Rosie the Riveter

[C-dot]

the whole Rosie-like ethos of "Use It Up, Wear It Out, Make It Do, or Do Without."

Make do and mend, right?

A childhood friend of mine (whom I wished remained in only my memory) once saw me darning a wool sock. She asked me what I thought I was doing - "darning the hole in this sock," I replied. "Why don't you just throw it away? You can buy those for, like, 3 bucks at American Eagle." :eusa_doh:

Its so easy to just throw it out and buy something new these days. In WWII, that wasn't an option if you didn't want to be naked all the time. Personally I believe in making full use of things, and if not, passing them on to someone who can.

 

[Sharpsburg]

Ladies,

Sorry, but i am sick to death with women blaming Feminists for every woe you experience because your life is not just like little June Cleaver. We are all forgetting that without the bravery, innovations and determination of our feminist foremothers we would not have the right to own property, the right to vote, the ability to work at all and to have some attempt at equal treatment for those of us who do work, the right to get an education and do all we want to do with our lives. Feminism is not to blame for every problem under the sun. Human beings are when we focus on what has not benefited us and focus only on the rocky parts. it is all a work in progress.

my thoughts, mary

 

[Mrs. Merl]

That's you personally. That IS your choice. You CAN choose to either work and see less of your (future) children or not work and go without certain things. Life is full of such consequences. This isn't a feminist issue, it's a your personal economic issue. I could choose to not work and go on welfare, but it would mean no more meals out, walking to work and -worst of all- no new hats! So I suck it up and exchange 40 hours of my time a week for cash to support the lifestyle I enjoy. Them's the breaks.

No, I don't get a choice because NO MATTER WHICH I *choose* the constant is that I have to work. Even though my husband is willing to support me, economically he cannot. I have to work whether I choose to have children or choose not to have children. The point I was trying to make is this. Because the only way I would choose to have children is to not work and because I only get the *choice* to work no matter the circumstances - I, am therefore, by circumstance also denied the choice to have children. It is just a way I feel and in part of my mind I also feel that because of the way history has played out I am stuck between a rock and a hard place.

The only reason I bring it up, is because more and more people I know are discussing these ideas and are increasingly dissatisfied with the lack of options open to them. Many of us are reaching a point of feeling like, for lack of a better word, anti-feminists or reverse feminists.

 

[cecil]

Ladies,

Sorry, but i am sick to death with women blaming Feminists for every woe you experience because your life is not just like little June Cleaver. We are all forgetting that without the bravery, innovations and determination of our feminist foremothers we would not have the right to own property, the right to vote, the ability to work at all and to have some attempt at equal treatment for those of us who do work, the right to get an education and do all we want to do with our lives. Feminism is not to blame for every problem under the sun. Human beings are when we focus on what has not benefited us and focus only on the rocky parts. it is all a work in progress.

my thoughts, mary

Can I hug you?

 

[Mrs. Merl]

That's my greatest gripe with the modern world -- the whole notion of forced disposability. And I think every woman owes it to herself to get as familiar with tools and such as she possibly can so as not to be a victim of it -- I've learned to repair my own radios, TV set, washing machine, sewing machine, kitchen stove, and I-cant-think-of-what-else because I absolutely refuse to be a part of modern consumerist throwaway culture. It's the main thing in today's world that makes me physically *angry.* It's the antethesis of everything I was raised to believe in -- the whole Rosie-like ethos of "Use It Up, Wear It Out, Make It Do, or Do Without."

I love this! I think you are so right! I can't even believe the things I have already learned to do and how much I don't want things I can't fix!

 

[Mrs. Merl]

Make do and mend, right?

A childhood friend of mine (whom I wished remained in only my memory) once saw me darning a wool sock. She asked me what I thought I was doing - "darning the hole in this sock," I replied. "Why don't you just throw it away? You can buy those for, like, 3 bucks at American Eagle." :eusa_doh:

Its so easy to just throw it out and buy something new these days. In WWII, that wasn't an option if you didn't want to be naked all the time. Personally I believe in making full use of things, and if not, passing them on to someone who can.

LOL - so sad, but so true. I at least use mine as rags until they are so threadbare a nesting bird would laugh.

