RebelDad

Posted on 03. Nov, 2004 by Brian Reid in General

Need a new place to direct your anger? Try Home Alone America, a new book that happily lays most of the problems with today’s kids, from obesity to Ritalin, firmly at the feet of working mothers. The New York Times tackled the book yesterday in an insightful piece. (Disclaimer: I haven’t read the book. But the author, Mary Eberstadt has published a few pieces in Policy Review, so it sounds as if the Times fairly outlines the book.)

Eberstadt doesn’t exclude men from her book, but it sounds like she goes after the low-hanging fruit (especially for a conservative) of divorcing dads or unmarried fathers who disappear. I can’t find anything in the Times — or past Eberstadt writings — to suggest that she thinks men should be staying home full time at greater rates (though the back of the book, apparently, has an illustration of a kid clinging to a male pant leg. The cover — natch — has a kid clinging to a pantyhose-clad leg.) I’m not the first one to question Eberstadt on this. Check out this aging up still spot-on piece from Reason for a similar take on Eberstadt.

Obviously, I believe (like Eberstadt) that there’s a lot to recommend at-home parenting. Eberstadt says her work “isn’t a finger-pointing book.” But blaming the decline of our youth on women who work makes it clear that Eberstadt believes there is a right choice when it comes to work/family balance: staying home (if you happen to be female) or staying married and, presumably, working (if you happen to be male).

This is a mommy war book, no doubt about it, and like every other mommy war book, it sounds like it largely misses the central point when it comes to work, family and kids: (all together now) Flexibility is key. There has to be flexibility in work arrangements so that work and family are not set in opposition to one another. And there has to be flexibility in gender roles so that no husband or wife is consigned to a family role on the sole basis of their sex.