Do you think feminism has been a net positive or net negative for relationships?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Imo most important achievement of feminism is to free women from being caregivers for children, men, sick and elderly in the family. Its a woman's job to birth a child but men are equally capable of doing the rest.

But particularly among the educated and relatively wealthy classes, that hasn't resulted in partners sharing work and home care more, but rather, both working more and hiring people to do the care. I don't think society benefits by having the caring for children and elderly outsourced to working class labor.

So what do you think would be more optimal for them? What should happen?

Sounds like you're suggesting that women should just go back home and take care of the kids.

I'm not suggesting that at all. I think that policies that encourage parents (of whatever gender) to be home with young children, whatever those might be, would be good. I just think that the huge shift of labor from in-home to outside work over the last several decades has not been an unalloyed good for society. Policies that encourage a shift back to more time dedicated to families would be good.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I do think there are some positives, but I worry it’s pushed women to prioritize careers over marriage and children.

That's what society is pushing them to do. Companies need workers, men need earning partners and ultra feminist want to party so women are getting pulled in all directions.

It is obvious that the capitalist society benefits from having women in the workforce in greater numbers. It increases the number of workers, which pushes down wages and increases output. It increases household income, which gives both the means and motive to consume more. It disproportionately helps highly educated women from wealthy families. Companies realized that this would be a huge boost to the bottom line during WW2, and the societal changes started shortly thereafter. It is good that women got more agency over their own lives, but nothing was done to make sure that families didn't suffer from less parental involvement in children's lives, fewer people caring for their own elderly relatives, and fewer people involved in local community efforts. We might argue that this is a net good to society, but to ignore the downsides is really dumb.

That’s not true in families where fathers expected to play an equal role in their children’s lives. You’re also forgetting that the era of intense parenting is recent— modern parents spend more time with their children, not less. As a result of feminism, men spent more than twice as much time with their children in 2010 than 1965. Sounds like feminism may have helped fatherhood quite a bit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I do think there are some positives, but I worry it’s pushed women to prioritize careers over marriage and children.

That's what society is pushing them to do. Companies need workers, men need earning partners and ultra feminist want to party so women are getting pulled in all directions.

It is obvious that the capitalist society benefits from having women in the workforce in greater numbers. It increases the number of workers, which pushes down wages and increases output. It increases household income, which gives both the means and motive to consume more. It disproportionately helps highly educated women from wealthy families. Companies realized that this would be a huge boost to the bottom line during WW2, and the societal changes started shortly thereafter. It is good that women got more agency over their own lives, but nothing was done to make sure that families didn't suffer from less parental involvement in children's lives, fewer people caring for their own elderly relatives, and fewer people involved in local community efforts. We might argue that this is a net good to society, but to ignore the downsides is really dumb.

That’s not true in families where fathers expected to play an equal role in their children’s lives. You’re also forgetting that the era of intense parenting is recent— modern parents spend more time with their children, not less. As a result of feminism, men spent more than twice as much time with their children in 2010 than 1965. Sounds like feminism may have helped fatherhood quite a bit.

I do think it is helped fatherhood in that sense--men (who are present in a family) do spend more time with their children. That's probably a good thing, although somewhat at odds with the increase in divorce, which has meant that some men spend much less time with their children. But it is true that parents overall spend less time with their children from infancy into early childhood. I don't know that all of the driving to travel soccer makes up for that early deficit.

[Anonymous]

If this thread is not proof that we haven’t gone far enough with feminism I don’t know what is. Truly despicable that we are still talking about women as second class citizens.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If this thread is not proof that we haven’t gone far enough with feminism I don’t know what is. Truly despicable that we are still talking about women as second class citizens.

If that's what you get from this discussion, it is proof that we haven't gone far enough with reading comprehension.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I do think there are some positives, but I worry it’s pushed women to prioritize careers over marriage and children.

That's what society is pushing them to do. Companies need workers, men need earning partners and ultra feminist want to party so women are getting pulled in all directions.

It is obvious that the capitalist society benefits from having women in the workforce in greater numbers. It increases the number of workers, which pushes down wages and increases output. It increases household income, which gives both the means and motive to consume more. It disproportionately helps highly educated women from wealthy families. Companies realized that this would be a huge boost to the bottom line during WW2, and the societal changes started shortly thereafter. It is good that women got more agency over their own lives, but nothing was done to make sure that families didn't suffer from less parental involvement in children's lives, fewer people caring for their own elderly relatives, and fewer people involved in local community efforts. We might argue that this is a net good to society, but to ignore the downsides is really dumb.

