What happened to women's liberation?

BeverlyRose I’m guessing you’re a man.

I do find the judgemental views if young families today unpleasant. Life is different, society has changed for all of us than it was in the 50’s 60’s and 70’s.

‘Also marriages don’t last, if they do get married that it’.
Young people today want it all, we were poor but happy etc etc.

None of these sweeping judgements reflect the lives of the young families I know.
Are posters speaking about their own adult children in such negative, critical ways?

I often used to jest that we women have been taken for fools and say that, indeed, "a woman's place is in the home" but with her feet up and a cup of coffee in her hand, as modern machinery deals with the household chores. In the distant past we spent hours cleaning with inefficient tools, washing clothing by hand, struggling to dry it then ironing everything (no easy-care fabrics or disposable nappies), etc, etc. - yes I have been there. Then along came the machinery to ease the drudgery and what did we do? We were swiftly persuaded, either by society or circumstance, to seek out 'fulfilling' employment outside of the home. I should add that I have myself always found gainful employment as necessary but often wished that I could have spent more time being a homemaker and a little more time with our children.

anna7

I agree LuckyFour. Women who stayed at home with their children were penalised pension wise. I think there is something now called home responsibilities set up by HMRC which is supposed to address this problem but too late for women of our generation. Divorced sahm of our generation are often in an even worse position

anna7 I don't know how old you are but it is stil possible to make a claim for Home responibility payments and backdate it until 1978 www.gov.uk/home-responsibilities-protection-hrp
^You may still be able to apply for HRP if, for full tax years (April to April) between 1978 and 2010, you were either:

sharing the care of a child under 16 with a partner you lived with and they claimed Child Benefit instead of you - you can transfer their HRP^
caring for a sick or disabled person
You can also apply if you were a foster carer for a full tax year between 2003 and 2010.

The difference between now and the 1960s/70s when my children were born is that I didn't have a choice of whether or not to work outside the home. I left my job when pregnant and became a "housewife" which was a designated occupation title at the time. I had a university degree and the potential to have a good career but there was never any question of me following a career once I became pregnant. My husband worked long hours and travelled a lot so childcare and housework were solely my responsibilitites. I did a variety of part-time casual jobs but never had a career as DH's job moved us all over the UK.
By saving hard when we were first married we were able to buy a maisonette - a struggle with interest rates at about 12%. I don't say this with any sense of virtue or judgement. It's just the way it was at the time. If credit had been available then, if foreign holidays and coffee shops had existed who's to say we wouldn't have opted for those rather than fanatically saving.

I don't really regret the lack of a career but I do regret the lack of a pension. For the short time that I worked in the 1960s I paid a reduced rate of insurance (known as married women's stamp). This was based on the assumption that we were financially dependent on our breadwinner husband. It seemed like a good deal at the time but no one warned us that when we got to retirement age there would be a shortfall. So yes, I regret that too and continue to be dependent on my breadwinner husband!

These things evolve all the time. Our DDs tell us that some of their younger colleagues are now having to delay a second pregnancy because they can't afford to pay two lots of childminding cost at the same time. And so to another development in the pattern of women's lives.

Thanks Trisher. I didn't know that. I think it's too late for me unfortunately. I'm 66 today and get my state pension at the end of the month. I'm only a year short of the full amount anyway so I'm not too bothered. I'm grateful for the information though as I am not sure if my friends of a similar age know this. They may well be better informed than me!

Iam64

I do find the judgemental views if young families today unpleasant. Life is different, society has changed for all of us than it was in the 50’s 60’s and 70’s.

‘Also marriages don’t last, if they do get married that it’.
Young people today want it all, we were poor but happy etc etc.

None of these sweeping judgements reflect the lives of the young families I know.
Are posters speaking about their own adult children in such negative, critical ways?

Totally agree with you there.

Me too. It certainly does not apply to my DDs. Their lives are tough in many ways, "juggling" as the saying goes - but they do not expect owt for nowt and cut their coat according to their cloth - that goes for all their friends.

Thankfully none of them are career-minded in spite of their high qualifications - I say thankfully as, if they were, they might find it all even harder, because they might resent the need to compromise between that and bringing up their children. As it is they have made those compromises with support from their spouses and seem to have achieved a reasonable balance - although they are very very busy.

