There isn't an answer here, only questions. I've spent some time thinking about feminism over the years.
First there's the equality thing, there's a lot of pent-up anger there. My question is this: Why? Why would women want to be like men? Why would they want equality in the work place? Why would they even want to be in the work place?
It's a pretty shitty, thankless place to be. Worshipping at the alter of the almighty dollar. Take a look at the pinnacle of American businessmen. Souless, arrogant bastards willing to screw over anyone with no remorse.
I've always felt women had the best job, raising children. But there is another question: What happened to the days when one income could support a family?
So, since it seems to take two incomes, then of course women deserve equal pay. I understand being forced into the workplace... but wanting to be there leaves me confused.
I don't want to be there. I don't rate people on there wealth and I've never been "money motivated". Which means I lied a lot in job interviews, because we all have to play by the rules to some extent. Even though I don't like the rules, nor did I agree to abide by them.
I, like most people, am forced to play by these rules and attempt to convince myself there is some sort of freedom within this system.
But, because I don't like being forced to do things against my will, I often wonder why women want to be in the workplace that I chafe at the chains of everyday?
It would seem to me that raising children, spending time with your family while your husband or partner is sent off into slavery would be the thing worth fighting for.
Fighting for the chance to have your soul flogged baffles me.
It seems the major problem is this system we love so much now requires two incomes, which forces us all to compete for jobs many us of don't want, but need.
Given the choice I'd rather spend my days reading, writing, contemplating the world and searching for answers to questions (which always leads to more questions) without some idiot giving me orders. Although, as jobs go, I work for a very nice family which leaves me alone and gives me big Italian hugs. So, since I have to go to work, this is a comprimise I can live with.
However, fighting for the chance to have your soul flogged still baffles me.
Once again the system has us fighting against ourselves instead of fighting the system or those we should be resting power from... imho.
This is not the system the founding father's envisioned.
TIP:
Enter the amount, and click "Tip" to submit!
Kemstone
Les Braunstein
LadyMiko
Yablonowitz
Safe_Bet's Amy
Stacey Youdin
Salon.com
Comments
Paper cuts, thousands of paper cuts... that'll do the trick.
"I often wonder why women want to be in the workplace that I chafe at the chains of everyday?
It would seem to me that raising children, spending time with your family while your husband or partner is sent off into slavery would be the thing worth fighting for."
Here's the thing about your description of work - not all work is just about pushing buttons and earning income. Work can be a place to explore things you're passionate about.
I chose my line of work because I freaking LOVE writing code. I know, it sounds insane. But the reality is, nothing makes me happier than having a problem in front of me, grinding away writing functions, tweaking the code, really getting into a sweet groove... and then at the end, it's like magic: *poof!* I push "run" and out pops this amazing program that solves my problem. Even better, I get the satisfaction of knowing that something that *I* wrote, something I created is going to go out in the world and help people.
I worked on a project when I was in the Air Force nine years ago that went live and, to this day, provides a valuable service to the hundreds of thousands of Air Force members. That's something I still look back on with pride, even today.
On the flip side, having kids and staying home with them all day... that's just not for me. Honestly, that would be my own personal definition of Hell. I have no problem with people who chose to be stay-at-home parents, but I do reject the notion that the life is the most fulfilling option for all people. It's not.
My work does not make me a slave. My work frees me to explore a field, computer science, that I really really enjoy. Work has paid to send me to amazing places, like Japan, Guam, Korea, and so forth. While it's not all sunshine and roses, overall, work gives me focus, challenges my brain in ways that wouldn't happen if I just stayed at home all day.
In fact you're dangerously close to "not having to work at all", by my definition that's getting paid to do something you love or at least like to do, or might do for free if given the chance.
Of course i know it's because income has not grown along with the massive gains we made in our economy over the past 30ish years. The wealthy became more wealthy and the middle and lower became more disenfranchised.
I could've written it like this. But it I like for people to figure it out for themselves.
With all due respect, how long have you spent at home, all day, every day, raising children?
I love my children dearly, but I also love to write and teach. I don't know if you've ever had the opportunity to change places with your partner and be a full-time stay-at-home dad, but not all women enjoy staying home raising children.
I'm sorry you dislike what you do for a living. Wage slavery sucks. But so does domestic slavery. Equality is about choice--whether to work or stay home. Feminism argues that men as well as women have choices about raising children. There is nothing that says a man can't stay home and raise kids while his partner works, but we live in a culture that sees something wrong with that.
Some of us are good at dealing with two-year olds all day long. Some of us are not. Doesn't mean we don't love our children, but imagine going to college, getting a good education, and then marrying and being expected to give up everything in order to stay home and raise your kids. Imagine spending your days hanging out with toddlers. Charming at first, yes, but some of us thrive in adult company.
I think what I' m trying to say, and I'm not saying it well (I'm blaming the headache) is this: feminism is not about forcing women to go to work. It's about choice. It's about all human beings getting to make fundamental choices.
There are branches of feminism--materialist feminism, Marxist feminism, that argue that the "woman" question cannot be answered without dealing with issues of class and capital. We are living in a society where real wages have decreased since the 1960s. We are living in a society where more money is in the hands of fewer people. But we are also living in a culture where we are easily distracted, and feminism has been reduced to questions of whether we hate men or not.
I don't think you're wrong for raising these questions: I don't think there are much things worse (in this particular context) than going to a job each and every day that you hate. Drudgery is drudgery. But the answer, for some of us, is not staying home and going strir-crazy.