That’s not true in families where fathers expected to play an equal role in their children’s lives. You’re also forgetting that the era of intense parenting is recent— modern parents spend more time with their children, not less. As a result of feminism, men spent more than twice as much time with their children in 2010 than 1965. Sounds like feminism may have helped fatherhood quite a bit.

I do think it is helped fatherhood in that sense--men (who are present in a family) do spend more time with their children. That's probably a good thing, although somewhat at odds with the increase in divorce, which has meant that some men spend much less time with their children. But it is true that parents overall spend less time with their children from infancy into early childhood. I don't know that all of the driving to travel soccer makes up for that early deficit.

This isn’t true and it’s been studied extensively. WaPo has the graphic if you search, in 1965 women averaged weekly 10.5 hours with their kids, men 2.6. By 2010 women spent on average 13.7 hours with their kids and men 7.2. Feminism has increased parental attention on kids, not eroded it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Imo most important achievement of feminism is to free women from being caregivers for children, men, sick and elderly in the family. Its a woman's job to birth a child but men are equally capable of doing the rest.

But particularly among the educated and relatively wealthy classes, that hasn't resulted in partners sharing work and home care more, but rather, both working more and hiring people to do the care. I don't think society benefits by having the caring for children and elderly outsourced to working class labor.

So what do you think would be more optimal for them? What should happen?

Sounds like you're suggesting that women should just go back home and take care of the kids.

I'm not suggesting that at all. I think that policies that encourage parents (of whatever gender) to be home with young children, whatever those might be, would be good. I just think that the huge shift of labor from in-home to outside work over the last several decades has not been an unalloyed good for society. Policies that encourage a shift back to more time dedicated to families would be good.

I think you have a very idealized notion of what life was like for parents and children in past generations. For most women in most of human history, they weren’t just sitting around playing with the kids.
But also, tjese policies cost and American don’t like them. Part of the New Deal was establishing a minimum payment to allow mothers with children to stay home with them. The New Dealers explicitly said that the country should recognize mothers as perming a service akin to that provided by soldiers for their country. Those were feminists that got that law passed and implemented. But then a bunch of men called it welfare and derided the welfare queens and said they should all go to work. I would blame capitalism but even in society Russia, basically all women worked full time. The only societies that really prioritize women staying home are societies that do so not for altruistic reasons but because they want to disempower women.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In good marriages you can't be chauvinists or feminists, both are required to care for each other and work as a team.

Seems like you don’t know what “feminist” means.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I do think there are some positives, but I worry it’s pushed women to prioritize careers over marriage and children.

That's what society is pushing them to do. Companies need workers, men need earning partners and ultra feminist want to party so women are getting pulled in all directions.

It is obvious that the capitalist society benefits from having women in the workforce in greater numbers. It increases the number of workers, which pushes down wages and increases output. It increases household income, which gives both the means and motive to consume more. It disproportionately helps highly educated women from wealthy families. Companies realized that this would be a huge boost to the bottom line during WW2, and the societal changes started shortly thereafter. It is good that women got more agency over their own lives, but nothing was done to make sure that families didn't suffer from less parental involvement in children's lives, fewer people caring for their own elderly relatives, and fewer people involved in local community efforts. We might argue that this is a net good to society, but to ignore the downsides is really dumb.

That’s not true in families where fathers expected to play an equal role in their children’s lives. You’re also forgetting that the era of intense parenting is recent— modern parents spend more time with their children, not less. As a result of feminism, men spent more than twice as much time with their children in 2010 than 1965. Sounds like feminism may have helped fatherhood quite a bit.

I do think it is helped fatherhood in that sense--men (who are present in a family) do spend more time with their children. That's probably a good thing, although somewhat at odds with the increase in divorce, which has meant that some men spend much less time with their children. But it is true that parents overall spend less time with their children from infancy into early childhood. I don't know that all of the driving to travel soccer makes up for that early deficit.

This isn’t true and it’s been studied extensively. WaPo has the graphic if you search, in 1965 women averaged weekly 10.5 hours with their kids, men 2.6. By 2010 women spent on average 13.7 hours with their kids and men 7.2. Feminism has increased parental attention on kids, not eroded it.

