Having It All

Everyone has weighed in on the #HavingItAll discussion that raged this week in the feminist blogosphere and twitter. Every important point has basically at least been raised and most of them have been hashed out and beaten to death.

So, really, what I just want to say is : This conversation is why Feminism is still relevant. This conversation highlights just how far we have come and just how far we have to go.

In the mental health field, we are encouraged to use a tool with clients that I call the "Magic Wand" - we ask, "If I had a Magic Wand, and could do/fix/change *anything,* what would I do/fix/change? What would my life/the world look like after I did/fixed/changed things with the Magic Wand?"

I think that we as a society need to really sit back and think about that question with regards to how we have families and how we have careers. This is not a women's issue, it's an everyone issue but it IS a feminist issue and I think it's a vital one because it demonstrates the real need for feminist lens and critique in society as a whole.

So, what would my Post-Magic-Wand world look like?

As for families, I would like to see a re-valuing of the family as part of the social contract. This ranges from Marriage Rights Issues* to Reproductive Rights** to the big mess of gender roles in the home. I'm a big fan of the feminist creed that everyone should get the chance to make the choices in their personal lives that work for them, but I also think that we need to have a frank and open discussion about how those personal choices impact those around us - especially in light of the new studies showing that men whose wives do not work outside the home undervalue their female coworkers (and worse!).

For me personally, I feel that my family life is basically perfect how I want it with regards to this in large part due to the enormous privilege that I hold as a Feminist, White, Middle-Class, Cis-Gendered Woman, in a heterosexual relationship with a Feminist, White, Middle-Class, Cis-Gendered Man. I get to be legally married and my relationship is openly and publicly celebrated. I have access to birthcontrol that works and that has allowed me to control my fertility. I had the ability to get pregnant using the old fashioned, easy, cheap and fun method. Within my home, my husband and I have worked out a relatively fair division of labor that keeps our home well maintained, clean, and comfortable***. Some of those tasks are sort of gendered - Boybee takes out the trash and I clean the bathrooms for example, but some of those tasks just fall naturally into our interests/skills - Boybeee lays the tile and I clean the cat's box for example. As we discuss our foray into parenting, we know that some of the work will be determined by biology (I'm the only one who can breast feed, especially in those first few weeks, feeding will be my sole responsibility), but a lot of it can be determined by looking at our individual strengths/talents. I think we'll be able to figure out those tasks in much the same way that we have figured out the tasks of maintaining our home. Boybee and I both work full-time outside of the home - though we both work for non-profits in healthcare, his work directly benefits the super rich whereas I work with the most at-risk folks ... guess who makes more money? But we both work hard and we value each other's work and careers (Boybee's work is a job and what is now his hobby will hopefully someday become his career, whereas my low paying gig is a career I love and am devoted to). We have a very pragmatic view and see each other as equal partners in our family's financial future. It's pretty sweet.

That brings us to the whole issue of careers. Yuck. In my ideal, Magic-Wand world, everyone would be able to pursue the work that suited their skills and passions, for that work all people would be justly compensated, and through that work, we would have a shared goal of leaving a better world for the next generation. I think this is a lot less feasible than my Magic-Wand world for families.

The way it is now, we ask people to sacrifice emotional and social well-being for most jobs and though with some of them (like Doctors) folks are pretty well compensated for that sacrifice, most are not. That's not a Working Mom problem - that's an everyone problem and I think that it is a big stupid cop-out on our part to call it a Working Mom problem. I say that because there are other problems that get swept under the rug that really ARE Working Mom problems - like access to affordable childcare (if I had two babies in day care, it would probably not be financially feasible for me to continue working in the career that I love and I have a masters degree and work full-time), like paid maternity/paternity/adoption leave (pushing a human being out of your body is a pretty big deal medically speaking and alone deserves about 6 weeks of recovery time, the ON TOP OF THAT there's that whole brand new, super fragile, human being to figure out how to care for which also takes time for moms and dads, bio and adoptive parents). Those are big, huge, major issues and all we can talk about is attachment parenting and Stay At Home Moms??? PUH-LEASE.

That brings us to the basic question regarding social reproduction: Who is responsible for the next generation? Is it moms? Is it dads? Is it the government? Is it the schools? Who should it be?

Well, first off - go see Children of Men - Clive Owen is gorgeous and it's a powerful, well made film. We can all agree that it is in our collective interest as a society to make more people. Yeah, the world is over populated and humans are a big bunch of polluting doofuses, but we are still animals who want to propagate our genes and let's face it, we need people to take care of us when we're old. Life is like a giant pyramid scheme and making new people is the best way to get to the top of the pyramid! :)

Whereas:
1. Female people get the awe-some privilege of making people but male people are a necessary component and need to be held equally accountable for the new people made. 

2. Society as a whole benefits from the making of new people.

3. Society as a whole has a vested interest in those new people becoming active, engaged, productive members of society which requires vast resources in terms of parental/familial time and attention, schooling/education, health care (prenatal and childhood), etc.

I argue that we need to agree that we are all responsible for the creation of healthy, well-adjusted productive new members of society and as such, we have a social obligation to support parents (see those working mom problems and so many others) as well as a social obligation to communally provide the resources necessary to educate those new people and keep them healthy.

Maybe if we could all just sign on to that social contract and take the time to Do It Right, we would be able to get past the #HavingItAll conversation.

*I've talked about my Family Corporations idea here before, but basically, everyone should have at very least equal rights to form legally supported relationships with those people that they love and yes, I do believe that the formation of those legal relationships ought to be solidly in the Realm of The State because it has lasting Social and Public Health Consequences.

** Reproductive Rights is NOT CODE FOR ABORTION PEOPLE. Reproductive rights issues include abortion, birth control, sterilization, population control, and not just for women! Male reproductive rights are a major set of issues that we push under the rug and that need to be examined.

*** Everyone now gets to be jealous that I happened to find myself a partner who thinks that my love of reading is *so* cute that some of the time he will happily clean the house while I read a book, coming by to check on me and kiss my cheek and squee over how cute I am. No joke. I am the luckiest human being who was ever born. For Serious.