Hmmmm, my neighbors all have chicken coops, but it's because they have large families and go through a lot of eggs. Had no idea Mexican immigrants were so trendy in Berkeley! Or that my great-grandmother was really a feminist. Oh Northern California, how you enlighten us all! (um, yeah - that's good ol' Kansas sarcasm!)
It's interesting to see this applied to more or less affluent areas. I personally see it as a milestone in the changing consciousness of the country. Not all women find validation and/or peace behind a desk and not all women must stay at home to be considered women. I am rather irritable regarding this new label, but it seems human nature to compartmentalize, categorize, and label all things.
Oh oh oh!!! Can I offer a guy's perspective for a moment? horse-hockey. The article is horse-hockey. I will explain.
Getting chickens is not going to give those women any more validation or cure their "malaise". It may give them temporary surcease, but they moved to the chickens when the garden wasn't enough, the moved to the garden when the house wasn't enough, they moved to the house when the family wasn't enough. (please don't mistake me when I talk about the women in Berkeley, CA in the article vs. the women that have do this because they love it.) I truly wish that these women do truly learn the lessons that chickens and gardening have to offer, but I hold out very little hope. Femivorism? Where are the husbands and the children? You wouldn't get a dog without consulting the rest of the family and extracting the agreements for help and support. Would you do that with chickens?
What are these women going to do in 2-3 years when the hens stop laying prolifically? Through extra ordinary measures (aka heat lamps and lighting), you may extend your laying season till 3 years of age. Then what? Are these women going to process and cook the chicken for their families? I hope so, but the slant of the article makes me doubt it.
Don't put a sexist label on something like this and expect those of us out there to like it. This article was offensive to me as a man, as the corporate laborer in a one-income family, and as a homesteader.
I too was a little miffed by the label but I find it amusing our "lifestyle" has to be labeled once the middle class jump on board. Apparently only the white, middle class, stay-at-home moms can legitimate what the rest of us are doing (or aspiring to).
I am surprised that more readers didn't have much to say about this. People have been quiet lately.
But my opinion is this is that it is ridiculous. These are the same women that for years have told us that we have been setting the feminist movement back decades because we are not out of the home working, because we stay at home and raise our kids. For years we have been looked at as crazy and told that we were the stupid ones.
But now, now that a few upper middle class women have decided that they want to be like so many of us, does it get more attention, and a pseudo intellectual name. Apparently they do not want to be associated with homesteaders or hippies and must have their own class. They are not the new feminist movement. If anything they are only discovering what many of us already know.
I do hope that they do life this life to the fullest and see what it can do for them. But like the rest of you I see this as a passing fancy. novelty of bored housewives. And these chickens will end up in the pound with the potbellied pigs.
That articles pisses me off. even with all the negative comments, I didn't expect it to be as bad as it was. For one thing, I felt like the author was talking down to me: "look at all my friends they're so hip and well-educated but even pretty and smart people like to play in the dirt when they get bored with everything smart and pretty."
I just can't believe they're treating it like a FAD. It reminds me of grunge in a way. Grunge originally was a way to say "I don't give a **** about fashion and conformity," but turned into the exact opposite.
My least favorite part: "She interviewed more than a dozen families who were pursuing this way of life. They earned an average of $40,000 for a family of four. They canned peaches, stuffed sausages, grew kale, made soap. Some eschewed health insurance, and most home-schooled their kids. That, I suspect, is a little further than most of us are willing to go: it sounds a bit like being Amish, except with a car (no more than one, naturally) and a green political agenda."
Looks like the ultimate point is people who put their blood, sweat and tears into their homesteading are backwards, while bored housewives are progressive. I'd rather be backwards and care about what I'm doing than a bored housewife trying on the latest fad for size.
10 comments:
All I can say is UGH. I don't need a label, thanks.
Carnivore: One who eats meat
Locavore: One who eats local
Femivore: One who eats females?
I have read it, but still, what a name.
