Letters to the Editor
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I never wanted to have kids...
I was born in 1970. By the time I reached high school, it had become apparant that my father was the ONLY father doing any housework or childcare.
My father was a middle school history teacher while my mom was a math professor at a community college. He had all the same vacations we did and worked set hours while my mom sometimes had night classes and worked all summer. He sacrificed being a high school coach to raise my sister and I because my mom made twice as much as he did. Together they decided he would be the primary parent because my mom wouldn't be happy staying home (neither would he) but someone had to be home in the evenings for us and during vacations and his job was the best suited for that (sans coaching of course). I let him know all the time how much I appreciated what he did.
My parent's marriage taught me that if I didn't want to stay home with the kids, I had to find a man who would. Looking at my prospects in high school and college, I wasn't holding out much hope. So, I always said I would never have kids.
At 28 I met my husband. He's from The Netherlands and despite his mom never working, he was raised to pull his own weight in the household. I think this is the biggest problem with society now. Not enough families are teaching their kids that everyone contributes to the household and when they get married it's an equal partnership. Too many woman get in the rut of doing everything for everyone in their family because it makes them feel good and validates their existance. This does a disservice to their kids (male and female).
We are trying to get pregnant now and he will be staying home with the baby because he wants to and he knows he will love it. He does half the housework and all the finances (he's better at it despite me being an accountant :-) right now. To say only women are suited to stay home with the kids is to not acknowledge the diversity of personalities and talents among both men and women.
Each couple has to work out their own rules for their marriage but any woman who has a husband who expects her to work full time, do all the housework and the majority of the child care needs to take a hard look at what kind of person her husband is and what kind of marriage she wants to have. If she's okay with it, that's her choice but no one should perpetuate a myth that men can't contribute equally to the household. They can. I refused to accept that when I got married I would be in charge of all the housework and all the childcare. If that meant I never got married, so be it. Luckily I found a great guy who wanted an equal partnership in marriage.
Sorry this was so long.
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is that the best she has?
>> hoped there would be a discussion/refutation of O'Beirne's ideas here>>
No one's bothering to refute O'Beirne's ideas because they are so so so so old. We're heard and refuted these time and time again. I actually found it amusing that she's rehashing the same old same ole stuff and apparently can't come up with anything new.
That's why is was all the more disapointing that the interview couldn't seem to keep up. This stuff is old hat.
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Thank you!
Rebecca,
Thank you for allowing Kate O'Beirne to show you how misguided you are in your opinions and assumptions, about feminism--and about human nature. I agree with every single thing she said in reply to your questions. I've read the book and I think it's wonderful.
For the record, I have 2 graduate level degrees and spent 10 years in exciting jobs that I loved and in which I excelled and was well rewarded. When I became pregnant I never imagined leaving my career. When I quit my job to become a full time mother to my then 9 month old infant, I was earning more money than my husband, but making my daughter my top priority felt like the right thing to do--and it was. At that time, a move such as mine was so "radical" that the local paper did a profile of me that talked--in aghast tones--about what it meant to make such a "sacrifice". I have never regretted this "sacrifice".
The only thing O'Beirne said that I'd edit is that the original feminists DID do us a favor, but they didn't know when to stop ranting. They pushed too hard and too far, and so created the absurd world that Kate O'Beirne's book exposes. While we should thank them for the initial effort, we must reproach them for the rest; for the things that caused them to dance off the mountain, and to try to take us--and our daughters--with them.
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that woman is insidious
>>It's kind of strange when a black progressive mother has more in common with the republican rightwing pundit than the liberal left in our thoughts about childcare.>>
You don't, though! O'beirrne would have you believe that, and that's all the more tragic, that's she spinning such rot.
Every mother: white, black, hispanic, asian deals with child care issues. We all want better child care options. Don't let the smooth talking O'bein make you belive they're addressing child care issues more than liberal groups! Their brainwashing is working if we fall for that!
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Clever sophist
Kate O'Beirne achieves success by ambushing, dismissing, and cleverly couching her message in mock-honest exclamations which hit the reader up beside the head and shut down his brain. In that respect, she reminds me of Rush Limbaugh.
In this real world, women have to work to make ends meet, not that they particularly want to go out there and slave for some pittance of a wage which is what most are getting. Those professional women who are fortunate enough to have a choice to work part-time are doing what they want to do. But they are not representative of the working woman. Who wants to work, be it man or woman? Wouldn't we all like to do as we please...travel, read, have a hobby? But if we have to work, please pay us equally, please give us opportunities to ascend to higher paying professions, and please, please do not tell me that the apex of life is motherhood and family values and that working is hurting my family. The working woman is taking care of her family!