February 2009 – Page 9

File Under “Feminism is Good for Families”

I love Stephanie Coontz. If you haven’t checked out her books yet, you should. She’s a history professor who focuses largely on the American family, and her work is fascinating. This latest op/ed is no exception.

Coontz’s work consistently points to the facts that (1) there really was no great 1950s golden age of the nuclear family, and (2) as gender equality increases, so does quality of life for men, women and children. Her Times op/ed is about research that suggests parenthood leads to decreased marital satisfaction and even divorce. More than 25 studies have confirmed that with parenthood comes a steep decline in marital happiness. However:

The Cowans found that the average drop in marital satisfaction was almost entirely accounted for by the couples who slid into being parents, disagreed over it or were ambivalent about it. Couples who planned or equally welcomed the conception were likely to maintain or even increase their marital satisfaction after the child was born.

Marital quality also tends to decline when parents backslide into more traditional gender roles. Once a child arrives, lack of paid parental leave often leads the wife to quit her job and the husband to work more. This produces discontent on both sides. The wife resents her husband’s lack of involvement in child care and housework. The husband resents his wife’s ingratitude for the long hours he works to support the family.

In other words, gender-egalitarian marriages and marriages where parenthood is planned tend to be stronger once kids are in the picture. And kids do better socially and academically in stable and happy marriages.

Coontz also emphasizes the importance of maintaining individuality and separateness from your children — not dedicating your entire life to being a parent at the expense of your marriage and your sense of self. It’s advice that is too seldom directed at women, for whom parenthood often comes with the expectation of total and constant devotion to someone(s) else.

The take-away: The conservative family ideal of a stay-at-home and subservient mother dedicated entirely to the domestic, a breadwinning and household-leading father, and as many children as God gives you is a recipe for unhappiness. Gender egalitarianism, including reproductive planning and the pursuit of individual needs and desires, is a better pro-family strategy.

Shameless Self-Promotion Sunday

Yeah, I can’t believe I’m up at 9am on a Sunday either. Gettin old.

As long as you’re up too, post a description of something you’ve written this week along with a link. Make it specific; don’t just post to your whole blog.

Seriously, “fattitude?”

Ampersand linked to Carol Lay’s new graphic memoir. He’s dismayed by the story, and I think I agree. It’s a book about how, via a really severe calorie restriction regime and a regular exercise program (but mostly the former), she has managed to stay at her “goal weight” of 125 pounds for the past half-dozen years. She’s 5’9″ inches tall, and 125 pounds puts her at the low end of the BMI’s healthy weight range.

Weekend Reads

HEY GUYS!: On the importance of gender-neutral language.

IS BEAUTIFUL: A touching memory from The Black Snob on little black girls, beauty, and barbie dolls. [via]

ROSIE THE RIVETER: On the gender and class implications of the economic recession, and whether the media will freak out over a female-dominated workforce.

LADY BUMPS: If you haven’t heard, someone famous gained weight and everyone hates her for her sloth and moral failure.

GOOD HAIR, BAD HAIR: Renee and Michelle look at Chris Rock’s new documentary on blackness and the anxiety of having and maintaining “good hair.” [Reportedly the movie dominated the Sundance festival this year and is being well-received by critics. Has anyone seen it?]

WOMEN OF THE LONG HOUSE: Kai takes a fascinating look beyond the lens of whiteness on the 1848 Women’s Rights Convention in Seneca Falls.

BAD JOKE ALERT: If you’re a woman taking your shirts to the cleaners, you may get, um, taken to the cleaners.

AND BOOTY FOR ALL: Watchdog group Morality in Media tries to take AARP to task for insinuating that people past the age of sixty might possibly have active sex lives. The horror!

INVISIBLE MEN: Thomas wonders who is bidding on Natalie Dylan’s virginity, and why?

SEX AND THE FAMILY: AL struggles with whether she is slut-shaming, particularly because the one she is worried for is her own little sister.

BRINGING UP BABY (GIRLS): Are Anglo Westerners developing a preference for female children?

LOLWARZ: On feminist pet wars and cattiness. (This is the best feminist blog war ever. You ought to know what side I represent.)

Justice, Justice You Shall Pursue

A guest post by Rebecca of City of Ladies

Peace and hello. The Feministe crew have generously invited me to guest-post here about the Israel-Gaza conflict. I’ll spare you the biography and just say as background that I’m a blue-state Reform Jew with an Israeli-born mother who’s about ready to disown me (not literally) because I support peace in Gaza. (How about that ceasefire, eh.)

This post is in three parts: Israel-Republicanism, One State, Two State, Multiethnic State, Jew State, and Shalom/Salaam.

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Israel-Republicanism

While I discuss below issues that are more specifically related to the current war, I’d like to first counter, somewhat obliquely, David Schraub’s earlier posts on anti-Semitism.¹ I agree when David says that, as with other forms of bigotry, it’s the victims of that bigotry that should get to define what is and what is not anti-Semitism.

However. Criticism of Israel’s actions is not, in and of itself, anti-Semitic. Period.

