No matter how long the mustaches grow on the hairy-chinned feminists, they never get any wiser. Women are still being badgered to “have it all” and “do more”, even though nature trumps nurture when it comes to childbearing.
Women returning to work post-baby often care less about their job than before they gave birth, says a joint survey released last week by ForbesWoman and TheBump.com, a U.S. website for first-time parents.
The survey, which polled 2,210 women online last month, found that although 59 per cent of mothers said they were “glad to be back at work,” 59 per cent also said they “no longer cared as much” about their job.
Nor should they care as much, since raising children is a much bigger, more important responsibility than pushing papers around a desk at some made-up corporate job. Having worked in the belly of the beast, I’d say that at least a third - and that’s a very conservative estimate - of office jobs could be eliminated in a fell swoop with nobody noticing the loss. Start with the HR departments, for one. Jobs for women, about women. What a waste. The same way the washing machine made women’s work easier at home, the computer has done for men at the office - except women keep insisting on working. So jobs have to be invented. Form-filling is nice easy work - let’s have women do that!
Think I’m making that up? Read on:
While 23 per cent of the women surveyed reported having flex hours, it is still a challenge to find employers willing to tailor jobs to women’s needs. After her son was born in 2006, Sara Sutton Fell found so many telecommuting scams online that she decided to started FlexJobs.com, a job-postings site for returning moms looking for alternative work arrangements.
The Colorado woman said companies would do well to invest in work-life balance solutions for new moms to avoid high turnover and the cost of retraining: “The employers have a short-sighted view,” she said.
The employers only have one view, Sara - making money. And if you are demanding things that mess with the bottom line, someone else will come along and do your job better than you, with fewer complaints. Employers pay us to do our jobs as the employer needs them done. Unless you are some kind of award winning CEO that a company couldn’t possibly live without (think Steve Jobs - they brought that guy back from the dead when Apple stock began to tank), the company is under no obligation to accommodate you or your children.
There are plenty of part time jobs out there, ladies. But they pay part time wages.
I’m not saying women shouldn’t work. And I’m not saying women shouldn’t have children - frankly there’s no one else who can. All I’m saying is don’t buy into the feminist line that you can have babies and a gold-plated career and six orgasms before breakfast. Life is about compromises. What are you willing to trade?