting my life and my brains and all of that. So both of us are in the same boat of being damned if we do and damned if we don't. Mumsnet is a great forum for connecting all types of women, however they choose to navigate this male-dominated world of ours

Well brought up Sakura. The stay at home or work debate is a huge one.

The issue I have with the stay at home option is that it is often 'expected' of the woman to take on this role.
Some would argue (not me at this point, at least not vehemently as I havent formed all of my opinions on the matter yet) that you have chosen this path because you have been socially conditioned to beleive it is what you 'want' to do...

Staying at home to raise children automatically makes you financially reliant on a man to support you. And that is a big thing to get my head around. I couldnt not support myself, I just couldnt.

I think your arguement is that you should be paid a salary for the work you do with your children and therefore you would be supporting yourself. But if that happened then you husband would essentially be paying you to keep his house for him.. that just doent sit with me I'm afraid.

I find you interesting though Saukura.

Sakura - I'm very interested in your views. Although I wouldn't want to be a SAHM myself I certainly don't think that choosing that nurturing role is opting to do 'inferior' work in any way.

I also agree that some work places want you to apologise for being a mother or simply pretend that you don't have children while you are at work. At my work place women are encouraged to come back to work very quickly - and full time too. The head teacher of the school where I work makes no secret of the fact that he doesn't like part-timers. One woman who came back to work part-time recently was removed from her department and now only teaches PHSE to KS3 (she was an English teacher, Year Leader and responsible for A Level classes) and has been completely marginalised.

I actually went into teaching thinking it would be family friendly (my DS was 11 months when I began training) but I was sadly mistaken. Yes the holidays are great but if I want to have another child and go part time I will have to look very carefully into moving schools before I become pregnant. I think it might just be my school though.

Can't stand the idea that women should do more around the house than men. It's too old fashioned for words. My DH and I share all household tasks and child care equally. So at least I'm not pathetic in every way

However I will say it must be difficult if the man refuses to do anything. I used to live with two filthy men in a house share - it took a lot of will power not to clean their mess; I did crack a couple of times. Not washing / cleaning their personal rooms mind - just communal spaces.