I really think a huge key to this is that the right has recognized this is a shit situation for women (and also for men, but we are talking about the women here). All I get presented from the left on social media is anger and more demands on my time - go out and protest, make 5 phone calls every single day, run for local office, go to your local school board and city council meetings, etc etc etc. As someone who is actually really involved in my local community and on various committees and advocacy groups, I am TAPPED OUT but keep getting asked for more (not just by social media, by my actual communities - I have joked in the last few months that everyone wants me on their committee). And this is on top of my work and family commitments. And I only work part-time! I do not even have a whole-ass full-time job. I am not sucked in by the tradwife content, but I see the appeal. It looks way more relaxing than anything presented to me from the side I actually agree with.
One other thought on this (I know Emily has pointed this out before but I think it's so important). The Right is paying and investing in these women so the social media performance becomes their full time job for compensation, not a free side gig. I think that's a huge piece of the puzzle that the Big Donors on the left need to understand (and that Emily has been screaming about for a while 🤯).
The Left is being asked for free labor to spread the messages while the The Right is being asked to work for pay. I mean... Put that in the context of the policy messages from the left around "fair wages, equal pay, fair trade, no labor exploitation, pro union, etc..." It's ineffective, hypocritical, counterproductive, and insulting.
The book 'Raising Them Right" talks about how the right invests much more heavily in political groups and such on college campuses too, giving New Right groups much larger budgets and more paying jobs to advocate for their policies on campus than Left groups do. If we want people to be messengers (especially effective and consistent ones), we should pay them for their labor.
I agree with you that we keep getting asked for more. I feel the same way. Running Instagram accounts like the big tradwife accounts IS a FULL TIME job (so doing it on top of another job seems really hard). That's being said, I agree with this article 1000%. Emily is absolutely right.
These "tradwife" women are actually entrepreneurs, often making more money than their husbands, which is part of the irony of this whole thing. Candace Owens is THE epitome of this. She is the CEO of a small media company!! I remember seeing a quote from her that said something like "Yeah, I am a full time working woman but being a mom is what really makes me happy so that's why I tell other women they should stay home instead of work." I mean, GTFOH!! She's literally living the feminist empowerment that she's belittling. It's horrific.
"All I get presented from the left on social media is anger and more demands on my time - go out and protest, make 5 phone calls every single day, run for local office, go to your local school board and city council meetings, etc etc etc."
100% this. We. Are. Tired. And not to sound nihilistic, but when our long tiring efforts manage to make a difference, that difference feels like it's ultimately wasted by the left or rolled back and/or destroyed in mere seconds by the right.
I would love to not have to work an 8-5 job. BUT, so would my husband. How fair is it to him that he should shoulder all the burden? In addition, I'm a terrible cook and I don't desire to learn. We shoulder the burden together. He cooks dinner every night. I do the laundry, etc. etc. Partnership is what makes our marriage great. I cannot imagine being in a role where I have no autonomy and am subject to the whims of my partner. My son sees a working family that loves him and also have lives that don't completely revolve him. He is going to be a great husband one day who will shoulder the burden of whatever is put before his family (should he choose to have one). Yes, the rat-race sucks. But also sucks for my husband. What we need is more support for families all around. MORE support = better parents no matter what lifestyle you choose.
SAHM to two kids, including one with disabilities. The trad wife accounts infuriate me because the picture they paint simply isn't realistic. Setting aside the fact that single-income households aren't financially possible for most families, being home with your kids isn't the sun-dappled, quiet joyfest shown in reels. It's loud, messy, lonely, and full of endless labor that is simply unvalued by society at large. The narrative whispered by serene-looking online trad wives is that the joy in supporting your family is all the compensation you need for your 24-hour job. And you know what? I love my family, but there is no joy in cleaning diarrhea off the floor, defusing meltdowns, and doing endless loads of laundry. This work is hard and should be valued. After all, if I weren't able to stay home and do it, we'd be spending $$$ for other people (mostly women!) to do it for us. By encouraging women to stay home and work for free, the right feels free to reduce or even eliminate government programs that support families. And what really sucks is that I have little time or energy left in my day to fight and advocate. It's so demoralizing.