I can't find it searching for that. Is it the Pew study? Regardless, that doesn't make sense. How would a woman who is home with a infant or preschool aged child only spend 10.5 hours with the kid? And it is clear that the percentage of stay at home parents (mothers, really) went from about half in the 1960s to about a quarter by the end of the 1990s. So how would the hours spent on childcare by women also go up significantly during that period. I know a lot of those time studies are self-reported, and I would highly question the results. (I also know, for example, that the same Pew study says that men work more hours than women when counting both work in the home and at outside jobs.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Imo most important achievement of feminism is to free women from being caregivers for children, men, sick and elderly in the family. Its a woman's job to birth a child but men are equally capable of doing the rest.

But particularly among the educated and relatively wealthy classes, that hasn't resulted in partners sharing work and home care more, but rather, both working more and hiring people to do the care. I don't think society benefits by having the caring for children and elderly outsourced to working class labor.

So what do you think would be more optimal for them? What should happen?

Sounds like you're suggesting that women should just go back home and take care of the kids.

I'm not suggesting that at all. I think that policies that encourage parents (of whatever gender) to be home with young children, whatever those might be, would be good. I just think that the huge shift of labor from in-home to outside work over the last several decades has not been an unalloyed good for society. Policies that encourage a shift back to more time dedicated to families would be good.

I think you have a very idealized notion of what life was like for parents and children in past generations. For most women in most of human history, they weren’t just sitting around playing with the kids.
But also, tjese policies cost and American don’t like them. Part of the New Deal was establishing a minimum payment to allow mothers with children to stay home with them. The New Dealers explicitly said that the country should recognize mothers as perming a service akin to that provided by soldiers for their country. Those were feminists that got that law passed and implemented. But then a bunch of men called it welfare and derided the welfare queens and said they should all go to work. I would blame capitalism but even in society Russia, basically all women worked full time. The only societies that really prioritize women staying home are societies that do so not for altruistic reasons but because they want to disempower women.

I'm not idealizing anything. I agree that a lot of childcare is work. Someone has to do it, and more and more it is outsourced to working class labor. That's not a good thing overall.

And yes, your point about the New Deal very much makes my point. I am a feminist and see the value of these policies for both women and children (of all genders), and it is indeed the powerful interests who don't like it because it increases taxes and lowers corporate profits. Russia is a bad example for many reasons, but there are far more reasonable policies in Nordic countries, although they have a lot of wealth advantages from relatively small populations and huge natural resource wealth.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Obviously it's a negative for relationships. That doesn't meant there aren't other positives. But for relationshipsurination.

women don't need men and men don't need women.

Do you think relationships are better when they reflect “needs“? I think the fact that I don’t “need” my husband to support me financially, sign for any business deal I do, or give me permission for medical treatment makes our relationship much better. Is your hypothesis that in places where women do not have rights, relationship relationships are better? Because, at least a news reporting, there seem to be a lot of murders and suicides of women being abused.

The question one is it better for relationships. No. It's not. Men can get the sex they want by never marrying and women can support themselves and kids if they want them. Neither "needs" a relationship to get their needs met.

People should never need to be together. They should want to be together.

Except that was the point of the social contract between men and women that worked for eons. And now that's broken. Men can get sex whenever they want and women can support themselves. There really is no point to a relationship for most people. Soon there will be bots so men won't even need a real woman. You can decide if that's better or not.

I don't think this is true, because men as a group haven't done the work to become more balanced people, but women have. Men can't get sex whenever they want because it requires a woman to want to have sex with them (and women have more choice than ever now), and it seems like there are things a lot of men want and either can only get in relationships or vastly prefer to get them in relationships (kids, societal connections and belonging, stability, etc.). Women also seem to prefer getting these in relationships, though it seems on the whole, women who don't find marriage are better able to attain these things than men do.

I think of my BIL who is never married, quite bitter about it, and very lonely. He lacks a lot of social skills that would enable him to build and maintain friendships, doesn't really know how to make his home nice, and absolutely could not raise kids on his own. Then I think of the half dozen female friends I have who are also never married, but still have really lovely lives. They are financially stable and work to give their lives structure and meaning without a spouse. Several of them have had kids on their own and done a good job of figuring out how to make that work (often living near family to ensure greater stability, making enough to afford nannies and other supports to cover childcare gaps). Others instead focus on friendships, travel, and hobbies. They are all very happy. I think all of them would have been happy to marry IF they had found the right person at the right time, but they didn't and demonstrated a lot of resiliency in figuring out how to make it work for them anyway.

