The War on Moms

I haven't blogged since September 2012 but it's only natural that I would make a comeback poking some serious anger-fueled fun at someone else's work.

This has to be a joke.  It can not be real.  Do women like this exist?  Are there people who think this way?  This has to be tongue-in-cheek, right?  These questions are a rhetorical tool through which I am compelled to introduce to you a blog shared on Facebook, entitled:

"I Look Down On Young Women With Husbands And Kids And I'm Not Sorry"*

I mean, right off the bat. . .with a title like that, it makes me wonder what would happen if you threw a bag of feces into one of those Dyson bladeless fans. . .would the expression still hold true?

Let me take you through this precept by ludicrous precept.  My comments are in italics and much of it is, in fact, tongue-in-cheek, thank you very much.

***********

Every time I hear someone say that feminism is about validating every choice a woman makes I have to fight back vomit.

Bulimia's a serious issue, Amy.  Do you want to talk about it?  I've got like 3 boxes of donuts and a 6-pack Dew in my car.  Like, right now.  We could do this.

Do you really think that a stay at home mom is really on equal footing with a woman who works and takes care of herself?  There's no way those two things are the same.

No.  They are not the same.  If they were, anybody could be a mom.

Define "work."  I know, I know. . .you're probably operating under the trivial notion that work equates to some kind of compensation of monetary value.  That's a fair assessment.  But it's interesting because. . .I teach physics.  Work is done when a force that is applied to an object moves that object.  So, let's say the poor choice-less unfulfilled mommy is the force.

Work is also all about the transfer of energy from one object to another.  I'm not going to list the myriad jobs that a mother does.  Go find the t-shirt.  We've heard it all before and it is exhaustively admirable.  To ignore a mother's efforts, even from the perspective of believing they have no place in the progression of feminism, implies that there is no associated intrinsic value at all.  Which means moms are pointless and, therefore, should probably be done away with.  Good luck with that soapbox.  And the same luck with getting anything to move ever again.

I'm wondering, Amy, who your mother is.  And what kind of person and mother she has been to you.  Because if her sacrificial choices aided you in becoming the free, independent, feminist spirit that you are, what kinds of steps are you taking to cover up that fact?  It would be seriously embarrassing if other lady-power fascists found out you were birthed and raised by a female who should have had the opportunity to make a better choice with her body.

It's hard for me to believe it's not just verbally placating these people so they don't get in trouble with the mommy bloggers.

Mad props to mommy bloggers.  If you can raise upstanding citizens who can't wipe their own bums and also find the time to write up a report for the rest of us on the tried and true failures and successes of potty training, pre-school registration, and dangerous pinstrosities, you deserve every accolade.  Which will probably come to you in the form of soggy toast in bed on Mother's Day or a sticky hug, but. . .whatever.

Having kids and getting married are considered life milestones.  We have baby showers and wedding parties as if it's a huge accomplishment and cause for celebration to be able to get knocked up or find someone to walk down the aisle with.  These aren't accomplishments, they are actually super easy tasks, literally anyone can do them.  They are the most common thing, ever, in the history of the world.  They are, by definition, average.  And here's the thing, why on earth are we settling for average?

I take it you are not married.  Because your comprehension of marriage is severely distorted.  Last time I checked. . .marriage didn't begin and end with a walk down an aisle.  Not to mention all the legless or paralyzed folk you just insulted.

Super easy tasks, eh?  I am grossed out.  Literally.  Not a gross to be found.  One-hundred forty-four ews. . .vanished.  Allow me to play devil's advocate here. . .why don't you go ahead and stake yourself a little spot outside a fertility clinic and say what you just said to the 11% of women and 7.5% of men who just couldn't muster the energy for this super easy task.

Be cautious with your language.  The idea of commonality as average is blurred.  Y'know, cancer is common.  Yeah.  People just keep getting it.  Like, every day.  Golly, what a bunch of lame-os.  Average much?

If women can do anything, why are we still content with applauding them for doing nothing?

*uncomfortable laughter*  Ok.

This.  This is verbal placating.  *whispers* If you were wondering.

I want to have a shower for a woman when she backpacks on her own through Asia, gets a promotion, or lands a dream job (Great!  I think that's awesome, a marvelous idea!!  Any excuse for a celebration of our successes and the goals we accomplish and the adversity we overcome!!  Here, have some of my exclamation points to decorate!!) not when she stays inside the box and does the house and kids thing which is the path of least resistance (Doh!  You started off so well.)  The dominate (dominant?) cultural voice will tell you these are things you can do with a husband and kids, but as I've written before, that's a lie.  It's just not reality.

You're wrong. Click me!

Wronger.  Look at this gal:

Wrongest! Click me, too!

You will never have the time, energy, freedom or mobility to be exceptional if you have a husband and kids.

I don't look for excuses to be offended.  This comment offends me to my core.  My absolute core.  My mother is exceptional.  I know too many extraordinary women who chose motherhood as their adventure, their path, their dream job.  I know several glorious women whom motherhood chose, women who grew into a role they never imagined they could fill.  And there are dozens and dozens of children who are the better for it.  I only leave the daddies out during this discourse because the attack is on women.

I hear women talk about how "hard" it is to raise kids and manage a household all the time.  I never hear men talk about this.  It's because women secretly like to talk about how hard managing a household is so they don't have to explain their lack of real accomplishments.  Men don't care to "manage a household." They aren't conditioned to think stupid things like that are "important."

Amy. . .quotes?  Come oooon.  You're better than this.  It's interesting, though, to "hear" that "stupid things" like raising "the" next generation "aren't" impor"tant."  Nice job calling men out as part of some kind of oh-that's-women's-work stereotype, though.

Women will be equal with men when we stop demanding that it be considered equally important to do housework and real work.  They are not equal.  Doing laundry will never be as important as being a doctor or an engineer or building a business.  This word play is holding us back.

I can not count the number of times I have physically cringed while reading this.  I'm fairly certain that the previous paragraph reeks of the kind of archaic mindset that most men and many women adhered to not so very long ago when feminism had hardly begun to burgeon.  Amy, this is backwards thinking.  And you discredit the home environment as a legitimate contribution to family and society as a whole.

"Real work."

Oh, Amy, Amy, Amy.  If laundry is your arguing point, I find myself feeling pity.  Not patronizing pity.  Like, I honestly feel bad that you just don't get it.  As if all that a mother is and does can be simplified down to menial tasks and thankless chores.  When I think about my childhood and my mother, I don't see laundry. *insert scoff here*  I see a strong woman, a wise woman, an industrious woman who made her dreams comes true by becoming a mom to 3 daughters who owe far more than they can ever repay in the way of love, devotion, and literal blood, sweat, and tears.

Maybe I'm more fortunate than most to have had that experience; one that indicates to me that honest, hard-working, compassionate children are a far better legacy than common work.  Obviously, I'm exaggerating to make my point because I find women in the economic workforce to be integral to feminism, something about glass ceilings, blah, blah, blah. . .

Word play isn't holding anyone back.  Telling women that feminism isn't really about choice, it's about swinging the equality pendulum so far the other way that we forget women as a species are different from even one another and suited for/interested in differing objectives. . .that's what's killing us.  Infighting.  Stop it.

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*Jan. 15, 2014   by AMY GLASS