Journal of the Motherhood Initiative for Research and Community Involvement (JMI - York University)

Turnbull, Lorna A.

Lorna A. Turnbull 
The Dilemmas of Feminist 
Activism in Law 
A recent Supreme Court of Canada decision about the constitutionality of maternity 
andparental beneJits made some important statements about the role of the state and 
our collective responsibility for the work of bearing and raising children. The 
challenge for-minists is how to buildon the court's recognition ofsubstantiveeguality 
when the very system that was aflrmed by theirjudgment is one that many agree is 
the wrongsystem for delivering maternity andparentaldenejts. This article reviews 
the histo ry of maternity andparental ben& as wellas theproblems associated with 
the current model and outlines the highlights of the Supreme Court decision. I t  
concludes with a reyection on where such progress leaves us i f i t  is apositive step in 
the wrong direction. 
Twenty years after the coming into force of the Charter equality guarantee the 
Supreme Court of Canada has recently breathed new life into the concept of 
substantive equality as it pertains to bearing and caring for children.' We could 
even look at this decision as coming full circle, back to the place where the Court 
first pronounced in 1989 that "those who bear children and benefit society as 
a whole thereby should not be economically or socially disadvantaged.. . ."2 
Now, in 2005, the Court unanimously recognized the economic costs of 
motherwork and stepped away from the current tendency to reprivatize 
women's social reproductive labour and upheld the power of the federal 
government to provide maternity and parental benefits as part of the Employ- 
ment Insurance scheme. In this short note I will briefly outline the history and 
current functioning of the federal maternity/parental benefit scheme, describe 
the Quebec Court of Appeal decision and provide a few highlights from the 
Supreme Court reasons. I will close by looking at the question ofwhether and 
how activists concerned with equality for mothers can advance a maternity and 
Journal ofthe Association for Research on Mothering 129 
Lorna A. Turnbull 
parental benefits scheme that truly meets the needs of all. 
Initial attempts by the federal government to enact a national unemploy- 
ment insurance scheme in the 1930s were challenged by the provinces as an 
encroachment on the provincial jurisdiction over property and civil rights. As 
a result a constitutional amendment was negotiated that allowed the introduc- 
tion of a federal unemployment program in 1940. Maternity benefits were 
added in 1971 and were expanded to include 10 weeks of parental benefits in 
1990. In 2001 parental benefits were extended to 35 weeks. It is section 22 that 
provides for the payment of maternity benefits to an eligible woman for a period 
of fifteen weeks surrounding the birth of her child. Section 23 provides for the 
payment of parental benefits for a total of 35 weeks to qualifylng parents of a 
newborn or child placed for adoption. In order to qualify for either of these 
benefits the parent claiming them must have worked at least 600 hours in the 
preceding 52-week period. Under the scheme the benefit payable is 55 percent 
of the recipient's weekly wage to a maximum of $413/week. With benefit levels 
this low many women cannot afford to take a maternity or parental leave. In 
families that can afford a45 percent cut in income it is the lower income earning 
parent who will take the leave and in a heterosexual relationship this is 
predominantly the mother. In fact as recently as 2000, 98 percent of all 
recipients of maternitylparental benefits under the scheme were women? 
Only claimants with sufficient workforce attachment are eligible for 
maternity or parental benefits, thus workers who are self-employed, working 
part-time or on contract, or other contingent workers are excluded from the 
benefit. As a result, more than one third of new mothers do not have access to 
maternity or parental benefits. Halfof these are women who did not engage in 
paidwork, or did not have sufficient hours ofpaidwork, in the qualifylng period 
because of the nature oftheir employment or because they were caring for their 
other ~hi ldren .~  These inequalities are at the root of the many criticisms that 
have been leveled at the scheme over theyears. Various challenges to the scheme 
for its failure to meet women's equality rights have failed at the level of the 
Federal Court of Appeal. For example, in Lesiuk v. Canadd a mother of one 
child challenged the denial of maternity benefits for the birth of her second 
child on the basis that the qualifylng requirement discriminated against her 
because her caregiving responsibilities for her first child affected the number of 
hours she was available to work preceding the birth of her second child. Her 
equality arguments were successful before the Umpire who found that the 
eligibility requirements had a disproportionate impact on individuals with 
childcare responsibilities, predominantly women. The Federal Court of Ap- 
peal struck down that decision on the basis that women's human dignity was 
not demeaned by a denial of benefits. The Federal Court of Appeal employed 
similar logic in Miller v. Canada, a challenge to the claw-back of regular 
benefits where a claimant has received maternity/parental benefits. 
The essence of women's claims relating to the maternity/parental benefit 
scheme is that it was designed to meet the needs of the ideal male worker, one 
130 1 Volume 8, Numbers 1,2 
The Dilemmas of Feminist Activism in Law 
who worked full-time, year round, and who had a partner at home taking care 
of all domestic labour. Because women's working patterns do not mirror those 
of this ideal worker, maternity and parental benefits have fitted poorly into this 
model with the most significant impact on marginalized women who already 
experience the greatest inequalities in the labour force. As Nitya Iyer has 
argued, the existing model reinforces the motherwork of the predominantly 
middle and upper class women who can access maternity benefits while "the 
maternal work of other women workers remains ~rivatized and invisible."' 
In  Quebec, the story has unfolded somewhat differently. Throughout the 
1990s women's groups and organized labour in the province worked with the 
government to develop a broader and richer maternity and parental benefits 
scheme under the opt-out provisions of the federal Employment ImuranceAct. 
This new Quebec model suffered from fewer of the discriminatory problems 
that plague the federal scheme but negotiations between the province and the 
federal government on the cost sharing dragged on for years. Finally, in March 
of 2002 the Quebec government asked the Court of Appeal for Quebec to rule 
on the constitutionality of ss. 22 and 23 of the EmpZoymentInsuranceActt8 The 
Court of Appeal held that the federal government did not have the power to 
provide maternity and parental benefits under the unemployment insurance 
constitutional amendment. The Court held that this amendment was to be 
narrowly construed as relating only to loss of employment for economic 
reasons. Maternity or parental benefits are more properly seen as part of a social 
program aimed at a situation that is personal in nature and therefore properly 
belong within provincial jurisdiction. The Court, echoing the formal equality 
notions of voluntariness that were rejected in Brookr: stated that matters of 
personal choice could not be covered by an insurance scheme that is intended 
to protect against unforeseeable risk 
The decision of the Court of Appeal provoked a great deal of anxiety 
because of the mixed message it sent. On the one hand, the more progressive 
Quebec plan that had been hard won by a broad coalition of community 
activists had been upheld. On the other, a finding that the scheme was outside 
of federal jurisdiction raised serious concerns for the continued availability of 
any maternity/parental benefits elsewhere in Canada. Moreover the regressive 
language of voluntariness and choice was contrary to feminist theorizing about 
gender equality and women's social reproductive work. These tensions created 
an untenable situation for women's groups who might have considered inter- 
vening before the Supreme Court of Canada, as none wanted to be seen to be 
arguing against the accomplishments of our Quebec sisters and yet none 
wanted to lose the national program or leave the formal equality construction 
of women's childbearing work unchallenged. This ambivalence perhaps ex- 
plains the absence of any feminist interveners before the Supreme Court. 
In October 2005, in a decision where a majority ofthe judges were women, 
the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the maternity/parental 
benefits on two grounds. On  the division ofpowers aspect ofthe case the court 
Journal of the Association for Research on Mothering ( 131 
held that the maternity/parental benefits were in pith and substance a "mecha- 
nism for providing replacement income during an interruption of work. This 
is consistent with the essence of the federal jurisdiction ... namely the 
establishment ofa public insurance program the purpose ofwhich is to preserve 
workers' economic security and ensure their re-entry into the labour market by 
paying income replacement benefits in the event of an interruption of employ- 
ment."" It  did not accept the dichotomy between "economic" and "personal" 
reasons that had been relied upon by the Court of Appeal. The Court also 
rejected the narrow original intent approach of the Court of Appeal although 
it did acknowledge the political elements at play in defining the features of 
federalism and affirmed that the "task of maintaining the balance between 
federal and provincial powers falls primarily to  government^."'^ 
Although it is not explicitly set out, the Court also brought a substantive 
equality approach to this case. Madam Justice Deschamps recognizes that "in 
our times, having a child is often the result of a deliberate act decided on by one 
or both parents. There are many facets to pregnancy however. Despite all the 
technological progress that has been made, conception does not result from a 
mathematical calculation that can be used to determine when or even if it will 
occur. In addition, the benefit derived from procreation extends beyond the 
benefit to the parents. Children are one of society's most important assets, and 
the contribution made by parents cannot be overstated.. . . . The decision to offer 
women the possibility of receiving income replacement benefits when they are 
off work due to pregnancy is therefore a social policy decision that is not 
incompatible with the concept of risk in the realm of insurance, and that can 
moreover be harmoniously incorporated into a public unemployment insur- 
ance plan."'2 This language underlines the benefit society derives from women's 
reproductive labour and the collective responsibility to support women in their 
