Trade215,
Sorry if I thought that you were only being scarastic of myself.

Do you want fries with that?As if children were the optional extra.If you ask any leader after a few years in office would they trade their position for their children; and guess what the answer will be.There is a price for everything and being a leader isn't necessarily all that flash. Ambition is directly proportional to our own insecurity.

Timkin

my response was to Audrey.

part of the problem we have created between the roles of parenting and career can be found in the phenomenon of the commodification of the child andthe distorted perception we have of parenting. These days if we have children it had better be a good one or someones got to be held accountable, alternatively if we have any doubts about the quality of the product, or the timing of the delivery for that matter, it can be jettisoned quite readily.

As predictable as the shot of a set of twins or triplets being splashed across the front page of our newspapers on the first day of school every year is the article by an economist advising us of the real cost, down to the last cent, of raisng a child. So within the realm of choice and cost the intrinsic value of children is some what lost. The term "our" children has assumed propriatorial dimensions. More and more we are seeking some immediate and tangible return on our investment.

Accordingly we need to be there - all the time - we ferry them to music and dance class; we take them to swimming lessons and tennis. We seek increasingly expensive and intensive modes of education. We subject them to direct and indirect pressures to deliver results in education and employment. We feel driven to do these things as it is, or so we believe , in thier best interests. Contemporary parenting has become a distorted and dysfunctional relationship between them and us. We are driven to drive and confuse it with nurturing - and of course we are the best to nurture.

Historically however parents were often the last to to much at all with children. While it is a crude distinction if you had the resources someone else cared for the children for a fee (not too dissimilar than today). If you were not well resourced someone else cared for the children because they were there when you were labouring in the fields or where ever - wet nurses, grandmothers aunts uncles elder sisters any one - parents were part of an equation of care. To assume we are the best is the hieght of arrogance.

But not today. Today we want to be there at the helm. We also want to make choices without consequences. We have a right to children. We have a right to a job - at the same time. And sadly while we struggle to reconcile this problem, apart from a little bit of guilt and envy that we might suffer, the real losers are the little economic units we seem to want to bring into this world in a very controlled and calculated fashion.

Arjay, Inkeemagee
In the case of Gillard not getting the job of leader of the opposition, the author of the article tries to infer that this was because she was single and childless. If that was a factor, then I think it would have been one factor amongst many. Should she get the job “only” because she is single and childless? Of course not, because she needs many other qualifications besides this.

Howard is an unattractive man, but an extremely good and experienced political strategist. Gillard is a charming and intelligent woman, but wouldn’t stand much of a chance against Howard who is also being supported by the Bush government and the neocons. In another time she might have gotten the job, or if Beazley can straighten out the Labor party, then he could help pave the way for her in the future.

However the article is typical of so many that are churned out, in that it is written to a formula. The formula is to try and make women feel insecure in some way (anyway will do) because they are female. There are numerous magazines filled with such articles and eventually they do make women feel insecure. The biased nature of these articles and the formula they are written to is ultimately very destructive for women.

SLIDING DOORS scenario - Miss JG marries in 1970, has 3 children and parents them excellently in every way. In 1985 their father floats away with THE HOMEWRECKER. Between 1985 and 2005 this other JG wrings herself out trying to stay employed (on account of being out of the work loop) and now aged 56 and arthritic, does regular battle with Centrelink who refuse to believe that NOBODY wants to employ JG.

Having provided this country with 3 taxpaying citizens, it has now thrown me on the scrap heap like the Old Man did. I warn all young women to avoid breeding.