>>Thanks, cosmicmojo

Thanks, for making my point:

Quote:

"besides, She spit out high-speed vitriol at us, why couldn't we respond in kind if we felt so inclined?"

Now that's tolerance!

Poco>>

it's an attempt at humor. Maybe I"m not a commediane (or speller). But geeze, does everything have to be such an angry blaming event for you. I do find it highly hypocritical that you post an angry letter, but if anyone jokes about angry vitroil spewing out as fast as a speeding bullet all of a sudden I'm intolerant! LOL Plus, I don't think saying we have the right to respond to her points --er, duh, sorta the whole point of debate--is intolerant.

I think we should all play that drinking game!

Who are these women who criticize women for staying at home? I'll tell you.

I'm an attorney. Recently another attorney came to me with a touchy problem. She has been licensed and employed by the same mid-sized (about 40 attorneys) firm for 4 years and recently got pregnant. The named partners at the firm are both women and have been vociferous in the past about women devoting their full time to work. They clearly look down on women who want to raise children full-time or work part-time and stay home part-time. This woman is afraid of becoming persona non grata at her firm. The firm has no pregnancy leave policy, no flex time, etc.

It's only one example, but my guess is that it's not the only one.

"I don't get it. So, the choices you made, and options you were faced with, are/were harder than you thought so......that means that feminism failed you? That doesn't make sense."

That depends on what you were taught. As I said, I came of age in the 1970s, so perhaps the rhetoric was more strident.

What I was taught...

1) Men and women would share equally in childrearing.

Not true.

2) Women can have high-powered careers and care for their children.

How's that supposed to work? Who is raising the children, when they need homework help, to be dropped off at sports, get sick and need to stay home for 3 or 4 days... who is doing that? Paid help? how much does that cost?

3) Men and women would share equally in household chores.

Not true. Negotiation is useless in this area.

4) Breast is best.

How are you supposed to breasfeed and work at the same time? Pumping doesn't work for many women. I tried. Do you want to sit on the toilet in the women's room at your workplace, with a noise breastpump, trying to extract milk between meetings? If you don't breastfeed, then you are compromising the health of your child.

And once again, who is caring for your child?

5) Quality daycare is the answer.

Have you seen most daycare centers? Not to say that kids are harmed? But if we were a child-centered nation, wouldn't most agree that children most benefit from being with their parents, rather than with paid assistants?

What amazes me about women like O'Beirne (and Phyllis Schlafley, and Danielle Crittenden, and Ann Coulter, et al) is that they would not be prominent pundits had it not been for the feminists upon whom they've built their careers denigrating. O'Beirne thinks the media are morons? She's right -- the media love women who hate women. Next to being a cannibalist serial killer, self-loathing attacks on one's own is the fastest road to media stardom.

Speaking of cannibals, has anyone ever seen Mr. Phyllis Schlafley? The guru of feminine submission seems to have an invisible lord and master. I wonder if she ate him?

>>) Men and women would share equally in household chores.

Not true. Negotiation is useless in this area>>

I'm sorry, but that is just your husband, dear, not all husbands.

My husband does the VASt, VASt majority of our housework. oh, all of it, ok. I do dishes sometimes on the weekend. And I do all my own laundry. I balance by doing the grocery shopping and cooking. Most couples I know DO share responsibilities and DO communicate, cooperate, and negotiate. If your husband won't negotiate that is really too bad. I don't know how to make someone cooperate who doesn'want to, but gee, again, that's not feminism's failure, but his for being uncooperative.

Okay so when interviewing someone who talks about numbers and statistics that she pulled out of thin air perhaps you should ask for the polls - the phrasing of the questions asked, etc. Talking about numbers and research and data is completely bogus. Rush Limbaugh says things like the data says or research backs up my claim. Does this mean it's true? If I ask 3 of my friends a question - that's a poll. For example the claim that research suggests that women do not want to work full-time. Do men? Many people seem to hate their jobs and I hated the first 4 careers that I tried. If you had asked me a few years ago I would've said that I didn't want to work full-time. Even now, loving my job I wouldn't mind more vacation time (say 4 wks each year or perhaps 6...) So it's no surprise that people probably men too would like to work less, especially parents. Numbers/data/research means nothing coming from this woman.

Next, let's talk about the fact that most Americans have to work regardless of whether they are in a single parent or two parent family. Only the privileged few are able to have one stay at home parent.

I understand that this women has been seething about what some feminists said 30 years ago. I appreciate that she's apparently been too busy taking care of her kids to write this book until now but it's 30 years too late.

Thanks for sparing me the pain of reading this book which is obviously filled with drivel.

>>) Men and women would share equally in household chores.

Not true. Negotiation is useless in this area>>

I'm sorry, but that is just your husband, dear, not all husbands.

My husband does the VASt, VASt majority of our housework. oh, all of it, ok. I do dishes sometimes on the weekend. And I do all my own laundry. I balance by doing the grocery shopping and cooking. Most couples I know DO share responsibilities and DO communicate, cooperate, and negotiate. If your husband won't negotiate that is really too bad. I don't know how to make someone cooperate who doesn'want to, but gee, again, that's not feminism's failure, but his for being uncooperative.

-- cosmicmojo

Cosmicmojo,

Maybe you live in a feminist's paradise, and god bless you for having achieved the dream.

But once again, I'm talking about most women, not the privileged few.

i don't think that my husband is any better or worse than the majority of men out there... he's just a typical man.

And it's the unreality of many of these posts that just lets me know that we will never get a liberal in the White House, not as long as people stay in denial and in their own little worlds. We're playing a losing political game. Sigh.