Thread: Why the assumption that a middle class woman will suddenly end up in a slum if she is a single mother?

it helps with the dogma. funny thing, with the divorce rate going the way it is, many married adoptive moms will likewise be *gasp* single. so maybe they should place their adopted children with a loving married couple. and when that couple divorces, the adoptee should be placed with another loving married couple....after all, the WORST thing in the world is for a kid to be raised by a single woman..

Dear Sly.I think the answer lies in the historical treatment of women and children in general. The ideas that a woman without a man is incapable of caring for herself, much less herself and child(ren) are "chattel" has been around for centuries. Arranged marriages, dowries, "family honor", lack of rights as human beings, etc. have all contributed to and perpetuated these stupid stereotypes.If you were an older, unmarried woman - even up until the 1950's - it was assumed that there was something "wrong" with you and that is why you were an "old maid". Having children outside of wedlock made you a "bad", "fallen", etc. woman. Being raped meant the victim had been "asking for it" or "promiscuous". Women were referred to as ""the weaker sex" (ha!). Women were not allowed to have jobs, vote, own property, etc. for ages and even now that we have won the "rights" to those things we get paid less for the same jobs (hopefully the Ledbetter statutes will help with this!), have been pushed against "glass ceilings", harassed and discriminated against, etc.“Women do two-thirds of the world’s work, receive 10 percent of the world’s income and own 1 percent of the means of production.”-Richard H. Robbins, Global Problems and the Culture of Capitalism, (Allyn and Bacon, 1999), p. 354" For many women, unpaid work in and for the household takes up the majority of their working hours, with much less time spent in remunerative employment. Even when they participate in the labour market for paid employment, women still undertake the majority of the housework. When women work outside the household, they earn, on average, far less than men. They are also more likely to work in more precarious forms of employment with low earnings, little financial security and few or no social benefits. Women not only earn less than men but also tend to own fewer assets. Smaller salaries and less control over household income constrain their ability to accumulate capital. Gender biases in property and inheritance laws and in other channels of acquiring assets also leave women and children at greater risk of poverty. Paid employment for women does not automatically lead to better outcomes for children. Factors such as the amount of time women spend working outside the household, the conditions under which they are employed and who controls the income they generate determine how the work undertaken by women in the labour market affects their own well-being and that of children."-— UNICEF, State of the World’s Children, 2007U.S. women represent 51% of the population, but comprise less than: * 1.2% of Fortune 500 CEOs. Source: Catalyst Census of Women Corporate Officers (www.catalystwomen.org ) * 2.7% of the highest paid officers at Fortune 500 companies. Source: Catalyst * 15% of the members of Congress. Source: Women's Research and Education Institute (http://www.wrei.org/pubs/WC_108.pdf )To reach equal compensation:In 2003, the median income of full-time, year round U.S. workers was $41,520 for men and $31,663 for women. Source: U.S. Census Bureau - Income in the United States: 2003 (www.census.gov )The simple fact is, women have more responsibility and less support than men. Being responsible for a child or children adds to a woman's "burden" of work without compensation. And since the prevailing attitude is that we (women) do not "deserve" help (despite the even most basic fact that we are RAISING THE NEXT GENERATION who will be making decisions for all of us at some point) or that that children are not a "communal responsibility"; it is quite possible that a woman CAN easily slip into poverty - with or without children.Until women have ACTUAL EQUAL RIGHTS and children have better and in some cases even just some RIGHTS and we start acting like communities instead of hanging families out to dry we will see this problem continue and this awful (because it IS partly true) stereotype and mindset in the general public. And no, I'm not "man bashing". Men AND women have allowed this to happen. It is up to men AND women to fix it.

Good question. All of the single mothers I know continued their education and created successful careers as nurses, sales execs, teachers, etc. And they did this while raising a young child.The myth of the poverty stricken single mother is hard to shake from our culture.

I believe it's a knee jerk reaction for people who are sexist in their thinking. A woman with a man is fine with her children, yet some people with archaic viewpoints believe that a woman cannot be successful at parenting without a man.There are millions of successful men and women in this world who were parented by a single mother.

I think there are several things going on. There's sexism-- the belief a woman is not complete without a man.There's age discrimination-- the belief that only older women will make good mothers or can be stable influences.There's class discrimination-- the belief that being of a lower economic class or making little money is a terrible thing or permanent condition, not a step common on the road to success. An unplanned baby may cause even a middle class woman temporary financial hardship, but I think that is too often assumed to be a permanent condition, not a brief cash shortage.There's still a stigma against premarital sex, since the United States (and to some extent Canada, but less so) has a higher percentage of religious and social conservatives than many nations.But honestly, I think there's an additional factor. I think to an extent we sometimes ironically and unintentionally push this idea ourselves when we speak on behalf of mothers, by talking about how a pregnant mother needs to be "supported," without giving any context. And I think people may get scared off in discussions about the subject when the idea that we need to "support" single mothers gets tossed around without much explanation. In reality, all a mother is likely to need is temporary financial assistance till she gets on her feet, emotional support to help her see she already has the capability to be a good parent, or both. However, without that clarified, "support" can easily be taken as "full support of this family is now a burden on the taxpayers, and the mother either intends to contribute nothing herself to her own support or the support of her child, or is incapable of doing so," as though we see pregnancy as a free pass to live off the hard work of others, or like there's no possible way she can function on her own. Now, this is actually RARELY true. But it can come off that way, especially when the focus of discussion seems to be on "giving support" (apparently placing the main responsibility on others, and implying the mother herself is not capable) rather than "helping a mother support herself and her child."I think we (including me, definitely,) sometimes shoot ourselves in the foot a little by how we broach the subject and phrase our ideas-- or by not explaining fully what we mean in context-- especially in light of the discriminatory views I mentioned earlier.

I will place my bets on the average single mom (or dad) who is a scrapper any day over a most of the spoiled married brats that I work with. Gawd, I feel sorry for the tug of war that their kids (bio and adopted BTW) are exposed to. The majority of the "marrieds" end up divorcing anyway and their poor kids are used as emotional pawns.The assumption is false. SSHHHH - don't let on to the truth. The baby sellers will go out of business.