Yes! Between the tradwives and (related) MAHA moms what has rung most hollow for me is the immense amount of privilege both groups have to only see as far as their own nose.
Very interesting read! The right had recognized that women (especially moms) are struggling and have capitalized on it. To me their big political movement seems to shift even more on on moms - you need to censor what your kids learn in school, you need to do all the research and decide if vaccines are safe, you need to be the ones to feed them safe food - can’t trust the food supply. Which ultimately makes the problem worse in my opinion. To me the future looks like - paid leave, access to high quality affordable childcare, access to high quality public schools with great teachers, access to great pediatricians - not this narrative of discrediting everything. We can invest and we can do this 💪🏻 moms deserve systems they can trust and depend on so they can enjoy their kids and their jobs (wether that be cooperate America, stay at home mom or something in between).
I’ve never fully considered the amount of time I spend researching everything and hadn’t fully connected it to a systemic issue. You’re absolutely right. If we had more robust and trust worthy systems, some of the burden of motherhood (and womanhood) would be lifted.
I’d also add reduced standard work weeks. Work and school hours that are more aligned to each other to reduce before and after school care gaps.
Hi, Emily -- I notice in the photo excerpts you show from the tradwife accounts that the woman is either alone, or alone with a child. In real life, this kind of isolation is all too common and takes a toll on women and families. Perhaps the social-media-inclined among us could promote a vision of women's lives (whether parenting, working outside the home, or both) that are richer in community - where women are not isolated in these roles but are part of communities of care, collective labor, fun, friendship, whatever. Such a vision might appeal to some of the women now being seduced by the tradwife social media universe.
What you say about the importance of using social media as skillfully as the right wing has makes so much sense. Yet I feel great resistance to directing my own time and energy to online activity. Deleting my facebook account back in 2020 enhanced my quality of life so much, and in general I find the less time I spend online, the better I feel physically and mentally.
This is an important article in so many ways. Hopefully I can contribute to this conversation. I was raised in a conservative religious environment where I fully internalized that my life goal was to be a wife and mother. I got a college degree, but it was in Marriage and Family Studies, because I never intended to have a career outside of the home and I wanted my education to reflect that goal. I have been a SAHM for almost 10 years now and while I have really enjoyed doing that and have no regrets, I also feel a lot of worry about how I've been left behind professionally. If anything were to happen to my husband I would be starting at square one trying to enter the workforce. My education does not qualify me for high pay jobs.
Now that both of my children are in school I have a VERY part time job, but even that is difficult to juggle in the summer months and when there are other school breaks. I'm lucky to have family close by that can help out. I will be nowhere near retirement age by the time my youngest is 18 so I definitely forsee a future where I will want to enter the workforce full time, but again it will require me to start at the bottom, with my peers decades ahead of me.
As for right now, our school systems are set up with the assumption that one parent will always be at home. I want to go on the field trips and be involved in their schools. I want them to be able to participate in extra curricular activities. And that's hard to do while working.
Add to all that the attack on public schools right now that makes me view homeschooling with ever increasing interest.
I think the Democrats actually do have a lot of solutions to these issues but we're not presenting them well. Universal health care would mean that women could work or not work and not have to worry about medical coverage. Better paid family leave policies and flexible work arrangements would enable moms who want to work to do so without sacrificing precious time with our children. The child tax credit that Republicans keep trying to eliminate is honestly just the start of what I would actually love to see - government subsidies for women who choose to stay home full time. It's WORK so let's value it and PAY MOMS to do it. (Dare I say universal basic income?)
I'd love to see federal programs that help moms re-enter the workforce after years of homemaking. I wish society did not punish us for raising children full time.
