From Britain: "The New Woman is a Housewife

[Triana]

I'm not going to waste my time commenting on this.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-2136625,00.html

[Warpy]

1. Gee, women with rich husbands who sit at home are happier

than women with poor husbands who have to go out and scratch for a living.

What a shocker.

[Selteri]

2. I'm not completely sure it's very true...

past that they might claim or act happier as they can usually use shopping and coffee as a way to 'cope' with thier harder life than people who both work and handle the kids at the same time.

[acmavm]

5. Oh phooey. I could have been a stay-at-home with my 1st

husband. In fact, that's what he DEMANDED. You could have eaten out of my toilets or off my floors at on any given day at any given time. He made me crazy. I went back to school. Then I got my first job. I've been working (or trying to work) ever since. It's a way better deal .

[Warpy]

6. I think the point of the whole article is CHOICE

which is a luxury poorer women don't have. They have to go out and work to support the kids they'd really rather stay home and raise full time.

Your ex tried to remove your choice. You reacted appropriately to it.

If you've got money, or you married it, you are presented with choices. The fact that some women chose to stay home and are happier for it is beside the point.

[rodeodance]

8. yes, choice--if can afford it.

Women who go to church with their husbands also claim they are happier than those who do not, according to the study, which is based on the responses of more than 5,000 couples.

“Progressive women with kids at home feel it is a legitimate choice,” said Brad Wilcox, co-author of the report, which has been published in the Social Forces journal.

[Triana]

10. Men with rich wives would be happier sitting at home too...

...no one ever mentions that.

[MADem]

3. Hmmm...some fundies would love to see this as not an option, but mandatory

..The women are predominantly drawn from the middle classes and have young offspring. They regard themselves as “at-home mothers”, seeing their prime responsibility as bringing up the children rather than housekeeping.

...Other key ingredients to matrimonial bliss include an attentive and emotionally responsive husband, a sense of fairness in a relationship and a lifelong commitment to the institution of marriage.

Women who go to church with their husbands also claim they are happier than those who do not, according to the study, which is based on the responses of more than 5,000 couples.

...In most marriages, wives do twice as much housework as husbands, yet only 30% of women in the study thought their relationship was unfair.

[Triana]

11. Of course they would...

...and I can see that the point of this article is that women have a CHOICE and I have no problem with them chosing to stay at home. HOWEVER, this type of reporting (whose scientific accuracy has never been verified and other reports to the contrary can always be found) encourages the Taliban (our very own AmeriKKKan Taliban and other mysogenist factions in other countries) to try to FORCE women into the home - as a mandate, and not a choice. They point to this as their excuse to exercise such control.

[stray cat]

4. If they want to and can afford to good for them

[Triana]

12. I agree...

...I always wonder though, about the accuracy of these reports and who/what is behind them.

[no_hypocrisy]

7. Being a housewife challenged my mother's sanity a majority of the time.

My mother earned not only a bachelor's degree, but also a master's degree at Wellesley during the 40s. She could have chosen a variety of futures upon graduation. She was teaching when she married my father in the early 50s. She continued to work until he could afford his own medical practice. Then came the kids. While she was good at managing the house, being a mother, and keeping balance amongst us, she had a discernible underlying sadness and anger. She wanted to return to the workforce when we were old enough, but my father refused. Later, she would complain a lot, drink a little too much, and appeared quite dissatisfied. By dissatisfied, I mean not only at where she was and what she could have been, but also how she herself chose her prison. (I ascribe her "succumbing to marriage" as being part of the 50s social mores of marriage and children, and to the pressure from her parents once she got her masters degree.) Perhaps as a consequence, she gave two types of advice that were diametrically oppositional to each other to me and to my sister: to me, it was "Stay free, don't easily relinquish your independence," and to my sister, "The world is a scary place for women who aren't tough enough if they're going it alone. Marry, and marry well."

She's gone now. Please don't get me wrong. She loved my dad and loved us, but we weren't enough. The best metaphor I can offer is the message on her favorite apron: "For this, I spent four years in college??!!"

[lukasahero]

9. I'm waiting for the headline "Women are human beings with individual

wants, needs and desires". Now *that* would be a revolutionary finding. :eyes:

I will chime in again that, for me personally as an individual human being, the thought of being a stay-at-home mom would equal suicide. Someday, maybe, some researcher somewhere will realize that just because one is a woman doesn't mean one is the same as every other woman.

[Triana]

13. EXACTLY!

Thanks for saying it so well. :)

The problem with this stuff is that 'researchers' and less-than woman-friendly factions in gov't/religion (which in the US is now one and the same) try to cram ALL WOMEN into these roles as a requirement, rather than letting it be their choice. We've all seen that happen and they always point to these types of articles and 'studies' (whose accuracy, source, and motives I usually question) to do it.

[NMMNG]

14. Huh

The University of Virginia study does, however, have its critics. Claire Fox, director of the Institute of Ideas in London, said: “What makes a happy marriage is likely to be people engaging with each other. If the full extent of your relationships with the external world is the toddlers’ group, daytime TV and ironing, it has got its limits.


Well duh. And what sort of relationships with the external world can Mom have during the day other than toddler's group, household chores and daytime tv? Her husband and female contemporaries are all at work! (And no, chitchat with the grocery store clerk doesn't count.)

[Katherine Brengle]

15. I........

didn't read it, because articles like that tend to piss me off, but--

I love being a stay-at-home mom. And I am a feminist. The difference is that no one should feel forced into being one. But I also think that no one should be forced NOT to be one if it is what they want.

It all boils down to economics.

(Also, to be entirely fair, I do write from home, so although I am home I still get to "work" so-to-speak, so I get fulfillment from that as well.)

[Odin2005]

17. Was't part of the reason behinds the feminist movement because of...

...stagflation forcing women to enter the workforce to make ends meet for thoer families?

[Odin2005]

16. We need more stay-at-home Dads

[mwooldri]

23. And I'd be willing to be one if we could afford it.

However it's not a choice that is available to us right now. In order to live, both my wife and myself must work. We had a long time where I was the only one working and my wife was (and still is) a full time student. We struggled and struggled but in the end got way behind on the bills. So to keep the household afloat and avoid having to move back into her parents house cooped up in a single room... she went back to work.

Now if she had a good job that paid plenty of $$$ I'd gladly drop down to part time or no time and take care of our son. However that is just not a choice that is economically viable.

Mark.

[HockeyMom]

18. You don't know what the future holds

Get an education. Get job skills. Go to work, even if only part time to keep your skills and resume current. Your husband could leave you or die. Then what? Try going back into the workforce after 20 years to support yourself and see what happens.

Been there, done that. It's not pretty.

[Triana]

19. Hocky Mom, you sound like my Mom!

I listened to her, too. I do believe she was right.

[cap]

20. what planet are they living on????

or, should I say, whose their daddy???? Unless you marry someone who is well to do.

The economics of running a household havent changed... it takes 2 incomes. Look at the debt load of the american middle class. u gotta be kidding... it's hard to be a stay at home mom if you want to be and keep your household afloat.

Most women have to work.... let's get over it....

[Jade Fox]

21. It's about time to whip out the old "Feminism is Dead" story....

which gets repeated like clockwork about every ten years.

Most PEOPLE would love to be able to spend more time at home with their kids, but with the work week expanding instead of shrinking, and the fact one can no longer raise a family on one person's wages, that is not an option. So if the "new woman" is a housewife, she is likely financially privileged.

[Proud_Feminist4Peace]

22. I'm sorry but.......

The new womyn is a housewife? ROTFL!!! This isn't the good ol' days when womyn was abused by their husbands and forced to have babies. This is the 21st century and our foremothers didn't stick our neck out on the line for this shit!!! We demand equal pay if not more pay for our work. We don't need men to "shelter" us, we can take care of ourselves just fine. I watch my mother "stay at home" and she was miserable. I never want that for myself or any self-respecting womyn.

[mwooldri]

24. Really depends on the woman in question.

I'm supportive of my wife in whatever she wants to do. Admittedly she has times when she wants to do X, and is in the middle of doing X and decides now to do Y... maybe as she said herself she has ADHD but that's for her and a pyschiatrist to talk over and I guess I might need to nudge her that way.

However she has said in the past that she'd love to be a stay at home mom, get her degree, might work part time when our son goes back to school... Fortunately I have enough life insurance on us right now, I probably couldn't get a decent rate if I wanted to now (unless I signed one that explicitly ruled out suicide - you got to love being bipolar!). So if I were to pop my clogs my family would be covered for some time... but not entirely long enough; my wife would have to go back to work full time eventually.

Now I might draw the line at her prostituting herself (but if she wanted to do porn that's OK by me... prostituting and doing porn are two different things in my eyes and yes I'm sure that there are men who have a fetish about 'large' women) but she's she and I wouldn't have it any other way. I mean, when we married she kept her last name... even if it was on the grounds of it costs too much to change the passport. In any case I don't care - I didn't marry her to increase the number of people with my last name... I married her because I love her to bits and want to spend the rest of my life with her. I must admit with work, our son, money, etc, I may have lost touch with that and haven't showed her I care for her... but I try.

Anyway. Enough rambling.

Mark.

[dropkickpa]

25. I would love to stay home...

...and spend more time with my daughter. But, as a single mom (with NO outside monetary help) that is just a pipe-dream. I returned to work when my daughter was 3 months old and, except for 2 non consecutive weeks a year, I only spend time with her for about 3 hours a day M-F (which also coincides with dinner-time, bath-time, etc all that crazy hectic stuff).

It would be nice to have the choice to stay home with your children. But it has to be a choice. There need to be options. I know plenty of women who recoil in horror at the thought of being at home all-day, everyday, and that is their right.

Making it sound like the women who stay home are happier than all of those who work, and vice-versa, is misleading and just sets up yet another of the stay-at-home/work-outside-the-home mother wars. It pits woman against woman, and draws attention away from the fact that women are made to feel guilty for whatever choice they make, be it guilt from "traditionalists" for wanting to and enjoying working ("abandoning their children"), to some "feminists" who make women feel guilty for wanting nothing more than to be at home with their kids rather than have a career ("throwbacks").