Why does everything have to be political? Women get pregnant, and men don’t. If they don’t want to have babies, they can get their tubes tied. They can make sure their partner uses a condom. I get that it’s not all fool proof, but that’s how life is. Don’t have sex!
I like children, I think babies are cute, but I never had the urge to have my own. Not everyone does. But lots of people want to have children, and it’s a big deal to them. I celebrate that, and I’m grateful to the women who decide to become mothers. It’s a hard job, but most moms (and dads) think it’s the best thing they’ve ever done. Thank you moms and dads!
"Bare chested, masculine men" and fit "women [mothers] in sheath dresses"... FASCISM!
Here's the thing though... I think fit women in sheath dresses look pretty good. I suspect most guys agree with me on that. And based on the popularity of fireman calendars, I suspect most women think built (bare-chested even) men look pretty good too.
So which is more likely: 1) We're all fascists? 2) The Ivy grads that run the NYT are a bunch of androgynous weirdos who resent children because they don't have any?
Subsidies for daycare are part of a larger atomization of society, one that began with Social Security. Social Security was meant to fix the real problem of poverty in old age, but the program unintentionally began the breakdown of the family. I lived in China for four years, and I saw a functioning society without the extreme response of Social Security. (Contrary to the common understanding in America, there really isn't anything like a universal retirement system in China, and there is very little welfare. Some employees of state enterprises get a pension, but it is small, not like the benefits under Social Security.) The results were surprisingly human and humane, overall. In China, many generations of a family typically lived either together or near each other. When women go to work---women have normally worked out of economic necessity and not some concern for independence and equality---their parents or the parents of their spouses take care of their children. Unlike in America, life and even public presence doesn't end in China when you reach your sixties; your role transforms. You become a trusted adviser, caregiver to children, and anchor for the homelives of the younger, working members of your family. The same used to be true in the United States, and Social Security destroyed the traditional family organization and replaced it with . . . nothing. Suddenly, because they now had means, the elderly were expected to live alone and care for themselves or disappear into retirement homes. Working-age parents found themselves without childcare. For awhile, the relative prosperity of America accelerated the new social arrangements by enabling the single-income family organization. As the structure broke down in the seventies and eighties, having completely forgotten the old model of integrated generations sharing domestic and financial responsibilities, people started paying strangers for childcare. The effect was to further destroy the cohesion of the family and any continuity of values. Now, strangers raise your children, and you likely don't know what values that they're being taught.
No, subsidized childcare isn't the answer to any demand except the demand of business for more, cheaper workers. If we are willing to use government to encourage them, we now have technological solutions to some of the social problems created by Social Security---for many information-age jobs, work-from-home could enable a new, family-oriented life for workers, one in which they take a direct, personal role in the development of their children, and the practice even aligns well with left agenda items like reducing the nation's carbon footprint if you care about such things---but other problems, for example, the social discarding and alienation of the elderly, require a new mindset (actually, the resurrection of an old mindset). Maybe we can create it by sundowning Social Security and replacing it with a more limited approach to dealing with hard cases of poverty in old age, a welfare program dealing with the worst outcomes. If we stop subsidizing the destruction of the family, the economic incentives alone might help to renormalize the kind of generationally integrated and extended family traditionally supporting work and human life.
So explain how you solve a problem where day care is unaffordable to the many and yet doesn’t pay enough to actually keep day care workers. Also as to free stuff how much does the fire department charge you if you call them?
First, you don't burn giant piles of money via government waste and fraud to feel all morally superior and pretend you "did something".
Second, you don't act all morally superior and self-righteous because you are the "good person" who "feels" - even though in reality you have shallow, always ineffective, solutions (burning OTHER peoples money).
Third, you don't start with the tired firemen or roads analogy. A little socialism that barely works is not actually an argument for more socialism that doesn't work at all.
Fourth, stop worshiping money. People managed to take care of their children for the last million years without stealing other peoples money to do it. All animals get along just fine without socialized day care to make the self-righteous feel all high and mighty about themselves as they steal from others to pay for their virtue signaling.
Fifth, recognize that utopia can not exist. Perfection is not a valid goal in a real world. Using lame excuses to steal to forever ramp up socialism because you envy the hard work of others, is fundamentally immoral, and everybody but leftists see through the farce now.
So. Basically you have no answer or solution except pretend that we can exist like wild pigs. Well, I guess. But they live really sh*tty and short lives.
The is difficult for leftists to understand, but many things don't need "a government answer". They need to be left alone for individuals, and churches, and charities to try what they will. VOLUNTARILY.
Let's all wish the Vance family well, and allow them to enjoy their family life in private.
Far more relevant would be a piece on what comes next for the Middle East war started by the "new" right/MAGA, since the failed MOU JD negotiated has now expired.
Thinly disguised attempt by progressives to cancel Usha Vance, because we'll they would rather not talk about the disastrous persona of some of their failed DSA candidates. She's a mother by choice, why would that in the least be a threat to anyone who chose not to have children, unless you live in the world of progressive cognitive dissonance.
