The New Mystiques (Coontz)

[Gormy Cuss]

Short piece, worth a read. It's a reflection upon the 50th anniversary of Friedan's The Feminine Mystique.
http://billmoyers.com/groupthink/the-feminine-mystique-50-years-later/the-new-mystiques-2/

The New Mystiques
By Stephanie Coontz, Author

...Yet despite the progress we’ve made in overturning discriminatory attitudes and laws, two corollaries of the old feminine mystique live on. One is the assumption that a “serious” employee has no family obligations that will compete with work because there is someone at home to take care of the rest of life. Even though 70 percent of American children now live in households where every adult is employed, the United States has yet to adopt the family and work reconciliation policies that are standard in the rest of the industrial world. This creates huge work-family stresses for both men and women as they try to live up to their new egalitarian values.

The second is the flip side of the feminine mystique: the assumption that a normal man has no interest in care-giving or any other activity traditionally thought of as “feminine.” This masculine mystique still leads to bullying and ostracism of boys who engage in “girlie” activities such as studying hard or behaving well in school. And men who take an active role in childcare and housework face a heightened risk of being harassed at work and passed over for promotion.

Two other gender mystiques have arisen in recent years. One is the “hottie mystique.” Although young women no longer feel the need to play dumb or pretend to be bad at sports, as the old feminine mystique mandated, they feel more pressure than in the past – and at a younger age – to flaunt a highly sexualized image.

A second mystique kicks in not at marriage, as the happy housewife ideology did, but at childbirth. This “motherhood mystique” insists that women need to make every second of their child’s life a teachable moment, leading homemakers and working mothers alike to feel inadequate – even though both sets of mothers now spend more time with their children than their stay-at-home grandmothers did in 1965 at the height of the male breadwinner family.

The workplace attitudes resonate with me. I've seen it in action. Women without children are considered more reliable employees, men with children who take time off for a sick kid are seen as weak. Ultimately though both are reinforcing gender stereotypes that caring for children is woman's work and IMHO as long as it's relegated to women's work there will never be adequate family/work policies in this country.

I also agree with the "motherhood mystique" and the "hottie mystique" which together are just updated madonna/whore complex. The hottie mystique keeps the emphasis on how we look over our intellectual capacities. Smart women now can take credit for their contributions but when they make bad decisions all too often the complaints are still based on makeup, hair styles, and fashion or on the tone of their voices. When men get criticized for appearance it's usually an afterthought and based on equal opportunity insults like "fat" and "old." Men are also criticized for not being "manly" enough, often with slang terms implying they are women. It just amazes me how prevalent it is today.

The motherhood mystique also reinforces the notion that men are incompetent in terms of parenting, and that's just damaging for everyone.

[libodem]

1. Thanks for the interesting article

Ms Cuss. Enjoyed it.

[Gormy Cuss]

2. Thanks, libodem n/t

[kdmorris]

3. Great article

I think the motherhood mystique also leads to the competition women are almost forced to endure during pregnancy and childbirth. We are let to believe that you are superior if you have a vaginal delivery with no drugs, breastfeed on demand until 2 years old and never work outside the home. I've seen so many young women suffer through childbirth because "everyone else handles it" when everyone else really doesn't. If they did, there would be no such thing as an epidural.

This topic has been most on my mind because I'm pregnant with twins. I'm told that I shouldn't accept a c-section because they can "certainly" be delivered vaginally with no meds, even if they are both breech. Well, fuck that. I will get them out of my body whatever way results in them being the safest and me being the safest. If that happens to be a vaginal delivery, so be it. As far as breastfeeding, I'll certainly try, but I'm not going to kick myself and be forced to feel bad if I cannot produce enough milk for two babies.

My husband will be the primary caregiver after I go back to work... there is almost no support for stay at home fathers these days... as if they are bad men or something.

I'm an older pregnant woman - I think everyone at work assumed I was done with child bearing, but I can certainly tell the difference between when they thought I was done and now that I'm pregnant. I got the first 3 out of 5 rating this year in the 5 years I've been there. Every other year, I've gotten a 4 out of 5. I have no proof that it's because of the pregnancy.

[Gormy Cuss]

4. Congrats on your pregnancy!

You're so right about the "motherhood mystique" starting with the pregnancy competition. Of course vaginal deliveries and breastfeeding are good but they're not the best way to go for everyone. It's stupid to add that pressure. My sister had twins and her planning went out the window when she went into labor. All that mattered was delivering healthy babies.

I really wish that we weren't STILL talking about such basic work/family issues and attitudes in this century.