The tradwife movement makes women who choose homemaking and the SAHM mom life feel valued and important in a world that often makes us feel useless. I don't consume tradwife content but I can definitely see why I would have loved it in the past. The left can do a better job at valuing a woman's choice to "live the traditional life" and also communicating that Democratic policies would actually make this choice EASIER and less fraught with financial risk. Democrats need to be able to articulate "if you want to stay home and care for your home and children, we have policies that will help you do that successfully."
Yes to all of this. I've been a SAHM and secular homeschooling mom for over 10 years now. I have an education and experience in my field, but it's too far back to "count" when I re-enter the workforce. If I listed my current skills and accomplishments, no one would take them seriously because it wasn't professional - it's just "mom stuff."
I manage our home, plan, organize and execute educating my two children (and in doing so have learned so much left out of my own education!) with the financial and time management and self motivation that requires. I also founded and lead a community of 15+ families - organizing and leading classes, field trips, and generally building community. I've been in support roles for my kiddos extracurriculars - volunteering and working as a team with other parents.
All of those experiences involved me gaining tons of skills and experience - none of which would count on a resume since it's "mom stuff," as if I'd spent the last 10+ years twiddling my thumbs.
I love my life and I'm glad I *chose* it, but I definitely agree it's not a valued role. Otherwise, as my children age, I wouldn't be fretting so much about my own employment prospects.
I have so many feelings about all of this. I'm only 53, which isn't exactly ancient, but it's apparently old enough to be able to clearly see the major pitfalls of the tradwife lifestyle. Our mothers and grandmothers didn't have the choices we have today and they suffered for it. The problem with all this traditional family roles nonsense is that it has zero flexibility for when life itself happens. People get sick, people die, divorces happen (at least they do for now while they are still legal!) And when any one of these things happen, the whole house of cards falls down. Women without jobs, without experience, without their own income are left in dire straits when their husbands die or leave them. We've been moving away from this kind of mindset because it doesn't work!
Maybe the problem with a vision from the left is not only the lack of funding for influencers, but also that the left isn't trying to present a one size fits all identity for anyone. The left is all about actual freedom, freedom to be whoever you want to be. Hard to encapsulate as one vision.
Agree with Caron - my vision for the future is better support for families all around. Paid leave for all. Better, more affordable health care, including better postpartum care, which, in my experience, is basically non-existent. AFFORDABLE CHILDCARE. School days and school years that account for working parents. Workplaces that account for the fact that people have lives outside of work. We should all have choice about how we live our lives. While I love to cook and sometimes wish that I was home baking something on a workday, I do not wish to be a full time caregiver to my children. I want to work and have autonomy. I do not have the flexibility I want (and neither does my husband) because everything child related is very expensive, housing is very expensive, etc. etc.
Poor sourdough-- it's just been minding it's own business, being a delicious vehicle for butter and jam, and it gets weaponized by the right.
Thank you for your words, Emily! Sending to a friend who just was telling me about her friend who is feeling guilty about going back to work after having a baby and (RED FLAG) recently just made her first sourdough loaf.. as someone who has been baking sourdough since before it was The Thing, we gotta look out for those taking their first, doughy steps into the dark abyss. You can bake and have a job, and not be subservient, and I'm doing my part to spread the message.
After growing up in a very pro-trad-wife religion, a big issue I had with this lifestyle is you have to attach yourself to a man to make it possible. A man also raised in this religion and taught to be attracted to pretty, preferably blonde woman who want to serve him. Most women got married young to men they hardly knew. Smart women who were more focused on education & career in their early 20s (or not conventionally attractive/thin) ended up having to lower their standards as the options narrowed so achieve this only acceptable version of adulthood that they couldn’t do alone.
Yes I agree with you. I was in a culture that sounds similar and if you weren’t the ideal submissive, virginal, etc bride at 19 or early 20’s, you were not the hot ticket. I know many women who were a part of that culture who never married despite wanting to because they missed “the window” according to their subculture.
