Oh look, I’m going to respond to this post: Gender Imbalance in Higher Education because I can’t help myself.
I will state now that my experience of higher education is Australian based and thus does not rack up the astronomical debts of the American education system (as far as I’m aware) – we only rack up slightly astronomical debts and hey if we don’t earn it later we don’t pay. And as much as I would like free education, it’s probably worth my money.
(go read the article and return)
This is what frustrates me:
“Call me a sexist, but my first reaction is to find that disappointing. Call me a sexist, but I believe that in most cases the husband should be the primary income-earner in the family, and that the wife should be free to stay at home with the kids.”
Since when did we develop this idea? It’s cultural. Long standing. Take a non-western society, I’ve lost the actual location, but there are communities where women do the work, all the work, plus the family raising and the guys just sit on their bum’s or go hunting now and then. Weak argument, but then, the author is kind in suggesting a slightly lighter load for women (oh look, they just raise children and don’t have to work).
Hello?! Of course I am going to call you sexist, because immediately in reading your post, I perceive a higher value on men via my GenY thinking: men choose with what they do with their lives, women do something and then must go have babies. It may seem forward and culturally sterotyped but hey, I’m a 22 year old female in 2008, I’m allowed to be a GenY’er. Golly, by rare standards I’m married already, but because I did okay in school and like expanding my skill set and think that I have something to offer to the world in this way, I’m following a career. Don’t assume I never want kids, beacuse I do. I believe education is worth paying for regardless of how I end up using it. Full-time exclusive motherhood is not my dream.
I am not one the following, and I think the next assumption, however gracious is really wrong:
“And many of the college-attending women may be pursuing lower-cost liberal arts degrees that make them more well-rounded, that give them opportunities to meet their husband, that don’t rack up the debt, that equip them to take on jobs while awaiting Mr. Right.”
What a crock. Regardless of whether I wasn’t yet married, I wouldn’t be going to university to buy my time before getting married. I’d be going to do exactly what I’m doing now, because I am intelligent and worthwhile.
To be honest I don’t care about the stats of more women at university, 50% men vs 58% women is negligent. I think his theory that this stat is concerning – “More men need to be studying to earn money for their families”, is ridiculous.
Can’t we seperate education and gender entirely? It’s a farty old stigma that holds onto the male, female roles in this arena. Regardless of his complementarian non egalitarian stance maybe he could’ve said it better.
Wow Bec! I love you for writing this. I almost choked on my shock, contempt and amuzement when I read this guys original post. I’ll chat to you tonight over tea about it.
Rebecca, the idea that women should be primary caretakers of their children while their husbands should be the primary breadwinners is not cultural, it’s biblical:
Titus 2:3 “the older women likewise, that they be reverant in behavior, not slanderers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things – that they admonish the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be discreet, chaste, homemakers, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be blasphemed.”
1 Timothy 5:8 “But if anyone does not provide for his own, and expecially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.”
Those verses are pretty clear, and when you put them into the context of the entire Scriptures, it’s even clearer, right from Genesis 3.
In his post, Ted wasn’t saying that women should never be educated or pursue a career, he was just pointing out that men should be taking the responsibility to provide for their families and that women should avoid spending excessive money to get an education that could put a strain on family finances in the future. I am educated and in debt, but will thankfully be able to pay it off within a year because of my current situation. However, it’s not uncommon for a woman to graduate with $40,000 debt. Paying that back with 7-10% interest can be a significant hardship, especially if you’re wanting to raise children. Ted’s just pointing out that it’s not wise to rack up the debt, which may get in the way of what is clearly biblical: that a woman’s main responsibility is homemaker, helper for her husband, and caretaker for her children.
That being said, I don’t think that eliminates the possibility of women working. There are so many opportunities to work from home, to work part time, or to follow other options that give you the flexibility to pursue a career at least to some extent while you’re raising your children. There’s definitely room for that biblically (Proverbs 31 is probably the best example), it just can’t be a priority over your family.
hey bec. i don’t like how you said this “and think that I have something to offer to the world, I’m following a career.” because it makes it sound like that women who do want to raise a family, and who don’t really care about a career (aka, me), have nothing to offer the world.
which is not true.
raising a family, raising ‘good’ children, and being a all round loving parent, is extremely important, particularly because it doesn’t really happen much these days.
Thanks all for stopping, by. Sam I’ll answer you first because I have the time.
I should have added an ‘in this way’ to the end of the ‘I have something to offer…’. It was simply an oversight, because I do think that everyone has something to offer the world regardless of education, role etc.
*I’ve even edited the post to include it
Jen, in short – although it’s in the Bible you cannot leave the Jewish culture behind – which I might add was very strong about men-women roles.
Jesus was truly radical in his approach to women.
The Titus verse is Paul’s letter to a church at the time and thus the culture MUST be taken into consideration. Yes we have things we can learn from it, but you cannot take the slap bang black and white and apply it to today without looking at it properly.