 

[cecil]

No, I don't get a choice because NO MATTER WHICH I *choose* the constant is that I have to work. Even though my husband is willing to support me, economically he cannot. I have to work whether I choose to have children or choose not to have children. The point I was trying to make is this. Because the only way I would choose to have children is to not work and because I only get the *choice* to work no matter the circumstances - I, am therefore, by circumstance also denied the choice to have children. It is just a way I feel and in part of my mind I also feel that because of the way history has played out I am stuck between a rock and a hard place.

The only reason I bring it up, is because more and more people I know are discussing these ideas and are increasingly dissatisfied with the lack of options open to them. Many of us are reaching a point of feeling like, for lack of a better word, anti-feminists or reverse feminists.

People are anti-feminist now because they don't have everything handed to them on a platter? Seriously?

So that, really, would be down to the field your husband has chosen not paying as much as would be ideal?

Do you really think that women who married men who weren't in well-paying professions had it easy? Money would have been tight and families would be going without luxuries, just as you would be now. One working-class income for a whole family has never been an easy thing to manage.

 

[LizzieMaine]

The only reason I bring it up, is because more and more people I know are discussing these ideas and are increasingly dissatisfied with the lack of options open to them. Many of us are reaching a point of feeling like, for lack of a better word, anti-feminists or reverse feminists.

And this is exactly the thing that will, eventually, have to *make* economics a feminist issue. There's genuine voices being raised on these points, and it isn't just a matter of people complaining because they can't have a new dishwasher. Organized feminism does itself no favors by being selective in which women it listens to.

 

[Foofoogal]

because your life is not just like little June Cleaver.

I would like to think it is. That is my point and my personal choices. Why mainly? Because I didn't buy the crapola shoveled out to (lack of other word) weaker women back in the 1970s.
I saw feminism for what it was. A bunch of stupid women trying to tell me what to do.
I have 8 brothers, a husband and a father then. I had a home I loved to nurture my home and husband and children.
Never could and still don't figure out how women didn't want men to tell them what to do but jumped when it was suggested to them you really need to get out of the home to be fulfilled.
Half of the time when they were getting fulfilled I was watching their kids run wild around the neighborhood.
Back then I promise every woman did not need to work.

 

[Mrs. Merl]

Ladies,

Sorry, but i am sick to death with women blaming Feminists for every woe you experience because your life is not just like little June Cleaver. We are all forgetting that without the bravery, innovations and determination of our feminist foremothers we would not have the right to own property, the right to vote, the ability to work at all and to have some attempt at equal treatment for those of us who do work, the right to get an education and do all we want to do with our lives. Feminism is not to blame for every problem under the sun. Human beings are when we focus on what has not benefited us and focus only on the rocky parts. it is all a work in progress.

my thoughts, mary

I am not sure everyone wants to "blame them for everything." And I do think that most people could agree on the great things that women have fought for and achieved. I just think that some might be looking at the history of such movements and feeling that perhaps the extreme situations we find ourselves in may have been a side effect of some of these well-meaning ideals. I cannot think that my grandparents bad mouthing me or my mother are a result of not being influenced by the ideals being discussed. (I guess you would have to take into account that neither my mother, nor myself are lazy bums by any stretch of the imagination - even though at times we have chosen not to work.)

 

[cecil]

I would like to think it is. That is my point and my personal choices. Why mainly? Because I didn't buy the crapola shoveled out to (lack of other word) weaker women back in the 1970s.
I saw feminism for what it was. A bunch of stupid women trying to tell me what to do.
I have 8 brothers, a husband and a father then. I had a home I loved to nurture my home and husband and children.
Never could and still don't figure out how women didn't want men to tell them what to do but jumped when it was suggested to them you really need to get out of the home to be fulfilled.
Half of the time when they were getting fulfilled I was watching their kids run wild around the neighborhood.
Back then I promise every woman did not need to work.

Those stupid women got you the vote. Those stupid women got me equal pay and planned parenthood. Off-topic but as an aside another group of people got jack of economic and political inequality around the same time. I suppose they're stupid too.

 

[Foofoogal]

http://www.parents.com/app/stayathomecalculator/
http://life.familyeducation.com/calculator/stay-at-home-cost/55187.html
http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/CollegeAndFamily/RaiseKids/CostOfBeingAStayAtHomeMom.aspx

And this is exactly the thing that will, eventually, have to *make* economics a feminist issue.

many never ever truly sit down and crunch the numbers. For many it actually cost to go to work.

