feminism

Since it doesn’t look like there’s a baby in my very near future and I’m largely restricted (no pun intended) to the couch these days, I thought I might as well bring up a controversial discussion 😉  Maybe it will make me go into labor.

I received this email from my inbox last week and it pierced my heart…

“Dear Kelly,

I wanted to write to encourage you to keep speaking on the hard topics–I wish someone had told me.

I went the typical routine–high school–“what are you going do now”–college–then pursuing my “good job” because that’s what you do and besides, you need to be able to take care of yourself.

I get married in my early twenties, we made good money and we spent it well:  nice house, new furniture, two new cars, vacations, etc.

When my first baby came along, I was blown away by my love for her. And not once had I thought about (or been told) that given the lifestyle we had acquired, I would be forced to go back to work when she was just a few months old.  It floored me.

But surprisingly, no one else seemed to think it odd that I was struggling.  It’s what everyone did.  Of course we were obligated to find best day care and that would make all the difference, and then I could carry on, guilt-free, fulfilling my duty as a wife who made half the income.  But when I handed my tiny baby over into the hands of someone I barely new, I might as well have given her my heart too.

Here’s the one thing I can’t get past: if feminism is so “liberating”, why did I feel so enslaved, without a choice, (emphasis mine) bound to a decision I didn’t want to make?  The choice was being a mother who could take care of and nurture this beautiful gift God had given me, or handing her over to a complete stranger and go back to my “liberating job”, because I’m a woman and I can do what I want to do.

What kind of choice is that? “You can have it all?” No you can’t.  And it’s cruel to even suggest it.

I know not all women will feel this way, and from my experience, it’s because the whole movement itself was intended to callous a mother’s heart toward her children and family so she would be more aggressive in the man’s world.  They knew unless she was brainwashed to think that motherhood was just a side job and anyone else could do as good as she could, women would never “roar and conquer” in the man’s world.

And I’ll go ahead and add that I think the whole idea was Satan’s in the first place…what a clever way to destroy families than to get Mom out of the home?

But some of us kept our tender love in tact and have lived to regret that not one woman cared enough to tell me that the pursuit of motherhood was worthy of my entire devotion.”

Heart-broken,

Leah

 

All it takes is a word about feminism, like yesterday’s post, and the feminists jump up to defend it.  “Feminism is ONLY about choice,” they say.  “You sound ignorant when you stereotype feminists as being against the stay-at-home mom.”

Many women still desperately want to believe that feminism is only about total freedom of choice.  That it’s only about valuing all vocations and making sure no one is abused.  No doubt, many women who call themselves feminist do sincerely hold to these claims. But the movement itself doesn’t even pretend about its agenda.  It is not about choice.

One only need listen to its proponents to hear its agenda:

Gloria Feldt, leading feminist activist and former CEO of Planned Parenthood, was interviewed by the NY Times, clearly stating the truth about feminism.  Why are feminist still defending what is being openly taught?

“It should be acceptable criticism to point out that, although everyone has the right to make their own life decisions, choosing to “opt out” reinforces stereotypes about women’s priorities that we’ve been working for decades to shatter, so just cut it out. And, the “individual choice” women have to become stay-at-home moms becomes precarious when they try to return to the workplace and find their earning power and options reduced. If we could see child-rearing as a necessary task and not an identity, and if we could collectively recognize that facilitating it benefits us all, we would go much further in guaranteeing women’s choices than we do when we are expected to uncritically celebrate every individual’s decisions.” From Where is the Female Steve Jobs

In case you missed it, here’s what Feldt is saying:

“Technically women have a choice but if you make the choice to be a stay at home mom you destroy everything feminism has worked to gain so we must criticize (and that should be acceptable) the women who choose to stay home with their children.  Oh, and raising children is just a task that anyone can do.”

Perhaps you get tired of my talking about feminism.  Perhaps you don’t realize how important it is that we understand its true colors and recognize its dangers to the family and ultimately to all of us.  I get really impatient with the defense of feminism and the accusations that I’m simply “uninformed” when there is such blatant evidence of the feminist agenda splattered across the NT Times and everywhere else you care to look.

There is no reason to get upset at those of us who oppose the true agenda behind feminism.  It is precisely because I desire to defend women and children and families that I fight so vehemently against it!  I know the typical replies: “Because of feminism women can vote and women can work and women can do such and such.” Let it be said that I don’t propose that nothing good has come out of the feminist agenda.  But the harm far outweighs the benefits (I for one don’t get excited about “my right to vote”.  I had a right before women’s suffrage.  The right to stay in my cozy house while my one-flesh husband casted our house vote ;-))

I don’t have to be a feminist to recognize the incredible value of women.  I don’t have to be a feminist to feel empowered.  I was crafted by the Master Creator with the ultimate gifts and abilities to make the world a better place.  As feminists continue to destroy the blessedness of home, let us weep for their destruction and never stop proclaiming the truth that God’s blueprint for family is the only hope for salvaging society.

Actress Barbara Billingsley, best known for her portrayal as June Cleaver, died at the age of 94.  She was an important icon, though she is now virtually villainized for her portrayal of “the perfect housewife”.  Mary Kassian has some great thoughts regarding the influence feminist thinking had on the role of wife and mother:

“In the early sixties, a landmark book, “The Feminine Mystique,” burst onto the scene. It claimed that women were NOT happy as housewives—at least they shouldn’t be happy in that role!  Those women who were content as wives and moms simply hadn’t had their eyes opened to the extent of their oppression. Men had duped them to believe that a June Cleaver-type of existence was worthwhile and satisfying, when, in fact, such a role was subservient, and demeaning. As this feminist message spread, women in the sixties and seventies began to vilify Billingsley’s June Cleaver ideal….

Whether a woman ought to pursue an education, career, or have a job outside of the home is not at question here. The question in my mind is, ‘Do we as a society believe that family is so important that we uphold caring for home and children as the best and most important job a woman might ever have?’ “

Read “Grieving June Cleaver” by Mary Kassian