Will Sarah Palin's Candidacy Set Back Working Mothers?
Sarah Palin either has a screw loose or is a negligent mother. That's the consensus of some of my working mom friends and bloggers amazed that she would run for vice president as the mother of 5 children ranging in age from 4 months to 17 years. Several readers took me to task for suggesting that Palin is a role model, given that her eldest daughter is a pregnant, unwed teen and that campaigning will take her attention from her infant with special needs. (Please note, I wrote that blog post before the McCain campaign disclosed Bristol Palin’s pregnancy.)
I can certainly understand this criticism. In my own life I have made very different choices than Palin. I can't imagine returning to work three days after giving birth or subjecting my pregnant, unwed teenage daughter to nationwide scrutiny, much less getting on a flight from Texas to Alaska after my water broke!
But just because we make different decisions for our own families doesn’t mean we know what’s best for the Palins. Maybe mothering a newborn in the governor’s office is easy because you can plan meetings around your breastfeeding schedule. Maybe Bristol Palin is ready for motherhood and will have a happy, lifelong marriage to her high school sweetheart. Maybe the Palin kids are willing to compromise their privacy to see their mom make history, as the first woman to be governor of Alaska and the Republican vp candidate.
Like many of you, I watched Sarah Palin address the GOP convention last night, and I judged her. That's what we do as moms. We look at other people's choices and consider how they will influence our own course. But I believe we should not be judgmental -- to say that we, complete strangers, can decide what Sarah Palin and her family need or want. That's the kind of thinking that kept women second-class citizens for so long, and continues to penalize moms in the workplace.
I also wonder why a middle-class American mother like Palin reaps criticism for pursuing a high-profile career when a poor immigrant wins admiration and sympathy for leaving her children to take a job overseas. Isn't each simply trying to make a better life for her family and herself? Who are we to decide that the middle-class mom should be satisfied with a home in the suburbs and the PTA, instead of striving for the White House?
I disagree with Sarah Palin on many issues, but I refuse to substitute my judgment for hers when it comes to her family. I wish that all mothers could give each other that gift. It would end the Mommy Wars and allow us to work together for a world in which moms can truly choose the best path for their families, instead of compromising time with their kids for economic security or giving up a career in order to be the parent they want to be.
And I have to say it's an amazing thing to see a vice presidential candidate cradle her infant son on the stage of a national party convention. I really would value hearing your thoughts, in the comments section or the forum.
Photo credit: Paul J. Richards/Getty Images
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I guess that Sarah Palin sees her duty to try and make the country better is worth the sacrifice her family will have to make, and that is her decision. But, whether I agree with her politics or not, I look at that baby and just wonder how she would ever have any time to spend with him. Whether or not mothers have to/want to work, being a mother is still the most important of the roles a woman chooses in her life, in my opinion, especially with young children. I just don’t see how she could devote any of that much needed time to her son in such an incredibly demanding position.
It certainly would be interesting to see the VP traveling around the world with a baby carrier!
I don’t judge her for her choice to run, I will vote based on the politics one way or the other, but it is something you just naturally think about when you see her with her baby. Will someone else get up with him if he’s sick at night? or will she go to important meetings with heads of states and other important people sleep-deprived and looking haggard? Maybe her husband will take over caring for the kids. Who knows, but being a mother of small children myself, it boggles my brain to think of doing it all.
I’m a democrat and my vote wasn’t going to be changed by this VP pick or her speech, but I’m
watching the RNC just to see what really inspires and motivates republican voters. I thought Gov. Palin did a nice job, was articulate, acerbic, and funny, and clearly the people loved her speech. However, it was disappointing to see a candidate take such a negative approach, going on the attack against Obama and mocking his community work while rehashing the old republican talking points about taxes and the “liberal” media. She spent a long, long time describing her background, which is not a bad thing because she’s an unknown, but didn’t deliver much substance about her vision for the country or her plans for governance, just that she was going to shake things up in Washington.
As for her family, I really feel like that’s none of my business, and as a VP candidate, Palin shouldn’t be judged on her choices as a working mother or on what kind of trouble her kids get into. Lord knows there have been plenty of leaders on both sides who have less-than-perfect family members. I’m a future working mother myself – pregnant right now, and will have to return to work at least 30 hours/week after 3 months’ leave. It angers me that bloggers are saying nasty, speculative things about Palin’s child-rearing choices, just as I’m offended when far-right bloggers speculate that Obama is a
secret muslim or a black panther or whatever their smear of the month is. Politics in this country is a nasty, nasty business and it tends to bring out the worst in people.
I doubt her potential to bring peace to the mommy wars. While she could serve as a role model for working mothers, she would have to
reconcile that image with the cold hard fact that republican policies do not provide the support system that women desperately need so that they can be wage-earners and good parents. If women had affordable, quality childcare in their offices or near their job sites, if quality early childhood education were available at all public schools, if there were more support for fathers of young children to stay at home and share childcare duties, would there even be a mommy war?
I’m so disappointed in all the negative press Sarah Palin has received just because she’s a mother. I agree with her on almost no policy issues, but as a working mother and feminist, I think the outpouring of criticism is shameful. People can’t believe how she can go back to work immediately after her son is born or how she can hold a position of power and responsibility when she has five children? Millions of fathers go right back to work and hold the highest executive positions in this country with newborns all the time. Children are the responsibility of both parents. Maybe her husband is going to stay home and watch the kids but even if he’s not, it’s scary to hear that people think this woman should be limited because she’s a mother. This is the 21st century, people!
I agree I have no wish to jugde Sarah Palins effectivness as mother. However scrutiny of her ability to govern is the duty of a voter in order to become an informed citizen able to vote responsibly for the party who has at heart the best interst of this country.
Sarah Palin’s introductory public display dismayed me. my family and I found it both tasteless and offensive. Certainly she engaged her audience, however the demeanor of her deivery and the republican parties raucous response would have seemed more fitting had it taken place in an off color stand-up comedy night club.
I don’t usually follow election politics, but have always leaned toward Republican. This year captured my interest as it presents historic groundbreaking events in regards to candidates.
Imagine my surprise that a VP woman candidate’s claim to governing ability would tout the ability to catch a fish, and shoot straight, center on an unsuccessful venture involving e-bay, highlight poor management of a sadly understaffed national guard, purport outright misleading statements about her flip-flop position on political policies, and make claim t experience by being governor to a state whose entire population does not exceed that of a single smaller than average American urban area.
Fact: Alaska’s population is estimated 670,053 people. Compare this with any metropolitan area. New York city has a population of 8,314,426, Los Angeles, 3,849,378, Chicago, 2,833,321 an Huston 2,144,491.
Sarah Palin sadly dissapointed expectation when she sidestepped addressing Republican policy on campaign issues using misdirection in a string of opponent putdowns, delivering misrepresented facts with an acid tongue and smug sneer.
McCains choice of running mate is nothing short of disappointing and generally insulting to American women when one considers highly the intelligent women with truly shining political careers passed over for a hockey mom likening herself a pitbull with lipstick, whose main qualification is holding the key to Alaskan oil fields and whose public record stands for exploitation of the environment.
“Drill Now” puts off the inevitable while squandering precious resources which will not be realized by the consumer for another to decades, rather than focusing on renewable energy sources as a means of keeping in check the precarious balance of a planet in peril. It prospers big business and corporate America leaving average citizens in the lurch facing unemployment, foreclosures, rising living cost, unaffordable health care, and increasing fuel prices.
Not surprising coming from a party whose campaign dodges the issues of common citizens by repeatedly pointing to the very distant past, because their recent past and present track record leave much to be desired. Whose policies have tripled in 8 short years, a national deficit 200 years in the making. Whose legacy for the future is to cripple this nations average citizen in indentured credit debt servitude, while promising the tax breaks, loopholes, and write offs to corporations whose yearly profits are in the trillions, and further burden minimum wage earners.
McCain voted no at least 14 times to raising the minimum wage. He voted against tax credits for renewable energy sources. When the republican party says “you” they are speaking to people earning more than $250,000 per year, 5 % of the population.
Facts which continue to surface and come to light about Sarah Palin distance her from the sort of person I could ever conscientiously support much less wish to see in the White House as a representative of this country in a deomestic or international arena.
Please do not be snowed by this Alaskan beauty. Her interest in the fine people of America is primarily self serving. The web is at your fingertips. Use it to research and educate yourself. See what both parties have t say. Cast your vote as an informed citizen.
I consider myself a feminist, but I can’t agree with those who says that we shouldn’t question Palin’s choices because they wouldn’t be questioned if she were a man. She is not a man. That baby came out of her body, and it is her body that has to recuperate. If she’s breastfeeding, she has to feed the baby or spend a lot of time in the company of a breast pump. And any woman or man who chooses to have five children should realize that he or she is going to have to give up some career moves. I know that even at my youngest and most energetic, I couldn’t have coped with young children and the second highest office in the land. When I used to go to the doctor and complain about being tired, he would say, “You’re the mother of three young children. You’re going to be tired.” I can’t imagine hearing, “You’re the mother of five children and you’re the vice president of the United States. You’re supposed to be tired.”
Look, people really need to select a person to be president not because the person is female. Palin is not ready nor is McCain. We
do not need a war like we already have. McCain is far too tired, do not have new ideas to run a country when he still think 1950;this is 2008. Being a hero in a war does not qualify a person to be president.
After really watching McCain and Palin, it
does appear they copy Obama ideas as though
they invented it. You should not use ideas
of others to run for an office, nor do you
need to tell and make false statements. All
of the sorry statements made by McCain towards Obama then he does the same then think it is OK? The republicans really tore
up the economy, in 9 trillion dollars of debt, unemployment, home crisis, school
crisis, poor enery sources, medical care is
poor, no jobs because they are sent overseas,
the war, our home security, crime, and other
seriouus issues then you are still voting for
McCain-Palin-Bush administration? People need
to get their heads out of the sand and stop hating on Obama and his VP, and get with the
program. Palin is not Hilary, we do not know
who she is, and trust her to help run this
country. Look, did the republicans help the people in the storms in the country,NO. We do not want the same, we want democratic change. So do not get mad, look at the facts, the country is in a very serious crisis. We all bleed the same so, don”t hate.
Very well said. I, for one, would like her to start talking about what she has done for her working woman/mother constituents in the past and how she might tackle working woman issues as VP. Every VP has some sort of “pet project” so why couldn’t she embrace this and make it hers. I bet she won’t and that is a shame.