How do you feel about stay-at-home-moms?
vs. working mothers.
DISCUSS!
Original Post by kathygator:
Dunno. I see boys needing the outlet, but have no notion of whether girls need the same kind of outlet.
Legally they do.
Original Post by moonikins:
I didn't say get rid of the outlet. I said have the importance downplayed.
Good luck with getting the NCAA or any college to comply with that - better athletes lead to championships, which lead to larger alumni donations. I suspect a lot of boys good at football/basketball in high school are commodities to higher education before being seen as students.
Original Post by revots33:
Original Post by moonikins:
Girls are finally getting the advantage in our education system. Mostly though it's because they are "taking" advantage of education. Girls are easier to teach in the early grades because they tend to have a longer attention span and learn to read easier. They also tend to get in less trouble. The girls are rewarded and the boys are held back an extra year in most cases before they even start.
Girls are taught that education is the key to getting ahead. They are pushed to do well. If boys don't do well, they are often left alone.
I saw this change taking place when my son was in school. It was so different watching how the schools and teachers operated in regards to boys and girls. It was so different than when I was young.
I agree with you 100%. And this is a big problem. The methods we are using to educate boys need to be re-thought and re-worked. Boys and girls learn differently. Right now the only option, pretty much, is the one that tends to be more suited to girls. I'd argue that this plays a much bigger role in male dropout rates, than all the great jobs supposedly available to male dropouts.
And keep in mind that, if women want the option to stay home, they need men with the skills and education to support their family. If less and less men are getting college degrees, that is a big problem for the next generation of wanna-be stay at home moms.
But you see, the methods for teaching boys and girls is about the same as it was when I was growing up. The difference is what is expected. When I was young, it was expected for girls to not be good at math and science. It was expected for boys to outperform. Those expectations have changed. We empowered the girls and they have taken advantage of it. This has left the boys behind, because they no longer are given the advantage out the gate. They aren't expected to do as well anymore.
Edit fixed gate.
I'd argue that this plays a much bigger role in male dropout rates, than all the great jobs supposedly available to male dropouts.
i believe that some industries prey on boys. this doesn't occur so much in cities, but in rural areas a boy can go to work weekends and summers at a mill or in the bush at 13 or 14 (often with dad). take a kid at that level of maturity, start paying him more per hour than his teachers make, the chances that he's going to drop out of school at 16, buy a shiny truck, and work in that industry until it breaks him down (or until the mill goes broke) are pretty high.
but it's not women who are doing this to boys; it's the males running the show.
Original Post by santonacci:
Original Post by moonikins:
I didn't say get rid of the outlet. I said have the importance downplayed.
Good luck with getting the NCAA or any college to comply with that - better athletes lead to championships, which lead to larger alumni donations. I suspect a lot of boys good at football/basketball in high school are commodities to higher educatiion before being seen as students.
I have no delusions that this is going to happen any time soon. The families have to make this change. When my step son started to wrestle a couple of years ago (age 6) he had very natural talent for it. He was immediately pegged as a kid they wanted to groom for the high school team. His whole family except for me told him how he would be able to get his college paid for if he kept at wrestling. It was kind of sickening to watch.
The kid is stilll good at it, but he doesn't have the mind set for being aggressive in the ring. He quit after last season and I'm kind of glad. Many of his family members are still talking about him throwing this "opportunity" away.
Shameful.
Original Post by pgeorgian:
I'd argue that this plays a much bigger role in male dropout rates, than all the great jobs supposedly available to male dropouts.
i believe that some industries prey on boys. this doesn't occur so much in cities, but in rural areas a boy can go to work weekends and summers at a mill or in the bush at 13 or 14 (often with dad). take a kid at that level of maturity, start paying him more per hour than his teachers make, the chances that he's going to drop out of school at 16, buy a shiny truck, and work in that industry until it breaks him down (or until the mill goes broke) are pretty high.
but it's not women who are doing this to boys; it's the males running the show.
This definitely plays a huge role in rural areas. My SO was in college. He watched his younger brothers buying stuff because they got in the trade unions. He got convinced that he should joing with them and not wait for that college education to pay off. He deeply regrets it now. He does make good money, but the work and hours suck and it takes a toll on his body.
Original Post by moonikins:Many of his family members are still talking about him throwing this "opportunity" away.
Does his family realize that nobody gets a full-ride for wrestling? nobody.
His sister would probably have a much easier time getting an athletic scholarship anyway.
Original Post by revots33:
Why must you resort to name-calling, just because you disagree with my opinion? I haven't called you any names.
At any rate, the feminists who fought for equal rights did not expect every woman to cure cancer or AIDS (although surely at least SOME great accomplishments are not being achieved, because so many smart women are staying home). The feminists wanted every woman to be able to use their talents and abilities in the same way men could. It was not about "choice", as in "it's ok if I stay home, as long as I'm CHOOSING it". That is a cop-out in my opinion. Are you really choosing it? Would your husband switch places with you tomorrow if you decided you wanted to go back to work? Could you even support yourself financially without your husband if he drove off tomorrow and never came back?
I love it when anti-feminist trolls presume to tell us what feminism is about (usually some drivel about "being like men") when it's completely contrary to what the actual feminists on the thread are saying.
