Conference turris::womannotes-v1

    George,
    You cover lots of topics in your note, but let me address one of
    them:
    
    Both my mother and (when she remarried) stepfather worked outside
    of our home. Neither worked in factories. We did have babysitters
    when the adults were away, and my mother made a special effort to
    find people who would take us on field trips and play creative games
    with us. I think I would have suffered more if my mother had stayed
    home (and she probably would have suffered more too).
    
    This particular topic is like religion -- you've got to find what's
    right for you and do it. Others will treat it as a moral issue (as
    in "this is what's right for me. therefore it's right for everyone
    else, too."). But I feel that it's only appropriate to comment on
    how I choose to live my life.
    
    Liz

    Re:  .0
    
    George, I think you have the cause and effect turned around.  Housing
    costs didn't increase because of two income families - two income
    families were created because of increasing costs.  
    
    The truth is that the standard of living in the US is going down
    if you measure it by what a family has to do to be comfortable.
    It used to take one income and now it almost always takes two.
    
    The other issues is growing expectations.  Go home tonight and look
    around your home and count the number of appliances and other things
    that the average home didn't have in the 1950s.  My parents didn't
    even have hot running water when they got married.  How many people
    would settle for that now days.
    
    My point - between increasing costs and expectations, we both work.
    
    Sally
    

    Damn, and all this time, I've been waiting for some successful 
    woman to come into my life and take me away from all this.
    
    For her I would clean, vacuum, raise the kids, sew, shop for
    food, get a charge at Bloomie's... :-)
    
    Very possibly, I might finally even learn how to cook. :-)
    
      Alan

RE:1

 I see your point.Sorry about that, there are indeed many valuable occupations
outside of the home not just factory jobs.I agree it is a personal decision
whether to pursue a career with out interruption or put it on hold to raise
your children, realizing that putting your career on hold could drastically
hurt your advancement.The concern I have is that with both parents pursuing
outside goals, the raising of the children seems to have been lowered in
priority.Even though this is a personal decision it does affect others
in a financial way (competing with the two earner couples).This makes
the decision a financial one for many people even though one of the 
parents would like to stay home it is financially impractical.Because our
personal decisions on this affect others, I feel there is a moral side to
this question.It might turn out that having certain people raise our children
as their job could be a positive thing, but many people don't seem to be 
sending their children to others as a goal in itself but as a necessity of
other decisions they have made.

RE:2 

    I have to strongly disagree prices follow our buying power and the demand
for a particular product.Homes for example are desired by most people this
demand causes them to sell to the highest bidders so to speak.This at times
happens literally.


             George D.

    George, there are many people who, regardless of finances and who's
    working where *count on other people to raise their children*. Case
    in point - the public schools. Many parents have figured for a long
    time that whatever problems their children exhibit in school is
    the problem of the school, and none of the parents' problem....
    
    This is nothing to do with both parents working outside the home,
    but rather with parents as a unit abdicating the raising of their
    kids. Period. As a friend of mine says, "Plenty of time to make
    'em and no time to raise 'em." There are way too many parents who
    don't want to put in the hard work it takes to raise a child. Let
    'em do what they want for 5 years and then let the school straighten
    'em out. By which time, of course, it's too late.
    
    Too often, this abdication is taken as the "fault" of the woman
    who works outside the home, which is why it is dangerous to assume
    that parents in general are having problems raising kids for this
    reason. Having *both* parents with the kids all day makes no difference
    if they don't want to put forth the effort to raise the child.
                         
    --DE
    

    RE: .5	Bravo! I agree thoroughly. 

	Actually, I think 2-career families actually put a lot more thought
	into the decision to have children.  They think about how it
	will affect their careers, how they can spend time with the children,
	if one should stay home, if they can find quality day care.  Those
	who do have children really want them and devote time and energy into
	their upbringing.  Having children is more of a conscious choice,
	not something you just do after marriage, because that's what
	everyone does.  Perhaps there will be more outside influence on
	how the child is brought up (commonly referred to as "brought up
	by strangers"), but there is nothing to say that just being a parent
	makes you the better child-rearer.  At least a lot of people in
	day care have actually been trained in dealing with kids.  Which is
	a lot more than can be said about most parents.  The parents don't
	just dump their kids anywheres, they look for places that reflect
	how they want their children brought up, or they decide to have
	one parent stay home for a period of time.

	...Karen

	p.s. I read a newspaper article once that said that children of
	dual-career families tend to do better in school and were more
	independent.  I have no idea what type of survey they used.

