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Clarification Post.

Posted by JSYL on Saturday, June 17, 2006 in ,
Here you go, Tim.
In black and white? In Australia, we have an ageing population with a trend towards couples having fewer children. The solution thus far has, as I said before, been predicated on the assumption that the onus is on women, being physically able to give birth, to have more babies.

Rather than looking beyond the physical aspect of giving birth, you Tim, (yes I do mean you Tim Tjun Wong who commented below =p) and Costello (sorry to lump you in the same category as our soon-to-be-God-save-us-all new PM) have lightheartedly, insensitively and offensively overlooked a number of things that influence a woman's decision to have babies.

Herein lies the double standard:
Men say: women have a uterus, so why wouldn't they want to have more kids for the good of the nation?
Other men say: That woman has millions of kids by different fathers, she is a slut.

Men say: go have kids! don't be a selfish bitch!
Men also say: but i'll be damned if I'll pay any money to support those kids! (i.e. fathers who won't pay child support)

Men say: go have kids- its easy to do, you have a high-paying job that can financially support them.
Men also say: but if you don't give up that career, you are a money hungry ice-queen. if you choose to work and be a mother, we're not going to let you get much further than where you are, and we won't provide child care for the kid- you're on your own there.

These i realise, are vast generalisations, but they show you (i hope) quite clearly the fact that while it is a woman's duty to pop them out, once they're "out", it is not a man's duty to do all the things neccessary to help that woman and those children survive in the real world of supposedly equal rights. I argue therefore, that women are both encouraged to have kids, and discouraged from doing so realistically because of all the difficulties they would face if they were to have children.

So to answer your question- I'm not just mad, I'm morally against comments that dismiss women as simply baby factories and milk pumps. I'm not mad at all men, I'm not even mad at the men who make such comments. I'm against the general attitude that women hold both the cause and solution to Australia's population crisis in their uterus-es (uterii??), and that men play absolutely no part in the scheme of things..

I think that many people (note- both MEN AND WOMEN) often forget that it takes 2 people to make a baby, and many many more to support and love that baby. It should not be dismissed as an easy choice, nor an easy solution to a much more complex issue.

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