Meanwhile my BIL sits around angry at the world for not providing him with a wife to compensate for all his shortcomings. He wanted someone who would not only give him sex, but also children and create a comfortable home for him and manage his social life and cook his meals. He also would have needed a woman who would do all that while also earning an income, because he's a low earner who is often unemployed and would not have been able to support a family on his own. My MIL often laments his "bad luck" in not finding a partner but the truth is that I've never met a woman who would be willing to take all that on. He has had several lengthy and somewhat serious relationships but they don't last because he'll start out on his best behavior and then as he reveals himself to her, she realizes what she's taking on and leaves. One of his ex girlfriends was a single mom in her 40s -- she chose to stay a single mom rather than take on BIL as essentially a second dependent. More recently he dated a woman in her late 40s who never had kids and likely didn't have a ton of other romantic prospects. That one lasted two years but ultimately she decided she'd rather be alone than deal with BIL. And I've heard of other stories like this for other men. The women who reject them do fine even if it means being alone. The men don't.

The biggest problem with feminism is that some men have not stepped up to the plate and bettered themselves to make themselves worthy of women and marriage. When women have the choice to support themselves and be alone, it might not be their first choice but they can make it work and some even really enjoy it. And men suffer because before feminism, those women would have HAD to marry. Independence was not an option and they would have been really exposed and in danger of starvation or physical harm without a husband. That single mom especially would likely never have chosen to give up the protection of a husband, even one as burdensome as my BIL, because her prospects would have been so bad.

Feminism is a net positive for women in relationships because it has allowed us to choose, and offered us an alternative to marriage if we can't find a man we want to marry. For reasons I frankly don't understand, men have not seized the opportunity to make that same choice for themselves, and there are too many men (see the incel movement if you are looking for examples) still view access to women and a wife as a god-given right even though they've done nothing to earn the love of a woman.

[phone] YES

That's great that you keep telling us why women don't need men. But men don't need women either. If you think this is a plus for society then we'll have to agree to disagree. If you have children you might be wondering what the future will look like for them.

Which aspect of feminism are you suggesting it’s in my daughter’s best interest to roll back? The laws that keep her from being raped by her future spouse? The legal right to leave her marriage? The right to have medical treatment without her husband’s permission? Truly what am I supposed to be worrying about for her?

Did the PP ever respond to these questions?

Of course not, because its easier to complain about feminism when you don’t have to deal with facts and can just make vague assertions of doom.

Vague assertions of doom? What planet do you all live on where the future is bright?

Oh good you're still here! Could you tell me which parts of the future will be brighter for my daughter if her husband can rape her at will? If she needs his permission for lifesaving medical care? Or if she can’t have a credit card without his signature?

Your daughter won't get married so it's really irrelevant this fake rape scenario. Our daughters will all be single, working their fingers to the bone in a purposeless life, wondering what the point of life is.

You need to stop reading tradwife fanfiction by incels and comprehend that being a stay at home mom is extremely hard work -- except it thankless, with zero promotions, zero severance, zero sick days, zero pay, and zero protections from your stupid husband. What is this silly narrative that only paid employment is "working their fingers to the bone"?

Do tell us where all these eligible bachelors will be found in the future! On college campuses? Where?

Are you mentally ill? Where did I mention eligible bachelors?

Then who will your daughter be marrying and potentially raped by? I've said all along she won't be getting married at all.

How exactly am I supposed to know what you have said "all along" on an anonymous forum? And how is your bizarre non sequitur even a response to what I wrote about the hardships of being a SAHM?

Who cares about SAHM? I know you don't. Feminists sure don't. But marriage as an institution is hanging on by a thread while people are patting themselves on the back for being a positive thing for relationships. Ok!

Don't you have some clothes to wash, asses to wipe? You are waaaayyyy out of your depth here.

All of you trad wives shit on feminism, until of course, your husbands cheat on you and you need to enjoy all of the protections that feminism affords you.

Your husbands? What about yours? Are you even in a relationship?

Because I need a husband in order to be credible? BAHAHAHAHAHAAHA

Where did you get your expertise on relationships?

