Take two: equality doesn’t mean sameness

And that matters for feminism

This is a revised version of the post I sent out this morning. I am sorry if I offended anyone with the previous version. I did not intend to use exclusionary language and I clearly needed a bit of schooling!

Here’s the truth of how I feel about it. I think trans people are every bit as deserving of our love and respect as anyone else. I believe that the problems and discrimination they face are deserving of our attention. I also understand that the language we use matters and that when you have a platform, like I do, it comes with responsibility. I would never want my words to be used in a way that could cause harm to trans or nonbinary people.

That said, I would like to clarify the fact that my work and advocacy is specifically focused on the struggles of cisgender mothers (or anyone with XX biology experiencing things like childbirth, breastfeeding, periods, etc). As I point out in this article, the struggles of cisgender mothers are inextricably intertwined with the biology of motherhood. Some (trans) men can have babies and some women (trans or cisgender) cannot, but I believe the issues they face are different and specific to their status. They are simply not the focus of my work. I think we need to create space for discussion of cisgender motherhood because it’s essential to our understanding of the challenges faced by the vast majority of mothers. I also think thank we simply lack the language to be able to talk about motherhood in a way that is both inclusive and specific. It’s not a cop-out when I say that talking about mothering and motherhood in a way that is inclusive of non-binary and trans individuals, without erasing issues specific to biologically XX motherhood, is difficult.

Andrea O’Reilly talks extensively about the issue in her book, Matricentric Feminism. Citing Michelle Hughes Miller, she says:

“Neutral language is often used to erase gendered, racialized, classed differences among individuals. The goal is often purportedly equality or inclusion, but that is rarely the outcome we see. Instead, that erasure of specificity is important and dangerous…Parenting and caregiving as neutral concepts both presume that anyone can do and everyone does do these tasks, when data are clear: everyone does not do these tasks, and certainly not the extent that that those who identify as women do.”

O’Reilly acknowledges that the words “mother” and “mothering” can be exclusionary for nonbinary individuals, but ultimately concludes that retaining them is essential for her advocacy without erasure of core issues. I agree with her.

All that to say, I deserved a bit of schooling and I will be more careful in my use of language in the future. This newsletter is for anyone who identifies as a mother, but much of our discussion will focus on biologically-rooted issues of cisgender motherhood. It’s a question of focus, not of intentional exclusion. I am simply not qualified to speak on behalf of trans mothers. I believe that we need to elevate their voices, but theirs is not mine. The issues I choose to focus on here are those most relevant to my own experience as a cisgender mother. I hope you find value in it and I hope you can forgive me for any mistakes I might make along the way as I explore the complexity of these issues.

My last post was about how the feminist fight has always been, and should continue to be, about equality between the sexes. I disagree with the popular rhetoric I see so much of these days that feminism is about choice, because what may seem freely chosen is often so constrained by patriarchal norms about what an acceptable choice is for a woman. As expected, there was a lot of pushback, mainly from women who feel care work is undervalued by society, and that second-wave, girl-boss, lean-in feminism has made it worse. 

So where does that leave us? One of the things that I struggle with in my own feelings about feminism and equality between the sexes is that cisgender men and cisgender women are different. Cisgender women are capable of pregnancy and birth, while cisgender men are not. Cisgender women have breasts that make milk. Cisgender men do not. None of this really matters that much unless you have children, and then it matters a lot. The cost of pregnancy, birth, breastfeeding, and mothering has always fallen disproportionately on women. That’s not about to change, no matter how badly we want it to. Feminism has largely sidestepped the issue of motherhood and its costs, because it represents such an obvious flaw in the plan for true equality. 

