Kathleen Parker writes a lot of good stuff when it comes to gender, and here’s some more from her. This time she is marking the 50 year anniversary of Betty Friedan’s seminal work in feminism, The Feminine Mystique, and offering comment on it.
“Friedan did, indeed, identify and give shape to “the problem that has no name” — female angst born of privilege — but she also helped launch a flotilla of myths that have many women (and men) still scratching their heads.“
Angst born of privilege – Parker nails one of the core problems with a continuing problem in feminism, the clear sense that it is a lot of poor little rich girl whining. This drives a lot of MRHA contempt of feminism – lesser harms to women are equated to greater harms to men, or more often, raised to a higher level of urgency. This also drives the womanist criticisms of feminism – that it never gets much beyond being about privileged white women.
In fact this issue of white female privilege is such a hot button that it has generated two complimentary defense mechanisms. One is the gleeful acceptance of the concept of white privilege. This puts you in good standing with 70s Third Worldism, which is a very potent and normative conceptual matrix for many even now, so that’s good, but more than that you get to demonstrate that you acknowledge your guilt, that you have a social conscience, that you are moral and high-minded person, so that you can go back to ignoring your privilege. The other is blank denial that there can be any kind of female privilege. “There is male priivlege and saying female privilege would deny that!” (How so?) “What you are calling female privilege is really just benevolent sexism ! (Well it damned sure is benevolent to women and it damned sure is sexist towards men, so, yeah maybe so…….. oh, that’s not what you meant?)
And by the way, however problematic you may find the dominance of privileged white woemn in feminism, it was probably necesary. It’s always the people with privilege who have the resources to start these things. I can’t think of one social revolution that wasn’t dominated by privielged people, quite often women, for good or ill. The Temperance Movement was a completely female-dominated movement, with the men, elected oficials too, serving the demands of the women. Okay, so that ended in disaster… The Abolition Movement? That started with a privileged women writing a novel and was settled with men dying at Gettysburg. Anyway, anyway, my point stands – elites have an indispensable role to play.
Parker quotes Friedan:
“It simply wasn’t fair that men had fulfilling lives, intellectually and monetarily, while women were expected to find satisfaction in the latest invention aimed at whiter collars and cleaner toilet bowls.”
This kind of delusion about the reality of men’s work lives comes out of two kinds of privilege. The first kind is a system that so insulates women like Friedan from the economic realities of life and the harsh realities of the work world outside the home that it can even look like men “had fulfilling lives, intellectually and monetarily,”. The second form is more insidious. It is the gendered belief that of course women understand men and our lives in ways that men can never understand women and theirs – that of course women understand everything little thing about men and our lives.. Mother knows best and knows all – she has eyes in the back of her head after all. Men are simple creatures, women are complex and mysterious. Feminine Mystique indeed.
Yes, Friedan was working outside the home at the time – it doesn’t count. She wasn’t being expected to be the sole support of a family off that job. Not the same thing at all. She had that privilege, and it blinded her.
And when the revolution began to bear fruit in the 70’s and 80s and women began to enter the corporate world, the bill for of this deluded view of men’s work life came due – women ran into the same buzz saw that men always had, but without the childhood years of soul-crushing hardening that boys go through to get there. They didn’t have the “unfair advantage” of a dehumanizing socialization process that would have prepared them for the trials ahead. And the reaction for a lot of women – most, really – was to buckle down and adapt fast. But for some, and for all the theorists, the reaction was 180 degrees out from that. The answer was that this was all sexism! Women were being singled out for mistreatment . This was raw sexism!
This analysis made as much sense at applying it to the experience of someone who tries to cross a muddy corral in high heels instead of cowboy boots and attributes her inability to walk to sexism, because it’s unfair, it’s unfair, it’s unfair that she should have to adopt male modes of dress to walk through mud. Now in this particular example, the most harm done is that this kind of whining just causes the women standing around in cowboy boots too the sneer at the complainer’s East Coast accent or whatever.
But in the corporate world the reaction was different. In the corporate world, with all that evil, male competition we started to hear reviled so much about this time, women’s complaints were seized on as one more weapon to beat down low-status males. Apexuality in the service of feminism! And frankly if you look at the history of feminism – at the suffrage movement, at sexual harassment policy, at domestic violence law, at all the rest of feminist gains in law and public policy – this is the pattern you see.
Well not all women were so uniformed:
“Doubtless I would have been a member of the stampede had I been of age, but as it happens, I was being raised by a widower and assumed that all men delighted in carpooling and cooking. How little I knew of the toils of sad, wealthy women.”