I'm a woman and a feminist. My relationship status is irrelevant. But how unsurprising that a trad wife can only see herself through the eyes of her husband. Please make sure you stay with him if he cheats, beats you, or abuses you financially. Those benefits we enjoy after fighting for them are not for you.

Go pet your cats. You don't know anything about relationships.

Oh honey, you are so sad. You don't even understand most of what is being discussed here. Go bake something.

DP. Do you both not find it weird that you're are trading in misogynistic tropes ("cat lady" and "get back in the kitchen") to take jabs at each other in a thread about feminism?

Sigh

NP. Some of this makes me think this tit for tat is a Russian man arguing with a North Korean man usin AI to craft replies. Lol.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I do think there are some positives, but I worry it’s pushed women to prioritize careers over marriage and children.

That's what society is pushing them to do. Companies need workers, men need earning partners and ultra feminist want to party so women are getting pulled in all directions.

It is obvious that the capitalist society benefits from having women in the workforce in greater numbers. It increases the number of workers, which pushes down wages and increases output. It increases household income, which gives both the means and motive to consume more. It disproportionately helps highly educated women from wealthy families. Companies realized that this would be a huge boost to the bottom line during WW2, and the societal changes started shortly thereafter. It is good that women got more agency over their own lives, but nothing was done to make sure that families didn't suffer from less parental involvement in children's lives, fewer people caring for their own elderly relatives, and fewer people involved in local community efforts. We might argue that this is a net good to society, but to ignore the downsides is really dumb.

That’s not true in families where fathers expected to play an equal role in their children’s lives. You’re also forgetting that the era of intense parenting is recent— modern parents spend more time with their children, not less. As a result of feminism, men spent more than twice as much time with their children in 2010 than 1965. Sounds like feminism may have helped fatherhood quite a bit.

I do think it is helped fatherhood in that sense--men (who are present in a family) do spend more time with their children. That's probably a good thing, although somewhat at odds with the increase in divorce, which has meant that some men spend much less time with their children. But it is true that parents overall spend less time with their children from infancy into early childhood. I don't know that all of the driving to travel soccer makes up for that early deficit.

This isn’t true and it’s been studied extensively. WaPo has the graphic if you search, in 1965 women averaged weekly 10.5 hours with their kids, men 2.6. By 2010 women spent on average 13.7 hours with their kids and men 7.2. Feminism has increased parental attention on kids, not eroded it.

I can't find it searching for that. Is it the Pew study? Regardless, that doesn't make sense. How would a woman who is home with an infant or preschool aged child only spend 10.5 hours with the kid? And it is clear that the percentage of stay at home parents (mothers, really) went from about half in the 1960s to about a quarter by the end of the 1990s. So how would the hours spent on childcare by women also go up significantly during that period. I know a lot of those time studies are self-reported, and I would highly question the results. (I also know, for example, that the same Pew study says that men work more hours than women when counting both work in the home and at outside jobs.)

Probably by the same people who claim that all women have always worked outside of the home in full time jobs.

[Anonymous]

https://storychanges.com/wp-content/images/?q=How%20much%20do%20parents%20spend%20on%20kids%20in%2018%20years?

[Anonymous]

Linked a free copy.

Your premise of “i wont believe a study if it doesn’t already agree with what I think is unsurprising” but I’ll play: children weren’t cared for 100% of the time by parents even if they were the 1950’s ideal housewife. They were left with siblings or in playpens often. Yes by today’s standards it’s irresponsible but my dad says they always had to take their 2-3y/o brother along with them and they were expected to play until dark.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Linked a free copy.

Your premise of “i wont believe a study if it doesn’t already agree with what I think is unsurprising” but I’ll play: children weren’t cared for 100% of the time by parents even if they were the 1950’s ideal housewife. They were left with siblings or in playpens often. Yes by today’s standards it’s irresponsible but my dad says they always had to take their 2-3y/o brother along with them and they were expected to play until dark.

Your link doesn't work for me. I don't understand why you have to be nasty.

Even if kids were left in playpens or with siblings, that still doesn't make sense to me. Your numbers would mean that women on average were spending less than two hours a day with their children, including infants and preschoolers. I'm willing to be educated on this point, but that doesn't seem plausible, even for school aged children, let along those not yet old enough to attend school. This is particularly true because infant childcare and preschool was much less common back then.