The problem with ignoring the issue of biologically-rooted, differential gendered investment in the birthing and rearing of offspring is that it actually perpetuates inequality. Imagine there are two people starting off a marathon at the same starting point. One is a cis man and one is a cis woman. Let’s assume they are equally matched in athletic ability (there are plenty of women out there faster than the average man). The gun goes off. They are neck and neck for the first eight miles. At mile eight, someone hands the woman a 40-pound bodysuit with a giant belly hanging off the front and says, “you’re doing great, but now you have to run the next half mile wearing this.” She loses some ground over the course of that half mile, of course, and then at the eight-and-a-half-mile mark they say, “okay please step into this torture chamber for a minute. We will remove the bodysuit but it’s going to hurt a lot. Actually, in order to get it off we need to tear a hole from your vagina halfway to your asshole. So sorry about that.” Then they give her some gatorade and say “You’re doing great. Now get back out there, but don’t forget to take this too” and hand her a screaming baby. She also has to put on a new kind of bodysuit with half-gallon milk jugs attached to the front and when the baby fusses she has to feed it the milk. The apparatus is finicky and the milk will only come if she and the baby are focused and the baby puts his mouth over the opening in just the right way and sucks really hard for 30 minutes (meaning she has to stop running for it to work). The baby does this every hour. At this point, the race is obviously lost. She can’t even see the man anymore. That’s when they tell her it’s time to put the big-belly bodysuit back on. 

You see my point? Pregnancy, childbirth and breastfeeding are a huge burden and yet, somehow, we are pretending like they are not. In Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign she made the issue of male-female pay gap a central issue of her campaign, citing data that women earn 76 cents on the dollar compared to men. She said “You have more pay parity in today’s world when you start to work, which is why so many young women don’t see this as a problem, because they’re getting equal pay,” she said. “But then when you get up in years, you find out it’s not true anymore. Why? What happened? I’m still the same person, I work just as hard.” 

No, Hillary, she is working ten times harder. We gave her the belly and the vaginal tear and the milk jugs and the baby. That’s what happened! Clinton’s primary proposed solution was passing the Paycheck Fairness Act so that women could learn about their coworkers salaries. In all fairness, she did also say that she supported a larger agenda of furthering economic equality for women workers, including paid leave and access to quality, affordable childcare, but it was a little-referenced piece of the solution. More recently research has determined that the so-called “motherhood penalty” makes up 80% of the gender pay gap. Duh. 

Another widely-cited estimate is that breastfeeding takes up about 1,800 hours of a mother's time in the first year after birth. That’s almost the equivalent of a full-time 40-hour-per-week job. The AAP recommends exclusive breastfeeding for one year and for at least two years after the introduction of complementary solid foods. This work cannot be outsourced. Your partner cannot take an equal share in it. It’s up to mom and mom alone. How can we recommend that women take on what is essentially a second full-time job without making any allowances for it?

What’s the solution? How can we even pretend to talk about equality when the race is rigged from the get-go? This is where I think feminism has work to do. We need to define what exactly we mean by equality. Equality of what? Equal happiness? Equal finances? Equal leisure time? 

This is where, once again, I think we can learn from the hunter-gatherers. Afterall, if humans lived according to their model for 99% of our existence, there must be some wisdom in it. Most hunter-gatherer societies are famous for their lack of hierarchy, for their sharing, and for equality between the sexes. However, in hunter-gather societies, equality does not mean sameness. There are specific gender roles and people rarely diverge from them. Men mostly hunt and women mostly gather and care for children. Although it varies between societies, in most, mothers spend far more time engaged in active childcare than fathers (although they also have far more help than we do in the West). This is because breastfeeding is essential for the survival of a child and typically lasts about three years. Again, this can’t be outsourced (except on occasion to a lactating sister or friend). Men can’t do it, though. They just don’t have the equipment. The primary reason why women gather and men hunt is because gathering is more compatible with childcare. Gathering is hard work, but the women manage it with babies tied to their backs, while taking frequent breaks to breastfeed. Men hunt because chasing large game often requires being gone for days, running as much as 30 miles in a single day, and going for long stretches without food, water and sleep. This is simply not possible with a baby tied to your back. If you stop tracking the giraffe long enough to breastfeed, you lose it. (There are some exceptions: Agta women are famous for hunting with infants on their back, but it’s more the exception that confirms the rule). Despite this very clear division of responsibilities, men and women spend an equal amount of time in leisure, have equal sway in group decision-making, and are “economically independent” in the sense that either can survive without relying on the other. Gathering provides most of the calories, and because meat is shared with the entire group regardless of who made the kill, a woman is not dependent on her husband. 