Parker also homes in on Friedan’s inability, and that of the movement at large, so be more than an in-group defined by and focused on one set of concerns to the exclusion of anything else, except for lip service (see also men and WOCs), all while claiming to be offering the world the heuristic for analyzing all things gender:
Parker again:
“Nevertheless, I was marinating in a culture that was shifting, and I was surely absorbing the zeitgeist. But members of my generation also were becoming unwitting hostages to myths that few were brave enough to challenge. My own skepticism came to full fruition the moment I became a mother.”
Unlike Friedan, I wasn’t tethered to home but to a job. Rather than resenting the prospect of staying home with a baby, I was stricken by the realization that I couldn’t. The “strange stirring, a sense of dissatisfaction, a yearning,” words Friedan used to describe thwarted ambition, was for me the sense of having abandoned my son. “
This narcissistic tunnel-vision dogged 2nd Wave feminism enough that it triggered 3rd Wave feminism, (Which then went ahead to fail to overcome it, but that too is for another day.) In this instance it went further, it went as far as the old “your life is grist for my ideology” shredder. Women who wanted feminism to be about freedom found that some freedoms were more equal than others, found themselves reviled as traitors to women everywhere. It was called the Mommy Wars.
Parker just loves a Parthian shot, too:
“In a twist to delight the Fates, Friedan’s ultimate legacy may well be a stay-at-home dad, grateful for the latest appliance that liberates him to carpool and make organic treats — squealing oui, oui, oui! all the way home.”
It’s an ill wind that blows no good, I guess.
- The Woman Card - May 2, 2016
- Frat boy bachelorettes and the invasion of gay bars - April 15, 2016
- “Not my kid….” - February 22, 2016
by 
Abolition did not start with Harriet Beecher Stove. By the time it was published the Journal of John Woolman was about 75 years old, and it was extremely well known in its time.
Quaker men were also among the first teetotallers. Saying that movement “ended in tragedy” is typical of today’s self-serving interpretations (and alcohol industry pushed narrative). Its history, even of prohibition, is a lot more complex and ambiguous than some would have you believe.
Welcoem, Harald!
“Saying that movement “ended in tragedy” is typical of today’s self-serving interpretations”
The alcohol industry didn’t create Al Capone and bootlegging and the rise of the Mafia, and they didn’t need to create any narratives around that. My grandparents did a god enough job on thier own and they were far from orginal on that. And it wasn’t the alcohol industry that pumped life into the drug cartels in the form of price supports, otherwise known as the artificial scarcity arising out of enforcement actions. We have te DEA and state and local jurisdcitions to thank for that.
But you are right, the Temperance Movement was complex. It owed as much to nativist hatred of the saloon culture Anglos attributed to the Irish, as well as having the virtue of beng a slap in the face to the Germans. But there was ahealthy dose of demonization of a predominantly male pastime. The female equivalent drug was church-going and note how it was exempt from criticism.
“Abolition did not start with Harriet Beecher Stove”
This is certainly true. Olaudah Equiano’s book was well-known, at least in Britain, and the Quakers went after slave chocolate early on. And after all, northern states had been abolitishing slavery since the early 1800s. I was using a broad brush on that.
MRHA?
Welcome, Sherlock.
“MHRA?” – Yeah, I k now – I use dthat advisedly. MRA is plain old men’s rights activist, but Paul Elam is trying to rebrand to men’s rights *human* rights activist for greater clarity. So I decided to give that a push. I guess it was so much clearer after all. Well, maybe it made more of an impression since it led you to ask.
First line: “Kathleen Parker WRITES a lot of good stuff….”
And she makes an excellent point. Apparently a lot of 1970s-era feminists fell for the grass-is-greener fallacy of thinking that the corporate workplace was some dreamy Land of Respect and Fulfillment. Boy, were they in for a rude awakening. A lot of men from that period were honestly bewildered at their eagerness to sign up for a slot in the salt mines: “What on earth do they think we do all day–have fun?”
Even their ‘voluntary’ entry into the workforce never carried the true costs and impact that men faced. Remember that at that time, feminism offered wives THREE options for personal fulfillment:
1) Work full-time and be a career woman;
2) Work part-time while still being supported by a man; or
3) Stay home with the kids, if that’s what you like.
And what were the husband’s options offered by the great emancipation of feminism?
1) Work full-time
2) Work full-time; or
3) Work full-time.
A lot of women–especially privileged suburban housewives like Freidan–went for Option #2, which men rightly regarded as women ‘playing’ at work while not having to shoulder any of the actual cost and burdens of being a provider. It was hard to take a woman seriously when she chattered about “maybe starting my own little boutique or a scrapbooking or cookware business out of my house… part-time, of course… just to get a sense of accomplishement and independence.” Gag–meanwhile, who’s paying the frickin’ mortgage?
And guess what became of the money from Wifey’s ‘career’? Easy answer: what HE earns belongs to both of them (and pays the bills), but what SHE earns is alllll hers.
Sheesh, Copyleft – thanks. Of all the weird spelling mistakes I make, that kind of thing is the only one that I seem to be safe from. Only usually, apparently.
“This kind of delusion about the reality of men’s work lives comes out of two kinds of privilege. The first kind is a system that so insulates women like Friedan from the economic realities of life and the harsh realities of the work world outside the home that it can even look like men “had fulfilling lives, intellectually and monetarily,”.”
This might belong in one of the other posts, but some time ago, a few months maybe, a Congresswoman (or maybe she was part of a think tank or something) was interviewed on NPR. On women in combat roles, she lamented that women were being denied the opportunity to further their military careers and better pay iirc.
Maybe my sensibilities are screwy on this, I’m not a veteran, but does this not sound naive?
@Copyleft:
“Easy answer: what HE earns belongs to both of them (and pays the bills), but what SHE earns is alllll hers.”
This reminds me of an article by Liza Mundy in the March 26, 2012 issue of TIME (Vol. 179, No. 12). It presented statistics from a survey indicating that in heterosexual couples where the man earns more, each partner is about equally likely to “make the final decision about household finances” (36% vs. 35%, F vs. M). In ones where the woman earns more, she is 46% likely to “make the final decision” versus the man’s 21%.
“Maybe my sensibilities are screwy on this, I’m not a veteran, but does this not sound naive?”
It is worse than naive, it is venal. This is called careerism, and an officer who wants to go into combat to further her or his career deserves to have a grenade into her tent, and I do mena deserve. There is no excuse whatever for seeking combat to further a career.
There is really no discussion to be had on this point.
“And what were the husband’s options offered by the great emancipation of feminism?
1) Work full-time
2) Work full-time; or
3) Work full-time”
this is one of the lesser reasons why I’m MGTOW…
I work part-time and have a tiny amount of “disposable income.” I know that if I was in a relationship there would be nagging about my “lack of motivation” and disinterest in climbing the corporate ladder. I know people might say “NAWALT.” I witnessed it as my sister talked her boyfriend into buying a house. I don’t think he wanted too. They later broke up. The next guy my sister hooked up with put her in the hospital. The women in my family pick winners….
Anyways, I spent Valentines alone, the past two years are really the only two in my adult life where I could’ve afforded a date. It’s funny how feminist’s will dismiss MRA’s concerns as “oh, those guys just whine about getting laid.” Well, it takes a tremendous amount of privilege to not even see how someone who spends a large portion of their adult life below the poverty line is pretty much invisible as a potential sexual partner. And, damn, all the shaming language comes into this one-well damn, son, this is America, pull yourself up by the bootstraps, if you want a free ride, move to Canada or some other commie country, ain’t nothin’ free in America. At this point in my life I could probably move into the protector/provider role but quite frankly, I’d rather go pay a prostitute and be done with it. Wham, bam thank you mam. Here’s the cash, have a nice life, hope I didn’t catch something nasty.
Also not a vet, but it seems like if you are going into combat in order to further a career, your incentive is to act/be heroic, rather than keep your men (sorry, people) alive. That seems like a quick way to get people killed, who never needed to die.
Also seems like a quick way to lose the trust of your unit, which is going to make your combat readiness go in the shitter.
SWAB,
“At this point in my life I could probably move into the protector/provider role but quite frankly, I’d rather go pay a prostitute and be done with it. ”
In what substantive way are those two options any different?
Protector/Provider?
What about Protector/Nurturer.
From my PoV, for many middle class people it’s better to have the woman work and be the main bread winner. Men can do more around the house than women (in general) like home repairs and landscaping, and middle class women have a nice glass floor to walk on. They are shielded from the worst jobs and shielded from high expectations like going in early, staying late, or coming in while sick.
With that said, poor women have shitty jobs. And I think it’s still harder high status woman to rise high up in their field. There is still a glass ceiling.
Anyway so much of the issue IMO women face at work is related to the fact that most women have never played team sports. So much about comradery and competition is learned through team sports.
And yeah, I’ve said all this before. Sorry. I got nothing new.
“Anyway so much of the issue IMO women face at work is related to the fact that most women have never played team sports. So much about comradery and competition is learned through team sports.”
All that and also something else, which is even more valuable – how to function in a hierarchical setting, one where we are not all on personal terms, so that is going to take a litle learning of how to code switch in relationships, and one where ther eis not one queen bee running everything and setting norms.
