Posted on 04/26/2002 9:12:13 AM PDT by Korth
WOMEN have become unhappier as a result of concentrating more on their careers than the family role they once fulfilled, an academic claims in a new book.
Prof James Tooley believes the feminist revolution of the 1960s and 1970s brought about huge changes in attitudes which have not be conducive to motherhood.
In his book, The Miseducation of Women, published next month, he suggests many professional woman would have been more contented by staying at home and bringing up children.
He draws comparisons with the film character Bridget Jones, a love-hungry young woman in publishing who becomes a television presenter and craves a stable relationship rather than being left "a singleton".
Prof Tooley, professor of education policy at Newcastle University, considers that the role of housewife has been "desperately undervalued" in society.
He argues that schools should allow girls to concentrate on the arts and domestic science rather than being pushed towards subjects such as engineering and computer science in an attempt at sexual equality.
Prof Tooley, 42, who is single with no children, said yesterday: "The Bridget Jones effect is growing in society. Women find themselves successful in their careers and unhappy in their lives.
Domesticity has been degraded over the year, particularly by feminists in the 1970s who used the phrases 'parasite' and `leach' to describe the housewife.
"I expect career women will react very strongly against me and to even suggest women would be happier in the home has become almost a taboo. We need to cull a few sacred cows and start a debate on the subject. That is what I am trying to do."
He describes his book as "largely a think piece", based on a study of more than 100,000 men and women in Britain and America by the National Bureau of Economic Research.
Its findings led him to examine the way the education system was shaping the way women lead their lives.
Among his assertions are that women who were pushed into science as pupils and embarked on careers such as law and accountancy are unhappy by the time they reach 30.
Prof Tooley, from Rothbury, Northumblerland, said: "I'm not suggesting we ban girls from the labs, but my research shows that 30 per cent of young women are unhappier with their lives than previous generations were, while young men now seem happier than previous generations were."
Prof Tooley believes the "Bridget Jones generation" was spawned by the feminist revolution.
"Feminists went right to what they thought was the root of the problem. They looked at schooling to change the situation. The Sex Discrimination Act of 1975 and the introduction of the National Curriculum in 1988 are, in a way, products of that, and they've transformed what is taught in school.
"But this means that the curriculum is now designed according to the feminist idea that girls should be following the model that was set down for boys. That is, pursuing a career at the expense of all other things.
"I suggest that this is pushing girls in a direction they don't want to take and there's a whole generation of working women who don't want to be there."
How about "Domestic American"? :-]
We had to move all sorts of money around, pay tax penalties, and agree to eat a lot of spaghetti.
So what?
I want my wife at home, and she wants to be there.
I couldn't agree more. Men have been big beneficiaries of feminism in that it took away the imperative dictated by society to provide. It used to be that if a man couldn't provide for his family, he wasn't much of man at all, barring any tragic circumstances.
In fairness to the new generation of men who want to diversify more than provide; a dollar doesn't buy what it used to. In 1958 (when my parents emigrated to the US) their rent totaled slightly less than 25% of their income; that is unheard of today. But be that as it may, men are just as ready to chuck childrearing to a disinterested third party as are women.
There is no doubt that there are a lot of bad, stupid, ugly on the inside women; as a woman I have to say that I'm probably a bit of a misogynist myself. I always got along much, much easier with men than women, because women have a tendency to be ruled by their jealousy. And they are usually not fond of women who like to go it alone.
For me men are much easier to be around. I'm an only daughter in the middle of a bunch of fiesty men, and I'm very much loved. A man in love is extremely fragile, as is a woman, but it's also up to men to pick good women, because they are out there.
I understand the pull of the physical, but alone it's without value. It's ok to date a hollow "looker", just don't marry her.
Now, if you are referring to why more full time working moms don't go part time. I have some ideas. A very big one being that they don't know any other way to be even if they are unhappy, it's just like the housewives of the 50's, they think this is what they are supposed to do.
Oh, and there is another way to plan too. I stay active in our financial situation and part of the way I plan while staying home is to work with my dh as far as saving money. This to me will reap a better life for me and my children if anything happens to him, than finishing my degree at this point and taking some entry level job and shoving the kids off to daycare when they need me the most.
Well, let's see. I can tell you it's NOT fairy tale land since I'm living it. While I feel terrible for you, I don't think your situation should be some banner for why girls shouldn't get married, stay home, etc. Like I said in another post, if you are busy worrying and planning for an eventuality that may never happen, you will miss out on life.
Again, sorry for your situation, but don't out of your misplaced rage sit here and demean those of us who do stay home by insinuating that what we live does not exist.
BTW, I would point out that by the tone of your post, you are not really refuting what this says right? Life has thrown you some loops, but it doesn't seem that you are all that happy with working even though you have too, so what was wrong about this post. just because women feel they have to work because of irresponsible men doesn't mean that makes them anymore happy or less miserable because they HAVE to work. My guess is you would still choose to stay home being supported by a LOYAL and DEVOTED man, than work, no? Your divorce has not changed the basic desires of many women? Or refute what this article says.
Unfortunately some mistakes leave women childless, barren, and alone just when they want children though. While making choices, young women should be given some very basic truths and the biggest of which being when thier fertility is at its peak, when it will likely be gone, and the dwindling supply of mates as one waits to marry. They need to understand that they can have a career well into thier 70's with good health, but they can not have babies well into thier 70's. Once they have some of those basic biological truths, then, and only then, can they be free to make informed decisions about the rest of thier lives, and yes, to make mistakes too.
"...when people begin to talk about this domestic duty as not merely difficult but trivial and dreary, I simply give up the question. For I cannot with the utmost energy of imagination conceive what they mean. When domesticity, for instance, is called drudgery, all the difficulty arises from a double meaning in the word. If drudgery only means dreadfully hard work, I admit the woman drudges in the home, as a man might drudge at the Cathedral of Amiens or drudge behind a gun at Trafalgar.
But if it means that the hard work is more heavy because it is trifling, colorless and of small import to the soul, then as I say, I give it up; I do not know what the words mean. To be Queen Elizabeth within a definite area, deciding sales, banquets, labors and holidays; to be Whitely [a famous London Department store owner] in a certain area, providing toys, boots, sheets, cakes, and books; to be Aristotle within a certain area, teaching morals, manners, theology, and hygiene; I can understand how this might exhaust the mind, but I cannot imagine how it could narrow it.
How can it be a large career to tell other people's children about the Rule of Three, and a small career to tell one's own children about the universe? How can it be broad to be the same thing to everyone, and narrow to be everything to someone?
No; a woman's function is laborious, but because it is gigantic, not because it is minute. I will pity Mrs. Jones for the hugeness of her task; I will never pity her for its smallness."
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.