roles as workers and mothers. It  represents a move away from the privatizing 
approach that is seen in many recent decisions that touch upon social reproduc- 
tion. The decision also seems to recognize that maternity/parental benefits are 
different from regular unemployment benefits because they are designed to 
meet the particular needs ofwomen: "a growing portion of the labour force is 
made up of women, and women have particular needs that are of concern to 
society as a whole. An interruption of employment due to maternity can no 
longer be regarded as a matter of individual responsibility. Women's connec- 
tion to the labour market is well established, and their inclusion in the 
expression "unemployed persons" is as natural an extension as the extension 
involving other classes of insured persons who lose their employment 
income.. ..The social nature of unemployment insurance requires that Parlia- 
ment be able to adapt the plan to the new realities of the workplace. Some 
eligibility requirements derive from the essence of the unemployment concept, 
while other requirements are, rather mechanisms that reflect a social policy 
choice linked to the implementation of the plan."13 
The power of this decision is that it represents the strongest statement of 
132 ( Volume 8, Numbers 1,2 
The Dilemmas ofFeministActivism in Law 
the public, collective responsibility for the work of raising future generations 
since Brooks and it affirms an existing mechanism for providing at least some 
level ofthat public support. The challenge it presents is that many feminists and 
other activists in this area are agreed that maternity and parental benefits are 
best provided outside of the unemployment scheme where they could be 
expanded to cover the many marginalized women who are currently excluded 
from the benefits. The current scheme is still far from meeting the needs ofthe 
- 
most vulnerable women in Canadian society and has significant regressive 
implications even for the more privileged among us. Because women still do the 
bulk of the work of caring for children even when they are employed in paid 
work inequalities in the maternity/parental benefits scheme disadvantage them 
disproportionately compared to men. A full realization of women's equality 
rights requires an adequate maternity/parental benefits scheme. 
The strategic question facing activists now is how to continue to promote 
a broad social program with minimum national standards while advocating 
additions and enhancements to the program that are antithetical to its contin- 
ued existence within the Employment Insurance Act. This is an especially 
pressing concern when the Supreme Court has taken a significant step in the 
direction of equality in a case that reinforces the position of maternity/parental 
benefits within the Act. Should we build on this momentum and lobby for a 
richer, more extensive benefit program along the lines of the Quebec program? 
Or should we be seeking a universal program that would include all mothers 
regardless of their connection with the work force in a way that recognizes the 
inherent value of each one's motherwork. There are numerous proposals for 
reform to the EmploymentInsuranceAct that have been circulated recently, and 
practically speaking, such an incremental approach is probably the correct one. 
It is important to keep our larger, transformative, ideal visions of full equality 
in sight, but as we grapple with this challenge we should not forget to celebrate 
the victory this case represents for women who are struggling to reconcile their 
roles as mothers and workers in contemporary Canadian society. 
The author wishes to gratefully acknowledge the SSHRC and the Legal Research 
Institute at the Faculty of Law, University ofManitoba for their support of this 
research and ofthe largerproject of which this forms apart. The author is a member 
of the NationalAssociation of Women and the Law Working Group on maternity 
andparental beneJits and shared in many provocative and he&ful discussions oftbe 
issues that have surely informed the ideas expressed here (although all errors are 
entirely the author's own). 
'Reference re Employment Insurance Act (Can.) ss. 22 and 23,2005 SCC 56. 
2Brooks v. Canada Safeway Ltd [l9891 1 S.C.R. 1219. 
3See generally Turnbull, Lorna A. , Double Jeopardy: Mothemuork and the Law 
(Toronto: Sumach Press, 2001). 
Journal ofthe Association for Research on Mothering 133 
Lorna Turnbull 
4Shillington, Richard. 2003. Access to Maternity Benefits, http:/l 
www.shillington.ca~publicati~nslmaterni~~benefits.pfd. 
5[2003] 2 F.C. 697 (C.A.). For more on this case see Turnbull, Lorna A. "How 
does the Law Recognize Work?" (2004) 6 JoumaloftheAssociationfor Research 
on Mothering 5 8. 
62002 FCA 370. For more on this case see Turnbull, ibid. 
'Iyer, Nitya, "Some Mothers are Better than Others: A Re-examination of 
Maternity Benefits" in Susan Boyd, ed. Challenging the Publi JPrivate Divide: 
Feminism, Law and Public Policy (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 
1997) at 177. There is a voluminous academic commentary on the limits of the 
current maternity/parental benefits scheme that cannot reasonably be summa- 
rized here although reference to the Iyer article and to Turnbull, supra note 3 
will give a reader some sense of the literature. 
S[2004] R.J.Q, 399 (C.A.). 
9Supra note 1. 
l0Supra note 2 at para 68. 
llIbid at para 10. 
121bid at para 54 & 56. 
131bid at para 66. 
134 1 Volume 8, Numbers 1,2 


