I listened to Louise Perry and she said many things that either were unsupported or didn’t take into consideration fundamental changes to our society in the last 50 years. Most importantly many many women really crave work that challenges their intellect in meaningful ways. Meghan and Louise are both women who could not be fulfilled with being a “trad wife.” Their brains compel them to read and think and challenge themselves with new ideas and intellectual challenge. Children are great but they grow up and leave. What are “trad wives” left with? Meaningful work? I question that. The statement that mothers and grandmothers were “happier” is unsupported fantasy. Women were very unhappy when limited and home bound. I can really see Meghan being happy with that life (not!). So where will these women be at 40 when they will live til 90? Start school? There are many many other unanswered and ignored issues about how society will not accommodate one income families and poverty will be an issue, but I’m out of space. RK
Yes, I paused at the "mothers and grandmothers were happier" moment and thought about asking if there was any data to support that. But I doubt that's measurable and I think the point ultimately is that young people, especially young women who can't find partners, are very, very unhappy now. Or at least report being so.
If the young women are unhappy because they can't find partners, how will returning to "traditional" wifehood rescue them from the unhappiness? Without work or a partner where will they find themselves as they age? Is it Ms. Perry's theory that being a traditional wife will help them find a partner? What kind of partner will they find?
I think the logic is that in a more traditional environment they WOULD have partners (because people would quit wasting their lives on dating apps and just settle down) and therefore be less unhappy. I'm not co-signing this, just interpreting it.
There is some survey data to back up the claim about declining happiness (e.g. Stevenson, B., & Wolfers, J. (2009). "The Paradox of Declining Female Happiness." American Economic Review, 99(2), 190–225.).
But happiness is not something you can objectively measure, and I’m not sure any realistic study design could really tell us whether women as a category have gotten more or less happy over time without enormous confounds.
Every generation thinks they are the first ones to discover sex. I would argue the baby boomers have a better claim to this than others, because the boomers had the good fortune to discover sex after the invention of the birth control pill and before the advent of AIDS.
It's hard for me to accept that the women's rights movement (flawed as I would say it is) is responsible for a woman being misled into thinking prostitution is a good thing.
I would back this up by saying prostitution is known to be one of the oldest professions and wasn't that rare prior to women's rights.
not to say its bad for all prostitutes... my point is just that the women's right movement shouldn't be blamed for a woman becoming a prostitute... but I'm open to some evidence around that.
I often site that the only success of protesting that Gen-Xers have experienced is for gay rights... we haven't seen protesting do anything for abortion, clean food (no gmo), clean water, natural resources, minority rights etc.
I probably agree with Louise on some of the fundamentals but I find her (and Sarah, and Bari, et al.) naive whenever they talk about getting married and having kids as if it was just a switch you can flip on.
I don’t think that kids who were raised with a bunch of disinformation about sexuality (among other things) are well suited to live it. I don’t think that someone who’s having their first kiss at 40 is set up for success. I don’t think it makes sense to “just put yourself out there” when everything you say is recorded and might be judged in 20 years by standards you can’t even imagine.
She says if you want kids it’ll work out, and I think that’s true if you’re young and female and passable looking and not ideologically captured. Most people do not fit in that category.
I think one of the biggest problems with modern intersexual dynamics, if not the biggest problem, pertains to how poorly each sex understands the other sex. The older I get, the more I realize how different we are from one another, on average.
I don’t think the current path is sustainable. We are going to need to stop pretending we don’t have vastly different needs and priorities, then both sexes need to learn to take the perspective of the other sex. This should be followed by attempts on the part of members of each sex trying to give the other sex what they want so we can get what we want.
This may be picky but I'm going to argue with the assumption that "baby boomers" (1946-64) were the ones instigating all the social changes.
I think it was the people born *before* the baby boom--they were the ones who led the counterculture, the sexual revolution, etc. The baby boomers just followed those leaders.
For example, the Beatles (1940, 1942, 1943), Mick Jagger (1943), Bob Dylan (1941), Joan Baez (1941), Abbie Hoffman (1936), Bernadine Dohrn (1942), etc etc etc.
Is there a name for this leadership cohort, the ones who influenced the Baby Boomers?
Outliers. It's always a few that kick the door open and then the masses walk through. Fwiw, my parents were of that generation and they felt alienated from--and actually resentful of--the whole baby boomer ethos.
Okay--maybe you're right that there was a vanguard.
But my parents were born in 1940 and were part of the countercultural movement (free speech movement, indian gurus, etc). They and their siblings and cousins born in the early 1940s all embraced the counterculture. They sincerely believed it was the end of society as it had been--and they were enthusiasts for overturning the old order. So they didn't seem like an unusual vanguard to me--in my world all the adults born in the early 1940s were like that.
