Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Feminist Says Child Rearing not Worthy of Time and Talents of Intelligent Humans
LifeSiteNews ^ | 6/20/06 | Hilary White

Posted on 06/20/2006 3:34:11 PM PDT by wagglebee

NEW YORK, June 20, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Linda Hirshman, a feminist US writer on cultural issues, has told the world why she thinks staying at home with the children is an occupation “not worthy of the full time and talents of intelligent and educated human beings.” She complains at length that the feminist movement, while making some gains in public life through legal activism, has largely failed in the one area where it counts most: the family.

She upbraids women who stay at home for failing the feminist agenda, saying, “They do not require a great intellect, they are not honored and they do not involve risks and the rewards that risk brings.”

Writing in the November 2005 edition of the American Prospect, Hirshman admitted that the real intention of the feminist movement was not “equality”, but to destroy what she calls “the unreconstructed family” of a husband and wife rearing children. She writes that the goal was to see as many women as possible abandoning family life for high-level professions and politics.

Hirshman a committed radical, was a member in the 1970s of the feminist lobby, the National Organization for Women (NOW), a donor to the pro-abortion political organization, EMILY’s List, and a professor of women’s studies.

But, she complains, the movement has “stalled”; while the “public world has changed…private lives have hardly budged.” Childrearing is still seen by both men and women to be the natural purview of women. She writes of her “shock” to discover that among those professional women whom she called the “logical heirs of feminism”, large numbers were leaving their careers to opt for childrearing.

“Marriage is essentially unchanged,” she laments. “The real glass ceiling is at home…Looking back, it seems obvious that the unreconstructed family was destined to re-emerge after the passage of feminism’s storm of social change.”

She writes, “this represents not a loss of present value but a loss of hope for the future -- a loss of hope that the role of women in society will continue to increase.”

Some of the women she interviewed confirmed her worst fears: they liked being mothers. One declined to be interviewed because she could not leave her activities with her daughters: “We’re all in here making fresh apple pie,” she said.

Another, an “an Ivy Leaguer with a master’s degree” described her at-home activities: “I take my [3-year-old] daughter to all the major museums. We go to little movement classes.”

The article ignited a blaze of online outrage from feminists and traditionalists alike. Bloggers and editorials in print and online editions of a number of magazines have run comments blasting Hirshman.

In an op-ed at the online edition of the political magazine, the Huffington Post, Ann Coulter wrote that Hirshman and those who think like her, are “expressing an intolerant world view that women who don't work are losers.”

“Hirshman isn't just expressing an opinion about what she thinks is best, she is saying that any woman who makes a choice different from what she espouses is unequivocally ‘wrong.’”

Coulter writes that feminism is losing its sway in public because it focuses on “problems that hardly exist…while spending precious little energy on issues that indisputably have a negative impact on women: pornography, sex trafficking.”

“If [feminists] spent a fraction of the time on these issues that they spend trying to get women to get their men to vacuum the living room, the world would be a better place.”


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Extended News; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: childraising; feminazis; feminism; lindahirshman; moralabsolutes
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-20 ... 61-8081-100101-120 ... 201-219 next last
To: Knitting A Conundrum

Excellent point!

Children are only young for a short period of time. I have the rest of my life to go "back to work" and/or get another degree. I "find myself" on a daily basis when I'm with my boys!


81 posted on 06/20/2006 4:17:16 PM PDT by jnygrl
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 68 | View Replies]

To: Tall_Texan
You ~~should~~ duck after that tasteless and unfunny comment.

(Here is a little something you must have missed in Rhetoric 101: When saying something deliberately outrageous, it needs to be redeemed by some kernel of truth, some wicked piercing of conventional wisdom, something expecially funny and forbidden...it needs to be redeemed by SOMETHING. The fact that something is obnoxious is not, in itself, a reason to say it.)

82 posted on 06/20/2006 4:18:14 PM PDT by LK44-40
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 29 | View Replies]

To: wagglebee

Too bad her mother didn't take this advice.

Alouette: proud mother of NINE and grandmother of FIFTEEN!


83 posted on 06/20/2006 4:18:19 PM PDT by Alouette (Psalms of the Day: 113-118)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Tall_Texan
Feminist Says Child Rearing not Worthy of Time and Talents of Intelligent Humans

as opposed to..... who should be having them?

84 posted on 06/20/2006 4:20:07 PM PDT by Arizona Carolyn
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 29 | View Replies]

To: freedumb2003
Feminist=Ugly girl with bad attitude who couldn't get a date

Today's skewed version of the "feminist" would fit that perfectly. However, I consider myself a "true" feminist in that I actively support a woman's right to life, I'm against the sexual degradation of women through pornography, the sexual abuse of women through prostitution and the sexual servitude of women through sexual slavery. I actively encourage women to take joy in the physical, emotional and mental differences we have with men. I don't begrudge men when they are stronger than me because I am confident in who I am as a woman and peaceful in the knowledge of my own strength. I think raising a child is the highest calling in life, for either men or women, but God has blessed women by giving them the greatest role in raising a child.