This is an insightful piece, but I think the better reference for Usha Vance than “women can have it all” is what Scott Yenor dubbed the “eras” approach.
I can't find a single elected Democratic officeholder who has said anything but positive support for Mrs. Vance and her family. I'm sure you can troll the internet to find some commentator with no public office or Democratic Party post who says something unkind.
What really seems to be the newsworthy story is the recent surge by elected Republicans accusing certain Democrats (inaccurately) of being vegetarian, while it is Mrs. Vance who is the most prominent civic person who is a vegetarian. I expect if there is a contest between Vance and some other Republican for the GOP nomination, one of the slams against him will be that he allows his wife not to serve him meat.
It's not a healthy mindset to be demanding that pregnant women crawl into a closet and hide themselves until after birth. Good grief. This reinforces my hypothesis that "feminism" is really chauvinism - a belief that men traditionally did all the "important" things in life, and women only did inferior things, so that to be a successful women, you have to "become" a man, doing traditional masculine things and denigrating and avoiding traditional female roles. The reality is that motherhood is pretty darn important, and civilizations that forget or deny this are well on their way to self-extermination.
She a trad wife that cooks, so it is her choice. Vance gets a lot of his meals away from home and eats plenty of meat protein.
MAGA does not care if a person is a vegetarian, they don't even care if she is a vagitarian. MAGA only cares if the Karen's on the left of sanity attempt to force it on them.
"MAGA does not care if a person is a vegetarian, "
Malarkey. They are attacking Democrats all over the country (inaccurately) claiming they are vegetarians. But of course these are the same MAGAs who would slam a Democratic woman for wearing a short skirt while pix of Melania's titties are all over the internet.
Why does everything have to be political? Women get pregnant, and men don’t. If they don’t want to have babies, they can get their tubes tied. They can make sure their partner uses a condom. I get that it’s not all fool proof, but that’s how life is. Don’t have sex!
I like children, I think babies are cute, but I never had the urge to have my own. Not everyone does. But lots of people want to have children, and it’s a big deal to them. I celebrate that, and I’m grateful to the women who decide to become mothers. It’s a hard job, but most moms (and dads) think it’s the best thing they’ve ever done. Thank you moms and dads!
"Bare chested, masculine men" and fit "women [mothers] in sheath dresses"... FASCISM!
Here's the thing though... I think fit women in sheath dresses look pretty good. I suspect most guys agree with me on that. And based on the popularity of fireman calendars, I suspect most women think built (bare-chested even) men look pretty good too.
So which is more likely: 1) We're all fascists? 2) The Ivy grads that run the NYT are a bunch of androgynous weirdos who resent children because they don't have any?
For all the handwringing about falling birth rates, it sure would be nice to see someone trying to subsidize day care.
Subsidies for daycare are part of a larger atomization of society, one that began with Social Security. Social Security was meant to fix the real problem of poverty in old age, but the program unintentionally began the breakdown of the family. I lived in China for four years, and I saw a functioning society without the extreme response of Social Security. (Contrary to the common understanding in America, there really isn't anything like a universal retirement system in China, and there is very little welfare. Some employees of state enterprises get a pension, but it is small, not like the benefits under Social Security.) The results were surprisingly human and humane, overall. In China, many generations of a family typically lived either together or near each other. When women go to work---women have normally worked out of economic necessity and not some concern for independence and equality---their parents or the parents of their spouses take care of their children. Unlike in America, life and even public presence doesn't end in China when you reach your sixties; your role transforms. You become a trusted adviser, caregiver to children, and anchor for the homelives of the younger, working members of your family. The same used to be true in the United States, and Social Security destroyed the traditional family organization and replaced it with . . . nothing. Suddenly, because they now had means, the elderly were expected to live alone and care for themselves or disappear into retirement homes. Working-age parents found themselves without childcare. For awhile, the relative prosperity of America accelerated the new social arrangements by enabling the single-income family organization. As the structure broke down in the seventies and eighties, having completely forgotten the old model of integrated generations sharing domestic and financial responsibilities, people started paying strangers for childcare. The effect was to further destroy the cohesion of the family and any continuity of values. Now, strangers raise your children, and you likely don't know what values that they're being taught.
No, subsidized childcare isn't the answer to any demand except the demand of business for more, cheaper workers. If we are willing to use government to encourage them, we now have technological solutions to some of the social problems created by Social Security---for many information-age jobs, work-from-home could enable a new, family-oriented life for workers, one in which they take a direct, personal role in the development of their children, and the practice even aligns well with left agenda items like reducing the nation's carbon footprint if you care about such things---but other problems, for example, the social discarding and alienation of the elderly, require a new mindset (actually, the resurrection of an old mindset). Maybe we can create it by sundowning Social Security and replacing it with a more limited approach to dealing with hard cases of poverty in old age, a welfare program dealing with the worst outcomes. If we stop subsidizing the destruction of the family, the economic incentives alone might help to renormalize the kind of generationally integrated and extended family traditionally supporting work and human life.