 I find myself agreeing with part of your reply.When problems
arise in the raising of a child the woman does get blamed
unjustly because of some peoples expectations about roles .
The reason I posted the base note was to raise my concern about
the way many children are being raised.I would like to use
day-care as an example.My daughter was in a very nice day-care
I liked and new some of the people who worked there.But we
ran into a problem that did not get resolved until after a
few months of therapy.My daughter refused to do anything she
did not want to.We knew this was not uncommon but she simply
could not be persuaded in any way to pick up her blocks for
instance.We tried everything we could think of and finally 
went to a psychologist.To make a long story short over time
we found out that she had learned all kinds of routines to
avoid doing what she didn't want to do.At the day care if she
did not want to pick up the blocks she would refuse and be
punished.Having to sit quietly at a designated chair was one 
punishment.By the time she got out of the chair someone had
picked up the blocks or another child had become interested
in and was playing with them.To her it seemed strait forward
if you don't want to do something refuse and take the punishment.
She thought we were being mean to her when we would send her
to her room and then after still want her to pick up the blocks.
As far as she was concerned she had already paid not to.
 The point is, raising our children in an environment different
from the one that most children have been raised in for generations
could have results we don,t expect.Some of those effects could
be on us and how responsible we feel about the actions of our
children after all we can always blame the day care ;^)

          George D.

    re .0
    I really don't have a lot of time to respond to all your
    comments right now.  Also, being single I doubt I could
    anything of any value any ways.
    
    However, my attention was drawn to your last line.  I
    would like a little "piece and love" over the holidays.
    (sorry, don't mean to detract from the seriousness of
    your note, but just couldn't resist that! Chock it up
    to holiday cheer ! :-)  ).
    

 I hope everyone is having a fun holiday. I am curious about how the 
men and women reading this note feel about men taking time of and raising
their children until they reach school age.Would you guys want to?Would it
make you feel less masculine? I am also curious about the woman's point view,
what if one night you came home and your husband or lover said that he wanted
a family and was willing to stay home and raise the children, if you were
willing to go through nine months of carrying and child birth.How Would you
feel? I personally think I would offer to raise the children under some
circumstances.I must confess that I probably would be a little embarrassed
about it when asked at a party or such what I did for work,but then again
maybe not.Russ their just might be a woman that would take you a way from
all this if you were willing to raise the children.She could have a 
career and a family to.If this is a situation that you would like I would
guess that it would be less than impossible to achieve :^) 

               Do not forget to have a little *peace* ;^) 
                        over the holidays

                                     George D.   

RE: .0

Don't I wish...

RE: .1

"I think I would have suffered more if my mother had stayed home (and she
probably would have suffered more too)."

What about your father?  Do you know if he would have liked to stay home?

RE: .2

I do believe that the costs of housing is demand side driven to a greater extent
then you think.

RE: .7

Ahem... not everyone lives up to the high standard of raising children, 2 career
families are not any more immune then 1 career families. 

RE: .10

Don't I wish.  No.

Jim.

    re .11
    > What about your father?  Do you know if he would have liked to
    > stay home?
    
    my dad has little regard for tradition and expectations and seems
    unafraid to try new things. i assume that if he'd wanted to stay home
    to take care of me he would have. (good thing he had a career of
    his own, though -- he ended up leaving home when i was three and
    has had to support himself ever since.)
    
    good question though. made me think.
    
    liz
    

    The answer George is quality day care where the values match your
    own. We're very lucky to have had our daughter in an excellent day
    care situation in Acton for the past 3 1/2 years. We're now in the
    process of selecting a kindergarden for her and know that she will
    fit in to any type of situation because of her experiences.
    
    But we looked very carefully at the kind of values the people would
    be imparting and how they handled various situations. We've always
    felt free to discuss her development and behavior with the teachers
    and, because they are specialists in early childhood development
    and education, I have felt they were better qualified to answer
    my questions than any pediatrician.
    
    BTW, not all children in day care come from dual-career couples.
    By the age of 3, children need to be with other children in group
    situations to learn socialization skills. It has been shown that
    those with pre-school experience fare better in school. They've
    already resolved seapration issues and learned how to get along
    with their peers. My daughter is in day care the three days I work
    (and when you work part-time, you're sure not doing it for the money!)
    and some of her friends mothers don't work.
    
    I personally think it's healthy for kids to get more than one
    perspective and to be able to rely on others to provide their
    entertainment.  I enjoy my time with my kids, but it's very hard
    to keep up with their level of energy all day everyday. 
    
    BTW, you didn't say how old your daughter is. Is she still in day
    care? 
    
    The problem, as I see it, is to make good quality day care a respected
    profession for the care givers and affordable for the parents. It's
    awfully expensive because it's so labor intensive and you can't
    use just any facility.
    
    Enjoy your holidays!
    Maryan