to Joan Walsh for the discerning review. I've come to the conclusion that what makes Flanagan's writing so grating is not her hypocrisy in cataloging the imagined sins of employed mothers -- or even her one-woman war on feminism -- but the fact that she's basically a snob. A wonderfully witty and genuinely gifted snob, but a snob nonetheless.

Unlike earlier masters of the domestic genre -- such as Jean Kerr and Erma Bombeck, who Flanagan professes to admire -- she can't quite manage to sustain the level of self-deprecation that made those writers truly funny and compelling. But then, unlike Bombeck and Kerr, Flanagan doesn't want her readers to identify with her --she wants to seduce them with her flawless prose so they'll stand still while she twists the knife. And frankly, it's not unheard of for magazines like the New Yorker and Atlantic Monthly to launch the careers of writers who excel at that particular art.

To deconstruct Flanagan's flabby reasoning and hold her feet to the fire is the job of a critic. To recoil from Flanagan's conclusions is the mark of a humane and intelligent reader.

Having cancer is not a pass. Flanagan is as accountable for her writing when sick as when well.

I hope she gets better; I feel compassion for her illness and for her child self with its losses.

I hope she learns how to think.

Kudos to Walsh.

I really wish writers like Caitlin Flanagan would stop acting like this whole, "women working" thing is something new and was brought on by feminism. For most of human history, women have used their physical or mental abilities to bring income into the family house. Whether it was gathering, while their husbands hunted, working on the farm, or tending the family store or restaurant, women worked and they worked hard.

The only women who stayed home and didn't work at all were members of the aristocracy or the upper classes. And even they, like Ms. Flanagan, depended on hired help to take care of the house and children, etc. It wasn't expected of them to spend every minute of the day bathing their children in "mother-love." (BTW, I don't begrudge Ms. Flanagan her hired help. I don't think women should ever feel guilty for hiring a nanny or housekeeper. That said, I agree with Ms. Flanagan that you should at least pay their social security taxes and their health insurance.) True, the nature of the kind of work women do has changed dramatically over the centuries (we're writers, lawyers, executives and so on), but women are a permanent part of the office.

We may scale back hours or stay home for few years when the youngins come, but most of us will go back to work. It's time that people like Ms. Flanagan got used to it.

Flanagan is like a bad car wreck: you don't want to think about what she says, but at the same time you can't look away.

Flanagan is right in one respect, that is, when a mother works, something IS lost, and let's be honest, I can see it in my child's eyes precisely in the moment when I drop her off at day care.

But what she doesn't talk about is what is also gained: independence for the mother and the child, a greater variety of learning and social experience for the child, satisfaction in working and accomplishing something in your own right, maintaining your individuality instead of being absorbed by husband and family. I am fascinated to see the respect my stepsons express for their two moms who are college professors, to see women shouldering responsibilities, dealing with job crises, and effectively managing their employees alongside men. Maybe it's a flaw of our society, but this is a kind of respect my peers and I didn't show (or probably feel for) our stay-at-home moms.

You can work at home, but you can't effectively work and pay attention to your child at the same time (believe me, I try!). This is where Flanagan's reasoning breaks down: if you'd ask her where her attention is focused, then she couldn't get around the question. You CAN have it all, just not all at the same instant! I think women who can utilize the more "male" skill of compartmentalizing their activities are probably a lot happier. The feeling of constant distraction is what is so unsettling and what the kids respond poorly to.

I keep thinking sometime soon we'll all get sick of Mommy Wars, but alas . . . It is amusing to read the anti-feminist thoughts of a woman who lives the feminist dream - husband, kids, interesting job, and enough household help to make it all possible. Just as it is amusing to read Kate O'Beirne rant on the subject of working mothers as she rakes in unfathomable amounts of dough while working her little conservative ass off, presumably with a passel of household help. And I can be amused instead of outraged because I am fortunately past the problem. The kids done growed and gone. I did not work. I had the luxury of staying home, which I chose to do, and though sometimes I envied my friends who worked and had nannies, I only envied them because they seemed to have better haircuts and nails than I did. Our society forces us to be hypocrites, and that is because our society doesn't really like families. It likes wealth, and the gaining of it, over all else. I know it will sound like socialist pap to say it, but say it I will: the country's resources should be concentrated on families not warheads. That's so 60's, sure. Still, feminism is about who takes care of the children, not who gets to be a lawyer.

This ongoing debate between working and stay-at-home mothers always seems to occur in a vacuum where there are no men. Dad is always assumed to be the full-time working stiff and main breadwinner, except that this isn't true in many families, including mine. My wife works full-time outside the home in a very demanding job. I work full-time, but am based at home (kind of like Caitlin Flanagan, except that I don't pretend that my job isn't really a job). I know at least three other families in our neighborhood who follow similar working schedules. Our kids all seem fine, but who gets credit for that? Do the working moms get to use us as an example of successful two-career families, or can the stay-at-home moms claim us as reasonable facsimiles of traditional families, but with some gender issues? In the end, you can't change the definition of femininity without also changing the definition of masculinity--they're two sides of the same coin. Ignoring dad provides the clearest evidence that this battle isn't really about what's best for children and families, it's about confining men and women to traditional roles.