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Forced Labor: What's Wrong with Balancing Work and Family
The last thing parents should do is try to “balance” work and family. A revolutionary shift of time and attention from home to the workplace has left the family on the ropes. Researcher Brian Robertson shows how a potent combination of ideology, government policy, and corporate coercion has driven parents from home—and how they can find their way back. Confronting the overwhelming evidence that children suffer when their mothers leave them for the workplace, Mr. Robertson asks why it has nevertheless become the norm for mothers to work. The power of feminism seems the obvious answer, but until the 1960s, the women’s movement zealously fought against mothers’ being forced to abandon their homes for wages. The real answer, Mr. Robertson reveals, is the transformation of the way we think about work itself. What we once undertook to support our families we now pursue as a means of self-fulfillment. Along with this new view of work have come coercive new policies in business and government—always labeled “family-friendly”—that have deliberately stacked the deck against one-income families. While Democrats embrace the feminist mania for working mothers, Republicans will not threaten the corporate grip on parental priorities. Mr. Robertson responds with an outline of sane family policy designed to help mothers and fathers prevail against the anti-family current. Forced Labor is the first book to challenge the idea of balancing work and family. Work belongs in the service of the family. And nothing less than our children’s happiness and security is at stake.
240 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2003
23 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
August 21, 2012
Explains the Assault on Women's Rights and the Assault on Family
Yes I say women's rights because before the 60s women were protected in their families, from harsh labor and now nothing protects women anymore or the family in that case which is clearly seen in that so many of today's families that have failed.
He explains how the early feminists actually protected women from the work outside the home in fact this was the goal of social feminists at that time to actually stop the exploitation of women and children in the manufacturing factories. Therefore the family wage was enacted making it possible for a man to be a single breadwinner who is able to support a family by himself while the woman is free to stay home and take care of the children.
In fact as Robertson states "It was one of the primary benefits of marriage is that it eliminates the need for the mothers to perform both bread winning and child-rearing roles, thus freeing them to devote their time to the latter" (p. 16). Today however what we see is a different society because now there is no longer a marriage in a sense what a marriage used to be, a safe haven from all the stresses of corporate life for the man who comes home to his stay at home wife. In fact today couples live just like a non married live in couple would live they both work outside the home and the woman for the most part takes care of the child rearing and the households responsibilities.
Studies actually show that women are more unhappy then ever before, now wouldn't that have anything to with the fact that women are working twice as hard in the home and outside of it?
Robertson furthermore tells us how this assault on the family and women (especially the mother and the homemaker) has been enacted through tax law, no fault divorce, a welfare system that promotes illegitimacy by only supporting the mother only if she is an unmarried single mom. In fact, before the 60s as Robertson sates mother pensions actually existed to support women and families whose husbands were sick or incapable of work, so that the mother can stay in the home and raise the kids single-moms were not included in the category.
Just to think how much more family and women were valued before feminism just shows how much feminism has ruined this once family oriented society into a society of zombies with no real morals or values or goals in life. Something is amiss in our society I recommend this book very much because it shows the detriment of the society we live in, every man, woman and child must know the vital information, which is contained in this book.
Yes I say women's rights because before the 60s women were protected in their families, from harsh labor and now nothing protects women anymore or the family in that case which is clearly seen in that so many of today's families that have failed.
He explains how the early feminists actually protected women from the work outside the home in fact this was the goal of social feminists at that time to actually stop the exploitation of women and children in the manufacturing factories. Therefore the family wage was enacted making it possible for a man to be a single breadwinner who is able to support a family by himself while the woman is free to stay home and take care of the children.
In fact as Robertson states "It was one of the primary benefits of marriage is that it eliminates the need for the mothers to perform both bread winning and child-rearing roles, thus freeing them to devote their time to the latter" (p. 16). Today however what we see is a different society because now there is no longer a marriage in a sense what a marriage used to be, a safe haven from all the stresses of corporate life for the man who comes home to his stay at home wife. In fact today couples live just like a non married live in couple would live they both work outside the home and the woman for the most part takes care of the child rearing and the households responsibilities.
Studies actually show that women are more unhappy then ever before, now wouldn't that have anything to with the fact that women are working twice as hard in the home and outside of it?
Robertson furthermore tells us how this assault on the family and women (especially the mother and the homemaker) has been enacted through tax law, no fault divorce, a welfare system that promotes illegitimacy by only supporting the mother only if she is an unmarried single mom. In fact, before the 60s as Robertson sates mother pensions actually existed to support women and families whose husbands were sick or incapable of work, so that the mother can stay in the home and raise the kids single-moms were not included in the category.
Just to think how much more family and women were valued before feminism just shows how much feminism has ruined this once family oriented society into a society of zombies with no real morals or values or goals in life. Something is amiss in our society I recommend this book very much because it shows the detriment of the society we live in, every man, woman and child must know the vital information, which is contained in this book.
January 25, 2009
A compelling yet easy to read book about how a new work culture has succeeded at tearing apart the family's structure. A refreshing view on the history of feminism and what how the definition of it has changed over the last century.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews