Reply to I’m happy being a SAHM, except when others talk about it like I’m some kind of sucker

Forum Index » General Parenting Discussion

Reply to "I’m happy being a SAHM, except when others talk about it like I’m some kind of sucker"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]For those of you who think being a stay at home mom is useless because you aren’t earning money and maybe not volunteering or doing much that is intellectual: what constitutes a “useful” life and why is that important? Can people with disabilities that prevent them from doing those things lead useful lives? [/quote]

Exactly, and apparently nannies and daycare workers are "useless" as well, since they are doing the same thing as a SAHM, except for the pay. [/quote]

No, it’s SAHMs of school-age kids who are pretty much useless. If you have young kids at home, that’s a lot of work. Often more work than an office job. [/quote]

Well again, what makes us useless, and what implications does that have for the broader question of what constitutes a “useful” human being? How utilitarian do people want to get here? Because I don’t think this goes down a pretty path.

Frankly I think that so many women have been indoctrinated by capitalist theory, especially as articulated by second-wave feminism. [/quote]

Stop with the intellectualizing mumbo jumbo. You have a life of leisure and you know it, you like it that way, won’t change and hence you are and choose to be useless.[/quote]

See, this is fascinating and just what I’m talking about! We have been lead to believe that too much leisure is bad. I do have a good amount of leisure time that I fill with intellectual pursuits (the horror!), working out, playing with my kids, teaching my kids, etc., and I don’t apologize for it. I’m grateful for it. I think everybody could stand to enjoy more leisure time (I especially like John Stewart Mill’s thoughts about the matter). I do a good amount of non-leisure activities like cleaning toilets and laundry and meal planning, and so one could say that I lead a useful life, but I refuse to believe that is what makes my life valuable, even if society decides that’s what they care about.

I am disabled and I can’t work a regular job so I imagine people want to give me a pass, but practically speaking what I do is no different  than what lots of able-bodied SAHM moms do, and I am not more useful or valuable than they are.

Now there is the issue of living a rewarding life and when you are home with kids it is easier to slip into habits that don’t lead to a rewarding life. But that’s a different story than the idea of somebody being useless or not. [/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics