Where's Mama?

Carey Roberts has an interesting piece on women and "equal rights" at ifeminists.com.

He asks if it's time to scale back the "pedestal," i.e. the pedestal upon which civilized men have always placed women in some fashion or another.

Roberts makes the case that when the radical Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) was shot down back in the 70s, feminists learned from the one who defeated them. Roberts credits the death of the ERA with Phyllis Schlafly's essay which asked, "Why should we lower ourselves to 'equal rights' when we already have the status of special privilege?"

After the defeat of the ERA, Roberts says feminists exploited "the pedestal" tendency, making the pedestal higher and wider by obtaining a number of legislative victories which were specific to women.

And as Roberts' column points out, children are the greatest losers in this "battle of the sexes." Good women are made to feel as if being a mother and homemaker are worthless, second-class vocations, and men are made to feel unnecessary. Meanwhile, children (which are the natural product of a marital union) get about as much consideration as the family dog. (Actually dogs usually get to stay in familiar surroundings all day, where many children are shuffled off to daycare for 8+ hours a day.)

It's only in uncivilized cultures (unChristian?) where women have it bad (Islam?), being treated as bad or worse than dogs.

In traditional Christian cultures, women tend to receive most if not all of the rights men do, but receive deference that men (tough guys) don't enjoy.

It has often been said, and I believe it's true, that if husbands and wives truly understood their privileges and carried out their Biblical responsibilities, there would be no need for either sex to feel unappreciated.

In the end, though, there is an eternal truth that transcends all others in this regard. Having been a son and a husband, I can attest to the deep truth of the old saying: "If mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy."

HT to Free Republic.