Korean Job Discussion Forums

[aboxofchocolates]

Gender inequality sucks, huh. Different people have different takes on what causes it and what we can do to realize equality. Name calling and finger pointing might be good for a laugh, but some people on this board have some serious and interesting opinions on how our overall quality of life might be improved by recognizing and addressing gender inequality. Take this dude NQP for example:

[MollyBloom]

While I feel I can't comment on that posters quote yet because I need some more time to think about it, I will say myself that for a woman, being a stay-at-home Mom is possibly the MOST important job in the world. It's a lot of work to stay at home, keep a house, take care of the kids, etc. For some time, I have been thinking about what I want to do when my boyfriend and I get married. I really dislike the idea of other people looking after my kids, and I feel that one parent should stay home. I think about when I am a new mother and how hard it will be for the first few months getting acclimated to being a new mom. If I like it, maybe I will continue to stay home. My boyfriend said if I want to stay home that's fine with him (he wants to work), but honestly the only thing holding me back is the pressure of him being the sole earner. It's a lot to think about. If women want to work, let them. If they want to stay home, that's very respectable as well.

I have been seeing a lot of stay-at-home Dads lately. I think that's great. One I know is an AMAZING cook, is a carpenter (so he always has projects), and takes care of the house in general. My boyfriend's sister-in-law stays home and does the same thing, except her husband is the gourmant.

[aboxofchocolates]

Well, here's an interesting website. It seems this stay at home father is in the process of creating an internet support network. Interestingly enough the first few articles seem to deal with gender inequality perpetuated by media stereotypes (ok, I read a little into it). It comes with stay at home dad statistics, too!!

http://www.rebeldad.com/index.html

[Underwaterbob]

I look at it another way:

Maybe there would be less backlash if more people would choose the profession of stay at home parent and thus give it the respect it deserves.

[aboxofchocolates]

[blurgalurgalurga]

I hope I don't sound like a complete jerk, but I totally disagree with the notion that the loss of the traditional stay-at-home parent is something to be mourned.

First, it's financially impossible for most people, and wishing it otherwise won't change that fact.

And besides: staying at home to be with your one or maybe two kids is a very short term proposition, unless the child is retarded or under permanent house arrest. They grow up, they go to school, they move away. Is it really so neccessary to be at home when they get back from school or piano class or whatever? Let the whelp make its own damn sandwich. It ain't that hard. Hell, get it to cook dinner too, and clean the bathroom.

Check out the upper middle class here, and its society of stay at home moms. I worked for them for a few years, and I figure most of them were utterly stifled, unfulfilled, and half-mad from the boredom. It's not a Korean thing; it's a stay-at-home-mom thing. The expectations they have of their kids is nuts. So totally dissatisfied with their own lives, they squish their children through the meat-grinder of school and hagwon with complete, constant supervision. The myopic fixation on the Kids leads to a covetous, control-freak hunger for vicarious success.

I guess that's not the respect you figure it deserves, underwaterbob, but honestly, that's how much I respect it. Maybe in yonder times of olde when women were expected to pump out ten or twenty kids, staying at home was the way to go, but do you really need to give over your whole life for that brief period in which the kids really need their butts wiped and their hands held?

[Underwaterbob]

[aboxofchocolates]

[espoir]

I take my fathers' cue on this one. After my older brother was born my mom wanted to stay at home and be a stay at home mom. My father responded by saying "okay sounds good, actually it sounds so good I think I will be a stay at home dad as well."

He was basically like forget that shit you are not staying home all day with the kid, and better get back into the workforce because hey I ain't funding this family by myself. And I agree completely, I have nothing persoanlly against women who stay at home, but if your family isn't in the best financial situation (my parents married at 21 and had my brother at 26, so a very young couple still) and this was also around the recession in the late 1970's, early 80's, so having only one parent working was not going to cut it.

[sharkey]

[quote="aboxofchocolates"]

[Underwaterbob]

I guess it's all really a question of nature vs nurture. Do men and women fulfill the roles they do today because they were raised that way, or because they were born that way? Is either one of these choices somehow superior to the other? Some combination of the two?

And yes, the economy is also a driving force in having both parents working. Two incomes is practically a necessity in many areas of the world.

[laogaiguk]

Of course there is backlash, because some women don't want equal rights, they want more. But I could say the same for foreigners, religious people, non-religious people, etc etc. The backlash to anything comes from extremists. And there are feminazis out there making a bad name for anyone actually fighting for equality.

BUt if you want equality, you can damn well get the check sometimes too then

[red_devil]