I love Maureen Dowd because she is the only New York Times op-ed writer who understands class. Gender...not so much. Case in point is today's "Blue is the New Black" http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/20/opinion/20dowd.html?_r=1, in which she tackles the issue of why American women have gotten gloomier since 1972, with a trend line that's truly depressed. Men are getting happier.
Who knew? We women are less happy because now we have choices, Dowd tells us. "Choice is inherently stressful," she quotes her source as saying, "And women are being driven to distraction."
Let me get this straight. Choices for the American consumer -- good. Drives the economy. Choices re. health care -- good. You can choose your doctor. Choices for American men -- good. Whoa....Men have choices, too. Why aren't they depressed? More to the point, why didn't either Dowd or Buckingham think about that?
Let's dig a little deeper. Here's Buckingham again: "Though women begin their lives more fulfilled than men, as they age, they gradually become less happy....Men, in contrast, get happier as they get older." "Buckingham and other experts dispute the idea that the variance in happiness is caused by women carrying a bigger burden at home, the 'second shift.'," Dowd tells us. "They say that while women still do more cooking, cleaning and child-rearing, the trend lines are moving toward more parity, which should make them less stressed out."
Ah-hem, Maureen (whiny tone here). Last time I looked, American women in two-job families still do twice the housework as men. (When husbands are the sole earners, wives do three times as much housework as their husbands.) In Pamela Stone's Opting Out? Why Women Really Quit Careers and Head Home, she reported one woman describing her husband: "He has always said to me, 'You can do whatever you want to do.' But he's not there to pick up any load." Only 16% of the women in Stone's study had always wanted to stay home with their kids. Over 80% felt pushed out by workplaces that required long hours -- hours much longer than the traditional 40-hours-a-week.
Men, to be players, insist on working those long hours -- 40% of college-educated men work 50 or more hours a week, twice the percentage as did so a few decades ago. Not surprising, given what happens to anyone with the naïveté to insist on a 40-hour week. Stone quotes one woman who tried to work "part time" (that's what they call the 40-hour week these days):
So I decided to quit, and this was a really, really big deal...because I never envisioned myself not working. I just felt like I would become a nobody if I quit. Well, I was sort of a nobody working, too. So it was sort of , "Which nobody do I want to be?"Whining again. The penalty for working part-time in the U.S. (a 21% cut in hourly earnings) is much higher than in other countries, twice as high as in the U.K. and seven times higher than in Sweden.
Even mothers who had planned to proceed full speed ahead hit the maternal wall. Having a child is the worst economic decision a woman can make, in part, because workplace discrimination against mothers is the strongest and most open form of gender discrimination. When researchers gave subjects identical resumes with a three word difference -- one but not the other listed membership in the PTA -- they saw dramatic results. The mothers were 79% less likely to be hired, 100% less likely to be promoted, offered an average of $11,000 less in salary, and held to higher performance and punctuality standards.
So many women are pushed off the fast track, which makes them and their children economically vulnerable. As we all know, the standard of living of women and children falls upon divorce, while that of men rises sharply. Divorce laws take families where husbands' careers have been systematically privileged -- last time I looked fathers earned 68% of the family income -- and allow the men to walk with their wallets, paying low levels of child support and alimony. That's why the children of divorced families are less likely to reach the education level or class status of their fathers. And that's not depressing enough?
Then consider those women lucky enough to have dodged that downer -- children. (Dowd says that "Across the happiness data, the one thing in life that will make you less happy is having children." I disagree. I would have been a narrow workaholic maniac without my two cool kids). As women get older, they hit the glass ceiling: they find that they have to work twice as hard to get half as much, due to negative competence assumptions about women in high-powered jobs. And they also find that, if they act as the men do, they are -- typically implicitly but sometimes explicitly, as in the famous 1989 case of Price, Waterhouse v. Hopkins -- told to "act more femininely." Although, of course, if they do -- begin to hedge their speech in deferential ways and generally stop threatening the men -- then they will not succeed in jobs where the objective requirements often require masculine behavior.
So, to sum it up, why do women start out happier and get bluer as they age? They start out believing in equality. And then they discover the scoop. In this society, the most dependable path to equality is to die childless at thirty. Before you hit the maternal wall, before those depressing children arrive, before you have to prove yourself 900 times to get what a man got after 90, before you are called a bitch when you do what they men do.
Maureen, you heard it here: What depresses women is not the fact that they have choices. It's the dismal choices they have.
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Meanwhile the dating game is all worship and fawning, and paying for the females, thanks to "the Rules".
Since the 60's ended and the the new social conservatism hit dating, it's all about a man's height and wallet, and aggressive pursuit.
Women don't want men who make less than they do, are less aggressive than they are, or who are physically smaller than they are. Put those three together, and women end up with Big Violent rich men.
