will prib regret this, and won't be here all evening to discuss, but just want to knbow why i am not a good role model for the kids if i choose to stay home with them

[mrsjohnsimnelcake]

i am interested in why certain people think that staying home with the kids is not a good role model.
I am university educvated and post grad qualified and have had a professinal role for 20yrs. I have managed and i have taught undergraduates.
I think staying at home for a while with my children is what i want to choose now.
I don't feel that i am teaching them not to expect the best from themsleves in any way- could you explain how I am doing this?

I feel it is the best for me and my kids and i may well change later when they are at school full tjme.
Surely your job is not the only thing that identifies you as a strong role model to children??
i can't really believe this to be the case.... it would seem a somewhat narrow minded way to exist in the world.
I think it is interesting that when you meet people they often ask what you do for a living. The shallow people are not interested if you are a SHAM, the more interesting and dynamic and less conventional people accpet that at some points in one's life different priorities take precedent.
I am still ME and i am still a strong and powerful woman whether or not I go out to work outside the house... and why would it be otherwise ?

Xenia, you're very good at making sweeping generalizations but not at answering direct questions. When you go out to work, what do you do with your kids? You can't have it both ways ... if you are demeaning women who play caring roles in society, are you also happy to place you children in the care of such imbeciles?

dumdy, bet you don't get a direct answer to that one!!

Nope, ssd. I certainly did not, nor ever have with Xenia. I am convinced that she's doing an Open University Course on something socio-political that was lost in the post for a couple of decades. A very curious mix of the communist and the capitalist, don't you think?

curious, yes.

somethings I can relate to some of her posts (well a tiny amount) a bit, but with a little encouragement she seems to get carried away and starts getting bogged down in a load of phsyco-babble which is really just her opinions, no stats to back them up.

Ha dumby, I've made all these points below to Xenia but, she hasn't bothered answering. It's a bit like having a conversation with Tony Blair, all soundbites and no substance. So X the mark of a worthy woman is to make pots of money, does this mean that Jordan or Jodie Marsh or Mrs Beckham are worthier role models in your opinion than a SAHM? I really am curious to know. Yes, I take your point that more women are needed in big business and politics for our interests to be represented but labelling all SAHM's bad role models is, at best ignorant. I think you may have read too much Germaine Greer, next you'll be telling us that genital mutilation is a good thing because it's an accepted part of some womens culture!!

I can't read and answer everything. The thread was set up by someone other than me because of one of teh reasons I had said it was better to work - the role model point. But it's only one of about 100 points which suggest women ought to work.

I have written on mumsnet before that I'd rather we invaded countries to stop FMG and give women the right to vote and even drive cars than for the reasons we do. So no I'd not be in favour. I am happy to have objective rights and wrongs and one for me is it is morally politically and objectively wrong for women to play just a caring role in the home their lives bounded and indeed bound to hearth and home whether that's the culture of here or timbuktoo I would prefer it to be changed and am happy to lobby against it until men and women have better equality and can make proper informed choices rather than just conveniently sticking to their cultural norm. If that means dragging women kicking and screaming into the boardroom and men out of there and into their homes for a year's forced paternity leave so be it until we gain proper equality in this important historial period for women.

On dm's point most women work in the UK. Quite a lot of women in London leave their children with male au pairs once they're of school age but at present most people prepared to look after small children are female in nurseries and as child minders. When we had to make bombs to defend this nation against Hitler women left their children with other women to enter factories and make bombs. if it takes leaving our children with other women so we can lead this country, run hospitals schools and businesses then that's necessary until we get a fairer country.

Was I asked anything else? I am always happy to answer any reasonable direct question. What is the role of housewife? Depends doesn't it - if you're the housewife on my other thread about spending then you dont' do much except manage the cleaner and nanny and keep yourself fit for your husband's sexual pleasure. If you're an average housewife and your children are under 3 then you're likely hardly to have a second free all day breastfeeding the baby, dealing with the toddler etc. Just depends on your life stage. Also there is a huge lot of interaction between parent and and child which is a big part of any childcare role.

SAHMs are denigrated by some but so are WOHMs - I've been called unnatural by DS's friends mummy because I work. Oh and obviously DS is more at risk of neglect because DH is at home with him and he doesn't have the parenting skills a woman has (except obviously me because I am unnatural...).... wtf?!

people are just too judgy on this subject. I quite honestly don't care if your kids are raised by tree frogs if they're happy, healthy and cared for and if you are happy in yourselves.

Xenia's way isn't everyone's way but you know what she's right on one thing - we do owe a debt of gratitude to the women who pushed open doors in the past. It means we can have these debates. Otherwise, we'd be hair in curlers, subservient and lacking in choice.

"Mine at times say the same - love you, best mummy in the world etc. That's irrelevant to whether you work or not"

BUT that is EXACTLY my point Xenia! The children don't really need anything more than to know they are loved. It doesn't matter if mummy works or sah.

