mentioned on Colbert
Mar. 12th, 2008 03:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
walkitoutIn the context of learning not to hate McCain.
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200803/single-marry
Again, I'm reasonably certain this person is completely serious, which just goes to show how monumentally silly a certain category of middle-aged professional white women engaged in writing/publishing can be. I wish people would leave the feminist angle out, or at _least_ not deny reality as experienced by other women. My mother told me something very similar ("your biological clock will start ticking") when I said I wasn't sure I ever wanted to have children. (What I said was more complicated and is almost invariably misunderstood.)
I do sort of wonder about people who decide to go down the single-parent path right from the beginning. I considered it, pretty seriously, and talked to some other people about it, read some stuff, and paid attention. I concluded that you can't really do it by yourself; you'll have to hire someone else to help out, or establish a partnership, if not a romantic one, at least a partnership in raising the kid(s).
The real issue isn't one of "settling", or feminism or anything like that. The real problem is the ridiculous ideal our culture perpetrates on people by encouraging them to expect some form of madness to descend upon them resulting in an unbreakable attachment to another person, continuing through marriage and producing children. Yeah, _that_ is a _great_ plan.
Come on. Figure out what you want to do. Find someone you like to do it with you. Arrange the legal and social constraints to make the program likely to succeed. Proceed. This would be a huge _duh_ and calling it "settling" is just like all that crap people say about "following your dream" without mentioning things like, "oh, by the way, most people with journalism degrees don't get to write for newspapers and the ones who do aren't paid very well". Never mind the whole music/art thing.
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200803/single-marry
Again, I'm reasonably certain this person is completely serious, which just goes to show how monumentally silly a certain category of middle-aged professional white women engaged in writing/publishing can be. I wish people would leave the feminist angle out, or at _least_ not deny reality as experienced by other women. My mother told me something very similar ("your biological clock will start ticking") when I said I wasn't sure I ever wanted to have children. (What I said was more complicated and is almost invariably misunderstood.)
I do sort of wonder about people who decide to go down the single-parent path right from the beginning. I considered it, pretty seriously, and talked to some other people about it, read some stuff, and paid attention. I concluded that you can't really do it by yourself; you'll have to hire someone else to help out, or establish a partnership, if not a romantic one, at least a partnership in raising the kid(s).
The real issue isn't one of "settling", or feminism or anything like that. The real problem is the ridiculous ideal our culture perpetrates on people by encouraging them to expect some form of madness to descend upon them resulting in an unbreakable attachment to another person, continuing through marriage and producing children. Yeah, _that_ is a _great_ plan.
Come on. Figure out what you want to do. Find someone you like to do it with you. Arrange the legal and social constraints to make the program likely to succeed. Proceed. This would be a huge _duh_ and calling it "settling" is just like all that crap people say about "following your dream" without mentioning things like, "oh, by the way, most people with journalism degrees don't get to write for newspapers and the ones who do aren't paid very well". Never mind the whole music/art thing.
no subject
Date: 2008-03-13 09:59 pm (UTC)Yup. The real issue is acting like a grown-up. I mean, I do think antifeminist attitudes promote women not acting like grown-ups (well, men too, usually different mechanisms), but that fact doesn't exactly get you off the hook.
I have actually known a number of women who chose single parenthood. I don't think it's *always* hard -- heck, one woman had twins and went back for a third, a configuration I find difficult *with* a husband, and last I saw seemed to be getting on pretty swimmingly -- but the potential is sure there.
Helen S. (representative of *quite* a different category of middle-aged professional white women in publishing, thank goodness)