Lots of things - when you consider how few female inventors, scientists and engineers there have been until very recently.

For example:

Hedy Lamarr (yes, the movie star) co-invented frequency-hopping spread-spectrum radio and got a patent on it - during WW2.

In the same time period, a team of women at the University of Pennsylvania essentially invented/developed computer programming (for ENIAC).

There's also the many accomplishments of Marie Curie, more than 100 years ago.

Those are just the ones that come to mind without doing any research.

There are probably all sorts of gender differences in how people think when you look at large groups of them and make sweeping generalizations. That doesn't say anything about what an individual can do.

btw, Pem Farnsworth worked closely with Philo T. to invent high-definition electronic television. Her face was the first image he transmitted using it.

"Jump ahead to the 1950s and 1960s and to the rise of the American middle class, and we see a weird mixture of the past. People had to work and do a good chunk of their own child rearing, but family and community were often close by, giving parents enough room and society so that the adult world continued to dominate. The idea then was to live in an adult world with children, not to live as an adult in a child's world."

It wasn't like that. Not totally, anyway, and not for the middle class.

"People" in the middle class didn't have to work. *Men* in the middle class had to work, and their wives mostly stayed home and took care of the house, the kids, etc. Good or bad, the gender roles were pretty clear and reinforced in lots of ways.

A lot of middle-class American families in those years moved far from family to follow Dad's career. Yes, there was "community" - it meant the neighbors (who were often stratified by economic class, ethnicity, religion, etc.) helping each other out.

"The fragmentation of family and community, along with the non-stop marketing and catering to children, has upended our worlds and reversed their importance."

That was going on in the 1950s and 1960s as much as now, if not more so. The products were different but the constant marketing to kids is nothing new. It was the baby boom and there was lots of money to be made.

"Most parents now live in the child's world, partly because they are alone and have little child care options, but in part, it seems, out of peer pressure and market forces."

I don't know any parents who "live in the child's world". I do know plenty who try to do the best they can for their kids.

Back in the '50s and '60s it was common for adults to booze and smoke around kids all the time - and then they wonder why the kids ignored their lectures about not using drugs. It was common for kids to get in serious trouble, such as the hospital or morgue, due to lack of supervision.

Peer pressure and market forces aren't new at all.

Accipeter writes: "Make your male partner take equal responsibility! Stop assuming you'll be the one to stay home!..if you stay home one minute longer than he does, and if you sacrifice your career (and ability to be economically independent) one minute longer than he does, you are a dumbass."

If only it were that simple, and the line could be drawn straight down the middle, with 50% on each side.

Real life isn't like that. Real life is about doing what's best for the family, and it's often hard to know exactly what that is.

Suppose Parent A's job pays significantly more than Parent B's, and neither employer will accept a reduction in hours. Whose job is kept?

Suppose Parent B's job comes with health insurance and other benefits, and Parent A's doesn't, and neither employer will accept a reduction in hours. Whose job is kept?

There are careers where you can take off for a couple of years, or do part-time/freelance work, and it's no big deal. There are others where not working for a few years for any reason other than getting more education in that field will make you unemployable, because things change so fast. (Many healthcare professionals need employment and continuing education credit just to *retain* their licenses).

And like it or not, biological/medical reality can step in at any point and just say "HA!" Like the expectant mother who has to spend months on bed rest or have a miscarriage. Or the baby with medical problems, the new mother with medical problems, and much more.

The reality is that it's she who gets pregnant, delivers, and can breastfeed. That's not going to change any time soon, either.

Even when everything is seemingly perfect, how do you define exactly where the childcare halfway line is?

I know one family where Papa (that's what they call him, not Dad) works a few minutes from home, but Mom has a commute of nearly an hour. He works five days a week, she works four. So every morning when they both work, the parents get up at the same time, but Mom just gets dressed and goes off to work, while Papa gets himself and the kids dressed, fed and delivered to preschool/daycare/school, then goes to work. At the end of the day, Papa collects the children and prepares dinner. Mom usually makes it home in time to sit down with the family. The preschool/daycare/school know to call Papa in case of emergency, because he's closer. OTOH, Mom takes the kids to the routine doctor appointments and much more on her day off work. And when they were infants she did not work outside the home at all.

Are either of those parents a dumbass? Or are they just making the best of the situation?