Problem is that the China model isn’t working even in China. And the rest of your answer is all kind of naive at best.
Nope. More free shht is not the answer. To this - or anything.
So explain how you solve a problem where day care is unaffordable to the many and yet doesn’t pay enough to actually keep day care workers. Also as to free stuff how much does the fire department charge you if you call them?
First, you don't burn giant piles of money via government waste and fraud to feel all morally superior and pretend you "did something".
Second, you don't act all morally superior and self-righteous because you are the "good person" who "feels" - even though in reality you have shallow, always ineffective, solutions (burning OTHER peoples money).
Third, you don't start with the tired firemen or roads analogy. A little socialism that barely works is not actually an argument for more socialism that doesn't work at all.
Fourth, stop worshiping money. People managed to take care of their children for the last million years without stealing other peoples money to do it. All animals get along just fine without socialized day care to make the self-righteous feel all high and mighty about themselves as they steal from others to pay for their virtue signaling.
Fifth, recognize that utopia can not exist. Perfection is not a valid goal in a real world. Using lame excuses to steal to forever ramp up socialism because you envy the hard work of others, is fundamentally immoral, and everybody but leftists see through the farce now.
So. Basically you have no answer or solution except pretend that we can exist like wild pigs. Well, I guess. But they live really sh*tty and short lives.
Nobody is living short shitty lives but the people who choose to whine.
Happiness is not correlated with wealth.
Happiness is not correlated with IQ.
Happiness is not correlated with having day care (or any other free-shht, forcefully stolen from others).
Leftism is a religion based on envy and false woe.
You said the solution is the way we lived for millions of years. And that was short and ah*TTY.
The is difficult for leftists to understand, but many things don't need "a government answer". They need to be left alone for individuals, and churches, and charities to try what they will. VOLUNTARILY.
Utopia is a false goal.
Yeah. You should try college. You might learn enough to actually talk about economics
Shakes for getting jobs? I thought you liked people working?
Let's all wish the Vance family well, and allow them to enjoy their family life in private.
Far more relevant would be a piece on what comes next for the Middle East war started by the "new" right/MAGA, since the failed MOU JD negotiated has now expired.
Thinly disguised attempt by progressives to cancel Usha Vance, because we'll they would rather not talk about the disastrous persona of some of their failed DSA candidates. She's a mother by choice, why would that in the least be a threat to anyone who chose not to have children, unless you live in the world of progressive cognitive dissonance.
Dick Minnis
removingthecataract.substack.com
This is an insightful piece, but I think the better reference for Usha Vance than “women can have it all” is what Scott Yenor dubbed the “eras” approach.
https://americanmind.org/salvo/side-hustle-wives-are-tradwives-too/
I can't find a single elected Democratic officeholder who has said anything but positive support for Mrs. Vance and her family. I'm sure you can troll the internet to find some commentator with no public office or Democratic Party post who says something unkind.
What really seems to be the newsworthy story is the recent surge by elected Republicans accusing certain Democrats (inaccurately) of being vegetarian, while it is Mrs. Vance who is the most prominent civic person who is a vegetarian. I expect if there is a contest between Vance and some other Republican for the GOP nomination, one of the slams against him will be that he allows his wife not to serve him meat.
It's not a healthy mindset to be demanding that pregnant women crawl into a closet and hide themselves until after birth. Good grief. This reinforces my hypothesis that "feminism" is really chauvinism - a belief that men traditionally did all the "important" things in life, and women only did inferior things, so that to be a successful women, you have to "become" a man, doing traditional masculine things and denigrating and avoiding traditional female roles. The reality is that motherhood is pretty darn important, and civilizations that forget or deny this are well on their way to self-extermination.
"pregnancy in the public eye is not a conservative tradition—much the opposite"
Politically conservative has nothing to do with being old-fashioned.
It has to do with sane budgets (I wish), safe neighborhoods, legal controlled immigration, and a minimal nanny state..
Usha Vance paused her career to raise her children. That fact destroys 100% of the TDS-colored, anti-traditional family premise of this piece.
Mrs. Vance refuses to serve her husband meat, forcing him to eat vegetarian meals. That fact sets the MAGA world into an orbit of rage.
She a trad wife that cooks, so it is her choice. Vance gets a lot of his meals away from home and eats plenty of meat protein.
MAGA does not care if a person is a vegetarian, they don't even care if she is a vagitarian. MAGA only cares if the Karen's on the left of sanity attempt to force it on them.
"MAGA does not care if a person is a vegetarian, "
Malarkey. They are attacking Democrats all over the country (inaccurately) claiming they are vegetarians. But of course these are the same MAGAs who would slam a Democratic woman for wearing a short skirt while pix of Melania's titties are all over the internet.