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" Parents who obsess about every detail of child-rearing and orchestrate their children's 'resumes' may run themselves ragged while their own personal identities and adult relationships wither for lack of care. "

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" Liberal politicians, in celebrating the benefits of modernization, free trade, diverse families, and the rise of more women and minorities into political and economic prominence, have often glossed over the pain of white blue-collar communities. "

Stephanie Coontz

Women

Political

Pain

" I am not arguing that women ought to 'settle.' I am arguing that we can now expect more of a mate than we could when we depended on men for our financial security, social status, and sense of accomplishment. "

" As soon as love became the driving force behind marriage, people began to demand the right to remain single if they had not found love or to divorce if they fell out of love. "

" Establishing a 'livable wage' floor would immediately reduce the gap in average pay between American women and men. "

" Turning back the inequality revolution may be difficult. But that would certainly help more families - at almost all income levels - than turning back the gender revolution. "

" For a century, women have binged on romance novels that encouraged them to associate intimidation with infatuation; it's no wonder that this emotional hangover still lingers. "

" Why do people - gay or straight - need the state's permission to marry? For most of Western history, they didn't, because marriage was a private contract between two families. The parents' agreement to the match, not the approval of church or state, was what confirmed its validity. "

" The real gender inequality in marriage stems from the tendency to regard women as the default parent, the one who, in the absence of family-friendly work policies, is expected to adjust her paid work to shoulder the brunt of domestic responsibilities. "

" Unemployment, low wages, and poverty discourage family formation and erode family stability, making it less likely that individuals will marry in the first place and more likely that their marriages will dissolve. "

" Putting women first would mean strengthening America's social safety net, because a higher proportion of single-mother families live in poverty here than in any other wealthy country. "

" Feminism insists on women's right to make choices - about whether to marry, whether to have children, whether to combine work and family or to focus on one over the other. It also urges men and women to share the joys and burdens of family life and calls on society to place a higher priority on supporting caregiving work. "

" The closer we get to achieving equality of opportunity between the sexes, the more clearly we can see that the next major obstacle to improving the well-being of most men and women is the growing socioeconomic inequality within each sex. "

" Graduating from high school is certainly a good idea, but it's no longer much protection against poverty. "

" There's nothing wrong with celebrating the good things in our past. But memories, like witnesses, do not always tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. We need to cross-examine them, recognizing and accepting the inconsistencies and gaps in those that make us proud and happy as well as those that cause us pain. "

" We need to push for work-family practices and policies that allow individuals to customize their work lives according to their changing individual preferences and family obligations, not just their traditional gender roles. "

" As Americans lose the wider face-to-face ties that build social trust, they become more dependent on romantic relationships for intimacy and deep communication and more vulnerable to isolation if a relationship breaks down. "

" Averages are useful because many traits, behaviors, and outcomes are distributed in a bell-shaped curve, with most results clustered around the middle and a much smaller group of outliers at the high and low ends. "

" Rising inequality has changed family dynamics for all socioeconomic groups. "

" When I speak on work-family issues to audiences around the country, some of the biggest complaints I hear come from individuals who are described by the census as living in 'non-family households.' They resent the fact that their family responsibilities literally don't 'count,' either for society or for their employers. "

" Contrary to the fears of some pundits, the ascent of women does not portend the end of men. It offers a new beginning for both. But women's progress by itself is not a panacea for America's inequities. "

" As a child, I was lucky enough to spend each summer with my grandmother. "

" People feel better when their spouses have good friendships, over and above the effects of their own friendships. "

" If we want to revive and achieve the American Dream, we need to change a situation in which the people whose hard work makes this country run cannot earn a living wage, while bankers, speculators, and corporate elites - the real 'takers' in today's society - skim off far more than their fair share. "

" Indeed, the spread of 'virtual' communities on the Internet speaks to a deep hunger to reach out to others. "

" Deciding together to have a child and sharing in child-rearing do not immunize a marriage. Indeed, collaborative couples can face other problems. They often embark on such an intense style of parenting that they end up paying less attention to each other. "

" Marriage can provide a bounty of emotional, practical, and financial support. But finding the right mate is no substitute for having friends and other interests. "

" Heterosexuals were the upstarts who turned marriage into a voluntary love relationship rather than a mandatory economic and political institution. "

" I've had the kind of complex life I write about. I was a single mother for 12 years. I'd been engaged. The wedding fell through. I then discovered I was pregnant and opted to have the child on my own. I was a professor. I was in my mid-30s. I could manage it financially. "

" Sometimes, having a mom stay home is a big help. On the other hand, when a mother works outside the home, her husband generally does more child care and has higher parental knowledge about his childrens' friends, routines, and needs, cutting across the tendency for fathers to be second-string parents at home. "

" Historically, mass demonstrations have worked best at shifting public opinion and pressuring the powers-that-be when organizers highlighted one concrete demand: 'Bring Our Boys Home from Vietnam'; 'End Segregation Now'; 'Support Women's Right to Choose.' "