English

The Dilemmas of Feminist Activism in Law

Fisher-Wirth, Ann

Kisses 
First kiss is Denis Honeychurch, at the partywhere Jennifer Miles is smooching 
her no-count boyfriend, C. B. "C. B.?" the girl asks, "Is that his real name?" 
"Jeez," Jennifer groans, world-weary. "S-E-A-B-E-E. Don't you know it's like 
a sailor?" They're up, down, up, down, in the clinch on the couch, and each time 
Jennifer comes up for air she tells the girl, 'You've been Denis's girlfriend for 
months, just do it." The girl's ducking this way and that, he's trying to zone in, 
and finally she lets him and lets him and lets him till her braces are cutting his 
lips and Jennifer Miles is pulling them apart, bug-eyed, telling her, "Stop now. 
I won't take any responsibility." 
Second kiss is Billy McKay at the bottom of the hill that's her back yard. In the 
little pagoda by the cracked badminton court her father is reclaiming, Billy 
wraps his arms around her and barely brushes his lips on hers. Nights, she 
languishes on her balcony, gazes at his roof, imagines him adding her name to 
the list of the girls he's kissed. She's fourteen. She longs to elope with him to 
Alaska. The third, fourth, fifth kisses are Billy too. Karl Heimlich calls him no 
good, tells him to leave her alone, so Billy's friends from St. Mary's storm the 
school grounds one lunchtime to fight with Karl's friends from Garfield Junior 
High. "So this is the face that launched a thousand fists," Mr. Wigaman, Boys' 
Dean and history teacher, comments after he breaks the fight up and comes to 
class. 
No, Merrie Lu is earlier than Denis, even. They lie in her bed in the little stucco 
house upstairs from the shrunken father and bossy Christian Scientist mother 
who waves her arms around while reciting the Lord's Prayer, and pretend they 
are grownups. Merrie Lu will take a lover while still in high school-the 
middle-aged hippie jeweller in the tiny store on Telegraph. She'll vanish from 
the girl's life, vanish from the circle of girlfriends or even the gossip at Berkeley 
High. Back then, they put Kleenex between their lips as they take turns lying 
on top, lowering their faces toward each other, but they do not touch each 
other's skin-they're saving their glistening flesh for boys. 
M a n  Hance is the taste of Chesterfields and boredom. Not boredom with her, 
just boredom, stretchingout blond and lanky on the daybedin his sister's house, 
Journal ofthe Association for Research on Mothering 1 339 
Ann Fisher- Wirtb 
kissing hours, hours, as Alicia and her lover and their roommate discuss 
Nietzsche or bCarnaise or their architecture projects in the Berkeley kitchen 
over egri bikaver, bull's-blood wine. In the warm still night, his boredom seems 
holy. It's not love that's missing between them, but the will to claim, to bind. 
They don't date, really, just kiss. Like hayripening, or the stars that make their 
way across the window, or two corks bobbing on the water, they drift through 
the months. They'll write for a while, then seldom think of each other again- 
until he writes her nearly forty years later. There is no end, no end, ofthings in 
the heart. He  and Alicia are kind to the girl all summer. 
It's always easier not to start than to stop, once she parts her lips she's a goner. 
That consent ofthe teeth and tongue, the wet, the source ofwords. When she's 
small, she knows it makes a wet spot, so she sidles up to some beloved adult- 
her mother, say, or her mother's best friend Lureen-parts her lips, and touches 
just the tip of her tongue to the face. In college, she can never understand girls 
who set out to kiss-to kiss but.just to kiss-like Kathy Nye in the freshman 
. . 
dorm, who plays the bases like a nun nymphomaniac. Ifthe girl kisses someone 
she wants his body in hers, to hurl herself' over all the steeplejack jumps. The 
yes is nearly infinite. 
And when she is grown, kissing her children, she wants to bless them with her 
lips, to seal them forever in her love. Eskimo kisses where they rub noses, 
trading breath, "Nuggie nose, nuggie nose." Butterfly kisses-eyelashes tick- 
ling the cheek, up and down, fluttering. Eating the toes and fingers kisses, 
smunching down on the belly kisses. Kisses on the eyes to magic away 
headaches, on the salty sweat-damp hair, the hollow under the ear, the plump 
pulse at the clavicle. Kisses like water sheeting down a mountainside. Kisses like 
birth fluid, floating them, surrounding them, until the day they die. No, 
confess. She wants her kiss-shaped burning seal still to be glowing at the end 
of eternity. 
340 1 Volume 8, Numbers 1,2 


Kisses

Major, Laura

Alicia Ostriker's Propaganda for Motherhood

Hallstein, D. Lynn O'Brien

Conceiving Intensive Mothering

Daughters 
My house is full of blood. 
And my daughters, now, 
who used to be so cleanly 
cleft, so simple, carry 
the bit flesh in them, 
shark-torn fish trailing 
blood in the sea. Even 
my tortoiseshell, delicate, 
female, yowls when the 
blood comes to her, and, 
tail up in anguish, 
drags her pretty belly 
on the ground. 
My house is full of breasts, 
softly deep and nippling 
beneath camisoles or 
sweaters. I have to inch 
around them. I have to 
squeeze by, narrow. They 
float above my daughters 
in the bathtub, I mean, they 
are my daughters1 in the 
bathtub, pale, warm moons 
in a watery sky, they who 
suckled me now outdo me. 
And though I do not stare, 
my house is full of fur. 
Already, boys 
have touched it. 
This, one daughter 
tells me, and I think of how, 
when she was born, 
I stroked her arm so gently, 
cherishing the vein-fine 
skin, and swore no one would 
ever hurt her. 
Journal ofthe Association for Research on Mothering ( 341 
Detailji-om ''Peter Pan: To the Spirit of Children of Play,* 6 Sir George Framptom. 
1929 Replica, Glen Gould Park, Toronto. Photo: Joe Paczuski 
342 1 Volume 8, Numbers l,2 


Daughters

Green, Fiona Joy

Developing a Feminist Motherline: Reflections on a Decade of Feminist Parenting

MacDonnell, Judith A.