But they do value their roles as mothers alongside their careers and have turned down opportunities for more hours because they do not want to finish up totally frantic. They recognise the importance of some sort of balance in their lives.

I suspect that watching their father count the hours till he could retire, seeing the stress he was under and then watching him become very ill as soon as he retired has taught them something about what is important in life.

My daughters (and DILs) all say 'It was different - and so much easier - back in your day! (Charming!)

When pressed to explain, apparently, they feel very judged - by other women - on the quality of their careers and parenting, their incomes, property, cars, holidays, clothes, appearance, memberships (gyms, after school activities, sports, hobbies etc.) - and weekend socialising too! (Mostly those things we just couldn't afford when the kids were young.)

I do remember the pushy, competitive mums of the 1970/80s - but they were in the minority, I'm sure (and avoided like the plague, too). It seems to me that things have really gone downhill!

The eldest daughter says:

Happy parents, endless days in the garden, paddling pool, washing on the line, three siblings, walks to the park, bus to the shops, marmite sandwiches, beans on toast, home-cooked dinners, reading books - and, just sometimes, the cinema, the beach, birthday parties (pass the parcel, jelly and ice cream) picnics with friends - even fish and chips!

GrammyGrammy

Sadly it all went wrong. And women are to blame! Instead of using our new found powerfulness to gain better protections for ourselves and our children from the men we wrestles them off, instead we chose to jump into the moral gutter with the men, causing the disintegration of the family and ending lifelong support for us and our children by men and instead leaving ourselves in a worse mess than before. Now we have no sexual or moral high ground and we murder a quarter or a million of our own babies each year and raise our sons to disrespect women, use and abuse them and become porn addicts- whilst rejecting family members and discarding family and community. We didn't fight the right battles for long enough or hard enough. Now 'woman' is being disappeared from our own existence and we do nothing to fight it either.

No.

Just….no.

The most important job of all is bringing up children. Some women do want to work of course but others don't. It should be a matter of choice but rarely is as most people need the money. I feel sorry for young women now they work late into pregnancy to get time with their babies before returning to work.. everyone wants to see them take their first step or hear their first word. I don't envy young mums today

Lizzie44
These things evolve all the time. Our DDs tell us that some of their younger colleagues are now having to delay a second pregnancy because they can't afford to pay two lots of childminding cost at the same time. And so to another development in the pattern of women's lives
This is nothing new. Mine are in their 30s, with a big gap between. I couldn't have managed a baby, a pre-schooler and a tiring full-time job.
At the time, I didn't know anyone who worked with 2 small children, however just a couple of years later returning to teaching could be phased in, making returning easier tiredness-wise.

Lizzie44Exactly why my DGSs are 4 yrs apart. To continue to pay mortgage, utilities & food bills etc DD & SiL need both incomes & so saved enough to enable a year off work for child care. I helped out with 1 day a week which made childminder fees affordable with the tax & child allowance.

Same PECs, mine were born in the eighties and nineties, working mums have always had to space them out to be able to work successfully as well as having children.

Casdon indeed &, after a difficult birth, I was not intending on a 2nd child & was back at work but the iud failed & two years later my 2nd DD arrived. That was our frugal 4 years & DH working several jobs before I returned to work when DD2 started school.

Summerlove

GrammyGrammy

Sadly it all went wrong. And women are to blame! Instead of using our new found powerfulness to gain better protections for ourselves and our children from the men we wrestles them off, instead we chose to jump into the moral gutter with the men, causing the disintegration of the family and ending lifelong support for us and our children by men and instead leaving ourselves in a worse mess than before. Now we have no sexual or moral high ground and we murder a quarter or a million of our own babies each year and raise our sons to disrespect women, use and abuse them and become porn addicts- whilst rejecting family members and discarding family and community. We didn't fight the right battles for long enough or hard enough. Now 'woman' is being disappeared from our own existence and we do nothing to fight it either.

No.

Just….no.

What a load of cold, critical, judgemental nonsense.

I’d planned to return part time, then failed contraception meant another baby. It was easier to manage full time and meant my salary paid for our lovely childminder and meant my pension was paid into. I’d come late to employment with a pension scheme. Full time gave me flexibility to pick up from school a couple of days then work on admin in the evening once the little ones were asleep
I don’t understand this competitive view towards young families. The suggestion they’re not as good parents as the ones they had

My daughter thinks there is something wrong with the work culture here. She and her friends, all young professionals, are stressed with work. She does not know how she can combine her career with raising a family.

