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This is definitely a mommy-war book
?The Conflict? attacks progressive parenting as anti-feminist
Is our modern notion of good parenting cheating women of their full potential?
That?s the argument at the heart of an attention-getting new book by feminist French author and philosopher Elisabeth Badinter. ?The Conflict: How Modern Motherhood Undermines the Status of Women,? (Metropolitan Books) goes on sale in the U.S. next month and is arriving with a loud buzz thanks to its popularity in Europe and its aggressive attack on ?natural? parenting, including breast-feeding.
?Today?s ideal is supremely demanding, even more than twenty years ago,? Badinter writes. She argues that the modern ideal of personal fulfillment directly contradicts the modern ideal of motherhood (thus the ?conflict.?)
She categorizes the contradictions into social, conjugal and personal, giving the most weight to the last, which affects, ?every women who feels torn between love for her child and personal desires, between wanting the best for her baby and wanting best for herself. A child conceived as a source of fulfillment can, it turns out, stand in the way of that fulfillment. And, if we pile up a mother?s responsibilities to the point of overload, she will feel this contradiction all the more keenly.?
Perhaps even ore controversial is what Badinter writes about breast-feeding. She is scornful of what she calls the ?ideology? of the La Leche League and its promotion of long-term nursing.
?Advocating on-demand breast-feeding for as long as the child wants it effectively deprives a mother of her time,? she writes.
?If you add to this the obligation to stay by his side until the age of three to optimize his development, she receives the message that any other interest is secondary and morally inferior, since the ideal mother is enmeshed with the child bodily and mentally.?
Offended yet? If not, keep reading.
Badinter, who teaches at the Ecole Polytechnique in Paris, goes on to suggest that the root of the pendulum swing towards such ?natural? parenting is a generational reaction toward feminism.
Today?s mothers, she writes, resent their own mothers? work for equality and have responded by rejecting the quest for personal freedom and independence.
?Beneath the rejection of feminism lurked a deeper criticism of motherhood as their mothers had practiced it. Perhaps they really meant: In pursuit of your independence, you sacrificed me as well. You didn?t give me enough love, enough care, enough time. You were always in a hurry and often tired; you thought the quality of time you spent with me was more important than the quantity. The truth is, I was not your top priority and you were not a good mother. I won?t do the same with my children.?
Whoa.
What do you think? Is Badinter off base? Or on to something? Will ?The Conflict? spark conversation?
Re: This is definitely a mommy-war book
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I would join this club.
I think so.
I don't think the author is terribly far off base. Perhaps inflammatory but not incorrect. How often do we talk on here about how society is constructed to be completely anti-female, anti-mother (working or otherwise) and anti-family? Crap federal maternity leave policy, crap health care policy, crap vacation policy, etc. etc. It's all related.
And HaB just nailed one of my main issues with the more fringe proponents of AP. I feel it's so anti-father, even if they don't proclaim it out loud. It's all focused on proper mothering, not proper parenting.
How is this offensive? While I was on the one hand sad to wean B, I also felt liberated. Finally, FINALLY I was no longer the sole source of nutrition. Finally I no longer had this creature attached to me. Finally I could have a drink without thinking "When is he going to want to nurse again?"
And I know I can't be the only woman who struggles with realizing that I can, in fact, have a life outside my child and not utterly destroy his development. That I can, in fact, take time for myself. And that more extreme APers would condemn this as neglect.
*goes and sits next to HaB and eddy*
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I'll take a ride on this train as well.
Give me a break.
Most (all) of the extended breastfeeders I know IRL are pretty damned feminist. It's a choice. Most of us do it because *ready?* it makes our lives easier. People are inherently lazy, and making up bottles and being sure everything is clean and sterile is too much for me at 2 a.m. in the morning. Sue me.
As I said, it's a choice. I'm choosing to SAH parent and to extended BF and to put my babe in a carrier instead of a stroller and to cosleep because these things work for me. If somebody asks, I explain why they work for me.
Part of the struggle of feminism is trying to understand that all choices are valid. Working until you go into labor and returning to full time employment two weeks later is also a valid choice...
BUT (and here's the big BUT) neither extreme should be forced on people. Nobody should be forced to BF for five years, and nobody should be forced to return to work before they're ready. I get sad when I hear from people who would rather be doing something else with their parenting, but can't.
I get a little miffed when people talk about the "ideology" of LLL. I've been around LLL since the girl was born, and the "ideology" discussed in this article is something I, honestly, haven't seen. What I have seen is a group of women committed to helping women on their breastfeeding journey, wherever they are on it.
/rant.
I am the 99%.
This sounds fascinating.
And Team HAB. I'm so over "ideal" in everything. Look, there's a vast spectrum between letting your baby chew on broken glass while you drink and breastfeeding the kid until he/she is 8.
You can have kids and still be a person.
lol at "depriving a mothher of her time." I dont think we become moms with the intent of having a newborn and tons of free time on our hands.