This is ttoally a matter of gendered socialization and not due to soem kind of gentic gender essentialism. Women do fine in heirarchical settings and men do fine in non-hierarchical settings. But it does required some learned social skills.
“And yeah, I’ve said all this before. Sorry. I got nothing new.”
Well I didn’t immediately think of it, so the reminder was helpful.
Meanwhile in other quarters of the web:
http://dalrock.wordpress.com/2013/02/18/what-we-need-is-more-chivalry/#comment-73178
Check esp the comments where you get a fascinating insight on how some religious people think when it comes to political action that might help the causes they claim to espouse.
On the other hand being so ‘pure’ means your influence and size is bound to be very limited…
“In what substantive way are those two options any different?”
I could be more forward about what I want and I’m only obligated to part with specified amount of cash….
anyways a slight tangent to the thread….
feminist’s say men rarely listen to women, however….
In what substantive way are those two options any different?
maybe that’s why GWW and Typhone Blue are so influential..
oh, this was what was supposed to appear above:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2168713/Fighter-pilots-nagging-Nora-female-voice-commands-cockpit-Typhoon-jets.html
not:In what substantive way are those two options any different?
gotta be more careful; with the cutt’n paste….
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12103-012-9155-5
Clarence, that is a gem. That kind of thing is a recurring dilemma in any social movement, and typicaly the purists lose. They lose because the pragmatists have more to offer the public and it is the public who ends up deciding these issues. They lose also because even when it doesn’t matter what the public thinks, the pragmatists are often are quicker to the thrust when it comes to in-fighting, although purists can be really nasty when they think the ends justify the means.
@Clarence
In Dalrock’s defense, neither him nor his regular posters can or have ever been described as “worldly”. For the majority of them, the consensus that they’ve reached about the current gender paradigms is a very Marvin The Robotesque “This will all end in tears.” In fact, given the knowledge that the most vocal proponents, members and commentariat of the Christian Manosphere/Internet are rural/exurban dwellers, it can be argued that their total reach (when the continual urbanification of America’s population is taken into account) is miniscule.
They aren’t even *trying* to make the world a better place, any more. *They.* *Don’t.* *Care.* Excepting the “Christian” part, my own father is an exemplar of Dalrockian thinking. He gave up on the idea of living in America when he realised that credentialism trumped experience, aptitude and desire to learn (in his case, he decided to retire when he learned that none of his higher-ups at his last job had ever earned money/saved money by doing his job. My Da is a tradesman/mechanic/engineer of multiple disciplines. His “superiors” were a bunch of men with degrees in finance and women with degrees in Humanities.) Now, a man who (on paper) *should* be at prime employability level (mixed minority, decades of hands on and training experience, exempt from health insurance requirements), is fixing multiple types of vehicles in the tropics for fun. Last week, he fixed two boat motors, a dozen Vespas, one flat screen TV and reformatted 3 computers for $300 American. When I asked him why he wouldn’t want to return to the States and earn the same amount of money for just one of the jobs, he said, “America doesn’t make sense to me any more.” In his mind, it’s easier to do what he loves for pennies than to fight through bureaucracy/feminism for dollars.
Believe me, that side of the ‘Sphere isn’t in the “solution” business. It’s stocked with people looking for explanations, not solutions.
“Believe me, that side of the ‘Sphere isn’t in the “solution” business. It’s stocked with people looking for explanations, not solutions.”
The explainers contribute too, but the solvers have to exercise some judgment when they listen to the explainers.
Well:
I like Dalrock and his insights on marriage are awesome if you are a hetero person looking to get married in modern America. And he is, at least, in favor of some action.
But yeah, some of his commenters…range from the hopeless “pure” orthosphere types to downright misogynists.
@Clarence
Define “misogyny”. Like “misandry”, it’s literally an “eye of the beholder” definition. Some of Dalrock’s posters are ‘rational’ (eg. “Women should save career building for her pre and post-childbearing life, that’s more sensible than trying to wean children while working a 50+ hr/week job! Less money spent on day care, less risk of molestation, etc.”), some of them are not (eg. “Like was better when only rich men with land could vote! I hate the vagina!!!”, or “No rings for sluts!”) All three of those sentences would (and have) earned trigger warnings on feminist Tumblr sites.
