Mothers who work outside the home are still "Full-time Mothers"

I had to wait a bit to write about this so it was more than just an angry rant. I wanted to let my emotions calm down a bit and let my rational side take more charge.

Let me preface everything here by saying I am, in fact, a man. Not a woman. If you think that a man should have nothing to say about motherhood then you shouldn't continue here. Also note that while I'm speaking particularly about things that happened to me, one shouldn't assume that what I'm saying is unique to people in my social circle or religion which is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

So... Mother's Day kind of sucked. Here's the deal. My wife and I tried for years to get pregnant and during that time, Mother's Day held a special sort of torture for us. You see, motherhood is a pretty big deal in the LDS Church and in LDS culture. On Mother's Day, church is pretty much a totally devoted to honoring mothers, as it should be. When you are having trouble having a baby, however, it can act as a reminder of what you don't have and may never have. It's a day full of frustration and tears. Talk of how vital mothers are to the world made my wife feel worthless and the mean-spirited busy bodies who insisted on pointing out that childless women were selfish made her furious.

When this Mother's Day came around I was so excited for my wife. Finally we could go to church and she could be a part of the celebration and not feel like an outsider. Boy, was I wrong.

The doctrine of our church states that there is nothing more important that the family and there is no higher calling than that of a parent. Former President of the Church David O. McKay famously said “No other success can compensate for failure in the home,” and I totally hold to this idea. As a husband and father I want to make sure I never get so caught up in work or hobbies that I ignore my family.

So here's the deal. My wife works. It's not a situation now where we need the money in order to get by. My wife works as a computer programer because she says it keeps her mind sharp and keeps her sane. When she isn't working she has trouble feeling worthwhile. For whatever reason, being a stay-at-home mother doesn't scratch that particular itch. Right now she works part time with a good friend watching our precious baby boy on the days she works but if the opportunity came, she very well may want to work full time. She's good at what she does. She's very talented and she worked hard to get to where she is.

She does, however, love her son as much as any mother could possibly love a son. She's a great mother who is attentive and amazing.

Apparently, that's not good enough for some people. It was made clear on Mother's Day that some people think that if a mother works she is not a good mother. Here is a sampling of things people said (paraphrased) in talks and lessons that day along with the responses I would have made had I been in more control of my anger- I didn't want to just start yelling like a madman:

“We say that if the family needs more money then a woman can work, but we have a society that makes us think we need all these things we don't need. In places like Africa they live in poverty but the woman is able to stay home with the kids,” (Ok, there is so much wrong with that statement I don't think I need to explain why).

“Mothers who work are going against the natural order of things. They are spiritually and genetically disposed not to work the fields but to care for the home,” (Let's forget for a moment that Eve was the first mother whoworked for a moment and instead focus on how this statement is a perfect mix of ignorance and self assurance that is usually the domain of the Internet troll).

“The Church has made it clear. Mother's should not work out of the home,” (Uh... no, you are wrong. Like most Church doctrines, the issue of how a household should work is not given in pat answers. Each family and each mother is different. Each woman needs different things and each family needs different things. It's a family's job to carefully and prayerfully decide what is best for their family. We aren't living in Old Testament times where every little movement has to be dictated by God).

“Mother's who work give up their eternal reward of a family for a temporal reward of accolades of the world,” (Thanks, random dude. I'm glad you're not the actual judge of the world).

“You can either be a full-time mom or a working mom.”

That is what I have the most problem with because, unlike the other comments that were just too insipid to really get worked up about, this attitude is very prevalent.

Guess what? I'm a full time dad even though I work 40 hours a week. That still leaves me 128 hours for my family. Some of that time is spent sleeping, but not much really. Not since we had our boy.

If we accept that women who work are somehow part-time mothers, then all fathers who work are only part-time fathers.

My wife and I both spend all our efforts to improve the family. My wife's reasons for working helps make our household a more happy place. A good friend of mine pointed out that if a woman, for whatever reason, needs outside work to keep her sane, make her feel important or whatever else- then why would you arbitrarily trade that in and make her stay home and miserable? How does that help the family? How is it better to have a woman home with her kids and miserable for 168 hours a week rather than for 128 hours a week but happy? The (somewhat sexist) statement of "Happy wife, happy life" is true in so much that if any member of the household is miserable then the family suffers. 

It may be hard to be empathetic to people who have motivations outside our experience, but that's sort of the point of being a Christian and a human being, isn't it? Just because one woman finds fulfillment as a stay-at-home mother she shouldn't assume that a woman who doesn't is somehow defective or worse than she. 

