For the past several years, I have been classified as a DINK. This means "Dual Income, No Kids". This time is almost behind me. Now what?
I foresee that i'm going to be going through some real hard times in the future. Will it be worth it? Definitely. Will it be tough? Yes. I blame feminists.
1950-ish: imagine. Before the feminist movement gained real steam, the household was like this: Man goes to work, kids go to school, wife looks after the home and maybe works part time for some spending money or to pass the time. Kids come home from school, mom helps with homework, gets them all cleaned up and spends time teaching them some strong values. Man gets home from work and is greeted by his family. The kids regale him with stories of school while he takes off his coat and shoes and wife finishes making a healthy dinner. He is happy to enjoy the peace and quiet of home after a hard day at work. Everyone sits down together and eats their dinner with some friendly conversation and maybe a little lecturing or sermonizing from father. Kids go to bed and husband and wife spend some time alone together doing whatever it is they like to do: reading, playing cards, talking, etc. Husband and wife go to bed and do it all again in the morning.
2011-ish: live. The household is now like this: Man goes to work, kids go to school, wife goes to work. Kids finish school, but mom and dad aren't home, so they go stay with a family friend, or even complete stranger until wife gets done work. Wife picks kids up from other house to bring them home. Kids are rowdy and disrespectful of mom and treat her poorly because she hasn't had the time to spend with them to teach them to show the respect she deserves. Dad gets home from work, listening to the kids being rowdy and mom yelling at them to smarten up while he takes off his coat and shoes. He regrets coming home to all this anger and frustration, when he could have stayed at work and at least gotten paid for it. Mom is too tired from working all day to cook a decent healthy meal, so she microwaves a frozen lasagna for everyone to eat. Everyone sits and eats in the living room watching TV because they don't particularly want to talk to each other. Kids go to bed. Husband and wife have an argument about who works harder at providing for the family and how neither one of them particularly feels like doing more around the house because they're both so tired. They go to bed frustrated, and do it all again in the morning.
Is this an over-generalization? Yes. However, I don't think it's all that far off of our average household in this society. I think it's a tragedy.
The feminists had it in their head that women were second-class citizens and they needed to be able to work like men to be respected like men. While I will grant that they were treated as lesser, they never were actually lesser. To be equal is to be the same. To be equivalent is to be different, but of equal value. This is how we were meant to be. Men screwed up by treating women as second-class when we really depended on them as much as they depended on us.
We are hardwired so that men are the hunter-gatherers, or principle bread-winners in modern terms, and women looked after home and hearth. Now that women have entered the workforce in such strength, they no longer have the option of being homemakers. The family can not enjoy a comparable quality of life unless the woman also works full-time, so she must. Women have always been the more adaptable half of the species. Men have never been, nor will we ever be as able to take care of the family like women can, but women are certainly capable of winning bread to feed the family should the man fail.
How do we go back? I wish I knew the answer. It scares the bejeezus out of me knowing that my wife and I will both have to work part time and neither one of us will be able to focus on the raising of our child. My child will grow up eating preheated or fast food with his stressed-out parents, and I don't know how to fix the problem. (I'll also argue that this is why our society is obese)
How can I provide a decent quality of life for my young family without needing my wife to work full-time? I can't. As a society, we need to find a way to give women the option of going back to the home to look after their families. This doesn't make them slaves, or servants, or serfs, or anything lesser than a man. This means they are doing what is needed for their families so the children can grow up strong, healthy, educated, loved, respectful, and happy. Homemakers also provide a sanctuary for men to escape from their jobs and decrease the stress level before going back to work the next day.
I will doubtlessly vote for the first politician who comes forward and says he has a plan to bring homemakers back into society. We need them more now than ever.
Part 1 Response (word limit, lol):
ReplyDeleteI get really tired of people, especially men, blaming the deconstruction of the nuclear family (whatever that means) on the feminist movement.
The biggest hole in your argument - and I would argue its about the size of an actual black hole in space - is that this is written from the perspective of a man looking at his needs and the needs of his children first and not the woman as a person.
Tell me, do you only go to work as a means to financially contribute to said family? Or do you also go to work because you want to contribute to your job and in turn to society? Didn't you ever yearn to have a rewarding career? I have a feeling that even if you didn't like your job (which I think you do) you would still have a desire somewhere within you to have a fulfilling career and working life.