Hell, I agree with the first sentence! To me, it seems more sensible to have children, then go to work “full-time” when the kids are in school. In my perfect world, that would be the linchpin of society: men work when the kids are young (and mothers take care of the little ones), women work when the oldest child is in Hugh school (and men take over the hands-on details, such as cooking and wiping up vomit and shotgun maintenance for male teen callers.) I knew/know a *lot* of guys who would *love* to leave the rat race at 45, then sit home and dandle the youngest on their knees, help the middle child with homework and put the fear of God into the older ones. But, I’ve been called a misogynist for even **daring** to mention that idea from feminists and traditionalists. Feminists complain about the woman being “forced” to waste her youth taking care of children (as if it’s easier to chase a toddler around at 38 than 22.) Traditionalists act like the most sensible thing for a man to do is to work himself to death (despite the fact that women outnumber men in degree attainment and would be able to spend their 40-60’s sitting in offices doing paperwork.) Seeing as how America is heading towards a blue collar male/white and pink collar female environment anyway…
And now I’ve destroyed this thread. My apologies.
“And now I’ve destroyed this thread. My apologies.”
Not exactly, MaMu, when your comment goes right to the heart of the post, issues around expectations and acomodations for work in the corporate world.
MaMu: “Women should save career building for her pre and post-childbearing life, that’s more sensible than trying to wean children while working a 50+ hr/week job!
If men don’t, why should women? Weaning? Are we in the Amazon, nursing babies for two years or what? (granted, some women do, but not very many) BTW, there are these things called breast pumps, making it possible for men to nurse children.
You really think that is an egalitarian statement?
MaMu: Hell, I agree with the first sentence! To me, it seems more sensible to have children, then go to work “full-time” when the kids are in school.
So, go ahead… I take it you are doing that, then? (Wait, you aren’t one of these people preaching about parenting with NO REAL EXPERIENCE actually parenting, are you?)
MaMu: In my perfect world, that would be the linchpin of society: men work when the kids are young (and mothers take care of the little ones)
Why is that “the perfect world”? Are you a fundamentalist Christian or something? Are mothers all uniquely-nurturing wonder-creatures and men insensitive brutes unable to rock babies to sleep?
A deeply sexist statement, against men also.
MaMu: women work when the oldest child is in Hugh school (and men take over the hands-on details, such as cooking and wiping up vomit and shotgun maintenance for male teen callers.)
Why? I can fire a shotgun as well as any man. I know how to clean up baby vomit AND grandbaby vomit. Really.
MaMu: I knew/know a *lot* of guys who would *love* to leave the rat race at 45, then sit home and dandle the youngest on their knees, help the middle child with homework and put the fear of God into the older ones. But, I’ve been called a misogynist for even **daring** to mention that idea from feminists and traditionalists.
I doubt this. Maybe you are called misogynist by feminists for announcing women have to stay home and not work until their children are the age of your approval? Your above statements are sexist, of course, and that is likely what was pointed out to you.
MaMu: Feminists complain about the woman being “forced” to waste her youth taking care of children (as if it’s easier to chase a toddler around at 38 than 22.)
Can I ask how many children YOU have? Since you are authoritatively discussing this?
I have never heard any feminists say this time is a “waste”. Certainly, the next generation is not a waste. I’ve heard men HERE say child-rearing is a waste of time though (will name names if you insist).
I *have* heard feminists say that child-rearing should not be entirely a woman’s job, which is what you are saying. You may be confusing the two statements. They aren’t the same thing.
BTW, do you think MGTOWs are equally ‘wrong’ for not reproducing properly and/or babysitting children? If they don’t want to raise children, why are women who don’t want to raise or take care of them, somehow “worse” than these MGTOWs? Double standards.
MaMu: Traditionalists act like the most sensible thing for a man to do is to work himself to death (despite the fact that women outnumber men in degree attainment and would be able to spend their 40-60′s sitting in offices doing paperwork.) Seeing as how America is heading towards a blue collar male/white and pink collar female environment anyway…
Feminists are not traditionalists. Has nothing at all to do with us.
Blue collar work in America is now being sent abroad. Its ALL pink collar work. Men now have to learn to be nurses and waiters if they want jobs, too. That is not the fault of women, but of greedy industrialists (who are mostly men, last time I checked) sending jobs to India and Mauritius.
I am currently working on trying to free my husband to stay home while I work…but the entire society is set up so that it is difficult to re-enter the workforce later in life (at any point, after one has taken a lengthy hiatus) and make enough money to support TWO people.
That *prejudice* against parents should be the focus, not the *genders* of the parents who decide to stay home with kids.
Yeesh. Did I stumble onto the Book of Mormon discussion board by mistake?
“If men don’t, why should women? Weaning?”
Yeah, MaMu, how’s that supposed to work? Mom gets all the itme with the baby, dad gets to work 50 hours a week to feed them both?
“Blue collar work in America is now being sent abroad. ”
This is starting to turn around, although it’s about as fast as turning an aircraft carrier. One story that shocked me was some Chinese company wanting to build a plant in Newark NJ to make very high-end refrigerators to sell in China. The Made in the USA sticker was worth that much more in what they could charge for them. (This isn’t about actual quality prowess, just branding. People are obsessed with the US.)