Exploring Matrices of Mothering and Feminisms: Understanding Mothering Discourses for Lesbian Health Advocates Through Life Histories

Linker, Maureen

Explaining the World: Philosophical Reflections on Feminism and Mothering

Cater, Wendy

Book Reviews 
Mothering Occupations 
Challenge, Agency, and Participation 
Susan A. Esdaile and Judith A. Olson, eds. 
Philadelphia: F. A. Davis Company, 2004 
Reviewed by Wendy Cater 
Mothering Occupations is a wonderfully readable book to be savoured at one 
sitting or dipped into regularly for its many pleasures. Editors Susan Esdaile 
and Judith Olson describe their aim-to investigate mothering "through the 
lens of the helping professions from a feminist phenomenological perspec- 
tive"-and argue that "the authors in this text do not speak for mothers, but they 
speak out for mothers." Each chapter comprises an introduction, stories about 
the various experiences of three mothers/mothering experiences which pertain 
to the chapter content, a succinct explanation ofthe theoretical context of each 
section, a description of the challenges raised by the chapter, and anticipated 
outcomes for readers. 
In "Mothering in the Context of Unpaid Work and Play in Families," for 
example, Loree A. Primueau anticipates that readers will achieve the following 
outcomes after studying the chapter: readers should be able to a) define 
mothering; b) discuss the literature and research findings related to divisions of 
unpaid work in families; c) distinguish between traditional and nontraditional 
gender ideologies and gender practices; d) identify work and discuss two types 
of parental strategies used in mothering in the context of unpaid work and play 
in families; and e) describe parental participation in play within household 
work. 
Mothering Occupations is an antidote to books that tell mothers the "right" 
way to do things. It includes the stories of five families and their respective 
experiences of play and work within the home that range across the spectrum 
of traditional and nontraditional approaches to family life. Moreover, the book 
validates a mother's individual commitment, as Sara Ruddick suggests, "to 
meet three universal demands of children for preservation, nurturance and 
training to take their place in society irrespective of gender, biology or social 
role." 
The volume traces the lifetime continuum of mothering that women 
embark upon from the moment of conception through, for example, to caring 
for children with disabilities. It  also considers mothers who are physically 
debilitated or mentally ill. The authors' inclusive language enhances a reader's 
awareness and understanding of the possibilities of mothering. The chapter 
"Mothering across the Lifecourse" is particularly insightful as it acknowledges 
that mothering is a tenured position. Each chapter concludes with a list of 
suggested readings that is especially useful. I found Mothering Occupations 
360 1 Volume 8, Numbers 1,2 
Book Reviews 
readable and informative and would recommend it to professionals working 
with families, parents, and parents-to-be. 
Women and Children First 
Feminism, Rhetoric, and Public Policy 
Sharon M.  Meagher and Patrice DiQuinzio, eds. 
Albany: State University of New York Press, 2005 
Reviewed by Tatjana Chorney 
This collection of twelve essays is an important contribution to feminist 
scholarship and contemporary cultural and political discourses shaping how we 
see mothers and children in the context of citizenship. The essays use avariety 
of feminist theoretical frameworks to analyze the rhetoric-of heretofore 
unexamined American and Canadian public policies proposing "to put women 
and children first." The essays reveal the paternalistic and "masculinist" logic 
underlying these policies whose real effect is disempowerment-sometimes 
harm-to those they ostensibly seek to protect. The book demonstrates in 
compelling ways that individual realities are linked to wider social realities, and 
advocates greater critical scrutiny of how the discourses of modern liberal 
individualism often obscure this crucial interdependence. 
The collection is divided into five sections. Part one, "(Mis)Representations 
of the Domestic Sphere: State Interventions," features discussions focused on 
the co-optation of feminist discourse in the rhetoric of American homeland 
security and defense against terrorism; the oppressive and exclusionary nature 
of the heteronormative family ideology in public policy as manifested in the 
Census; and the use of international human rights discourse in domestic 
violence cases whose rhetoric erases power differentials, reinforces constructs 
of middle-class motherhood, and calls for increased surveillance of poor 
families. 
Of the two essays in part two, "Medical Discourses and Social Ills," one 
documents through cases studies the tragic effects of the promotion of a rigid 
conception of sex and gender for parents of "intersexed" children; the other 
analyzes depression in women as a "social" rather than an individual phenom- 
enon, finding its causes in contemporary culture whose persistent patriarchal 
values continue to devalue and debase women and mothers in ways that 
"colonize psychic space" (100). 
The essays in part three, "Subjects of Violence," reveal how a culture with 
traditional masculinist values celebrates violence when used "properly" in the 
service of protection, without acknowledging that "protection and predation 
are intimately linked to one another" (123), as well as remind us-by uncovering 
Journal ofthe Association for Research on Mothering ( 361 


Mothering Occupations: Challenge, Agency and Participation

McDonough, Carla J.