I am currently working to finish an MBA that I started before I had my child. The reason is not monetary...I'm not a fool. That MBA isn't really going to get me anywhere because I refuse to be a stranger to my child. I am finishing to say, "Mommy didn't quit. Mommy didn't roll over and say, well, that's not going to happen."
I love the last statement in your article because it is so right - "What depresses women is not the fact that they have choices. It's the dismal choices they have."
And P.S. to Maureen Dowd - There is nothing in the world I would want to be, do , or a place I would want to go that would make me happier than than seeing my child and hearing, "I love you Mommy."
More to the point, I am happy I had the choice not to become a mother. I am happy I had the choice to pursue an education and a career, and devote my time to causes and interests that appeal to me, not conform to some societal expectation of what a woman is supposed to be. If I am unhappy about anything, it is about how slowly some things change (and yes, sexism is still an issue, as some of the nastier posts here make clear.) I'll take a life of choices, thanks.
Having helped my mother with my younger siblings, I got a taste of what was in store for me and didn't like it. No way was I going to have kids just to satisfy someone else's... or society's... expectations for me. It would not have been fair to the kids.
So, throughout my first marriage, and now in a very happy long-term marriage, I was fortunate to find men who also shared and supported my decision. Did I ever become a narrowly focused workaholic because I had no kids? Hardly. Did I ever regret not having kids or grandkids? For about 5 minutes and that was it.
Do some women look at me like I have two heads for not wanting children? Sure: but it doesn't bother me, because I made the choice. No one forced me into it.
What is this business about happiness anyway? Or, equality?
I didn't need to "have it all" because I knew it was impossible for any woman -- or man -- to have it all.
Itt is that quixotic quest to "have it all" that leads to so much unhappiness.
I also have decided not to have kids, as has my closest friend. But, we never admitted it to each other until recently, and the whole event reminded me of the time my high school best friend came out. There's this idea out there that, if a woman doesn't want kids, there is something wrong with her. Something that will only be fixed by having kids.
Why yes. Heather McCarthy and Alyce Faye Eichelberger Cleese would wholeheartedly agree. Alimony amounts must be doubled effective immediately! It's for the happiness of women, dontcha know?
BTW, what's the point of having a cake if you can't eat it? It'll just go bad.
That struck a chord. I'm in my mid 30s, and I don't have any kids yet although my husband & I do want one eventually. What I have noticed is that even now I'm already stressing about what would happen when that day kid arrives. I don't think many women have much of a choice anymore, as far as staying home or working. A lot of people I know would have a very tough time financially if the family were to depend on the husband's income only.
*eye roll*
I think we need to take a concentrated effort at improving the attitude and behavior of boys worldwide, so as to have decent men at least in a few generations..... at least our daughters and their daughters should not endure so ?
I've taken Ms Dowd's book "Are Men Necessary?" from the library ..... looking forward to it!
I really have nothing wrong with your post -- just wanted to mention my thoughts on those two things.
The theory is that there are a few easy choices in life -- whether to eat or not eat. These are pretty much made up for you -- if you don't eat, you die. There isn't much of a choice at all there, so there really is no baggage that comes along with it.
The bigger choices that aren't life and death are the choices that tend to make us unhappy. Like choosing between 2 or 3 different types of cars to buy. One reason for this is the "what if I had done this differently" factor. If you get a car that is a piece of crap, then you made a bad choice, and then you will be even more stressed to make a good choice the next time.
If someone makes all of your decisions for you, there is no stress in trying to decide for yourself. Overall, the theory makes a lot of sense. That doesn't mean it is what is best for us -- but I can definitely see the connection between choice and stress.
I especially like and identify with your statement: "They start out believing in equality. And then they discover the scoop."
That just about sums it up perfectly. There is no equality. We are left holding the bag as far as raising children, whether married, divorced or single. Once divorced we have deadbeat dads who cannot put another human before their own needs even when it is their own child.
Work hours are longer, traffic is heavier, dinner is later, there is never enough sleep.
I have not had a vacation....not even a weekend out of town....since 2002. None of my girlfriends has had a vacation in years.
But my daughter's dad leaves her for every holiday and travels with his girlfriend.
Thank you for a great article; even if we can't make the changes, it's about time everyone in this society knew what was going on.
And this is a reflection of American society, in Europe, women are not only *not* penalized for having children, they are rewarded, given a social security account, better school, more maternal leave, and even up to 3 weeks in the hospital after delivery if they so choose.
American women have been reduced to, and convinced to accept, drive thru birthing.
Choice indeed.
Working 60 hours is a great contribution. But if your spouse is also working outside the home should you get a complete pass on the housework or be treated as a hero for doing the laundry? And if your spouse is at home does it mean she never gets time off? Even at 60 hours a wekk your job eventually DOES end and you get some vacation time. Not so if you are at home, especially with small children.
If you think meeting your responsibilities as a father is too much work, then I agree wholeheartedly.
Please do us all a favor and have a vasectomy immediately, before you beget any children you are bound to disappoint.