I mentioned this on a Whatsapp group with my family, and my brother who works in Australia said “ Come and work in Australia, we don’t do any overtime here” and my brother is working at a more senior level than my daughter!

Women have more rights at work nowadays, but some women abuse these rights to avoid doing work.

My DD’s partner is happy as Larry since he quit his job. He was in charge of a good number of staff mostly women.

One of his staff signed off work long term because she suffers from menopause. When he complained to the HR of his increased workload, they send him to attend a course on menopause instead!

I mentioned this to colleagues at work and they all burst out laughing they thought it was so funny.

Another one pulled the race card on him. She accused him of being racist towards her (he is English btw) so he was subject to a lengthy investigation at work. The irony is my daughter is half Asian.

I lived in Australia for a few years.

The people I knew didn't do any "overtime" because there were no agreed working hours and if you wanted to be successful in your job, you had to be there morning, noon and night. The myth of a short working day before you head off to the beach is just that - a myth.

And bizarrely, SporeRB, having a relative who is a different race doesn't automatically stop a person being racist.

I'd definitely say life is tougher now than it was say when I had my children in '86 and '90. Okay so they have a lot of things at their disposal such as the technology that we didn't have, but we couldn't miss what we had yet to experience.

Yes I did take time out to look after mine until youngest went to school, then I went back part time. Looking back at all the social gatherings that were part of the mother and child early experiences, it wasn't so unusual for mothers to have taken a break from work during that time but many did go back. What I do remember from friends who were working full time, was the difficulty they had in arranging after school care Without the after school clubs I gather it was very expensive and those clubs were thin on the ground then. Before we moved we lived fairly near both the infant and junior school, it was really noticeable when driving past than parents would be picking up continually from 3.15 to say 6ish, the proliferation of school based care had taken off since my time at the school gates, which I think is testament to the fact that both parents are working these days. I think, as others have stated, that two incomes are very necessary, a greater percentage of salary is required for the costs of mortgage, rent, bills everything really. It was never easy, but the decline in numbers getting on the property ladder is an indicator of some of the difficulties that young people starting out are now experiencing.

Women's «liberation» was just access to what was legally ours: our human rights! The right to choose was never ours because people had expectations!! Mainly that we should have children and sacrifice our personal interests to serve those of our family.
My greatest wish has always been to have children. I had 3, and loved every moment of motherhood. It was incredibly hard to raise them and pursue a career, because my husband didn't help at all, but I did it. My children and I get along very well, I see them all the time and my grand children very often stay with me, now that I am retired. I am 75 years old. If I were younger, I don't know if I would have children now. The right to choose includes not to have children! You are not selfish, you are not greedy, you just want to be happy and fullfilled. And children might not be part of the package!

Well what indeed !

When leading politicians are too afraid to even answer the question:

What is a woman?

It seems as though the concept of ‘Womens liberation’ is being knocked back to the dark ages!!!! ?‍♀️

Witzend

*NotTooOld*, I don’t know where in the U.K. you are, but anywhere around here, house prices are way less affordable relative to salaries, than they were when we bought our house in 1977.

It was still possible then to buy a modest family home on one reasonable salary.
It simply isn’t any more. Not anywhere around here, anyway.

That's the real problem. The housing market adjusted to dual income couples and now the choice to stay at home with the children has been taken away from many women.

Even worse, commute times have increased along with an expectation in many workplaces that people will work over and above their contracted hours. So many women are (along with their partners) dropping children to creches at 7 in the morning and arriving home late in the evening with tired children, dinner still to be made etc
That's not liberation.

Socksandsocks01

The most important job of all is bringing up children. Some women do want to work of course but others don't. It should be a matter of choice but rarely is as most people need the money. I feel sorry for young women now they work late into pregnancy to get time with their babies before returning to work.. everyone wants to see them take their first step or hear their first word. I don't envy young mums today

Bringing up children is an extremely important job. But there are many people with and without children who are also doing extremely important work to enable children to grow up in safe, secure environments, to cure serious illnesses, to teach our children etc etc etc

All these jobs, along with raising children, add to society.