Carla J. McDonough 
Motherhood and Feminism 
Lessons from the Titanic 
This essay examines my transitionfiom career woman to  stay-at-home mom, and 
how motherhood has raised my consciousness as to the naivete of thefeminism I once 
embraced. In championing more powerfor women in the public world, feminism can 
no longer beseducedinto accepting a male-definedscenario ofhow workingl$should 
work-the scenario of the ideal worker unencumbered by any family commitments 
thatguides most corporate, professional, andgovernmentalpoliry. Few workers are 
ever "ideal" (unless they have a full-time stay-at-home W fe), nor is the world they 
live in. Continuing to  acquiesce t o  such impossible ideal circumstances is rather like 
setting sail on the Titanic. The still rigidly gender-divided reality ofparenting in 
most families throws into sharp relief how our ';aost-feminist" culture continues t o  
devalue the "women's work"ofcaringfora home andrearingchildren even as itmakes 
thatjob necessary for all otherjobs to occur. My new mother-feminist consciousness 
makes clear to me the nextgoal offeminism. We must make the culture of the (paid) 
working world adapt to the needs of mothers and children, allowing the work of 
parenting children to become what it should be: not a disaster waiting to sink us but 
the rudder intended t o  guide our communities to  calmer waters. 
I have a new feminist consciousness now that I have given up my career in order 
to meet family needs. A few years ago, rather than continue a commute after 
being unable to land a job in the same town as my husband, I resigned from a 
tenured position in an English department to stay home and take care of three 
children-infant twins and a four-year-old. I was 37 years old and closing the 
book on my chances ofreturning to academia, no matter what well-intentioned 
friends and colleagues said about the changing atmosphere in universities that 
might provide me opportunities to re-enter the profession. Although I had 
planned my life quite carefully up to and including the arrival of my first child, 
Journal ofthe Association for Research on Mothering 1 123 
events in my life after his birth were increasingly not under my control. Brian 
Green (2003) discussing superstring theory in The Elegan t Universe, comments 
about laws ofphysics that "newlaws come into playwhen the level ofcomplexity 
of a system increases" (17). I know offew systems more complex than a nuclear 
family with several small children and two adults working full time. And in the 
end I did not find myself quite up to that level of complexity. 
It has been a rockyroad for me, emotionally, since leaving my career to be 
a full-time stay-at-home mom, which I consider myselfdespite a few semesters 
of part-time teaching. I have gone through, and continue, an identity crisis as 
I have seen myselfmorph from the person I really am into someone else, at least 
as seen through other's eyes. Whenever my children's teachers and friends and 
even the neighbors call me Mrs. Hobson, as they do most of the time, I feel as 
if I have been miscast. My real self wants to say "Actually no. It's Dr. 
McDonough-but that seems pretentious for a woman who spends most of 
her day doing laundry, running household errands, managing family finances, 
cooking, cleaning, and sorting out the myriad activities, conflicts, and commit- 
ments that arise from parenting three active boys. On one level, I want to be a 
mother like my own was, and remains-someone who always has time for her 
children, never acts as if they are an interruption or a bother, always seems to 
know how to support and encourage them. On another level, I don't want to 
be defined only by my children or for my life to be only in service to someone 
else's needs. 
So, I find myself wondering: have I been derailed by motherhood even 
though I consciously chose it for myself? In the past five years, I have felt 
shanghaied by a system that makes it so difficult for a woman to pursue a career 
and parenthood. Being unable to "find a balance" between workand home life, 
did I cop out to a gender stereotype? When push came to shove in balancing 
my wants and those of my children and husband, I gave up my personal goals 
for their greater good. I just could not make our family life work any other way 
because I did not want a frantic life. Having experienced the demands of full- 
time work and parenting I knew that feeling of skating on the edge where one 
slip up, one cog not working right in the machine of our lives threw everything 
into chaos. I knew how it felt to be one place but know1 was needed somewhere 
else. Although my work life was often a respite from the demands of family and 
my family life a respite from the demands ofwork, the demands of both soon 
pushed our family into a pace of life with which I felt uncomfortable. Family 
dinners of home-cooked meals should not be a luxury. The decision to keep a 
sick child home from day care or school should be based on the child's needs 
rather than on a work schedule. And small children simply need lots and lots 
of time. I was lucky enough that we could, with careful management, afford for 
me to stay home with the children-first on temporary leave, and then com- 
pletely unemployed. At the same time, it never felt like a choice. If1 could have 
landed a job in the town where my husband worked-one with flexibility for 
tending to children's needs-I would have chosen that. 
124 1 Volume 8, Numbers 1,2 
Motherhood and Feminism 
Thus when I first read Miriam Peskowitz's The Truth Behind the Mommy 
Wars (2005), I felt relieved. Here was a researched, thoughtful study voicing all 
the doubts and concerns I had been recording in my own journal over the past 
five years as an unintentional stay-at-home mom. Peskowitz's interviewees 
were voicing my sense of loss over a career I never planned to give up as well as 
my happiness at having the chance to be home when my children are young. 
They reflected my fear of not being able to return to rewarding work and my 
discomfort with the traditional gender roles into which my husband and I have 
fallen. They mirrored the solace I have encountered from the support of other 
