[thechat] [ugh]

[Judah McAuley]

aardvark wrote:
>>part of the explicit goal of welfare reform is to modify sexual and
>>social behavior: http://www.agi-usa.org/pubs/ib_welfare_reform.html
>>via education about how to abstain from sexual activity outside of
>>marriage.
>
>
> but that's not suppression of women, either... misguided, perhaps,
> but not overt suppression...
>

Actually, I think that it is overt suppression of women.  The
Republicans have been pushing "marriage incentives" for quite some time.
    They claim that two parent households are better than single parent
households even when one of the partners isn't much of a parent.  You
could argue that this stance is gender neutral, that they would push
marriage on single fathers just as hard as on single mothers, but that
is pretty disengenious in my opinion.  This is a rehash of the sexual
revolution going back to Margaret Sanger.  Women are responsible for
reproductive matters because they have the most physically invested in
it.  But we don't want to give them power over reproductive matters
because then they would have too much power.  So what do we call it when
we make someone responsible for something without giving them the power
to make any decisions?  I'd call that a raw deal and suppression to boot.

These work requirements/marriage incentives/abstinence programs are the
same thing.  We want these women to be good mothers supporting their
children, giving them lots of quality time. But we penalize them for
working less than 30 hours a week and we penalize them for going to
school.  The only option we give them to be a "good mother" is to get
married.  We tell them that if you want to meet social ideals and get
ahead in life, you have to do it by getting married.  You are
responsible for all the social burden of motherhood, but we are taking
away all your socially acceptable options to try and achieve your goals.
  It's worded in gender-neutral language, but its pretty overt
suppresion in my opinion.  You just aren't going to see the same
standards applied to men.

Classism is a bigger problem than gender or ethnic prejudice in my
opinion, but I don't feel that our government has become gender neutral
by any stretch of the imagination.

Too darn hot tonight.  Get's my class struggle rants going.  Must finish
beer and roll around in sweaty bed under the fan now.

Judah