 

[Mrs. Merl]

People are anti-feminist now because they don't have everything handed to them on a platter? Seriously?

So that, really, would be down to the field your husband has chosen not paying as much as would be ideal?

Do you really think that women who married men who weren't in well-paying professions had it easy? Money would have been tight and families would be going without luxuries, just as you would be now. One working-class income for a whole family has never been an easy thing to manage.

I don't ask for anything on a platter. I ask for the ability to put a roof over my head, eat a little food and not be naked. However, because of the current circumstances my husband (in a very good and worthy position) cannot provide for this, unless I too choose to be employed. And we certainly cannot have children either. And the point is that I may feel that it could be due to everyone feeling that because of our fight to work - we must work - and now there isn't enough in the fund to pay a person enough to support a family on a single income.

 

[Foofoogal]

cecil.
seriously. :eusa_doh:

 

[LizzieMaine]

Those stupid women got you the vote. Those stupid women got me equal pay and planned parenthood. Off-topic but as an aside another group of people got jack of economic and political inequality around the same time. I suppose they're stupid too.

Well, to be fair, I think the women Foofoo was criticising were the militant second-wavers of the '70s. Agree with them or disagree, I think it's safe to say that women were voting in the US for at least few decades before those particular feminists were born. And there *were* considerable ideological differences between the first-wavers and the second-wavers, especially the more extreme types -- it's quite possible to agree with everything the first wave accomplished without necessarily agreeing with everything the second wave said or did. Underneath the rhetoric going on here, there's worthwhile points for discussion. We could do with less "Stupid" and "Crapola" and more listening to each other.

 

[Foofoogal]

aw lizzie. you always understand me. :eusa_clap

 

[Sharpsburg]

Mrs. Merl - Noone is badmouthing you or your choices, but to say women today are not the beneficiaries of the hard work of feminists is just plain wrong. My grandmother, and many other of our grandmothers, were married to alcoholics or abusers or other troubled men, and had no other option for themselves and their children. They just put up with it. luckily today women at least have an option to get out and make a better life for themselves and their children.

 

[cecil]

Well, to be fair, I think the women Foofoo was criticising were the militant second-wavers of the '70s. Agree with them or disagree, I think it's safe to say that women were voting in the US for at least few decades before those particular feminists were born. And there *were* considerable ideological differences between the first-wavers and the second-wavers, especially the more extreme types -- it's quite possible to agree with everything the first wave accomplished without necessarily agreeing with everything the second wave said or did. Underneath the rhetoric going on here, there's worthwhile points for discussion.

This is true, but I truly believe that the radical "stupid" few (I'm no fan of The Female Eunuch myself!) opened MANY doors for the not-radical majority. This is what I'm saying. I've already said that second-wave feminism was picked apart and reconsidered by the third. There were aspects of it that were not quite right. The bra-burning and sit-ins seem very silly now, but they were a part of something that was, overall, important. I don't think it's accurate to call the whole movement stupid.

 

[cecil]

I don't ask for anything on a platter. I ask for the ability to put a roof over my head, eat a little food and not be naked. However, because of the current circumstances my husband (in a very good and worthy position) cannot provide for this, unless I too choose to be employed. And we certainly cannot have children either. And the point is that I may feel that it could be due to everyone feeling that because of our fight to work - we must work - and now there isn't enough in the fund to pay a person enough to support a family on a single income.

Ok, but a huge amount of women either want children later in life or don't want them at all. Is it okay to cut their wages so that there is more money to go around for men (or women with stay-at-home husbands) to provide for the families that they choose to have? Is it okay to deny a single woman or man without a child a job because people with children have it more difficult? Remember that couples and people with children get certain tax offsets etc already.

 

[Foofoogal]

see sharpsburg. I believe this is what happened. A few bitter women started a whole movement because they hated men.
Still happens today really.
Men are great. I love men. Not all are good and not all are bad. They are useful for many things. lol
Now you have young men that expect the woman to work and alot of young men completely disrespecting woman. Violence against women is at an all time high.
This to me is a byproduct of those bitter women.
They planted bitter seeds and it is now bearing fruit. Not good fruit.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antifeminism