Edit because this post showed up twice for some reason.
Original Post by floggingsully:
Original Post by moonikins:Many of his family members are still talking about him throwing this "opportunity" away.
Does his family realize that nobody gets a full-ride for wrestling? nobody.
His sister would probably have a much easier time getting an athletic scholarship anyway.
No, they don't. They have bought into the myth that sports will pay for your college. These aren't dumb people in most areas. I pointed out to my SO how few kids in any sports get full ride or even partial scholarships. He didn't believe me even after I showed him the hard numbers. He only remembers the kids from our area who do get them.
I had to laugh at the notion of his sister gettng a sports scholarship. If only you could see her "not move her feet" at any sport she plays. But yes, I know what you mean.
Original Post by revots33:
FWIW I consider myself a feminist. Yes, men can be feminists... and many men were very active in the feminist movement. However I have no patience for women who refuse to see themselves as anything but victims to us evil, controlling men.
Yes women were discriminated against, and yes it was wrong. It was wrong that all the smart women of the 50's who could have been great teachers or lawyers or corporate executives, were forced to stay home, often against their will.
However women in the year 2010 need to realize that the pendulum has swung too far the other way. News flash: schools are failing boys. If you are a stay-at-home mom with a son, this should bother you. A lot. But instead all you can say is how, "well women need college degrees to get a good job, and men don't!" What kind of response is that? What economy are you living in? Of COURSE males need college degrees to succeed also! Give me a break! And I'm not even just talking college degrees... males are dropping out of high school at alarming rates also. Years ago women were yelling about the disparity in education in favor of males, and rightly so. Now that is has swung drastically in their favor, they see nothing wrong with it.
Stop crying about discrimination that doesn't exist anymore. If you want to stay home then more power to you. But don't pretend that your college degree was essential to your career of driving your kid to basketball games or buying new curtains for the den, because it wasn't. Sorry.
Yes, men can be feminists. But not when they make their grand entrance declaring "feminism is a scam". The rest of this sounds more like MRA paranoia than any "feminism" I've ever seen or read about.
Original Post by santonacci:
Original Post by moonikins:
I didn't say get rid of the outlet. I said have the importance downplayed.
Good luck with getting the NCAA or any college to comply with that - better athletes lead to championships, which lead to larger alumni donations. I suspect a lot of boys good at football/basketball in high school are commodities to higher education before being seen as students.
It could be argued that the money universities make off the popular demand for college sports championships enable those universities to fund programs that might otherwise not exist, that have nothing to do with athletics.
I can say from our experience that my son would have gotten a 'full ride' for football, had he wanted to pursue it at a lower division - although they obviously wouldn't have called it a football scholarship.
Kathy, to some extent that is true. But if those other programs were truly valued, funding would occur. Instead, sports pays for things and sets the paradigm. People keep following the paradigm and making it stronger.
If the attention and money weren't on sports so many other things could get funded with the money put there in the first place.
Original Post by coffincritter:
I love it when anti-feminist trolls presume to tell us what feminism is about (usually some drivel about "being like men") when it's completely contrary to what the actual feminists on the thread are saying.
You are entitled to your opinion. I've read many essays by real feminists who were active in the movement, who are disappointed that so many women are going the homemaker route. Of course, those feminists usually get inundated with hateful emails from women who happen to disagree with them. I guess they are all trolls.
Totally off-topic ... but I've been wondering why the people who are so outraged at corporate salaries and bonuses don't display any similar disgust for what NCAA football coaches are paid.
Back o/t, sorta: Both of my secretary's daughters got full-ride scholarships to Pac-10 schools for volleyball. Yes, they are both like 6'4".
Original Post by coffincritter:
Yes, men can be feminists. But not when they make their grand entrance declaring "feminism is a scam". The rest of this sounds more like MRA paranoia than any "feminism" I've ever seen or read about.
OK fair enough I probably put it too harshly. But yeah, a lot of women who consider themselves feminists, looked at what the feminists were selling and said, "no thanks". In that respect it was a scam, in that all it did was make a lot of homemakers feel better about staying home just because they had the hypothetical "choice" not to.
A woman who is a homemaker is not on equal footing with a man, financially at least. There is a power dynamic when only one partner is bringing in the money. In many (if not most) cases, a homemaker is dependent on her husband for financial support. That is not what the feminists had in mind.
You need to google "conservative feminism." These sweeping claims about what feminism is or isn't, or what it sells or doesn't, are not helping your credibility.
there's more than one way to be a feminist, revots. as you should have noticed when you were reading all those articles.
Original Post by lysistrata:
Totally off-topic ... but I've been wondering why the people who are so outraged at corporate salaries and bonuses don't display any similar disgust for what NCAA football coaches are paid.
I can only speak for me but : 1) I haven't participated in a forum that brought it up before now and 2) posting on internet forums is not my only outlet for expressing disgust.
Original Post by lysistrata:
Totally off-topic ... but I've been wondering why the people who are so outraged at corporate salaries and bonuses don't display any similar disgust for what NCAA football coaches are paid.
Huge corporate salaries effect the ability of workers to get paid, football coaches, not so much.
