Random Rant
While catching up on friend's LJ entries, I noticed one in which ladylarken mentioned writing an article about how a lot of people think of being a young stay-at-home mom as archaic. It made me think about how people also consider the oppisite, being young and intentionally childless and intending to stay that way (childless, not young), is, if not outright wrong, at least bizarre. Or they don't beleive it's true and make exceptionally obnoxious and patronzing comments along the lines of "Oh, you'll change your mind when you get older." I'm sure L.L. hears her share of patronizing comments from the other end of things, which leads me to my point. We're supposed to have made all this progress in regard to the choices women have in life, and undeniably, things are better than they were 50 or 100 years ago, but in many ways, while we may have more options, there is still a very limiting set of expectations placed upon women.
This is especially true where children and household duties are concerned. Now, instead of being expected to become homemakers, women are expected to not only have children, run a household, prepare meals, and perform all the other traditionally female tasks, but to also quickly aquire higher education, a high paying job, and a career. Obviously, most people expect men to contribute to many of the areas that were once considered women's spheres of interest in the past, but think about how we talk about men in the home. I've heard many women say that their husbands/partners really "help" out at home, which begs the question, helps who? He helps the person who is ultimately responsible for the household tasks: his female partner. I've never heard anyone say that a woman "helps" her mate earn a living. And I would find it weird if I did. The expectation placed upon women regarding children is even more stringent. A woman must want to have childen, but not too many, and must take diligent, attentive care of them, with minimal "hired help," but must absolutely work full time as well. Women like ladylarken are "just mothers," and their work in providing a stable homelife and nurturing the next generation is completely devalued. Women like me, who choose to be childless, are deemed selfish or unloving, and "don't have a family" just because our families only have two members. Mothers are far more often critisized than fathers for focusing on their careers, and if they hire the best tutors and nannies to make sure their children are well cared for, they are derided for not providing this care directly.
As Eric once said after a particularly venoumous tirade about the state of society, I'm an angry woman. It just infuriates me when I find myself apologizing for my life, sometimes to strangers. For some reason, I feel like I have to say, "Oh, its not that I don't like children. Of course, I like children, I just don't want any of my own." Which is true. But what if it wasn't? There's no reason I should be obligated to want, or even to like, kids, and it makes me equally angry to think of anyone daring to suggest that the time, love, and effort that L.L. lavishes on her beautiful child is any less a valuable contribution because it doesn't yield a paycheck. In the long run, I think both of us are making an important contribution to our world, not only in the work we choose to do and the ways we give of ourselves individually, but just by modelling these alternatives and demonstrating their stregnths.