If I am not mistaken, the Timothy verse is talking about caring for widows. And is talking about injustice and has nothing too much to do with women being homemakers.
It is the fact that Ted was trying to bring men-women roles into the context of explaining why there are more women in higher education – that I find somewhat ridiculous.
Thanks for stopping by 🙂
Jen,
I’ve got to get stuck in here. It’s a sad day when Christians are advocates for less education – regardless of who that’s for. Education is a powerful thing, and it’s hard to read this post without believing that the author is concerned that unless the education is being biased towards men, then the men will lose the power.
The thing that bugs me is the way in which we bundle in so many additional cultural practices, and because they have happened historically in our “Christian” cultures, we’ve decided that these are Christian practices. So rather than needing people to follow Jesus, and actually put into practice his teachings (which we tend to put off to one side when they don’t fit with our conservative culture), we instead ask that people fit into our tiny little cultural box, and put forward that as Christianity. And it’s not.
I don’t think he had a problem with women being educated.
As Jen already pointed out.
But education doesn’t make one intelligent.
I went to school for math, but looking at the things I enjoy and am GOOD at, you’d think I went to school for religion, philosophy, or history.
This is because truly intelligent women don’t need professors and an education path to actually get an education.
However, if they want to work in a full time position that pays a lot of money, then yeah…more often then not, for women, a degree is necessary…because you need that piece of paper that says you studied philosophy, history, math, or whatever.
Education is not confined to a university.
Groan. Get back in the kitchen Bec.
(Cheap shot, but someone had to take it.)
I don’t have heaps of energy for thrashing this issue around on the following basis:
1. If someone wants to extend themselves, then let them.
2. A woman going to University and having “a career” doesn’t preclude her from having a family.
3. In Proverbs 31, “she considers a field and buys it”. No one said biblical wives were brainless or stuck in the kitchen.
It really doesn’t have to be so complicated. Why can’t we just let people be who they are?
A big part of the hurdle in this discussion is our definition of success and achievement, rather than it mattering whether or not someone has certain chromosomes and a tertiary education.
A big part of the hurdle in this discussion is our definition of success and achievement, rather than it mattering whether or not someone has certain chromosomes and a tertiary education.
That might be a big part of the hurdle, but when having children, your primary (not PRIMARY) responsibility is now to raising them.
If you think that God gave you a calling to be a nurse and that is a higher priority than ensuring your children are raised in the best way possible, then you are sadly mistaken. Given that children are only given by God and he explicitly states that we should raise them up in his word, I would think that once children are in the picture, they should be the PRIMARY responsibility. If you are in a job that doesn’t allow that to be the primary responsibility, than you owe it to God and your offspring to re evaluate what your priorities are.
But Christina, why is there an assumption that once a couple has a baby – the woman needs to set aside any skills they might have which don’t contribute towards raising their children, while there is no thought that the same might be true for the father.
Both parents should have their children as their primary responsibility and this concept that it’s somehow unchristian to have the mother as the primary income earner is a crock. When (and if) Bec and I decide to have children; I really hope that it’s possible for both of us to have working arrangements that allow us to share the two roles of working and caring for a child, but if they don’t – we’ll be making the decision on who will take up which role on the basis of what is the most practical, rather than some concept that the only Christian thing to do is to have the man providing for the family while the woman stays at home.
he beat me to it…
I think I’ll continue just to sit back and watch.
Biblically, I love how the Bible portrays women… as something beautiful created by God with a means and a purpose like Ruth and Esther and Martha, as something powerful and mysterious that is incomprehensible as Mary was, and as that which is needed to complete in the sense of Adam & Eve.
The old style of thinking, that men are the bread winners dates back to war times, when the men had to fight, and a lot of the roles back home running the cities and the towns were taken by women, not only to help out the men, but because they had the opportunity to do something else.
Then the men returned home weary after fighting the war, and they went back to work, and the womens role was now to look after her husband and raise the kids so the husband just had to go to work and back, but this took away a lot of opportunity for women in the work force, but thank goodness that thems not the times nowadays!
Nowadays women have stacks of opportunity to be who they want and do what they want, and i think that relationships are supposed to support each other, and be there for each other when what they venture in doesnt work out.
Western Australian arts degrees actually cost a way hell of a lot more than most degrees (unless its taxation or accounting or medicine or rocket science)
not only are we paying for the course, but then there are the numerous festivals, workshops, and other events in which we must network to climb the ladder of integral recognition, but then there is the supplies that come with the degree and all the extra work that has to go into it to create an end product, and if all that extra time was not spent on creating that product, and was instead spent working, im sure most art students would be able to afford to live on their own or buy a new car.
As far as well-roundedness goes… Those kinds of people who are looking to be well rounded and wholesome dont do arts degrees, they take up teaching degrees.
And finally in my experiences at pursuing arts degrees myself, in my entire course at tafe (meaning in all the classes from cert 2 through to advanced diploma) there were about 10 females and about 45 males, an average ratio at what i would put as 4:1.
So as for mostly women in art degrees? certainly no way as far as wa goes!