Yes I agree with you. I was in a culture that sounds similar and if you weren’t the ideal submissive, virginal, etc bride at 19 or early 20’s, you were not the hot ticket. I know many women who were a part of that culture who never married despite wanting to because they missed the window.
I want a world where women have the freedom to decide what works best for themselves and their own households. I feel like the US is the only country where a balanced life is thought of as a luxury; why can't it be the norm to have a good solid job (if you want one) but plenty of vacation that you can actually take; I love my job as a lawyer and I also love being a mom and being a woman with other non-law interests/hobbies.
There are times when I see these ladies in their kitchens and think, wow, that looks pleasant. Except I don’t want to have to hold a baby while I bake, I want to have help. And their Instagram kitchens bear little resemblance to my actual kitchen with piles of artwork and kid jewelry and art supplies scattered around. And sometimes I don’t want to bake bread, I want to go to the cute bakery on the next block and buy some bread and a little latte as a treat.
Anyway, my grandmothers worked. One was lucky and got to go to nursing school because there was a war and the government would pay, so she worked nights and still had a bunch of babies. The other one didn’t get the credit she deserved for bartending at her husband’s bar and running a tight ship at home. I don’t relate to this idea of prior generations having this all figured out because they worked hard and struggled to get our generation to where it is, with options. My mom did take time away from her career, and it was hard and lonely work to raise babies.
I am tired. I work and have kids and it is hard. I don’t ever feel in balance, and it is a rare treat to have a social life. Motherhood feels all-consuming so much of the time, whether I am with my kids or not. And we are lucky to have good jobs with flexibility. But I want there to be recognition in the form of policy changes that parenting is hard work that benefits all of us in the long run if it’s done well. Women have always worked for their families. This isn’t “modern life,” it’s reality.
I connected with this so much. I am not a mother but I still get pushed this content all of the time. I love gardening, drinking coffee on the porch while it rains and then baking. But I also want to connect with my colleagues, support them while they do important research and I honestly enjoy working. I’d be fine working less hours of course 😝
I struggle to see what this content looks like in a visual, aesthetic-first platform, especially with kids. I would love to see a roundup of women who are doing this well already. Any recs? @motherhoodforgood might be one example? But her content is more political than lifestyle. Thanks for any suggestions anyone had to help the rest of us see how this might look.
Talks about motherhood, mental health and is a gun safety/reform advocate. Her life is very aesthetically pleasing but she talks about how much she works, how she has help, how her and her husband are partners, etc. doesn’t talk politics that often but will bring it up
Our people are making their way into this space. I’ve long thought about how to make my way there because I AM a SAHM, a longtime gardener, a very light homesteader, and former micro flower farmer. Do you see a gap in content?
I've been talking about this in the context of talking about politics without talking about politics, and how we've got to learn how to do it.
You write:
"We have to show up where the battleground actually is: in feeds, in stories, in culture. And we have to offer more than critique, we have to offer a vision.
A vision where freedom doesn’t mean burnout, where motherhood isn’t isolation, and where femininity isn’t weaponized against us. A vision of modern womanhood that’s not defined by tradition or performance."
You're 100% correct. I submit, however, that we have to reframe that vision with positive values, not negative associations.
I would love to have you on my pod/substack to have this exact conversation...especially since we have to provide a positive vision of femininity and womanhood and choice, and not just oppose theirs.
I really think a huge key to this is that the right has recognized this is a shit situation for women (and also for men, but we are talking about the women here). All I get presented from the left on social media is anger and more demands on my time - go out and protest, make 5 phone calls every single day, run for local office, go to your local school board and city council meetings, etc etc etc. As someone who is actually really involved in my local community and on various committees and advocacy groups, I am TAPPED OUT but keep getting asked for more (not just by social media, by my actual communities - I have joked in the last few months that everyone wants me on their committee). And this is on top of my work and family commitments. And I only work part-time! I do not even have a whole-ass full-time job. I am not sucked in by the tradwife content, but I see the appeal. It looks way more relaxing than anything presented to me from the side I actually agree with.