I never suggested my dd said because I sah.

hi xena,
I suppose is did sort of set up this thread after something you'd written made me think a bit more about myself and what was going on with me... but it wasn't soley FOR you IYSWIM.
I did think it woulod start a debate, which it has..
again, i have about 5 minutes on here just now so can't really enter further discussion.
I do wee your point of view totally, and i certainly work in a prefession that has changed re its gender bias over a numebr of years.
I am paid exactly the same as my male and female colleagues and as i said, i have been part of training young prefessionals and certainly challenging the sexism I get from the younger men in training.

I am not sure at this stage how i can change the owrkplace, unless I retrain and become a woman in a boardroom.. and then fight to earn the same as the men.
Or maybe become a lwayer and help woen win tribunals....
but I am not sure I have the age advantage now (hey, tha's another issue all on its own!)and i really want to change my career just now..except to stay home for a while.

I am still nnot 100% convinced that the end point of feminism has to equal financial power...it is important, and still not achieved...
and I still debate that the only way to achieve this is to become a high earner and challenge the men...

and FWIW, I do plan to go back to work at least part time when the kids are bigger, and dh plans to stay home and take care of them pre and post school... it has been discussed and at this point our plan is to do this..

Thanks for the debate, sorry on your behalf it is one sided (ish)

Of course more women went out to work during the War but there was a huge backlash after it in the 1950s.

Yes I am grateful to have the choice of whether to do paid work or not, but what makes you think YOU can make the choice for thousands of women, Xenia? Very few SAHMs have never worked. Most will work again to a lesser or greater extent. I think it's great that some women have the drive and ability to get to the top but there isn't room at the top for everybody.

Even SAHMs can be politically and economically active. Education is not wasted on a SAHM.

sorry, i SEE your point, not wee it

and are we fighting for western woemn specifically, or are all these baordrooms of ethicallly biased companies....I would have thought the plight of the thrid world would be one to address too...

i think we all have differnet types of "ism" to contend with on a day to day basisi, and agree totally that straight white men rule the world (or at least they think they do)

But I am not really buying (ha capitalist term)
that the only way to deal with inequality is to become rich and powerful as a woman.... i applaud people who do this and wouldn't say that it is wrong... but there must be other ways of achieving being a good role model to children..?
will try to pop on and out to see if the debate is going, but have all the fmaily at hoem and it is sunny and there is a garden outside

I wish more British stay at home and indeed working mothers were lobbying to get women the vote oin Saudi or against imposition of Sharia law in countries where it doesn't presently exist or against female genital mutilation abroad. Those are much more important issues for women than how few run British boardrooms although the latter is still an issue. One reason so many women set up their own businesses is because many do feel prevented either through their own psychology, their inability to ask for pay rises and promotions or even sexism in some areas so what is nicely happening now is women run and owned businesses can sidestep problems by setting up on their own. It's why so many Asian lawyers and accountants presumably set up their own practices - if you work for yourself you can avoid discrimination.

I would still though keep my daughters away from sexist areas like the police if they wanted to run the Met in due course. Yet I ought to be encouraging them to go where women don't like their friend doing Engineering at Oxford (rare woman) and their friend who's just got a job learning to fly I think fighter planes in the US or is it just normal planes - I can't remember. It's hard to be a pioneer.

I'd say the police service is one place where competent women really can thrive!

That's great to hear. I hope so. I think of Alison Hallett - I think it was - they even set her up a separate phone line at work so she could speak to her lawyers in her sex disc case confidentially and tapped that phone. It's women at the top I like to chart as one of the best indicators and I suspected it was harder to lead a force as a woman than say to be a female NHS consultant but that was just my anecdotal view. I would like the head of the Met to be a woman etc

Many women, both working and SAH, are politically active on behalf of women. Head of Amnesty International UK is a woman and so was the previous incumbent. Amnesty fights cruel and inhuman treatment for all, but also has campaigns on women's issues abroad. We have a female head of state, (the Queen) and have had a female prime minister.

A woman has recently set up the Breastfeeding Manifesto, and who cares whether she is earning money outside the home or not? It is her own business and has no bearing on her political activism.

i agree , elastic woman.
i do think that although i agree with Xenia, i do feel that women have more voices than just that in coproate business, or whatever....and therefore the 50's view that seems to come across is a little difficult to swallow.
I can't really imagine that the only way to be a role model is through ££££

But am enjoying the discussion.
I agree totally that the police force and IME the fire service are particularly sexist.. especially the latter...
but i am not sure how to address this myslef...?
and i don't think buying my own business can sprt this out.
i can be involved in charity orgs that campaign re genital mutilation//support amnesty etc too... and support them financially with my husband's money (slightly sarky } and i can alos support my own choices of charity and awareness raising orgs...

Also, it should be remembered that the mother is not the ONLY role model a daughter has. My mother was a SAHM for 20 years before she went back to work (for peanuts and doing something that did not challenge or use her skills to the full), but I had high achieving and full-time working aunts and saw how this fitted in with their domestic lives.