There are men and women who thrive on raising their kids. Nothing gives them greater joy. My mother was one of those people and I think, once her kids left the nest, she was left bereft, but as much as I loved my kids' toddler stages, I loved even more being able to have conversations with their growing intellects.
Maybe when and if grandkids come along, I'll be happy to read PAT THE BUNNY again, but not now, thanks.
Thanks for raising great questions.
I have to endure children everyday. Their parents oblivious to how bad their kids are behaving. Ruining others dining/shopping, relaxing experience.
Some people must work two jobs, others have a choice. Since I have stepkids and that's all I can have, I've always wondered why some people have children? Is it because they can? Everbody else is doing it?
Many people pay others to raise their kids. So, are they the most selfish? Meaning they can have children and do and don't want those children to change their life. They take them out to dinner and ignore them there as well.
These are just hypothoses, I wonder about as one table complains about the kids and the parents are pissed that I asked them to please have their children sit down and stop screaming and throwing food.
Again, this is just for discussion, since I can't prove any of this. I'm just trying to think out loud.
Maybe some people should choose not to have children? Conceiving, as I interpret it, is not something to take lightly. Can we afford it? Are we emotionally ready? Are we willing to pay people to raise our kids? And when they turn into horrors at least we can blame someone else.
Again, these are only observations. Feminism is about choice, it's part of being a human. I just put out there that many people that have the choice to raise their own children aren't willing to sacrifice their own lifestyle. My hypothesis is that this is part of why we're such a spoiled "what about me, what about what I want" generation/s.
Being a human, we all want to have choices. Certainly women deserve to have the same lack of choices men have.
We pay great lip-service to how precious children are, yet millions and millions are in some state of dying. It would be a mistake to think all 7 billion of us are/were wanted as the evidence speaks for itself.
For those that want to be parents, I find the choice to raise your own children to be admirable. I find feminists somehow feel this beneath them.
As a man I do not find this beneath me.
But, there again is the me, me, me syndrome I find distasteful...especially in myself.
I did not say that as a feminist, child-rearing is beneath me. I did not say that at all. And I'm not sure how you extrapolated that women wanting to work while they have children has led to children misbehaving in restaurants.
A couple of things:
1. when I was a kid, kids didn't go to fancy restaurants. parents got babysitters and went out on dates. Many parents, for whatever reaon, insist on bringing very young children into environments where they're expected to do the physically impossible at that age: sit still for two hours on their best behaviour when they're very young.
2. Again, feminism is about choice. You say you're step-father. You haven' gone into personal details, but why doesn't your wife work and then you stay home and raise the children? Feminism says you have that choice.
3. Do you think it's selfish to put children in daycare? Who do you think might be happier: a child at home all day with no one but mom or dad to entertain them, or a child who hangs out with several of his or her peers and plays games or participates in structured learning activities?
4. If you're as close to my age as I think you are, few of us live in the neighborhoods of our youth. Whereas many of us have memories of getting home from school and not being expected to be seen again until dinner and then, after that, until dark, we now live in an age where parents feel they have to have GPS trackers on their kids to know where they are at all times.
Again. I'm probing around the edges here because I'm trying to figure out exactly what your beef is with feminism. If we've already established that feminism is about choice--the father's or the mother's to stay home with children--or, as is the case in many families, where both parents have to work and children are in daycare--feminism, for example, has worked like hell to improve daycare, access to daycare, afterschool care, establishing standards for who can run a daycare center, making daycare available so single mothers and fathers can pursue education or a better job while their children are well looked after.
What I think I hear you saying is this: feminism told women they couldn't stay home with their children; having to go to work sucks; therefore, feminism has made life worse for women by forcing them to work and by creating a situation where other people are raising "our" children. But I think you've created a Strawman version of feminism, and I'm trying to figure out what you thought life was like before feminism. Do you think that dads went off to work happily and moms stayed home happily? Because that's not the way it was.
Again, I think you're raising interesting points. I'm just not sure I understand the premise, and I'm digging and digging trying to get to it. I don't want to caricaturize what you're saying, so tell me where you think I'm not understanding you. Thanks.
The suppositions are just guesses as to why some things occur. I know why both people need to work. I was sort-of making fun of our system, which has been deteriorating for decades, forcing more and ore of us into it, just to survive.
I would've stayed home with kids, but at 46 I never felt qualified to have kids or a long-term relationship before I found Kim. I can't decide if I'm selfish or those that have kids and don't want to make any sacrifices are selfish. I think maybe we all are.
The sadistic humor I find here is that people are willing to climb over corpses to get into jobs they really don't like, but need. The system has required more of us to do it's bidding and we're fighting to get into it.
Instead of saying: Hey, the system may need to be tweaked. The economy had doubled in size over the past 30 years and the VAST majority of use make about the same. The people at the top get the almost unfathomable wealth and we work more.
The joke is all of us are caught in the net and my analogy would be fish clamoring and picketing to get into the fisherman's net.
Most of are only free because we choose to perceive ourselves as free. Most of our "choices" are limited to what the system gives us. So, it appears as though we have choices, although very limited choices.
Some days I choose to believe I have control over my life and although I'm behind equal rights for all, it appears as though we've convinced ourselves somebody has actual freedom and we'd like to have it too.
This is very Matrix-like. Sorry, it's a rather dark outlook from my point of view. Since my observations tell me that we've been assimilated.
Kept fighting amongst ourselves so we don't look behind the curtain and see who our real enemies are. This is how the few keep the vast majority occupied, white-noise, in fighting, etc.
Perceived race and gender issues, when what we have here is the have's and have nots... class/wealth issues are what I see as the problem.