What to Read on a Rainy Day?

~ Laura

The Jill Carroll story.

Wow. Best post ever by Lauren at Feministe about parenting and feminism.

Fellow feminists, I fucking hate the term “breeders,” and I’ll be goddamned if somebody attempts to tell me that they don’t hear that term used freely and often from those who work for the betterment of women’s lives.

My identity is not defined by my parenthood, but my life is. Without a child I wouldn’t feel as obligated to work as much as I do, to avoid such debt, to secure meaningful assets, or to better myself or the world. I’m naturally one selfish wench who would rather not be bothered by real world ephemera, and I recognize that having my little one in my life makes me a better person even if he isn’t the only thing I strive for. As for other adults in my world, I hope that they have the decency to well-wish my child even if they don’t care for or love him. My parenting theory does not obligate a random adult to a stranger’s child, just hopes that they recognize that children are indeed little people who haven’t yet grown up and thus continue to make bad decisions.

Published by Laura

3 thoughts on “What to Read on a Rainy Day?”

  2. I’m glad you caught some of this commentary, too, Sandy. I had read the Ampersand and Pandagan post and the comments and was really turned off. I didn’t link to it or make a big deal, because they’re nice people.
    A couple of things bothered me. One. I don’t think it’s cool to pull a post out of context from a personal blog and tell a much larger audience that the blogger is clearly oppressed. Later, it is still not cool to say that you were in some way educating them. It’s like me going into a project in Harlem, knocking on a random door, telling the family inside that they are victims of racism and demanding to know why weren’t they marching in the street.
    Two. The whole motherhood is oppression thing. I could write a book on this, so I’ll stop here, but let me just say that Red Neck Mother has it totally right. Unless you have ’em, you should at least respect the fact that you don’t have all the facts.

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