Hmmmm, my neighbors all have chicken coops, but it's because they have large families and go through a lot of eggs. Had no idea Mexican immigrants were so trendy in Berkeley! Or that my great-grandmother was really a feminist. Oh Northern California, how you enlighten us all! (um, yeah - that's good ol' Kansas sarcasm!)
It's interesting to see this applied to more or less affluent areas. I personally see it as a milestone in the changing consciousness of the country. Not all women find validation and/or peace behind a desk and not all women must stay at home to be considered women. I am rather irritable regarding this new label, but it seems human nature to compartmentalize, categorize, and label all things.
Oh oh oh!!! Can I offer a guy's perspective for a moment? horse-hockey. The article is horse-hockey. I will explain.
Getting chickens is not going to give those women any more validation or cure their "malaise". It may give them temporary surcease, but they moved to the chickens when the garden wasn't enough, the moved to the garden when the house wasn't enough, they moved to the house when the family wasn't enough. (please don't mistake me when I talk about the women in Berkeley, CA in the article vs. the women that have do this because they love it.) I truly wish that these women do truly learn the lessons that chickens and gardening have to offer, but I hold out very little hope. Femivorism? Where are the husbands and the children? You wouldn't get a dog without consulting the rest of the family and extracting the agreements for help and support. Would you do that with chickens?
What are these women going to do in 2-3 years when the hens stop laying prolifically? Through extra ordinary measures (aka heat lamps and lighting), you may extend your laying season till 3 years of age. Then what? Are these women going to process and cook the chicken for their families? I hope so, but the slant of the article makes me doubt it.
Don't put a sexist label on something like this and expect those of us out there to like it. This article was offensive to me as a man, as the corporate laborer in a one-income family, and as a homesteader.
$.02
(sorry for the rant.)
I was trying to figure how to respond to this......whatever it is, and now say thanks farmergeek you nailed it.
Thanks for the hat-tip.
I too was a little miffed by the label but I find it amusing our "lifestyle" has to be labeled once the middle class jump on board. Apparently only the white, middle class, stay-at-home moms can legitimate what the rest of us are doing (or aspiring to).
I am surprised that more readers didn't have much to say about this. People have been quiet lately.
But my opinion is this is that it is ridiculous. These are the same women that for years have told us that we have been setting the feminist movement back decades because we are not out of the home working, because we stay at home and raise our kids. For years we have been looked at as crazy and told that we were the stupid ones.
But now, now that a few upper middle class women have decided that they want to be like so many of us, does it get more attention, and a pseudo intellectual name. Apparently they do not want to be associated with homesteaders or hippies and must have their own class. They are not the new feminist movement. If anything they are only discovering what many of us already know.
I do hope that they do life this life to the fullest and see what it can do for them. But like the rest of you I see this as a passing fancy. novelty of bored housewives. And these chickens will end up in the pound with the potbellied pigs.
I think FarmerGeek hit the nail on the head.
That articles pisses me off. even with all the negative comments, I didn't expect it to be as bad as it was. For one thing, I felt like the author was talking down to me: "look at all my friends they're so hip and well-educated but even pretty and smart people like to play in the dirt when they get bored with everything smart and pretty."
I just can't believe they're treating it like a FAD. It reminds me of grunge in a way. Grunge originally was a way to say "I don't give a **** about fashion and conformity," but turned into the exact opposite.
My least favorite part: "She interviewed more than a dozen families who were pursuing this way of life. They earned an average of $40,000 for a family of four. They canned peaches, stuffed sausages, grew kale, made soap. Some eschewed health insurance, and most home-schooled their kids. That, I suspect, is a little further than most of us are willing to go: it sounds a bit like being Amish, except with a car (no more than one, naturally) and a green political agenda."
Looks like the ultimate point is people who put their blood, sweat and tears into their homesteading are backwards, while bored housewives are progressive. I'd rather be backwards and care about what I'm doing than a bored housewife trying on the latest fad for size.
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