One other thought on this (I know Emily has pointed this out before but I think it's so important). The Right is paying and investing in these women so the social media performance becomes their full time job for compensation, not a free side gig. I think that's a huge piece of the puzzle that the Big Donors on the left need to understand (and that Emily has been screaming about for a while 🤯).
The Left is being asked for free labor to spread the messages while the The Right is being asked to work for pay. I mean... Put that in the context of the policy messages from the left around "fair wages, equal pay, fair trade, no labor exploitation, pro union, etc..." It's ineffective, hypocritical, counterproductive, and insulting.
The book 'Raising Them Right" talks about how the right invests much more heavily in political groups and such on college campuses too, giving New Right groups much larger budgets and more paying jobs to advocate for their policies on campus than Left groups do. If we want people to be messengers (especially effective and consistent ones), we should pay them for their labor.
I agree with you that we keep getting asked for more. I feel the same way. Running Instagram accounts like the big tradwife accounts IS a FULL TIME job (so doing it on top of another job seems really hard). That's being said, I agree with this article 1000%. Emily is absolutely right.
These "tradwife" women are actually entrepreneurs, often making more money than their husbands, which is part of the irony of this whole thing. Candace Owens is THE epitome of this. She is the CEO of a small media company!! I remember seeing a quote from her that said something like "Yeah, I am a full time working woman but being a mom is what really makes me happy so that's why I tell other women they should stay home instead of work." I mean, GTFOH!! She's literally living the feminist empowerment that she's belittling. It's horrific.
"All I get presented from the left on social media is anger and more demands on my time - go out and protest, make 5 phone calls every single day, run for local office, go to your local school board and city council meetings, etc etc etc."
100% this. We. Are. Tired. And not to sound nihilistic, but when our long tiring efforts manage to make a difference, that difference feels like it's ultimately wasted by the left or rolled back and/or destroyed in mere seconds by the right.
I would love to not have to work an 8-5 job. BUT, so would my husband. How fair is it to him that he should shoulder all the burden? In addition, I'm a terrible cook and I don't desire to learn. We shoulder the burden together. He cooks dinner every night. I do the laundry, etc. etc. Partnership is what makes our marriage great. I cannot imagine being in a role where I have no autonomy and am subject to the whims of my partner. My son sees a working family that loves him and also have lives that don't completely revolve him. He is going to be a great husband one day who will shoulder the burden of whatever is put before his family (should he choose to have one). Yes, the rat-race sucks. But also sucks for my husband. What we need is more support for families all around. MORE support = better parents no matter what lifestyle you choose.
SAHM to two kids, including one with disabilities. The trad wife accounts infuriate me because the picture they paint simply isn't realistic. Setting aside the fact that single-income households aren't financially possible for most families, being home with your kids isn't the sun-dappled, quiet joyfest shown in reels. It's loud, messy, lonely, and full of endless labor that is simply unvalued by society at large. The narrative whispered by serene-looking online trad wives is that the joy in supporting your family is all the compensation you need for your 24-hour job. And you know what? I love my family, but there is no joy in cleaning diarrhea off the floor, defusing meltdowns, and doing endless loads of laundry. This work is hard and should be valued. After all, if I weren't able to stay home and do it, we'd be spending $$$ for other people (mostly women!) to do it for us. By encouraging women to stay home and work for free, the right feels free to reduce or even eliminate government programs that support families. And what really sucks is that I have little time or energy left in my day to fight and advocate. It's so demoralizing.
Yes! Between the tradwives and (related) MAHA moms what has rung most hollow for me is the immense amount of privilege both groups have to only see as far as their own nose.
👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼
Very interesting read! The right had recognized that women (especially moms) are struggling and have capitalized on it. To me their big political movement seems to shift even more on on moms - you need to censor what your kids learn in school, you need to do all the research and decide if vaccines are safe, you need to be the ones to feed them safe food - can’t trust the food supply. Which ultimately makes the problem worse in my opinion. To me the future looks like - paid leave, access to high quality affordable childcare, access to high quality public schools with great teachers, access to great pediatricians - not this narrative of discrediting everything. We can invest and we can do this 💪🏻 moms deserve systems they can trust and depend on so they can enjoy their kids and their jobs (wether that be cooperate America, stay at home mom or something in between).
Elizabeth- great take!!
I’ve never fully considered the amount of time I spend researching everything and hadn’t fully connected it to a systemic issue. You’re absolutely right. If we had more robust and trust worthy systems, some of the burden of motherhood (and womanhood) would be lifted.
I’d also add reduced standard work weeks. Work and school hours that are more aligned to each other to reduce before and after school care gaps.
Hi, Emily -- I notice in the photo excerpts you show from the tradwife accounts that the woman is either alone, or alone with a child. In real life, this kind of isolation is all too common and takes a toll on women and families. Perhaps the social-media-inclined among us could promote a vision of women's lives (whether parenting, working outside the home, or both) that are richer in community - where women are not isolated in these roles but are part of communities of care, collective labor, fun, friendship, whatever. Such a vision might appeal to some of the women now being seduced by the tradwife social media universe.
What you say about the importance of using social media as skillfully as the right wing has makes so much sense. Yet I feel great resistance to directing my own time and energy to online activity. Deleting my facebook account back in 2020 enhanced my quality of life so much, and in general I find the less time I spend online, the better I feel physically and mentally.
I love all of this. Community :) If only they would all just magically see social media as harmful as ______ (insert whatever the latest thing is)
This is an important article in so many ways. Hopefully I can contribute to this conversation. I was raised in a conservative religious environment where I fully internalized that my life goal was to be a wife and mother. I got a college degree, but it was in Marriage and Family Studies, because I never intended to have a career outside of the home and I wanted my education to reflect that goal. I have been a SAHM for almost 10 years now and while I have really enjoyed doing that and have no regrets, I also feel a lot of worry about how I've been left behind professionally. If anything were to happen to my husband I would be starting at square one trying to enter the workforce. My education does not qualify me for high pay jobs.
Now that both of my children are in school I have a VERY part time job, but even that is difficult to juggle in the summer months and when there are other school breaks. I'm lucky to have family close by that can help out. I will be nowhere near retirement age by the time my youngest is 18 so I definitely forsee a future where I will want to enter the workforce full time, but again it will require me to start at the bottom, with my peers decades ahead of me.
As for right now, our school systems are set up with the assumption that one parent will always be at home. I want to go on the field trips and be involved in their schools. I want them to be able to participate in extra curricular activities. And that's hard to do while working.
Add to all that the attack on public schools right now that makes me view homeschooling with ever increasing interest.
I think the Democrats actually do have a lot of solutions to these issues but we're not presenting them well. Universal health care would mean that women could work or not work and not have to worry about medical coverage. Better paid family leave policies and flexible work arrangements would enable moms who want to work to do so without sacrificing precious time with our children. The child tax credit that Republicans keep trying to eliminate is honestly just the start of what I would actually love to see - government subsidies for women who choose to stay home full time. It's WORK so let's value it and PAY MOMS to do it. (Dare I say universal basic income?)
I'd love to see federal programs that help moms re-enter the workforce after years of homemaking. I wish society did not punish us for raising children full time.
The tradwife movement makes women who choose homemaking and the SAHM mom life feel valued and important in a world that often makes us feel useless. I don't consume tradwife content but I can definitely see why I would have loved it in the past. The left can do a better job at valuing a woman's choice to "live the traditional life" and also communicating that Democratic policies would actually make this choice EASIER and less fraught with financial risk. Democrats need to be able to articulate "if you want to stay home and care for your home and children, we have policies that will help you do that successfully."
