"You’ve been laid off. Your wife is going back to work. Your at-home children are preparing to press your buttons as they’ve never been pressed before," writes Monster contributor John Rossheim in an article entitled "Tips to Help Laid-Off Dads Keep their Job Search on Track." "At a time like this, how can you even think about furthering your career? You can, and in these tricky times, you’d better."
"One thing’s for sure," he continues. "In this recession, husbands who find themselves in this boat have more company than ever. Since December 2007, four out of five pink slips have gone to men, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. But that’s cold comfort to men who need to keep their professional act together while devoting countless hours to the care and feeding of young ones. Warm-and-fuzzy self-affirmations are fine, but what these men-between-jobs really need is concrete advice on keeping their careers on track."
What follows is a list of ho-hum job search tips and the admonishment to "Address All Domestic Issues Up Front:"
"As soon as you file for unemployment benefits, you should have detailed discussions with your spouse about how domestic responsibilities will be divided to serve both of your careers and the kids as well. Will the arrangement continue indefinitely? When you land your next job, will you hire help at home? Will your spouse take up the slack? Consider these issues now, so that you can approach your first day on your next job with high hopes rather than high anxiety."
What's lacking here, of course, is any discussion of the way family dynamics might and should change when dad stays at home instead of mom. Rossheim's assumption that both parents are eager to return to the father-as-breadwinner model does a disservice to readers who might be relishing their time away from prescribed gender roles.
-Naomi
3 comments:
True, but chances are that the dads who would click on an article about keeping their job search on track, while browsing a job-searching website don't want to be staying at home. The venue of the article should be considered...
I agree that a dismissal of "warm-and-fuzzy affirmations" is unfair to the important work done at home, and I know many men who would enjoy being spending their days with their children. And it seems like the men in the article have examined their family dynamics, and the benefits of being at home. Says one dad, “I had been an executive at a nonprofit, and I felt my career was incompatible with the kind of dad I wanted to be.”
Is someone looking for a new job?
Brilliant and perceptive as always, Lindsay. I agree with you 100%.
Personally, I wouldn't mind being a stay-at-home dad at all--and I think one really interesting side benefit to the whole "economic collapse" thing is the way it has forced the cultural conversation to shift. Suddenly things like "thrift" and "saving" are virtues again, and our national priorities--which have been seriously out of whack for as long as I can remember--are shifting. We've been rather single-mindedly focused on the expansion of wealth since the nineties. It's nice to see people finally begin to question the value of that pursuit now.
Lindsay, I did find some of the quotes in the story to be at odds with the author's message, which seemed to be something like: Man up! Find a new job and stop playing with the kids! Rossheim treats domestic work as a distraction, something to be passed off to the wifey or a paid employee once dad finds a new job. I'm also bothered by the fact that Rossheim mentions the "warm-and-fuzzy affirmations" of being an attentive father. This plays into the notion that society gives a collective pat to stay-at-home dads while basically brushing off women because, well, they're expected to be at home with the kids. I know that Monster.com isn't a bastion of alternative thinking, but I would expect the site to be a bit hipper when it comes to envisioning the intersection of work and family life.
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