mothers I know, and they acknowledged the self doubts I sometimes feel over 
whether I am doing a truly "good job of mothering despite my long hours and 
commitment to it. And most of all, the women of Peskowitz's bookgive voice 
to the burden that I have carried as a mother that some how it is all up to me, 
alone, to make things work for my family against the pressures of a corporate/ 
consumer-driven culture. 
The mother's or woman's perceived burden to "make it all work" is 
increasingly significant as I think of my ideas of feminism before I became a 
mother. Those early feminist ideas were about being in control of my life and 
my choices. Choosing what to study, what to do, where to go. My life, my 
future, were all up to me. The possibilities seemed boundless back then. I look 
back on that twenty-something woman and realize how little I knew about 
what choices would be available to me once I stepped out of the position of the 
ideal worker unencumbered by family commitments. So many of the argu- 
ments about parenting and work conflicts grow out of the issues of choice or the 
lack of it. Motherhood has made clear to me that a focus on personal choice 
often obscures the lack of choices that are offered us. More particularly, these 
choices often do not acknowledge the unpredictability of life, especially, but 
certainly not limited to, life with children. Increasingly1 see the working world 
being created like the Titanic: built with such utter faith in one course of events 
that a simple matter of providing enough lifeboats has been overlooked because 
no one thought to consider the potential complications if an unexpected (or 
even an expected) obstacle were to arise. Any mother could have told those 
architects, designers, and financiers that obstacles will arise and that the 
improbable, unexpected, or unlikely can (and often does) happen, and thus 
should be planned for and accommodated. 
In championing more power for women in the public world, feminism 
can no longer be seduced by the best-case scenario ideal of how working life 
- 
should work that guides most corporate, professional, and governmental 
policy. Workers are not all "ideal," nor is the world they live in. Workers do 
get sick. They have important commitments outside of the office that include 
spouses, partners, children and parents whom they care for. Even when 
everything else is going smoothly in their lives, they still have to see doctors 
and dentists, pick up prescriptions, buy stamps, bank, update car registrations 
and driver's licenses, buy groceries, have their cars serviced, and a myriad of 
Journal ofthe Association for Research on Mothering / 125 
other errands that usually have to occur during traditional "working hours." 
Since becoming a stay-at-home mom, I have increasingly been the one to take 
care of these things not just for me but for my whole family-including my 
husband who has moved into greater and greater time commitments to work 
in order to support our family on his salary alone. Many days I wonder how 
he would do these simple things just for himself if I weren't here, much less 
manage to handle all the chiidcare, too. As it is, he has given up any 
semblance of personal time or regular exercise because he just can't fit it into 
the day and also spend time with the children and cover the few parts of the 
childcare needs he can fit in. He  has become the ideal worker whose work in 
the office is made possible only by having a spouse at home who covers the 
work of every other aspect of life for him from calling the exterminator when 
the house gets invaded by ants (and waiting at home during the four-hour 
time slot in which they might arrive) to washing his shirts for work (he irons 
them-I'm not a total domestic diva). If he wonders how he'd take care of the 
house and children without me, I have had many a sleepless night wondering 
what will happen to our family if he were to get sick or injured. Could I get 
decently paid work with such a huge gap in my resume? Are we on our own 
Titanic sailing gaily along toward some iceberg that will hit us unexpectedly 
one night? Do we have enough lifeboats? 
As I have gotten older, I feelless and less in control of my life. And I wonder 
if that is the effect of maturity or the result of the insecurity that our still rigidly 
gender-divided parenting culture has created. A culture that still devalues the 
"women's work" of caring for a home and raising children even as it makes that 
job necessaryfor all otherjobs to occur. Do  I feel insecure and uncertain because 
I am no longer an independent wage earner who supports herself and instead 
am relying on a (male) partner to take care of me and our children financially? 
Or  do I feel insecure because the experiences ofliving make me realize the world 
itself is an insecure place full of the unexpected, the unlikely, the unpredictable. 
I know that despite our current workable arrangement our family may be just 
one unexpected event away from personal and financial disaster. 
Many things hit us unprepared. Things that, as a friend of mine said to me 
recently, we never signed up for. How was I to foresee that a necessary job 
change on my husband's part would dictate a move for the family and a 
commute to work for me, and then I'd be facing the arrival not ofjust a second 
child but unexpectedly of twins? Or how could my friend foresee her beautiful 
first son would turn out to have so many special needs? Or why would another 
friend of mine have been expected to "plan" on being diagnosed with MS after 
the physical trauma of giving birth? If motherhood has taught me anything 
about life, it is that the concept of being in control is tenuous at best. Birth 
defects, breast cancer, miscarriage, divorce. Life is hll of things we never signed 
up for. So, is the concept of being "in control" of one's life really possible for 
anyone? Given the uncertainties, I have come to believe that all of us, mothers 
or not, need to readjust our glasses to a realistic rather than an idealistic view 
126 1 Volume 8, Numbers 1,2 
Motherhood and Feminism 