Yes to all of this. I've been a SAHM and secular homeschooling mom for over 10 years now. I have an education and experience in my field, but it's too far back to "count" when I re-enter the workforce. If I listed my current skills and accomplishments, no one would take them seriously because it wasn't professional - it's just "mom stuff."
I manage our home, plan, organize and execute educating my two children (and in doing so have learned so much left out of my own education!) with the financial and time management and self motivation that requires. I also founded and lead a community of 15+ families - organizing and leading classes, field trips, and generally building community. I've been in support roles for my kiddos extracurriculars - volunteering and working as a team with other parents.
All of those experiences involved me gaining tons of skills and experience - none of which would count on a resume since it's "mom stuff," as if I'd spent the last 10+ years twiddling my thumbs.
I love my life and I'm glad I *chose* it, but I definitely agree it's not a valued role. Otherwise, as my children age, I wouldn't be fretting so much about my own employment prospects.
Zinah, I feel like you should run for office. So good.
I have so many feelings about all of this. I'm only 53, which isn't exactly ancient, but it's apparently old enough to be able to clearly see the major pitfalls of the tradwife lifestyle. Our mothers and grandmothers didn't have the choices we have today and they suffered for it. The problem with all this traditional family roles nonsense is that it has zero flexibility for when life itself happens. People get sick, people die, divorces happen (at least they do for now while they are still legal!) And when any one of these things happen, the whole house of cards falls down. Women without jobs, without experience, without their own income are left in dire straits when their husbands die or leave them. We've been moving away from this kind of mindset because it doesn't work!
Maybe the problem with a vision from the left is not only the lack of funding for influencers, but also that the left isn't trying to present a one size fits all identity for anyone. The left is all about actual freedom, freedom to be whoever you want to be. Hard to encapsulate as one vision.
Agree with Caron - my vision for the future is better support for families all around. Paid leave for all. Better, more affordable health care, including better postpartum care, which, in my experience, is basically non-existent. AFFORDABLE CHILDCARE. School days and school years that account for working parents. Workplaces that account for the fact that people have lives outside of work. We should all have choice about how we live our lives. While I love to cook and sometimes wish that I was home baking something on a workday, I do not wish to be a full time caregiver to my children. I want to work and have autonomy. I do not have the flexibility I want (and neither does my husband) because everything child related is very expensive, housing is very expensive, etc. etc.
Poor sourdough-- it's just been minding it's own business, being a delicious vehicle for butter and jam, and it gets weaponized by the right.
Thank you for your words, Emily! Sending to a friend who just was telling me about her friend who is feeling guilty about going back to work after having a baby and (RED FLAG) recently just made her first sourdough loaf.. as someone who has been baking sourdough since before it was The Thing, we gotta look out for those taking their first, doughy steps into the dark abyss. You can bake and have a job, and not be subservient, and I'm doing my part to spread the message.
After growing up in a very pro-trad-wife religion, a big issue I had with this lifestyle is you have to attach yourself to a man to make it possible. A man also raised in this religion and taught to be attracted to pretty, preferably blonde woman who want to serve him. Most women got married young to men they hardly knew. Smart women who were more focused on education & career in their early 20s (or not conventionally attractive/thin) ended up having to lower their standards as the options narrowed so achieve this only acceptable version of adulthood that they couldn’t do alone.
Yes I agree with you. I was in a culture that sounds similar and if you weren’t the ideal submissive, virginal, etc bride at 19 or early 20’s, you were not the hot ticket. I know many women who were a part of that culture who never married despite wanting to because they missed “the window” according to their subculture.