I'm officially a baby boomer and was immersed in that counterculture from childhood--it was something I was born into and didn't acquire or join or, ultimately, endorse. So, maybe I prefer to have the leaders take the blame! ;-)
I listened to Louise Perry and she said many things that either were unsupported or didn’t take into consideration fundamental changes to our society in the last 50 years. Most importantly many many women really crave work that challenges their intellect in meaningful ways. Meghan and Louise are both women who could not be fulfilled with being a “trad wife.” Their brains compel them to read and think and challenge themselves with new ideas and intellectual challenge. Children are great but they grow up and leave. What are “trad wives” left with? Meaningful work? I question that. The statement that mothers and grandmothers were “happier” is unsupported fantasy. Women were very unhappy when limited and home bound. I can really see Meghan being happy with that life (not!). So where will these women be at 40 when they will live til 90? Start school? There are many many other unanswered and ignored issues about how society will not accommodate one income families and poverty will be an issue, but I’m out of space. RK
Yes, I paused at the "mothers and grandmothers were happier" moment and thought about asking if there was any data to support that. But I doubt that's measurable and I think the point ultimately is that young people, especially young women who can't find partners, are very, very unhappy now. Or at least report being so.
If the young women are unhappy because they can't find partners, how will returning to "traditional" wifehood rescue them from the unhappiness? Without work or a partner where will they find themselves as they age? Is it Ms. Perry's theory that being a traditional wife will help them find a partner? What kind of partner will they find?
I think the logic is that in a more traditional environment they WOULD have partners (because people would quit wasting their lives on dating apps and just settle down) and therefore be less unhappy. I'm not co-signing this, just interpreting it.
There is some survey data to back up the claim about declining happiness (e.g. Stevenson, B., & Wolfers, J. (2009). "The Paradox of Declining Female Happiness." American Economic Review, 99(2), 190–225.).
But happiness is not something you can objectively measure, and I’m not sure any realistic study design could really tell us whether women as a category have gotten more or less happy over time without enormous confounds.
Every generation thinks they are the first ones to discover sex. I would argue the baby boomers have a better claim to this than others, because the boomers had the good fortune to discover sex after the invention of the birth control pill and before the advent of AIDS.
I've heard this argument before. There is about a 20 year sweet spot 1965-1985.
It's hard for me to accept that the women's rights movement (flawed as I would say it is) is responsible for a woman being misled into thinking prostitution is a good thing.
I would back this up by saying prostitution is known to be one of the oldest professions and wasn't that rare prior to women's rights.
not to say its bad for all prostitutes... my point is just that the women's right movement shouldn't be blamed for a woman becoming a prostitute... but I'm open to some evidence around that.
I often site that the only success of protesting that Gen-Xers have experienced is for gay rights... we haven't seen protesting do anything for abortion, clean food (no gmo), clean water, natural resources, minority rights etc.
There used to be professional match makers. Wonder if that profession should return.
I probably agree with Louise on some of the fundamentals but I find her (and Sarah, and Bari, et al.) naive whenever they talk about getting married and having kids as if it was just a switch you can flip on.
I don’t think that kids who were raised with a bunch of disinformation about sexuality (among other things) are well suited to live it. I don’t think that someone who’s having their first kiss at 40 is set up for success. I don’t think it makes sense to “just put yourself out there” when everything you say is recorded and might be judged in 20 years by standards you can’t even imagine.
She says if you want kids it’ll work out, and I think that’s true if you’re young and female and passable looking and not ideologically captured. Most people do not fit in that category.
I think one of the biggest problems with modern intersexual dynamics, if not the biggest problem, pertains to how poorly each sex understands the other sex. The older I get, the more I realize how different we are from one another, on average.
I don’t think the current path is sustainable. We are going to need to stop pretending we don’t have vastly different needs and priorities, then both sexes need to learn to take the perspective of the other sex. This should be followed by attempts on the part of members of each sex trying to give the other sex what they want so we can get what we want.
This may be picky but I'm going to argue with the assumption that "baby boomers" (1946-64) were the ones instigating all the social changes.
I think it was the people born *before* the baby boom--they were the ones who led the counterculture, the sexual revolution, etc. The baby boomers just followed those leaders.
For example, the Beatles (1940, 1942, 1943), Mick Jagger (1943), Bob Dylan (1941), Joan Baez (1941), Abbie Hoffman (1936), Bernadine Dohrn (1942), etc etc etc.
Is there a name for this leadership cohort, the ones who influenced the Baby Boomers?
Outliers. It's always a few that kick the door open and then the masses walk through. Fwiw, my parents were of that generation and they felt alienated from--and actually resentful of--the whole baby boomer ethos.
Okay--maybe you're right that there was a vanguard.
But my parents were born in 1940 and were part of the countercultural movement (free speech movement, indian gurus, etc). They and their siblings and cousins born in the early 1940s all embraced the counterculture. They sincerely believed it was the end of society as it had been--and they were enthusiasts for overturning the old order. So they didn't seem like an unusual vanguard to me--in my world all the adults born in the early 1940s were like that.
I'm officially a baby boomer and was immersed in that counterculture from childhood--it was something I was born into and didn't acquire or join or, ultimately, endorse. So, maybe I prefer to have the leaders take the blame! ;-)
Your parents must have been both very cool and very young parents, since if you're a boomer you would have been born before 1965.
They were college-age—but not uncommon back then for women to have babies between ages 20-25