Sorry for the typos - I'm bf'ing.
*sigh*
Exclusive breastfeeding is different than on-demand is different than what I've personally seen at LLL.
She's conflating two things here.
IME, there's "on demand nursing" which is a means of talking about babies... particularly before a baby is taking most of their nutrition from complimentary foods.
Toddler nursing, or "extended breastfeeding" is a whole other thing. I don't know anybody who's an extended BF'er (particularly after about 18 months or 2 years) who doesn't set limits. Where, when, how long, night weaning, etc.
I am the 99%.
I am the 99%.
I think whether a dad is marginalized in their kids' lives has more to do with the parents' pre-existing values and gender roles than what parenting tools or techniques they use.
With the obvious exception of breastfeeding, there's no reason dads can't be responsive to baby's cries, co-sleep, baby-wear, use gentle discipline, even be a full-time or part-time SAHP.
Sure there are a lot of AP-oriented moms who take it upon themselves to do everything related to childcare (which isn't particularly healthy) ... but there are plenty of non-AP moms who do the same thing. I think families where parenting is divided strictly down gender lines would be like that regardless of what parenting style they have.
I think it's an interesting conversation to have, but it sounds like the author is oversimplifying a bit.
"The hardest thing is to live richly in the present without letting it be tainted out of fear for the future or regret for the past." - Sylvia Plath
I don't have a problem hopping on too. I don't have kids yet so who knows, I may go loony when I pop one out hopefully next year, but I really hope not.
I've already said I'd try to breast feed but if it becomes too painful or I have too many problems or god forbid I have PPD and need meds stat (I'm not messing around with that), I'm not going to sit there and beat myself up over and hate myself for going with formula. A lot of women pretty much hate themselves though and the mommy war attitude doesn't help- depending on where in the country you live you're more likely to get the stink-eye and rude comments for pulling out a bottle and not the boob in public, and that sh!it has got to stop either way. Maybe people should just STFU about stupid stuff like that in general.
I dunno, in general I think parents baby their kids way too long and I think it's really unhealthy the lengths to which modern parenting goes to make a child the center of the family universe. I definitely find it more than a little socially regressive when the status quo it seems in most AP and "progressive" parenting styles is that the mom and kid are attached at the hip.
I'm there with you. As a kid, I was left home with a sitter every time my parents had to go meet with clients, went to parties, weddings, etc. I turned into a very stable adult (IMHO). Reading some books about the 20's and 30's I see that the children were not brought to every little social gathering. I think that there is a lot of the child/ren being the center of the universe and it isn't doing them any favors. (Not everyone, mind you, but it is done more than it use to be).
2012 Reading Challenge
Yes, but momi, most of those choices are a compromise. The author is talking about two ideals that are being held up to modern women, not reality of everyday life.
One of the main goal of feminism, I would argue, is to ensure women are self-sufficient and independant. That includes financial independence which, unless you're the 1%, means working. You yourself said just this week that that is something you struggle with - that your choice to SAH has made you dependant upon your husband for money.
Likewise, the ideal of Attached Parenting held up for mothers is to exclusively breastfeed for 6 months, continue to breastfeed till 1 year (or, if you follow WHO, 2 years). To baby wear, co-sleep, and be a 100% responsive parent, etc. These are largely at-odds with being a working parent. You can't be 100% responsive when your kid is in daycare for 8 hours a day.
Regardless of whether or not that you are making choices based on what works for you and your family, it is a compromise of one ideal or the other. They are fundamentally in conflict.
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Oh, I agree that feminism does allow for different choices. But this ties in well with that other article about how your kids want you, not crazy Pinterest shiit. We are making a culture of mommy put downs in absolutely EVERYTHING. It would be awesome if everyone was like the ladies on this board, but they're not. Women are expected to be AMAZING ZOMG MOTHERS who do all this natural stuff and love giving of themselves to their kids all the freaking time, and that's not the choice everyone wants to make.
Dear Lanie, I heart you so hard right now.
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A--men!
I'll go you one further - the current multi-pronged attack on women's rights is a direct result of this current extreme AP movement. Get your ass back into the kitchen ladies and parent those babies because if you don't they will turn up to be mass murderers.
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thanks. But others are far better versed than I. Here are two articles that had me rolling with laughter:
http://bluemilk.wordpress.com/2010/07/29/why-attachment-parenting-needs-feminism/
http://gingajoy.blogspot.ca/2006/04/highly-subjective-diatribe-against-dr.html
"And then there's Sears' fondness for invoking "Africa" as a place where child-rearing was much more "natural" and unpolluted than in the West. After meeting two women from Zambia at a conference who carried their infant in slings (that colorfully "matched their native dress"--how charming!) Sears and Martha understood what innate mothering must look like, for, after all, "women in their culture don't have the benefits of books and studies about mothering hormones..." (Uhm, HELLO! You met these women at a *** CONFERENCE. Or did you think that they just happened their way into your presence after leaving the mudhut for a long journey to the water well?)."