“BTW, do you think MGTOWs are equally ‘wrong’ for not reproducing properly and/or babysitting children? If they don’t want to raise children, why are women who don’t want to raise or take care of them, somehow “worse” than these MGTOWs? Double standards.”
I’m not the tardy-con calling womyn spinsters and cat-ladies…
“Men now have to learn to be nurses and waiters if they want jobs, too.”
hehe, there’s one HBD (scientific racism) manosphere guy who works as a waiter and he has a masters degree. I get my food to-go, the idea of giving people money just to bring food to your table is disgusting, the cooks should get paid more….
MaMu:
“Women should save career building for her pre and post-childbearing life, that’s more sensible than trying to wean children while working a 50+ hr/week job!
Is this some sort of extreme backlash against the regular reminders that since women bear children they make all the choices? Backlash as in “sure make the decisions, but it will comes at the cost of in the event you want children and career you’ll have to get your child bearing out of the way before its too late and then get on with your career”.
Daisy:
I doubt this. Maybe you are called misogynist by feminists for announcing women have to stay home and not work until their children are the age of your approval? Your above statements are sexist, of course, and that is likely what was pointed out to you.
Unfortunately I know that what MaMu says there does happen. For some reason there are women and feminists out there that think a man not wanting to be in the rat race is an act of misogyny on the grounds that it means he expects the wife to take care of him so that he can get out of said race. Apparently feminists saying they want men to be free to do the child care is fine but men actually wanting to do the child care is bad????
many internet feminists I encounter are very anti-family, anti-motherhood, and anti-(well) anti-man-anything. YMMV. Anyway I think it’s sad when most of the people talking about family matters are right wing jerk faces. Fuck ’em all…like I need their permission or approval.
“Anyway I think it’s sad when most of the people talking about family matters are right wing jerk faces. Fuck ‘em all…like I need their permission or approval.”
One of the catfights shaping up in the MRM is between these so-called traditionalists – more on that later – and the more centrist MRAs over family issues. MGTOW comes into this, but the SAHD thing has the tradcons in fits too.
Traditionalaists – it would help immensely if the traditionalist were, you know, a litle more traditionalist. Then they wouldn’t be talking about the man-woman bond as the basis of the family. The traditional family was a man, his sons and their sons. The women asociated with thsi unit were members of the fmaily of course, but they were not the organizing principle, because families first and foremost were economic and mutual protection units. The evidence for this is everywhere – in law for instance – in England only sons could inherit, in Irish law the unit for paying fines was the three generation family, with every member chipping in to pay for the one member fine. Hell, this is the basis for male surnames, and institution that is alive and thriving.
So when the tradcons talk about the man-woman rumpy-humpy as the basis for the family, that model is either about 100 years old, or else it’s the peasant model where people married and raised kids of course, but had nothing to pass on and didn’t need or couldn’t have traditional families for protection because that had been superceded by their ties with whatever gentry they were bound to.
I don’t have any military experience,except staff told to me but other people that do.So I am not speaking here from expiring.Whoever I am interested in hearing what people who do have to say.
Ginkgo
“It is worse than naive, it is venal. This is called careerism, and an officer who wants to go into combat to further her or his career deserves to have a grenade into her tent, and I do mena deserve. There is no excuse whatever for seeking combat to further a career.
There is really no discussion to be had on this point.”
To be honest I never understood people who would put their entire junit in dangered for personal benefit.Blood baths should be avoided at all costs.That always seemed to me as something that was understood,without having to talk about it.
Also it is better to capture enemy soldier,instead to kill hem/her.
But I also think that officer should have some interest in job that he/she will be doing,including combat related jobs.And when I say “interest” I don’t mind some crazy dream about glorious battle and going out in a bless of glory and going batle,and similar staff.Because I also heard terrible stories about officers who did not want that particular job,or where not interested in it.Who would make terrible mistakes and some series oversight in security ,because there we not invested in the job ore sinply did not give a f….
Two cadets were recently killed here,combination of neglect and stupidity.But we are not supposed speak ill of the dead.
And I am not just talking about military jobs,I am also talking about other jobs that have people lives at stake.I almost lost one of my leg ,for reasons such as dis.So baby I am just overreacting because that.So I have very big mistrust for people who are not invested in their jobs,ore don’t want to do their job.