I understand the conflict here, of course. During the heyday of first and even second wave feminism, women who stayed at home were insulted and made to feel like less of a person. This was wrong but prominent. The problem with that attitude, and the problem with the current attitude that is reactionary to that, is that it makes the false assumption that the world has to be exactly the same way we as individuals see it.

Today, we shouldn't allow the sucky actions of the past color how we act in the present. Mothers should be celebrated- regardless if they work outside the home or not.

So anyway, I was pretty upset and I could tell my wife was too. She ended up taking our son out to change his diaper and I was fuming, imagining myself standing up in a Martin Luther-inspired rant and tell everyone what the score was, but when Beth came back in, she was smiling.

She said that as she changed Sherlock- our boy's name is Sherlock by the way- he was so happy and smiley that she decided she didn't care what anyone else though- her boy loves her and that's enough for her to feel celebrated as a mother.

Obviously, it took me a bit longer to get over it. While she taught me an important lesson that day, I don't think Church should be a place where we actively cultivate negativity by speaking ignorantly.

A final thought: I understand the need for people to watch their language when talking about motherhood. “Full-time mother” can be a hurtful phrase to a woman who works, but likewise saying a woman isn't fulfilled by “just staying at home all day” is insulting to the role of a stay-at-home mom. There is nothing “just” about being a stay-at-home mom. It's simple really, some women find fulfillment by being stay-at-home mothers and some women find fulfillment by working. My own mother was a stay-at-home mother and worked harder than most people do at any job they have.

These hurtful phrases can lead to hard feelings which leads to ignorant and prejudiced feelings against women in the other “camp”- though such camps are part of a false dichotomy that really should have no place in polite society. Both sides are guilty and should watch how they act. Men included.

The real bottom line is just don't be a jerk, no matter if you work or stay at home.  

Hundred Book Challenge #12: "An American Tragedy" by Theodore Dreiser

This was the first book in the Hundred Book Challenge that felt like a chore. I didn’t hate it exactly but every word was a special kind of torture to get through. The end result was like the end of a long workout. I know it was good for me but I can’t say I enjoyed the process or am likely to do it again.

“An American Tragedy” is a laborious book. The author, Theodore Dreiser goes into an almost mental patient’s level of description.

A fictional example? Let’s say you wanted to say, “The man paid 50 cents for an apple.” In “An American Tragedy” the sentence would read as follows:

And inasmuch as the man, given to the natural inclinations of all men, at the end of his day of labors- though such labors were not physical in nature, still he expended not an inconsiderable amount of energy- found himself to be in want of some manner of physical needs to build up not only nutrition and a general feeling of wellbeing, but also the act of trading part of one’s hard-earned pay for something else. This magical alchemy of commerce allowed the man to…” and so on.

Someone might have a lot of fun creating a computer program that Dreiserizes sentences.

The story follows Clyde Griffiths, a young man who wants to improve his station in love and life. The tragedy is that his drive ends up destroying the lives of those around him. The story meanders around his life following him from his youth where he was the son of evangelical parents who would, to the embarrassment and frustration of Clyde, street preach. He eventually moves on to other things as he seeks employment and love in areas he feels represents a higher station.

Ultimately he finds himself working in a management position at his rich uncle’s shirt collar factory.  He seduces one of the poor factory girls and gets her pregnant while falling in love with a rich socialite.

Spoiler alert: He ends up murdering the poor factory girl. He gets caught almost immediately, sits through an extended trial where his is found guilty, goes to prison and  is executed.

The story is a tragedy but what makes it an American tragedy? Published in 1925, the points of the story, if not the writing, are very contemporary. This tragedy could only happen in America because they are based on American goals and cultures. A mixture of puritanical religious fervor mixed with the concept of the right to economic and social improvement.

It’s all pretty much sad and depressing. The characters in this novel believe in higher purposes but are driven by base and materialistic desires.

At the same time, the story takes hard looks at various social issues, most prominently the troubles faced by single women who find themselves pregnant. How women at the time had absolutely no option and no future. No one would support them, no one would help them and no one would even recognize them as human. This book is best when it examines this and other truths that modern audiences would find hard to believe while forced to admit that, yes, things aren’t too different. Like reading a horror story and realizing its closer to reality than you are comfortable with.

Like a plate of lima beans or a bottle of kale juice, this book has important qualities, I just couldn’t get past the taste and texture.

This is a stupid, hypocritical, trite video- and that's good news.

This video is stupid, hypocritical, trite and totally misses the point

My eyes are not big enough to roll them in sufficient disgust over this ridiculous video.

A fourth-rate poem which delivers a self-important, self-indulgent message that, by its very nature, is hypocritical.

I also can't overstate how awful I think this poem is just on a basic level. 

