Can you be counter-culture and pro-intuitive at the very same time? Maybe...!
The counter-culture premise here is the un-popular assumption that in gaining more liberties, we may have lost something even more important. Namely, the comfort of pre-meditated social roles. You know, the days when blue-collar jobs were usually performed by men, elementary teaching and nursing was traditionally done by women, husbands earned the family income while wives raised the family, being Irish in Boston meant thinking about the police academy and being Polish in Chicago suggested prospects for the seminary... well no need to go on. You're already annoyed!
Recalling such days may be antiquarian, but not necessarily antiquated. Psychology has revealed time and time again the efficacy of having social comfort-zones in our lives. There's something intuitively comfortable about feeling there's a place waiting for you. A pre-arranged welcome mat you know you can cross anytime you wish. Not pre-determined as in class-structured cultures, but at least pre-available.
It's almost -- not quite -- too late to pose the question. Just like the returning dough-boys from World War I sang: "How you going to keep 'em down on the farm once they've seen gay Paree?" Likewise today, how can a society undo what it's done?
Society can't, some individuals are. Especially some working mothers who are finding their new "freedoms" have translated into being free to work harder and longer. Now as both mother and earner, homemaker and competitor. What some of them are saying is, "Yes, we should and can have it all...only not all at the same time!"
Which invites the question: Were the old roles really constraints or comforts? A great many experts are researching that question as they re-examine the emancipations and liberations of our times. I imagine there will be as many conclusions as there are studies. For me, I work from my own anecdotal research.
I asked Mom -- the quintessential stay-at-home mother of the 30s and 40s -- how she felt. Her answer was instructive: "If I had to do it over again, I might not do it the same way. But until I knew otherwise, I was really happy...."
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I think you may be just a "smidge" outdated when you say write:
ReplyDelete"Especially some working mothers who are finding their new "freedoms"
I think either by choice or necessity, that has been going on for quite some time now and is by no means a new trend.
When you pose the question:
"Were the old roles really constraints or comforts?"
I think everyone woman is going to have her own personal answer. Growing up, I always believed you finish school, get married, have kids, and that's life. I never imagined there were actually other options.
My guess is the majority of women would feel constrained (per your question) but I think our society has lost some of its family values with the good old traditional roles.
Then again, I may just be old fashioned and one who hates corporate America :-) I wouldn't want to be a female shark in those waters for anything!
There are a lot of sharks out there. Some women enjoy it. Others don't. Actually in earlier times a women usually never needed to question her shark skills. Was that better? Maybe safer...
ReplyDeleteMe personally, preferred it when we didn't need to question our shark skills. I like the traditional roles. I'm glad women have options, but I choose the traditional ones.
ReplyDeleteAs a man I may not understand women...but just being a woman doesn't mean you always understand yourself...I still suspect MANY women would find the "traditional" mores have something to them...after all, they lasted for centuries
ReplyDelete