Valkina,
“To be honest I never understood people who would put their entire junit in dangered for personal benefit”
We had a general in the US, George Custer, whio when he was a colonel in the Civil War used to come back from battles with casualty rates higher than 100%! They must have been ending him replacements during the battle or something. He thought this was really gallant and all that shit. Finally the Lakota and the Cheyenne killed him, at the battle of the Little Bighorn. Basically they took out our trash for us. I don’t we have ever properly thanked them for that.
“higher than 100%!”
WTF was he doing!!! I would have hanged his ass.I honestly have nothing to say except this.
And I absolutely hate when beatles,people and events like this get glory fade in movies and book.
@DaisyDeadhead
My reasoning for delegating full-time careers for women to their post-fertility years is simple.
2005, I was stationed in Germany. I worked in a clinic of about 500 people (more or less split evenly between male and female.) Our yearly complaint count was tallied at 1500-1550 (it’s been years, but I do remember that it was over 100 written/recorded/reported complaints per section.)
2006-2 of our 5 female GPs, 4 out of our 20 nurses, and our female pharmacist, surgeon, OB/GYN doctor and paediatrician were pregnant. Between the 10 women, over 2 years of work hours were lost, extended to their male counterparts or farmed out to our closest krankenhaus/military hospital. Our yearly tally of reported complaints? Over 10,000, 2,000 of which were reported “directly” to E-8’s/O-6’s and higher. More than *half* of those complaints (close to 70%, actually) were levelled at our inability to replace the labour of those pregnant medical providers. When the paediatrician miscarried in her sixth month, their office received over 100 written notes whose messages could be boiled down to one thing:”I know that you’re sad and all, but my kid has and ear infection so just get over it and get back to work.”(I should note that this was their idea of being *nice*. That doctor also received about a dozen hand-written notes telling her that she was **selfish** for having a child *at all*. Two weeks later, she accepted orders to a base in Florida, where the child population was low enough to avoid receiving callous “Congrats on the miscarriage!”, notes.) Our facility received so many complaints, we were inspected over a month ahead of schedule (final result: all of those women were transferred to different bases, 4 of the nursing slots were given to men and the complaints slowly returned to their prior 1,500/year level.)
Personally speaking, I don’t care *who’s* doing *what* and *how* as long as the job gets done. BUT (and this is a big **BUT**), if we have to live in a world in which customer/client/patient/whatever satisfaction **and** we have to live in a world in which women are mandated to receive as much time for themselves to carry children to term, one of two things will have to happen:
People will have to SHT THE FUCK UP! when women get pregnant and have to take days off
Or
Women will have to willingly step aside and allow men and non-pregnant women to take their slots
As you and those of your ilk have made abundantly clear, “Women should be allowed to do anything they want to do for as long as possible.” But, as I’ve seen happen time after time after time, those same women will go bloody spare when their “preferred” choice of worker (a “strong, empowered woman”) is unable to meet **their specific need(s)**. Either we suck it up or we live by “The customer is always right/our Number One priority!” Believe me, we can’t do both and as women now outnumber men in full-time, part-time and temporary jobs…
As you and those of your ilk have made abundantly clear
My ilk? This phrase gives me permission to ignore you. (Aside: Did you read the Camels with Hammers ‘civility pledge’? I signed it, so I can’t properly reply. Trying to be somewhat decent.)
Doctors are professionals. I am mostly concerned with the working class. Most working class women I know (the ones who mop the doctors’ floors, not the doctors) have been too afraid to take days (or even hours) off due to pregnancy…but then I am talking about a different class of workers than you are.
Speaking personally, I have worked for several pregnant women/young moms in my life…. took their hours and sick days and put my money where my mouth is. (I worked overtime, in other words, but did not get overtime pay for it, since I worked THEIR schedules as well as my own.) I did that out of a strong belief that they should not be penalized for ultrasounds, baby-ear infections or mastitis.
I do not have to prove myself to anyone here.
Love the post. Another giveaway that feminism was a movement for well-off white women is that working class women were already working alongside working class men* down the mines, in the mills and the factories. They were rarely bored housewives because they didn’t get the time: that job was reserved for the middle/upper classes.
* And their children, to a point.
“WTF was he doing!!! I would have hanged his ass.I honestly have nothing to say except this.”
Lots of people would agree with you, but medal chasers are not uncommon today or throughout military history, even if they’re not as extreme the majority of the time. I used to do convoy security for an Army unit whose commander kept volunteering them for back-to-back missions, presumably to get his own fitness report to look good. They’d get 4-5 hours of sleep per night for weeks on end. As a result, I got to see a Freightliner launch 15 feet up into the air off of a sand drift when the driver dozed off and failed to swerve around it. This is the kind of stuff that happens most often. You can usually tell which units have medal chasers in charge because their morale sucks really bad in spite of all of their achievements.
