Ross Douthat
In the May 26 edition of the New York Times, the Times’ conservative editorialist Ross Douthat briefly summarizes a new study indicating that the happiness of women has declined relative to men over the past 30 years. Significantly, this decline cuts across both race and class making it a phenomenon that is likely not related to changes in income or in the social status of various ethnic groups. Unfortunately, the link to the study in the editorial is to the abstract with one having to pay to be able to review the entire document.
Douthat goes on to cite studies concerning the declining rates of two parent families and the extra burdens of women who have dramatically expanded their roles in the workplace while still carrying the brunt of the work associated with child care and maintaining a home. Based on these trends, he feels that both cultural conservatives and feminists should agree on the need for public policies that would ease the burden of child-rearing and work for women.
Then, in something of a giant leap of logic in which the facts and reasoning remain opaque, Douthat infers that the increasing incidence of single mothers in this country are related to the declining happiness of women. And because of this alleged social science fact, feminists and social conservatives should join forces to stigmatize serial baby fathers and trophy wife collectors. But, Douthat wearily concludes his editorial by saying that such a strategy would not work because Americans no longer have the stomach to ostracize the sexually irresponsible and because of that, American women are unhappier than they were thirty years ago.
I love reading the NY Times editorial page and I do feel there is a need to add some more conservative balance to the paper’s roster of regular editorialists. Unfortunately, the specious logic demonstrated by Mr. Douthat does not serve the conservative cause well. In the future, I hope the Times will feature conservative editorialists that can present reasoned and logical positions on social issues that do not embarrass the conservative political stance. Or maybe that is not possible, but I sincerely hope that is not the case.
Or, could it be that I have misunderstood the reasoning and logic of Mr. Douthat’s editorial? Could social policies stigmatizing dead beat father increase the happiness of women? Am I wrong to challenge the Times’ choice of Mr. Douthat as their conservative editorialist? I ask you, Dear Readers, for your comments.
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Comments
Also, as to housework, women want to work and have careers, and yet they want control over the domestic sphere because of biology, so then they try to do too much and have everything be perfect, in the process making themselves miserable.
rated for discussion of an important issue.
Men could do more, but I was a stay at home Dad, and in the end, although the children are fine with it, the grandparents are not, for starters, and in the end, men and women cannot I have concluded accept the male that does it, and just naturally feel they have a right to crush that person totally. but rated.
I'm the happiest I've been in a long time because I'm not married. My children and I aren't living as well as we could be, but we are pretty comfortable with my income and my son's SSI. My oldest daughter also works. I've come to terms with the fact that the man I chose to father my children isn't much of a human being and I don't expect anything from him, which is incredibly freeing.
I agree with you that many women put impossible demands on themselves to keep a perfect home and family while working a full time job. When it can't be achieved, she is often unhappy and that doesn't do much for the overall happiness of the family.
I think you caught the gist of my critique of Douthat's editorial: he didn't cite any evidence that single mothers are less happy than married mothers. He then goes on to promote a campaign to stigmatize deadbeat fathers as a way to make women happier with no logic as to how that might work.
I would agree that there are many mothers in situations such as yours in which being single is far better than being married. Douthat seems to assume that a very large proportion of single mothers would be happier if they were married to the children of their fathers, but he presents no evidence that this would be the case.
I have found that my standard of getting things done in the domestic sphere is often very different from my female partner. And that has been the cause of more than a small amount of discord in the household.