While I absolutely love the book, and the conversations it’s spawning, I do try to remember that, say, attachment parenting, although it seems like 90% of people I know are trying to do it, is a BLIP on our nation’s radar. Most babies are on formula, most babies are in daycare, most babies are vaxx’d, most boys are circumcised, etc. I hate to pick on people who are already on the fringes for trying to defend their choices, many of which are great, sensible choices. How can women attempt to agitate for issues which ARE choices without being judgmental? One could say, never, but if you think that circumsion is genuinely wrong, do you say so to other moms? Do you try to convince people? When is it ‘mommy wars’ and when is it ‘lobbying for change’?
Well here’s the thing – they may be on the fringes population-wise, but not in terms of their cultural power and significance. And I don’t see it as “picking on” as much as I do thinking critically. But maybe that’s a fancy way to say picking on, I don’t know. And some of these issues – like anti-vaccination – have a huge impact even if they’re just practiced by a few people. The CDC says the whooping cough epidemic is at the worst its been in 50 years. If you can watch a video of a kid suffering with whooping cough and still not vaccinate…I don’t even know what to say. So that’s a tremendous public health issue. But with all of these issues, it’s always going to be painted as “mommy wars” so long as it’s women debating things. The difference for me in terms of what we should be focused on is lobbying individual mothers versus trying to create systemic change. It seems to me that all of this nastiness on mom boards and blogs (and I’m sorry, there IS a lot of nastiness) is a distraction that keeps us from politically mobilizing. So no, I’m probably not going to say to an individual mom that I think such and such is wrong (unless it’s vaccination then I’m just going to make sure my kid goes nowhere near her kid) because it’s not likely to create change that has any lasting impact.
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Ugh. Pet peeve: I hate it when people decide that antivaccination is some sort of core principle of attachment parenting, as though it has anything to do with fostering a certain sort of interpersonal relationship between a parent and child.
It might _sometimes_ travel in the same circles – but so does chicken-keeping and tie-dye shirts, statistically, and they’re generally not considered part of attachment parenting. Whether or not you choose vaccination has little or nothing to do with the ways you interact with your child 99.99% of the time. Attachment parents aren’t “let the baby say ‘no’ to absolutely anything no matter what” parents (that’s more like the very small hardcore end of unconditional parenting, perhaps), and aren’t “all post-16th-century medicine must be eschewed” parents either. Attachment parenting is presence, consistent loving care, respect for the child, sensitive response, positive discipline. None of that precludes vaccination.
A far more interesting and relevant conversation, in my opinion, might be how to go about fostering respectful doctor-child relationships in older children, and how you can negotiate examinations and treatments that might be challenging to explain to the child in terms that they might be able to assimilate. And how to negotiate all of that with a doctor who may or may not be unfamiliar with the principles of respecting children’s bodily autonomy.
“A far more interesting and relevant conversation, in my opinion, might be how to go about fostering respectful doctor-child relationships in older children, and how you can negotiate examinations and treatments that might be challenging to explain to the child in terms that they might be able to assimilate. And how to negotiate all of that with a doctor who may or may not be unfamiliar with the principles of respecting children’s bodily autonomy.”
I would read the crap outta that.
Also, IIRC, circumcision is now a 40-60 minority in the US in new births.
@lauredhel took the words out of my mouth.
I also wanted to speak to the circumcision conversation going on through AP. I avoid the label of AP, but it is the style of parenting that most adheres to my own beliefs and instincts. I’m also a Jew who circumcised her son in accordance with the requirements of Brit Milah, in a ceremony at our home 8 days after his birth. We had a mohel who did a terrible job (son was okay, everything was fine, it just took nearly 20 MINUTES and there was more blood than I had been led to believe was normal).
Both before and after that experience, I have been ambivalent about circumcision and would have left my son intact if my husband had felt the same way. As it was, I insisted that we have the full ritual rather than simply do the circumcision at the hospital, because if we were going to do a completely unnecessary procedure on my son, I felt we should have all the bells and whistles our culture required. That being said, I don’t regret circumcising my son (just the choice of mohel) and will do the same (with a different officiant, of course) for any future sons I have.
I’m giving all of this background to explain that I absolutely understand the anti-circumcision crowd’s attitude. I feel it myself, to a lesser extent. However, I have definitely noticed a rabidness about the anti-circumcision groups’ arguments that feels, for lack of a better word, merciless. There is no compassion for parents like myself who are trying to balance centuries of religious tradition with a personal ambivalence. There is no recognition that there can be valid reasons *for other parents* for performing this procedure. Because of this single-mindedness (circumcision is WRONG and EVIL), I feel as though there is no way for parents to talk to each other about a truly concerning and controversial practice. It leads to silliness like San Francisco banning all circumcisions–which honestly feels anti-Semitic to me.
In any case, I would love to see everyone lower their dukes a bit about their pet causes. Coming together to truly discuss things will lead to more relevant change–like parents mindfully deciding to circumcise rather than it being a default–than simply getting spittle flecked with rage.
(When it comes to vaccines, however, I am more understanding of the scientific and pro-vaccinating parents becoming incoherent with rage. It’s not so much a single individual’s decision there, and more of a way of nominating the human race as a whole for the Darwin Awards. For the love of G-d, people, just trust that the CDC is not in the business of attempting to sicken and kill kids on a national level. It doesn’t even make sense.)
“But with all of these issues, it’s always going to be painted as “mommy wars” so long as it’s women debating things.”
YES!
I have some incoherent thoughts. I’ll jot them down in point form and come back later if I have time and energy to make sentences or a paragraph.
1) Things being discussed by women should not automatically be put in the Life/Style section of papers/magazines.
2) Parenting topics should also include male voices
– without privileging those male voices
– not just because it removes the “mommy war” paint
– not just because it will lend legitimacy to the topic/proposed social change (although sadly …)
There’s a bit of the “mommy debating things” but there is also more going on than that, and some of it has to do with the ways that many feminists these days have integrated wholesale the language of personal choice as the centerpiece of feminism. (I was on a board once where someone made the throwaway remark, well isn’t that what feminism is about- everyone making her own choices? And I was like, um, actually I think historically feminism was about political and economic equality for women.) The problem with the “choice” rhetoric is that it immediately diminishes the conversation. So to take the vaccination example, find me a mainstream feminist with a large media outlet who doesn’t demonize parents who don’t vaccinate – the whole conversation is aimed at individual women and their individual choices, and worse, about vilifying them. Why not look at the health care industry? try to understand why someone would make a choice unfathomable to you? The distrust and hostility that many people feel towards the medical world is *grounded* in real concerns about significant problems. My lack of trust in many aspects of the health care industry is evidence-based, not some delusion theory I picked up on the internet one day. If we look at the whole conversation, rather than “choices” I think we can resolve the tension/problem that Valenti is talking about here. (Not that anyone cares, but I fully vaccinated my children, though I did stagger them/delay some, so I feel like I straddle both sides of that conversation, and many of my friends do as well.)
I feel like I left the exact same comment here a couple of weeks ago. Sorry for the repetition. It’s my bandwagon, I guess.
I agree with the interviewer in that I also had serious issues with Valenti’s perspective on baby friendly hospital initiatives. I hate that these initiatives, like so many breastfeeding promotion discussions, are framed through the perspective of anecdotal women who had problems breastfeeding. As Valenti readily agrees on other topics, like education: this is not about individuals. This is about systemic change. Baby friendly initiatives do not say “let your baby almost starve.” They do not say “pump for five hours and give up your job.”
I see hypocrisy in someone who thinks vaccination is a huge public health issue, but promoting breastfeeding responsibly is not.