@DD
And during my enlistment, I signed over 100 days of my own earned leave to various lower-level personnel (airmen, civilians, etc.), to allow them to take care of emergencies (divorce proceedings, medical appointments for themselves and their children, extension of leave to allow them to enjoy all 14 days of their redeployed spouse’s R&R…) It does nothing to change the fact that I had over 70 days of leave to sell back to the government when I was honourably discharged, because lack of manning created a situation in which *my* leave schedule was undermined by the needs of my troops/reporting officials. I’ll elaborate for clarity: in a decade of military service, I used about 180 days of leave, gave away 100 days of leave (a day here, three days there and it begins to add up) and still had about $3000 worth of days paid to me at half-price by the government.
But, even then, you’re overlooking the thrust of my argument. Jobs are created because work needs to be done to help or provide a service to people, not to provide people with work. Likewise, for all of the visible examples of nepotism in the world, the most common reason for raises, promotions and other incentives is exceptional performance, not personal want or need. I will reiterate: I don’t have any problem with women taking any job for which they are trained and qualified. My “problem” is with the fact that there are plenty of women in all economic classes who work solely for emotional fulfillment/political kudoes. When those women decide to stop doing their jobs (whether due to pregnancy, inability to work well with others, whatever), their work still needs to be done. There was a thread on Feministe detailing current issues with manning medical facilities. About 1/4 of the commenters were women in medicine. Their complaints were as follows:
“I’m tired of having to wait weeks to see a female doctor/getting to know a nurse (female), then having her disappear for years at a time!”.
“I’m taking a leave of absence to take care of my kids/go back to school/etc.”
“Why are so many men pouring in nursing/my profession? Don’t these men understand that this is *our* work?!?” Damn the patriarchy for taking jobs away from working women!”
So, to be clear: those women want to be taken care of by other women. For many of them, their sole reason for entering into a medical field was to *be* the “friendly, female face” that they wanted to see in their own time of need. However, they also demand the right to work or not work as they see fit (eg. Nurse got tired of earning less than doctors for performing diagnostic work, so they began to return to school for NP degees. The exodus led to and still produces massive nursing shortfalls every year), while complaining about the fact that they’re “unjustly” passed over for raises and promotions due to missed time *and* complaining that men are reentering the profession (as if people only get sick on a schedule and will magically stay well if no one is around to take care of them.) *That* is my reasoning for feeling that women (especially in the degreed classes) would be better served by having the kids, getting them out of the door, then joining the workforce (with men bowing out between the ages of 40-50 to accommodate women workers, or vice versa. Rare as it is, I’ve known my share of women who had no problem with the idea of a househusband/early retired “man of the house”. Oh God, I remember working out with the husband of a SMSgt a few years back. He told me that he had to up his regimen to 1hr weights/2 hr cardio to prepare for his wife’s returns so that he could “keep up” with her, in “that” way.) Hell, most of my male relatives worked nights and weekends because their wives’ jobs were daytime work and more profitable than their own (my female family members were getting degrees looooooooong before it was considered to be “empowering”. Combined with the fact that the men of “my ere considered too valuable for back breaking labour to waste education upon…)
Bottom line: in a service-based economy in which every customer complaint is seen as good as gold (which is the path that our “benevolent overlords” have chosen for us), any disruption in the flow of goods and services is business suicide, whether it’s a server who misses a shift to send her kids to a doctor, a plumber who turns down a job to ferry the kids to after-school activities or a financial advisor who “randomly” misses days of work for family-related duties, there’s a price to pay for pissing off your client base. In my workplace, it involved having an entire hospital being placed under government oversight because our higher-ups saw the jump in complaints and figured, “Where there’s smoke, there’s fire.” Or you can watch any of those schaudenfreude TV shows based on rescuing failing businesses, then see groups of people being portrayed as incompetents due to their customers rejecting the idea of “flextime” (the first season of “Restaurant Impossible” and a few seasons of Gordon Ramsey’s British shows featured restaurants whose businesses rose and fell depending on whether people were showing up to work or not. When it was brought to the attention of the producers that many of those restaurants received bad reviews due to apathetic/overwhelmed single mother servers, the format changed to shedding the spotlight solely on inept cooks.) I like my idea (and believe me, I have no intention of ever doing anything to implement it) because (in my estimation) it would provide a much better work-life balance than what we have now.
(I just chose to put this here because you have “HISTORY” as some sort of heading for classification. Feel free to move it if you wish.)
Someone passed this to me recently. It’s a write up by Jamie Utt on questioning the math behind the Lisak/Miller study.
http://changefromwithin.org/2013/02/26/rethinking-lisak-miller-checking-the-math/