Most American Jews I know are, if not always liberal, at least consistent Democrats. (Except for my uncle. Does everyone have a Republican uncle?) Which is why it confuses and saddens me when so many of them adopt what I call a Republican position with respect to Israel.² Meaning they take as their motto the saying “My country, right or wrong” without adding the coda that liberals do: “if right, to be kept right; if wrong, to be set right.” Rather than seeing the conflict as the complex and nuanced situation it is, they see it in black and white – “you’re either with us or against us.” In short, large numbers of American Jews that are progressive about American politics are total right-wing nutjobs when it comes to Israel.

Why is this? Why this willful blindness, this Israel-Republicanism? Does it stem from religious conviction? Anti-Arab racism and Islamophobia? A belief that Jews have just been persecuted enough? Simply a facet of American privilege? I suspect it’s all of these.

Don’t Divorce Us

Though I really wasn’t expecting to . . . just like Melissa, I cried like a baby:

(Music is the only audio in the video, and helps but is unnecessary to viewing.)

The faces of real people whose lives could easily be changed are more than enough to get one crying. But thinking about how I would feel in a similar circumstance, where someone else gets to decide the status of my relationship to my husband — and interestingly, also like Melissa, my husband immigrated to this country to be with me and so I do know something about what that kind of fear is like — well. It really does just confound me that anyone thinks some of us deserve more rights than others.

Sign the letter to the Supreme Court, asking them to invalidate Prop 8. Do it now.

Anti-Feminist Vandalism

After seeing the above image at Feministing yesterday, there was a little celebration going on in my heart. I felt really joyful at this message and its getting out there. Even though I’m usually opposed to talk about what “real men” do and don’t do, so long as those messages exist, this is definitely the kind I want around.

I saw the note at the bottom of the post, stating that the image had been defaced, but didn’t notice the links and assumed it was a mere reference to the tear at the top. That was annoying, but also not particularly surprising. It wasn’t until today, at Sociological Images, that I saw what was actually done to it. It’s below the jump, as it could easily be considered very triggering.

Woman Set on Fire Outside Strip Club

I really wish that I knew what to say, and I just don’t:

Shortly after 1:30 a.m., 22-year-old Nathaniel Petrillo and 27-year-old Rianne Therialut-Odom allegedly called the unidentified dancer outside the Babes and Beer nightclub in Tarzana to meet with them. For unknown reasons, they poured a combustible liquid on her and set her ablaze. She then ran back inside the bar where people came to her aid.

The dancer is now listed in grave condition with severe burns over 60 percent of her body. The suspects took off in a metallic gold in color newer model four door sedan, police said.

In another article, police suggest (I think rather insensitively and hopefully not prophetically) that the two suspects may end up being charged with murder. Apparently the woman’s condition is just that critical.

I think that abbeyjean said it well with her apparently needed reminded that women who work in strip clubs are PEOPLE, not firewood. If only more of us could remember that, as well as the fact that this is where misogyny and hatred and marginalization of sex workers leads us.

My thoughts are with the woman who suffered this horrendous attack, and I hope with all my heart that she makes a recovery. If you’re someone who prays, now would probably be a good time.

Bill Cunningham: Democrats Think “a Woman’s Womb is a Tomb”

Via Media Matters, Bill Cunningham “discusses” the woman who gave birth to octuplets:

Okay, so . . . is it just me, or does Bill Cunningham’s argument essentially go like this:

Democrats support the right to abortion! Which I think is very, very wrong (and murder, and destroying some kind of sacred femininity or something)! So you should support forcing abortions — which I think are wrong! — on women who want to continue their pregnancies! Because I like my money a whole lot! More than I dislike killing babies! “Abortions of convenience” are wrong, unless it’s my personal convenience we’re talking about!

Or am I missing something? I know that I at least got the exclamation point part right. Oh, and did you catch the part where he referred to the woman’s babies as a “litter”?

This, to me, just further demonstrates that conservatives really, really do not understand the meaning of “pro-choice.” And probably never will.

Women, Power and Politics Exhibit at The International Museum of Women

The International Museum of Women, an online museum dedicated to the “value the lives of women around the world,” has a really new and interesting exhibit up called Women, Power and Politics. The curator of the exhibit says in the Welcome:

As a counterpoint to these one-dimensional depictions, we wanted to collect and share real stories about how women are making change. In particular, we wanted to show inspiring tales of how women from all walks of life dare to believe the world can be different – and put their passions and ideas into action.

Despite what the evening news and our high-school history books tell us, women are powerful, and they always have been.

Though I haven’t had time to extensively comb through the entire exhibit (it contains quite a wealth of material!), it looks to be incredibly informative and diverse. Rather than focusing majorly on obvious and U.S.-centeric examples such as the campaigns of Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin, the exhibit seems to give equal time and energy to the experiences of women all over the world, and how they have made a difference in their own countries/regions.

Topics discussed include, but are not limited to, the ways that women have won and exercised power to make a difference, the effect that both biology and appearance have on the way that women in politics are often viewed by the public, how women are organizing, and the right to vote. There’s even a toolkit with ways that you can get involved.

Check out the full exhibit here.