of the world, and couple it with the most significant trait any person can have: 
adaptiveness. 
For me, the goal of the next wave of feminist activism is at last clear: 
expanding adaptiveness from our lives into the life of the culture we inhabit. 
Women are adaptable. We  excel at it. Biologically, our bodies are coded to 
adapt to amazing extremes in the process of procreation-as anyone who has 
experienced or witnessed pregnancy and labor can attest. That women have for 
centuries been doing the work ofbearing and raising children on top ofthe labor 
of the home and of the field and factory attests to the female ability to adapt to 
extraordinary demands. The question is, should such demands of adaptiveness 
be limited to women? Are we, as one of my friends recently put it when asked 
to take on yet another project at work on top of her already overflowing work 
load and her "home" work of parenting five children, being punished for our 
competence? 
My nine-year-old son recently watched a television program in which 
scientists discussing the shrinking Y chromosome speculated that the male of 
the species could eventually die out due to becoming unnecessary for perpetu- 
ating the species. The genetic evolution of some species has been toward 
parthenogenesis, the female of the species adapting to a point where procrea- 
tion is possible with no input from the male. My son, who is just on the cusp 
of really getting the whole sex thing, voiced concern over the idea of men dying 
out. "Do you think that's true?" he asked me. I had a flashback to an earlier 
discussion regarding his fear about what would happen to people when the sun 
becomes a red giant and burns up the earth in a few million years. I comforted 
him then by saying that given the long time we have to prepare for such an event, 
I was sure that our distant descendants of the human race would figure out a 
survival plan. Looking at his concerned face as he contemplated the idea of 
men-such as he will be one day soon-eventually becoming genetically 
unnecessary, I did not give a hint of the round of articles that came out a couple 
of years ago about the obsolete male, fueled in part by scientists in Japan 
successfully forcing parthenogenesis in genetically altered rats (Kono, et. al., 
2004; Loebel and Tam, 2004; Kirchheimer, 2004). That a Google search of the 
term "obsolete male" would turn up over two million hits. Instead, I told him 
I did not know if such a thing would happen, but that evolution occurs slowly 
over many thousands of years, so it would be a long, long time before we have 
to worry about it. "And maybe by then," he replied, 'We'll have figured some 
things out." "I hope so," I said. 
But I was thinkingwe need to figure something out now. My husband and 
son don't want to be obsolete men who are just obstacles to women's success in 
the world. They don't want to have their contribution to family reduced to their 
paycheck. They want to beworking partners in the business oflife. AndI'm sure 
that women don't want to have to evolve into some double-bodied creature that 
manages to be in two places at once-earning a living and parenting her 
children-or, worse, evolve into two types of females, like worker bees and 
Journal of the Association for Research on Mothering ( 127 
procreating bees. Probably there are many men who still need to adapt further 
to the necessary roles of active fatherhood and full partners in running the 
home. But a key change needs to occur in our culture. Unless we advocate for 
significant change in the structure of our societies-changes that adapt to the 
needs of parents and children by valuing the traditional "women's work" of 
home-making and child-rearing, we may be headed to cultural disaster. How 
long can we survive no paid family leave, little flexibility for workers to attend 
school functions or parent teacher conferences or to take care of sick children 
or elderly parents without jeopardizing theirjobs, the high price of motherhood 
(so well documented by Ann Crittenden, 2001) that forces stay-at-home and 
part-time working mothers to sacrifice financial security in order to parent their 
children, welfare policies that insist on forcing mothers ofyoung children into 
the work force? 
As it stands now, with too many corporate and government policies that 
either conflict with or fail to acknowledge family needs, I can't help but 
wonder--is America insisting on becoming the Titanic? A luxury liner, the 
grandest ship in the world with all the amenities imaginable for the upper class 
and locked decks to prevent the lower classes from climbing out-all sailing 
merrily to a watery death because we refuse to provide adequate lifeboats, escape 
routes, and support ships during the inevitable challenges of life? The biggest 
and most predictable set of challenges that the majority of adults face in life 
reside in parenthood. I think it's time our culture starts to recognize that raising 
children isn't like an iceberg in treacherous seas threatening to do us all in. It's 
more like the rudder that should be properly positioned to guide us to calmer 
waters. 
References 
Crittenden, Ann. 2001. The Price ofMotherhood: Why the Most Important Job in 
the World Is Still the Least Valued. New York: Henry Holt. 
Green, Brian. 2003. The Elegant Universe: Superstring Theo y, Hidden Dimen- 
sions, and the Quest for the Ultimate Theoy. New York: Vintage Books. 
Kirchheimer, Sid. 2004. "Are Men Becoming Obsolete? Genetically Engi- 
neered Mice Reach Adulthood via 'Virgin Birth."' WebMD. April 28. 
Online: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4855068/ 
Kono, Tomohiro, Yayoi Obata, Quiong Wu, Katsutoshi Niwa, Yukiko Ono, 
Yuji Yamamoto, Eun Sung Park, Jeong-Sun Seo and Hidehiko Ogawa. 
2004. "Birth of Parthenogenetic Mice That Can Develop to Adulthood." 
Nature 428: 860-864. 
Loebel, David A. F. and PatrickP. L. Tam. 2004. "Genomic Imprinting: Mice 
without a Father." Nature 428: 809-811. 
Peskowitz, Miriam. 2005. The Truth Behind the Mommy Wars: Who Decides 
What Makes a Good Mother? Emeryville, CA: Seal Press. 
128 1 Volume 8, Numbers 1,2 


Motherhood and Feminism: Lessons from the Titanic