Okay, so then if men and women are equal...how is it that we have to stay home to mind the children simply because of our biological makeup? It's not like we can wave a magic wand and have the man conceive and raise the children in case a woman is more career-minded than her spouse. Nope, what your saying is that if we as women choose to propagate the species and fulfill a biological yearning to have children that we then have to immediately sacrifice any dreams and ambitions and goals we, as equals to men, have had the strength to come forward over the years and claim as ours...in part THANKS to the feminist movement.
Now I am by no means a radical feminist...but I am also not walking around today in a burqa. I am free to attend (and excel) at higher education AND even have career prospects ahead of me that are almost as good as a man in my position (although not quite). Sure, in the 60s a woman could attend university...but it was more of a demonstration of family prestige and wealth than anything else. Girls were plucked from their schooling usually before graduation to be married off...and even if they managed to overcome all the barriers set up, on graduation day there was only one prospect: girl friday, take it or leave it.
I realize that your post isn't intended to blame individual women for making the decisions that were made that got us here today...however,I fundamentally cannot agree with most of what you are saying.
I already know that balancing a career along with the strains of motherhood and maintaining a good relationship with my spouse will be extremely difficult...but in my eyes its a small price to pay to realize my full potential as a fellow human being. Many things in life that are worth having come with consequences.
For some women, motherhood is their true calling and they wake up in the morning just dying to start planning that perfect dinner for her husband. Not to say I don't revel in my own acts of Suzy Homemaker...but if its the only thing I had to look forward to in my life and this meaning was arbitrarily assigned to me by MEN because it suits them for not wanting to come home to frozen lasagna...well fuck that. And that's what a lot of women said, and I am proud of them.
Part 2 Response:
ReplyDeleteAs much as a revolution was happening within households with the nuclear family...there were other societal changes taking place. Families had one car, smaller homes, grew vegetables, saw movies in the theatre once or twice a year, made gifts, walked around outdoors, the list goes on ad nauseum. Today, things need to be bigger, grander, sparklier...and most importantly better and newer than what everyone else has. The increased workload on mom and dad has just as much to do with societal expectations of "normal" than anything else. If you want to work less as a family to spend more time with the kids...find a way to reduce monetary/material expectations. Try to get by with one vehicle, downsize the TV, downsize the house, etc etc...none of these measures are easy but its a much more viable solution in my opinion than banishing women to their destiny of being human incubators. Modern society is very much about working to live (with lots of stuff). Consume less, work less.
Whether you are an evolutionist or not...its pretty hard to refute that species on this planet adapt to change in order to survive. Although the dissolution of the nuclear family can be seen by some (obviously you) as a complete negative...I would argue otherwise. I mean, are you telling me that people that are brought up in unconventional surroundings can't grow up healthy, happy, sane and intelligent people? I was never personally afforded the luxury of a nuclear family setting and I think I manage to function alright out there in the world. I have met people that have grown up in a traditional family of 4 and there was so much tension, resentment and issues that they barely got to adulthood in one piece.
If we had a time machine to the 50s I am sure we would see many happy families coming together and living this beautiful fantasy of idyllic society. I am sure we would also see many, many women sitting in their clean kitchen dreaming out the window about all the possibilities gone by. A brain in her head sitting idle that could have become president, cured AIDS, gone on a mission to Mars.
Nope, sorry...not buying it.
I am not disagreeing that it can be an ideal situation for two willing parties (man and woman). But it doesn't mean that life can't be fulfilling the way it is today.
Also...fast food is there and frozen lasagnas are sold but that doesn't mean that they need to be eaten. It is possible to make healthy food even with two busy adults...its just not easy. Donny works a hard labor job and I am in full time school (usually with part time work as well) and even I can huck some stuff into a slow cooker and come home to delicious healthy food. It needs to be a priority though and also in a more equal environment with two working people, the burden(s) must be shared. The obesity epidemic has as much to do with ease/availability of fast food, marketing of fast food (BE A SAVVY CONSUMER!!!), and the absolutely appalling lack of activity that most people settle in to. If someone has time to play internet computer games, they have time to work out an hour a day...!
So in closing I guess my point is that having choice is much more important to me in a society than not having choice. It usually has consequences but not ones that I feel outweigh the benefits.
I really enjoyed this, Ty. I stay at home with my children and I love it that way—though I've usually worked odd jobs to help make ends meet. I lost my job at the beginning of this semester and have just been home with the kids while my husband goes to school and works. Money is tight but the kids, oddly enough, are happier. :)
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