Yesterday, had i accidentally found £2m in my Pay Packet- ok, Child Tax Credit Payment- i would have handed it in, absolutely no question. Not because 'the overpayment would have been traced within days and the employee asked to pay it back' (though, way to Fuck Up a perfectly adequate Owen Wilson/ Julia Roberts Box Office Bomb). No, because it is Stealing. Today, however, i'm keeping half. According to a new study, it should just about cover the majority of the cost of raising my five children to the age of twenty-one. Twenty- One? That's just the Eldest one, right? Then he presumably somehow drags up the rest in his wake?
£210,000. And that's my children- we can probably knock off a bit on the thinking that Firstborn is Not 'Going to Contract', that Pedantic will have to wait for a garden with a Tree before he gets Treehouse, and that no one in this house will require their own Infant Counselor because their Daddies sang 'Candle in the Wind' at their Christening.
If we leave aside the Baffling amount that the survey claims is spent on a child in its first 4 years, when, as far as i recall, mine were clothed mainly in the rags vacated by elder siblings and fed exclusively off my Very Life Blood, the Priciest Period is of course- No Fanfare, Absolutely No Ta-Daaah- the three years when they might be at University. If the Price tag inflates at the expected rate over the next 15 years, by the time i am packing my Youngest into the Vauxhall Corsa with a box of the Second- Best Saucepans, that might well be where we both live. So far my Plans include some hitherto overlooked Sponsorship Windfall aimed at the Very Argumentative, Smuggling him into Mia Farrow's and hoping he gets educated by accident, or voting the Coalition out and hoping that the Labour Party reverses the worst of the damage that is being done to Our Children's Future.
Instead of spending the projected hundreds of millions of pounds on the Nick Clegg's Popularity Poll why doesn't the Government just ask a few people something more pertinent: like, do you want your children to have any kind of worthwhile future? The alternative is just to wait on the day when i have to look my sons and daughter in the eyes and admit that there is No Money- not just for Trainers, or MP3s, or for cars or laptops- but also no benefit safety net, nor further education that they can access, nor any jobs or trainee schemes or apprenticeships. No opportunities, no aspirations, no dreams. No punchline.
Friday 25 February 2011
Wednesday 9 February 2011
XXSex
i am a feminist.
this is not a radical position. it is the position of a person, who upon finding themselves to have been born female, and continued to be so, did not, at any point find themselves thinking 'this Inequality lark has Sorted Itself out nicely, hasn't it? i wonder if it's my turn to clean behind the toilet.' Feminism did not begin with the Suffragettes, it was not killed off by the Eighties; it is not defined or diminished by MTV. It is not an Insult, or a Secret Organisation commited to bringing down Wikileaks. It is not obsolete: if you are a woman, you are a feminist. Or you are a doormat- and if you are the Mother of a Girl, you are perpetuating what has constrained you.
There is a advert on tv at the moment, which attempts to attract more men into Teaching, by encouraging them to bring more adventure to learning. A group of little boys Run Wild in a wood, building and climbing and expressing their 'natural enthusiasm', while SuperTeach whoops alongside. Superimposed, a classroom of tidy, uniformed girls, chewing their pencils thoughtfully, and raising their hands to answer questions. about fabric conditioner and fridge deoderisation presumably.
Now, i have 4 sons and a daughter. My daughter is diligent, well-behaved and polite at school. Her teachers think the world of her. her reports are glowing, affectionate, even. Her elder brother's were a a litany of Petty Rebellion and Irk. He was the child who refused to go and 'sit in an old cow stall to wave at the queen', 'the only child in the school', as the head teacher pointed out, 'how disappointing'. Which one of the two is more likely to break out of the Little Boxes of Life and Soar over the Horizon, do you think?
i am a feminist because we are still Failing our Daughters. because while we value, even expect certain traits in girls; moderation, quiet, neatness- traits that enable an overworked teacher to better manage a room of extremely variable children- the characteristics we allow in boys- excitability, physicality, action, are the ones which will win out, which will equip them for the fight for a Life Worth Having. and come time to get a job, all those bright, funny little Female People are likely to find themselves being paid less, and valued less than their Male Counterparts.
i am a feminist. i am not biased Against Men, but maybe Towards Women. i don't want the boys back in the classroom, any longer than it takes to explain to them how to iron a blouse and turn on a cooker. What i do want, is to see the girls hanging from the rope bridge, and skimming stones, and storming the treehouses, in preparation not for a battle of the sexes, but for the fight for a Decent Society, where we are All feminists- whatever sex we are.
this is not a radical position. it is the position of a person, who upon finding themselves to have been born female, and continued to be so, did not, at any point find themselves thinking 'this Inequality lark has Sorted Itself out nicely, hasn't it? i wonder if it's my turn to clean behind the toilet.' Feminism did not begin with the Suffragettes, it was not killed off by the Eighties; it is not defined or diminished by MTV. It is not an Insult, or a Secret Organisation commited to bringing down Wikileaks. It is not obsolete: if you are a woman, you are a feminist. Or you are a doormat- and if you are the Mother of a Girl, you are perpetuating what has constrained you.
There is a advert on tv at the moment, which attempts to attract more men into Teaching, by encouraging them to bring more adventure to learning. A group of little boys Run Wild in a wood, building and climbing and expressing their 'natural enthusiasm', while SuperTeach whoops alongside. Superimposed, a classroom of tidy, uniformed girls, chewing their pencils thoughtfully, and raising their hands to answer questions. about fabric conditioner and fridge deoderisation presumably.
Now, i have 4 sons and a daughter. My daughter is diligent, well-behaved and polite at school. Her teachers think the world of her. her reports are glowing, affectionate, even. Her elder brother's were a a litany of Petty Rebellion and Irk. He was the child who refused to go and 'sit in an old cow stall to wave at the queen', 'the only child in the school', as the head teacher pointed out, 'how disappointing'. Which one of the two is more likely to break out of the Little Boxes of Life and Soar over the Horizon, do you think?
i am a feminist because we are still Failing our Daughters. because while we value, even expect certain traits in girls; moderation, quiet, neatness- traits that enable an overworked teacher to better manage a room of extremely variable children- the characteristics we allow in boys- excitability, physicality, action, are the ones which will win out, which will equip them for the fight for a Life Worth Having. and come time to get a job, all those bright, funny little Female People are likely to find themselves being paid less, and valued less than their Male Counterparts.
i am a feminist. i am not biased Against Men, but maybe Towards Women. i don't want the boys back in the classroom, any longer than it takes to explain to them how to iron a blouse and turn on a cooker. What i do want, is to see the girls hanging from the rope bridge, and skimming stones, and storming the treehouses, in preparation not for a battle of the sexes, but for the fight for a Decent Society, where we are All feminists- whatever sex we are.
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