What can we learn from this? For one thing, no matter what kind of work is being done, whether it’s paid or unpaid in the modern economy, work is work and it should be evenly distributed. The best way of assessing this is by looking at the opposite of work: leisure. If one gender is systematically getting far less leisure time than the other, that’s a problem. This is the case in most developed countries. On average, fathers have at least one more hour of leisure per week than mothers (and it’s much greater in some countries). That might not sound like a lot, but think about how nice it would be if you could go back to doing that weekly yoga class you miss so much, or get a coffee with a friend once a week, without the kids? So many mothers are denied these simple pleasures because of the uneven distribution of work. 

That brings me to the next point: all work has to count as work and not all work can be shared. A woman who has a difficult pregnancy and has to scale back at work should not be penalized for doing so. I think we should integrate paid leave for women with difficult pregnancies (or universally for the first trimester). Breastfeeding should also be taken into account in a woman’s work schedule and should be paid (it’s not a “break”). At home, if a woman is spending a huge portion of her time and energy breastfeeding, or if she is ill from a pregnancy, her husband should pick up the slack in all other domestic and childcare spheres that can be outsourced, such that the total amount of work in all its forms is evenly distributed between a husband and wife. A man who is doing this important domestic work should not be penalized in his paid work if he needs to slow down. 

Finally, women should never be forced into a position of economic dependence on men. If the gender pay gap exists mostly because of motherhood, that’s a clear sign that we are not doing enough to accommodate motherhood in the workforce. I’ve spoken at length in other posts about the need to implement paid leave and flex work options for women. In many hunter-gatherer societies, women only do about 2 or 3 days worth of “economic” labor (which is to say gathering work) over the course of a week. That’s sufficient for her to support herself and her family. With all of our relative wealth in post-industrial countries, shouldn't we be able to offer the same to mothers? The ability to work a 3-day workweek and, in doing so, cover all of our basic needs? The economic independence piece is essential because it’s so inextricably intertwined with equality in decision-making. Since women’s gathering work is just important (if not more) to the survival of her family and community, she has equal say in important group decisions, like whether to move and where (hunter-gatherers relocate as often as every three weeks). As traditional hunter-gatherer societies shift more and more towards agriculture, men spend more time doing farm labor and women spend more time tending to children and domestic work. When this happens, gender inequality grows. Women have less say in household decisions, the gap between women’s and men’s leisure time grows, and women’s activities are increasingly controlled and curtailed by husbands and other members of the community. Women are more likely to be trapped in abusive marriages and more likely to be isolated from supportive kin and family. 

I believe we can only achieve true gender equality when we start acknowledging the hard work entailed in mothering and adjusting workforce expectations to accommodate mothers. This means implementing generous paid leave and mandated part-time, flex-work options for mothers for at least the first three years of a child’s life (to accommodate breastfeeding and bonding). Whether a woman chooses to use these options or not, she should be able to comfortably live off of the salary they provide, whether or not she has a partner (meaning there should probably be some government subsidies to make up the gap in earnings for women under a certain threshold). 

One obvious difficulty with all of this is how to ensure that it doesn’t affect hiring. If companies know they have to offer flex work to a woman after she is pregnant, they might stop hiring women. I’m not a policy-maker, and we obviously can’t just engineer a wholesale adoption of the hunter-gatherer model into contemporary society, but I do know of other countries who have flex work policies for mothers and it seems to work. 

What about mothers who choose to stay home? For one thing, I think under this program many mothers would not have to stay home. So many mothers are forced out of the workforce due to inflexible policies. Having paid leave and mandated flex work would help them navigate motherhood without quitting. Perhaps we should compensate them for breastfeeding work as well, in line with whatever the deficit is between the 3 and 5-day workweek discussed above. I don’t have a precise solution here, but I do think we need to start valuing the work of mothering if we are ever going to achieve true gender equality.