Think parents have it easy in the workplace? Just the opposite, writes Dr. Wendy Walsh. Mothers get more scrutiny, and fewer breaks, than anyone at work – which is one reason we slam into the “maternal wall” way before we hit a glass ceiling. What do you think? Read the piece, and share your thoughts in the comments.
By Dr. Wendy Walsh
I was twelve in 1975. A skinny rail with a big mouth. Barely out of Barbies and not yet fully into boys, I knew it was a big year. That's because it was International Women's Year. Swollen with pride for the accomplishments of women everywhere I romanticized the concept of a glass ceiling, suspecting that someday I might get a glimpse of one, but quite sure I would never be touched by it. Boy, was I right.
In her new book, Reshaping the Work-Family Debate: Why Men and Class Matter (Harvard University Press, 2010) Joan Williams describes a system where most women never even see a glass ceiling before they slam into the maternal wall. She charts the systemic discrimination against mothers in the American workplace, beginning with the vigilant supervision of the time clock and ending with so little support for the competing needs of family and work that many women are forced to choose one over the other.
Williams’ theory is that women only experience true equality when they are under thirty and childless. Williams, who is director of the Center for WorkLife Law at University of California, Hastings College of the Law, says that after that, women hit a maternal wall that is so hard to see because the media loves to suggest that mothers choose to "opt out."
I remember as a young, single child-free woman (I'm about to bust myself here) I could dash out for a quick manicure during work hours with a wink to a co-worker who would have my back. But today, should I want to leave work to attend my kid's Christmas pageant or a doctor's appointment, I would have to clear it through human resources. And as for a co-worker who might have my back? If she's childless, she is more likely to squeal on me. Williams also talks about how our male-ordered, 50's-style workplace shepherds women onto two competing teams -- the "tomboys" who may outsource motherhood and the "femmes" who want a better work-life balance.
And all this hurts men too. Today's workplace is perfectly suited to a family of the 1950's, with one bread-winner and one home-maker, except the economic scale has changed and when mothers don't work, men are forced to work longer hours than ever. Remember the days when Dad was home for dinner every night? When a single forty-hour work week could support an entire family? When weekends meant camping, barbecues and Church activities? No more. Today's fathers stumble in, weary eyed, near eight p.m. and stick close to their Blackberries all weekend. That's for the fortunate white-collar crowd. Blue-collar fathers take on two jobs, or practice grueling tag-team parenting with one parent working the night shift and the other the day shift.
Back in 1975, I was being raised by a sidelined feminist, a stay-at-home mother who wished she was in the game. She never burdened me with a Cinderella dream of a prince and a castle, but instead stuffed her unused ambition into my tiny head with words like "independence" and "...don't need a man." I don't consider myself a feminist in the vein of the early soldiers. I never thought I'd have to be one.
Until I became a mother.
I am an employee, a tax payer, and a homeowner. Yet, I have no doubt that my children are the real wealth of my life. I am a mother, before all else. Except for the few occasions where I am obligated to put my own oxygen mask on first, my kids’ needs come well before mine. Their happiness is my happiness. The problem with this is that when I find myself discriminated against precisely because I am a mother, I am told I made a personal choice and parenthood is a personal responsibility.
Really?
I say hogwash. Parenthood is a basic human right. Even if I lived hundreds of thousands of years ago, foraging on the Savannah, without the worries of a sub-prime loan, bad public education, and rising unemployment, a tribe of my people would be helping me to raise my children. But whenever I suggest that my tribe of today help me create the next good citizen and employee or entrepreneur, I am somehow deemed a socialist. This nutty conversation mostly morphes into a discussion of politics and liberalism verses conservatism. And this gets us nowhere.
Let's look at this a bit differently. I am a mother, but I am also a patriot in the land of the "free." So, why am I not free to pursue the most basic milestone of life -- reproduction? Is this right only afforded to me if I can find a rich man to underwrite it or if I make a vow of poverty? Why can't I choose to be a good parent and have support systems in place to help me stay a good employee and tax payer? Just asking.
Dr. Wendy Walsh has a private psychotherapy practice in Los Angeles, blogs at "Dating. Mating. Relating" and is a columnist for Pregnancy Magazine. As a psychological expert, she appears regularly on television. She is the author of “The Boyfriend Test” and “The Girlfriend Test.” She is a single mother of a multiracial family.
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We live in SE AK and it seems to be more common here than down south. Definitely more acceptable.