(Untitled)

[twilightembrace]

This is an extremely important and hopefully influential report, that Radio 4 was justifiably banging on about all morning.

Some of the conclusions are controversial if you jump to the same narrative and generalisations that the tabloids will. Auntie reports them in a very objective way. My guess is that The Thunderer &c will leave out, or

Comments

[cowprintavenger]

Ideally, child-rearing requires a lot more than just two people. The people I know who have kids and live close to family/good friends who help out find parenting way easier than the people who don't have support. One of my friends at work is a single mum who lives on the same street as her parents and sister (who also has kids), and she has tons of help and support with her son. On the other hand, another colleague had a baby last year and she and her husband are finding it quite hard because her family lives in Germany and his are all in Canada so they have absolutely no-one who can help them out. A lot of the problems the report refers to come from the fact that people (not just parents - grandparents, aunts, uncles, whoever) just don't have the time to spend with the children in their family. People retire later than they used to, and yes, women are more likely to go out to work than they used to be, but I don't see why the article has to imply that it's the fault of working mothers - surely if we're apportioning blame, we should

[multiclassgeek]

but I don't see why the article has to imply that it's the fault of working mothers

The implication I got was more of a 'both parents working = potential problems' vibe, rather than a 'women shouldn't work' one.

And you're absolutely right about community raising the family; however, that requires a community in the first place... Which is a whole other can of sociological worms.

[cowprintavenger]

One of the paragraphs has the headline "Working Mothers" and then goes on to say It also suggests that having many more working mothers has contributed to the damage done to children. Most women now work and their new economic independence contributes to levels of family break-up which are higher in the UK than in any other Western European country.

Seems quite directed at women to me!

[twilightembrace]

As I read it the Beeb (and the report summary - link in my reply to Alex) is very careful not to apportion blame on anyone. If there's any value judgement on women working more it's a positive one; the negative implications of this are for, as you say, at least two caregivers to compensate for.

[cowprintavenger]

I agree with the majority of the points in the article & the report, but I think there's a big danger that the positive recommendations that are being made are likely to take second place in discussions because people are going to be so busy being all up in arms about this "working mothers have contributed to the damage done to children" business that they don't consider the rest of what's being said.