85 posted on 06/20/2006 4:21:48 PM PDT by The Blitherer ("These are not dark days, these are great days." – W. S. Churchill)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 30 | View Replies]

To: wagglebee
The article in it's entirety can be found here:
http://www.prospect.org/web/printfriendly-view.ww?id=10659

Its almost comical to read; this woman has quite an axe to grind with highly educated women who would choose to (gasp!) raise their own children instead of engaging in the (more appropriate) relentless pursuit up the corporate ladder.

And here I am lamenting all those times I missed spending with the kids while on the road taking care of business. I never knew those times were so unimportant!

I guess I should have married up . . .
86 posted on 06/20/2006 4:21:51 PM PDT by BraveMan
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Arizona Carolyn

The usual elitist garbage. Probably would like a setup like in Brave New World where all the children are conceived outside of the womb, born in artificial wombs, and raised in age ranked creches....


87 posted on 06/20/2006 4:21:57 PM PDT by Knitting A Conundrum (Act Justly, Love Mercy, and Walk Humbly With God Micah 6:8)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 84 | View Replies]

To: wagglebee

Feminist Says Child Rearing not Worthy of Time and Talents of Intelligent Humans

But no doubt it is perfect work for any man.
That is what she really means.


88 posted on 06/20/2006 4:22:50 PM PDT by calljack (Sometimes your worst nightmare is just a start.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: wagglebee
Feminist Says Child Rearing not Worthy of Time and Talents of Intelligent Humans

I'll give you odds that she is a lezzie.

89 posted on 06/20/2006 4:25:13 PM PDT by oldbrowser (We must act today in order to preserve tomorrow......R.R)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Alouette
Alouette: proud mother of NINE and grandmother of FIFTEEN!

Are you sure you're a Jew and not a Catholic?! :-)

90 posted on 06/20/2006 4:25:40 PM PDT by wagglebee ("We are ready for the greatest achievements in the history of freedom." -- President Bush, 1/20/05)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 83 | View Replies]

To: wagglebee

Alouette: having the babies other Jews don't want to have, since 1972


91 posted on 06/20/2006 4:28:51 PM PDT by Alouette (Psalms of the Day: 113-118)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 90 | View Replies]

To: zaxxon
Miss Margaret Sanger had two children who very much disliked their mother, if I remember correctly. She left them with thier father and went off to Europe with another man and caused a HUGE scandal because she was a married woman. Remember this was the '20's and 30's.
92 posted on 06/20/2006 4:30:41 PM PDT by It's me
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 56 | View Replies]

To: Alouette

Well, if they were boys you sure did keep the Rabbi busy!


93 posted on 06/20/2006 4:32:16 PM PDT by wagglebee ("We are ready for the greatest achievements in the history of freedom." -- President Bush, 1/20/05)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 91 | View Replies]

To: Ronin
What a poor, miserable, lonely hell her life must be.

Actually she's happily married and the mother of three grown daughters.

94 posted on 06/20/2006 4:33:05 PM PDT by CobaltBlue (Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. Moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 7 | View Replies]

To: wagglebee
Someone said "feminism" was mislabeled. The opinion that male pursuits (e.g. working for a living, sports, war) are valuable, and female pursuits (e.g. having children, rearing children, making a home) are not valuable should be called "masculinism."
95 posted on 06/20/2006 4:33:08 PM PDT by ChessExpert (MSM: America's one party press)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: ChessExpert

Or simply lesbianism.


96 posted on 06/20/2006 4:34:08 PM PDT by wagglebee ("We are ready for the greatest achievements in the history of freedom." -- President Bush, 1/20/05)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 95 | View Replies]

To: D1X1E
I thought it was all about giving women "choices"

Hmmm. Well, she chose to get married, have children, and go back to work. My guess is that you think your choices are the right ones and hers are the wrong ones.

97 posted on 06/20/2006 4:36:23 PM PDT by CobaltBlue (Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. Moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 74 | View Replies]

To: Gay State Conservative
This dame sounds like she'd be fun at parties.

LOL!!!

98 posted on 06/20/2006 4:36:51 PM PDT by yankeedame ("Oh, I can take it but I'd much rather dish it out.")
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 13 | View Replies]

To: wagglebee

There is one thing no one mentioned. What do the children say. The kids in their 20 and early 30s were the first on a large scale to be raised by parents who both worked and dropped the kids in daycare. I bet the kids didn't like it and have vowed to never do this do their children.

I met one guy at work who didn't have nice things to say about his parents dropping him off at daycare during his youth.


99 posted on 06/20/2006 4:38:04 PM PDT by art_rocks
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: wagglebee

I don't want 'em raising kids anyway!


100 posted on 06/20/2006 4:38:27 PM PDT by airborne (Satan's greatest trick was convincing people he doesn't exist.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-20 ... 61-8081-100101-120 ... 201-219 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson