The dust kicked up by Ann-Marie Slaughter's brilliant essay in The Atlantic, "Why Women Still Can't Have It All," continues to swirl around the far reaches of the Internet. Slate published a terrific round-up of the many voices weighing in.
A key part of the current debate is, of course, Sheryl Sandberg, and the thoughtful, heartfelt talk she gave at Davos in 2010. She was participating in a panel called "The Gender Agenda: Putting Parity into Practice," which was moderated by Arianna Huffington. Sandberg reflects on her own experiences as a mother and a woman in the corporate world to call for social change in the work/home balance between men and women.
"We all lose because of this [imbalance]," Sandberg says. "We limit women's ability to contribute in the workforce and, even more importantly, we limit men's ability to contribute at home."
In reaction to Slaughter's essay, Lisa Belkin, writing for the Huffington Post, may have put it best:
The questions Slaughter raises have all been raised before, as have most of the solutions. But it would be a shame if the reaction were the same old trope. If the web simply fills with commenters accusing her of whining on the one hand and selling out on the other, then an opportunity will have been lost. Responding to Slaughter's story as Slaughter's singular problem would mean losing sight of the larger, far more important point that what feel like individual conflicts and choices are really all of ours to solve.
What do you think?