Guyanese Online

Post- Mother’s Day—The OTHER  Say?

By Yvonne Sam

What do we really celebrate on Mother’s Day– When what is considered motherhood is no longer a reality?

Mother’s Day recently went by with all and sundry celebrating, recalling, acknowledging and appreciating in all manner, shape and form the maternal sacrifices made—basically Mom being there. Sadly what we consider motherhood today is no longer a reality.

In Canada, Britain, the United States and even Australia motherhood means not being there. Plainly stated motherhood means dropping the kids off to someone, somewhere else but home on the way to work.  For millions of children, the person teaching them how to talk, how to walk, how to eat, how to learn, how to treat others, how to play and what to say– is the other—the daycare worker who clocks in at $14-$15 an hour in Quebec.     

Consider your mother not only a minority but a rarity, if she works full time as a mother- supporting your father, helping you with your homework, keeping the home stocked and supplied, dealing with service repairmen, maintaining a budget, planning and cooking nutritious meals, cleaning the home, participating in school and community organizations, encouraging you, providing instruction and counsel and being present at school practices and games.

The current norm is for mothers to some or all of the workweek doing something, somewhere else—answering phones, filing reports, or sending electronic messages.

It is now normal for moms to spend some or all of the workweek doing something else somewhere else: answering phones, filing reports, typing on a computer. To all intents and purposes society is making it virtually impossible for mothers to look after their own children especially in the formative years—the role is being played by– The Other—-Daycare Worker. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/family/success-hungry-generation-fell-love-motherhood/There is an eventual price to be paid for such a move. Anecdotal evidence is building that things are amiss — increased aggression, lack of basic table manners, an alarming growth in speech problems that simply were not present two decades ago. .

Successive governments are also culpable, as they also encouraged mothers to relinquish their roles and go out to work, so that the more couples could pay for a house, which saw the price of real estate skyrocketing.  In certain areas only dual income families could purchase a home, so that, even when one parent would prefer not to work, that choice became increasingly unaffordable. The days when most moms spent their hours and their energy supporting their husbands, managing their homes, and raising their children disappeared more than a generation ago. Today a mother looking after her own small children is considered a luxury.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/family/working-mothers-mean-society-changing-not-necessarily-better/

In a May 5, 2017 speech at Brown University Janet Yellenthe Chair of the United States Federal Reserve, strongly encouraged more American women to join the workforce.  According to Yellen, if all women left their children and homes to the care of others and clocked in somewhere else, the overall economic output of the United States would rise 5 percent.

https://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/speech/yellen20170505a.htm

Tim Worstall, a writer for Forbes Magazine refuted Yellen’s statement, outlining that while it is a generally accepted axiom of our times that if the female labourforce involvement equaled that of the male then the economy would be greater, we should be careful how we define the economy, larger, and work, in order to make the argument succeed. This means that Janet Yellen’s comments about women in the workforce and a larger economy need to be examined in their detail, not just taken as being true at face valuehttps://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2017/05/06/janet-yellens-not-entirely-correct-that-more-women-working-will-grow-the-economy/#2ad320e6a2cc.

The statistics underpinning what motherhood has become are more impactful than one might imagine. In addition mothers are being persuaded by friends, family, acquaintances and even government bureaucrats to cease working in their homes and commence working in offices, stores, toll booths, restaurants, factories, call centers, stores and hospitals etc. Sad to say but nevertheless still bearing facets of truth, is that leaders in government and society have both

inadvertently and in some cases advertently, made it financially and culturally  prohibitive to be a homemaker. Women are being left with no choice, and are favourably forcing them out of the home. Even if a woman wants to work in the home raising her children, she often finds it virtually impossible. https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/comment/stay-at-home-mums-have-become-ararity-7l0ktmcn9

Over a year ago, The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development

rated Australia in the bottom third for female employment rates and categorized full-time mothers as “not in employment, education or training.”

The oecd experts further contended, “There are potentially large losses to the economy when women stay at home or work short part-time hours.”http://www.oecd.org/australia/connecting-people-with-jobs-key-issues-for-raising-labour-market-participation-in-australia-9789264269637-en.htm.

It is blatantly obvious that Yellen and the OECD simply deemphasize and exclude the work done at home by stay at home mothers. In the absence of a government-issued income and tax statement, does not render a stay-at-home mother’s economic input non-existent. Ignoring the contributions homemakers provide to the economy is tantamount to suppressing the economy.

Alexis de Tocqueville, aprominent diplomat, political philosopher, sociologist, politician and historian, who came to America to study prisons in writing about  19th-century “stay at home moms” in one of the most influential book Democracy in America, examining among other things the role of the family, stated unhesitatingly that although the American women are restrained  within the narrow circle of  domestic life , and in some respects in a situation of extreme reliance, nevertheless they were the primary reason behind America’s greatness. http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/tocqueville-women-made-america-great/

The time has arrived for a societal reconsideration.  Where feasibly possible, women should return to their homes and reassume their biblical roles as wives and mothers.  An end must be put to the immeasurable suffering to which our children have been subjected.

Celebration of Mother’s day should not just be the execution of tradition, nostalgia or warm sentiment. It is the core principle of a functioning society.

Motherhood and all its accompanying duties were given by the Creator to the mother, not intended to be passed on to THE OTHER.