I think his writing is dangerous in a dr. phil meets dr. oz meets parenting pressures sort of way.
Yep. I was all about AP when I was pregnant with my first and over the first couple years of her life I came to see it in a completely new light. The attitude that sleep training will traumatize your child was what made me start seeing AP in a negative light. Also I hate when grown women call me "mama."
I think a big problem with AP and all this natural parenting stuff is they take these idealized hunter-gatherer parenting practices and try to project them onto a completely different society and then imply mothers are depriving their children of something vital when it doesn't work for them.
Iris Victoria {9.13.08} Augusto Morgan {4.30.11}
In general I always laugh my azz off at "back to nature" arguments.
It's also natural for a scratch on your leg to get heavily infected, poison your blood, and cause you to die a few days later. Should you slap mud on that shi!t and light incense for the old gods, or should you take some friggin antibiotics?
There there mama. there there.
I would insert the eyeroll-y emoticon here if I weren't completely Nest-illiterate. I seriously just can't with the hand-wringing over "kids today are coddled, dammit!" Every single generation in this country thinks the younger ones are spoiled and useless. I guarantee that some moms choosing to breastfeed longer (and please, let's not pretend like the majority of moms in this country keep breastfeeding til even 6 mos anyway, which again is FINE) or bring babies along to select social functions will not mean this country goes to hell in a handbasket when those kids are running it. And this is coming from a non-bedsharer who got a part-time nanny at five weeks because I just couldn't handle the baby-isolation and who probably exposes her kid to way too much TV already.
Sweet, let me do it for you at this response you've typed up:
Yeah, a lot of older generations moan and whine at the newer generations, they have it easier, they're out of control, etc. That's not what I'm saying, at all, and don't act like it is.
AP parenting philosophy pretty directly tells parents that the kids run the show, and yes, that is a pretty new phenomena, and one I don't think is healthy. Why? Because I'm a member of generation Y, the first generation where bosses are having the parents of their Gen Y employees call out sick for them. I see the start of this sort of coddled, 'the world revolves around me' behavior in my own peers, so yes, it really worries me when I see that it's being even more pronounced in the generation that will be coming after me, because I hate it even among my peers.
I don't give a crap if a mom wants to extended breast feed, or if a mom wants to bring her baby out. Whatever- babies are people too, no one is suggesting mothers shut their kids inside and keep them excluded from adults.
What I am suggesting though is this overly kid-centric philosophy that has been picking up speed in recent years is not neccesarily better because it's newer, for the simple fact that the world does not revolve around one individual. Conditioning kids to believe that it does revolve around them seems incredibly friggin dumb on multiple accounts to me. I don't lament that parents bring their kids to social events- I lament that parents get so offended that their kids aren't invited to the same cocktail hour the parents are that they don't go or replan these typically adults-only events and things to be "kid friendly." I lament that moms are made to feel guilty because god forbid they want to put on a sexy dress at 5 months post partum, go drink some martinis with their husbands and have a great dinner and not be sitting by the phone waiting for the call that they need to tear home so they can breast feed because if they don't their kid is going to get brain damage.
To even assert that the din of, "If you aren't perfectly attentive and nurturing mother you're going to hurt your children!" isn't a roar that drowns out much else and isn't pushing this extremely child-centric view of family and relationships above more moderate approaches, to me is patently ridiculous.
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Touche with the eyeroll! Sorry I threw down the snark before--I rarely do that on these boards.
However, I'm wondering where you're getting your AP information from. My understanding of AP isn't that it's permissive by nature (and again, this is from lurking the bump AP board for years--many of those women seem to set boundaries for their children--Lanie, I know you'll probably have something to say about this!). I feel like AP likes to say that it's all about families adopting practices that both promote attachment but that also strike the best balance for the entire family.
The examples you cite (parents calling kids' bosses, being completely offended that they can't bring their kids to a black tie affair)--most parents subscribing to moderate AP would think they are totally ridiculous. There are extremes, yes, but a culture of coddling does not necessarily grow out of a practice that seeks to treat children slightly more humanely than the Draper School of Parenting.
Honestly, if you told me five years ago that I would be defending this practice, I would have laughed out loud. I was a staunch behaviorist by training and convinced that kids need to be taught how to behave, dammit! I don't even necessarily subscribe to AP as a parent, even now. I just think that it's counterproductive to wring one's hands (I realize I used that phrase already, pardon) over other people's parenting choices (other than the vaccine one, which is clearly a public health issue--like how I brought this in just to further confound things? I'm here to help ;-)
Interesting observation. You COULD (and I'm not saying I am) argue that putting tons of pressure on mom to be the be all and end all takes away from the "village to raise a child" school of thought, and perhaps schools were once part of the "village"?
I have other thoughts that I'll bet are more nuanced, but I seriously cannot express myself coherently tonight--apologies.