Yes I agree with you. I was in a culture that sounds similar and if you weren’t the ideal submissive, virginal, etc bride at 19 or early 20’s, you were not the hot ticket. I know many women who were a part of that culture who never married despite wanting to because they missed the window.
I want a world where women have the freedom to decide what works best for themselves and their own households. I feel like the US is the only country where a balanced life is thought of as a luxury; why can't it be the norm to have a good solid job (if you want one) but plenty of vacation that you can actually take; I love my job as a lawyer and I also love being a mom and being a woman with other non-law interests/hobbies.
There are times when I see these ladies in their kitchens and think, wow, that looks pleasant. Except I don’t want to have to hold a baby while I bake, I want to have help. And their Instagram kitchens bear little resemblance to my actual kitchen with piles of artwork and kid jewelry and art supplies scattered around. And sometimes I don’t want to bake bread, I want to go to the cute bakery on the next block and buy some bread and a little latte as a treat.
Anyway, my grandmothers worked. One was lucky and got to go to nursing school because there was a war and the government would pay, so she worked nights and still had a bunch of babies. The other one didn’t get the credit she deserved for bartending at her husband’s bar and running a tight ship at home. I don’t relate to this idea of prior generations having this all figured out because they worked hard and struggled to get our generation to where it is, with options. My mom did take time away from her career, and it was hard and lonely work to raise babies.
I am tired. I work and have kids and it is hard. I don’t ever feel in balance, and it is a rare treat to have a social life. Motherhood feels all-consuming so much of the time, whether I am with my kids or not. And we are lucky to have good jobs with flexibility. But I want there to be recognition in the form of policy changes that parenting is hard work that benefits all of us in the long run if it’s done well. Women have always worked for their families. This isn’t “modern life,” it’s reality.
I connected with this so much. I am not a mother but I still get pushed this content all of the time. I love gardening, drinking coffee on the porch while it rains and then baking. But I also want to connect with my colleagues, support them while they do important research and I honestly enjoy working. I’d be fine working less hours of course 😝
I struggle to see what this content looks like in a visual, aesthetic-first platform, especially with kids. I would love to see a roundup of women who are doing this well already. Any recs? @motherhoodforgood might be one example? But her content is more political than lifestyle. Thanks for any suggestions anyone had to help the rest of us see how this might look.
https://www.instagram.com/brimotherhood?igsh=anR4aXNzN3NlbXZy Has some light politics but not as heavy as Motherhoodforgood. She’s a “scrunchy” mom - sourdough and science
I love her!
I struggle wrapping my head around it too. This is a good one I think. https://www.instagram.com/baileeinbloom?igsh=YXR4dzAxdnNva2Qy
Thank you! That looks like a great one. Looking forward to more recs. I’m following them all!! 🥰
https://www.instagram.com/cameronoaksrogers?igsh=MTE1OG1hYmxqNm5idA==
Talks about motherhood, mental health and is a gun safety/reform advocate. Her life is very aesthetically pleasing but she talks about how much she works, how she has help, how her and her husband are partners, etc. doesn’t talk politics that often but will bring it up
Just wanted to thank you all for the recommendations! Exactly what I was looking for after reading this stack.
Our people are making their way into this space. I’ve long thought about how to make my way there because I AM a SAHM, a longtime gardener, a very light homesteader, and former micro flower farmer. Do you see a gap in content?
I've been talking about this in the context of talking about politics without talking about politics, and how we've got to learn how to do it.
You write:
"We have to show up where the battleground actually is: in feeds, in stories, in culture. And we have to offer more than critique, we have to offer a vision.
A vision where freedom doesn’t mean burnout, where motherhood isn’t isolation, and where femininity isn’t weaponized against us. A vision of modern womanhood that’s not defined by tradition or performance."
You're 100% correct. I submit, however, that we have to reframe that vision with positive values, not negative associations.
I would love to have you on my pod/substack to have this exact conversation...especially since we have to provide a positive vision of femininity and womanhood and choice, and not just oppose theirs.