This is the type of self-serving BS that makes the Internet worse. It's not saying anything new or worthwhile. All it's doing is giving people a chance to feel smugly superior to when compared to people- often the young generation- who are living life just a little different than you did when you were a kid.

Let's ignore the fact that this poem decries the very technology and devices that is making it viral in the first place. That's too easy. 

Here are some facts about teenagers and college students today, obviously the target of this video. First, 80 percent of them have a job while going to school. That is the largest percentage The United States has ever seen. They also participate in extra curricular activities at a higher rate than ever before, they are graduating at a higher rate than ever before and are completing college at rates higher than ever before all while somehow glued to their phones and social media.

What about relationships? Well, since the advent of smart phones, the divorce rate has gone down significantly when compared to any time post 1975- in other words any time after women were no longer considered property. 

Now I realize this is correlation and not causation- but still relationships appear more healthy now than any time in human history. This means that while we can't say smartphones and the Internet have had a positive effect on marriage, we can categorically say it has not had a negative effect on it. 

So, regardless of the insipid sing-songy poem that indicates you checking your email on the street will cause you to miss out on wife, daughter, granddaughter, everything is just some paranoid fellow's fever dream of a horrific future that just won't come to pass.

Here's the deal. Every advancement in technology or communication has brought this type of asinine commentary. You can find similar complaints about video games, comic books, TV, movies, radio and all the way back to the printing press. The common thread in every instance is they've all been wrong. Humans adapt and our ability to communicate and be part of the world has only increased.

Guess what? When my son was born I was able to share it with my parents and in-laws through the magic of my iPad. I was able to let way more people take part in the joy of that day than any generation previous to me because of the Internet and smartphones. My family routinely engage in huge group texts that allow us to follow in real time our various exploits. It brought my group of friends and family closer together, not further apart.

If the “poetic” git in the video doesn't get it, then he's doing life wrong, not just social media.

Now I suppose it is possible to feel isolated in our modern world- but who the hell cares? It's been possible to feel isolated in every period of history. Some of the best literature illustrates this.

Oh... by the way, kids are reading more books now they any point since the 1960s. Probably thanks to Harry Potter.

The bottom line is don't get caught on the wrong side of an argument that History and modern realities have already proved to be wrong. We aren't missing out on life because of smartphones. We are getting more out of it.  

Hundred Book Challenge #11: "Animal Farm" by George Orwell

So it's been a few weeks hasn't it. Well, I got a bit of an excuse in that we moved house. Not a huge excuse because we've been in the house for a bit now but still an excuse.

I haven't taken a break from reading however. I'm a bit behind so let's just jump into it shall we?

“Animal Farm” written by George Orwell long before everyone hated the Soviet Communists so a bit of a prophecy fable.

I read it in elementary school and I assume a lot of people did as this is a prime story to teach kids about allegorical stories while extolling the evils of Communism.

All these years later and I still loved reading this little thing. There isn't much joy in the book and that may be a reason I loved it so much as a kid. It taught me that not all stories have a happy ending or relateable, good characters and sometimes that's awesome. It's maybe my first literary fiction story.

I had two huge thoughts as I read this as an adult.

First, there is no way a book like this could be published today. The wiles of the publishing industry would toss it aside not due to content or story but because it's written so skerwonky. It's all “tell not show” which flies in the face of what we assume to be good writing. It's incredibly fast paced and the characters get little to no story arcs. Maybe this is my sour grapes for being rejected over and over by publishers and agents but I'd be willing to bet good spendin' money that if someone submitted “Animal Farm” to an agent or publisher who was somehow unfamiliar with it, they wouldn't even give it the time to write a rejection.

Second, this story has way larger implications above and beyond Communism. Yes, it's pretty much a one to one analogy for Soviet Communism and it's fun to align nearly every character with a real world counterpart which Orwell totally intended. Still, in good ol' capitalism democracy things still work. I speak particularly of how the pigs change the rules as it fits them and then convince their party members the rule had always been changed.

Look at how vitriolic people treat the President of the United States, but only if it's a member of the particular party they are a part of. This is how it works: If your guy is president and you hear people being all nasty to them you say “How dare you! Even if you don't respect the man respect the office! If you don't support the president you don't support America!” If your guy isn't president you are the one being all nasty while the opposite party feeds you the same lines.

Talk radio, TV news, political pundits and politicians themselves are all the same with this. It's all a show to keep people from knowing too much about whats going on and it's a shame.

Don't worry, there is only one more George Orwell novel on the list, “1984” so I won't be so negative about everything.

But seriously. Politics absolutely sucks and you shouldn't trust anybody who has the audacity to believe they can lead or represent everyone in their jurisdiction.