First car had a motor with cylinders from a salvaged metal pipe from his job. He worked at an Edison power plant, in Detroit. At the time men worked 12 hours a day, six days a week.
Compare this with the present where hours of work are reduced, many part time, and men must compete with women for jobs. Add to this automation and advances in other labor-saving equipment. The result is an overstaffed workforce out of balance with neglect in the home. Consider, vices can now infiltrate the home at electronic speeds. A network of interstate highways make easy and hidden criminal activity.
Women are closer to the fountain of life, they have a higher calling than us men. They have better social skills and a more complex anatomy. Nature designed them to create new life and thereby shape the future. Sure, a better, safer car is important, however, a stable economy free of poverty, homelessness and addictions is more so…[Abraham] Lincoln said: “No one is poor who had a godly mother.”
Every child has a natural right to good health. When shortchanged in nurturing care and guidance, they become resentful of authority, the source of criminal thoughts and violence.
It is a mistake to commercialize/standardize kids. They are not products. Father Flanagan, of Boys Town, wrote, “No nation can long endure which neglects and abuses its children.”
Women are central to the family. Their homemaking skills affect everyone to some degree. Food preparation and cleanliness for better health, watchful guidance, parent bonding, social exchanges.
There is a need for regulations to restore a solvent social order.
A) Job priority for men who are sole support of their families. B) Limit the hiring of women with underage children. Reward those who train for homemaking skills. C) Free kids from compulsory public education. The law was passed when railroads were built coast to coast. Workmen’s families lived in shacks along the rights of way. The concern was to get their kids into schools. The law is obsolete. What parent now does not realize the importance of education? D) We are a house divided and vacant. We know the rules of the road better than those needed for successful lifestyles regardless of rank…there are no prizes for clergymen. Their’s is a need to relate the precepts of the new testament to us; men and women of every generation.
When radiation was found to be beneficial to cure cancer, Madam Currie and her husband donated valuable patents to humanity. She won two Nobel prizes for isolating two new elements: Radium and polonium…women have made their point.
Russell Vesecky Harmony
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https://townline.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/TownLineBanner.jpg00Website Editorhttps://townline.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/TownLineBanner.jpgWebsite Editor2019-02-06 13:44:332019-02-06 19:44:17Letters to the Editor: Women have made their point
4replies
Ellen Holmes says:
If you’re not careful women will get the vote too. I thought this letter was a joke at first, maybe like an article from the Onion, but it appears to be real. This patronizing and colonializing view of women and children is exactly shared wrong with Maine and our economy. What young, educated family would want to move to Maine thinking their neighbors would have these points of view? Like racism, sexism is also an institutionalized injustice whose outcomes and messages normalize riduculous implicit biases and overt beliefs such as the ones described in this letter from the heart of Harmony. Instead of a woman at home raising children in the free woods of Harmony – how about parent-friendly workplaces and child-focused education – with funding, policies and practices that truly support this. By the way, the very policies that create standardized schools and workplaces hostile to children and families were put in place by mostly white, wealthy men who have been entitled to a seat at the power-table for centuries. In addition to teaching “home-making” skills – why not teach power-weilding and wealth attainment skills so that those without wealth and power understand the systems intentionally built and put in place to keep them from accessing wealth and power in this state and nation. Courses in school about how to access civic rights and how systems of economy actually work would lift a new generation ready to lead this state. In Maine, women and children are the the majorityof the citizenry living in poverty. Wealthy white men have overwhelmingly been in power that created the systems described in this letter designed to keep women and children as “have nots.” The very fact that you feel emboldened enough to write this letter and the fact that it was published is a clear indication women in Maine have more points to prove. In case you wonder- I have lived in Maine my whole life, was raised by a mother and grandmother from Maine, and have raised children who now live in Maine.
Do you know Aesop’s story about the grasshopper and the ant? Basically, Grasshopper enjoys the lovely weather while Ant does the work of two; then in winter, the starving Grasshopper is turned away by the well-prepared Ant. There is no mystical force inhibiting a man’s access to traits like social skills, avoiding/guarding against vice, nurturing care, guidance, bonding, or making food. If the women in Vessecky’s life are better at these, it is because they have practiced more, been forced to practice by patriarchal social expectations in order to succeed. They have picked up slack in these areas where men like Vessecky refused to practice because those men did not value those qualities for themselves. Simultaneously, women have been practicing workplace skills. Because many women are competitive in those skill sets AND have the extra edge of honed interpersonal skills Vessecky’s brand chose not to practice, those men are threatened and now perceive the world is not their personal, endless supply of low-hanging fruit. Sure, it’s easier to put us on pedestals as having natural gifts in “soft skills” than to recognize our work and admit you neglected to do that work yourself. However, the hollow flattery didn’t work on the Ant, and we reject it, too. Vessecky is learning the Grasshopper’s lesson. There is no matter of natural skill; it was work (that well-rounded men practice, too, albeit not under the same compulsion). It is not a matter of “making a point”, but of collecting what is past due on unrecognized, devalued, unpaid work.
I also thought it was a joke. But nope, it isn’t. I have studied history a lot and while it is true that family values have declined constantly since women got out of the house to work, what other choice does a mother have but to work.
This view neglected to say why many women have gone to work.
Men used to worship their wives, used to appreciate how much the wife did at home, and were happy to support the family.
Nowadays men will walk out and leave their wives and kids, fight tooth and nail to NOT pay child support. Men openly cheat, abuse, and walk away from their responsibilities without a second thought. Most men aren’t in it for the long haul. Women know that and have to be prepared to fend for themselves.
Millions of women wish they had more time with their kids but have to be both mom and dad with one income.
If you’re tossing blame as to why today’s family dynamics are slim to none, blame the man manly enough to leave his children and their mothers, give zero financial assistance, and take no responsibility what so ever for the family they created and destroyed.
To the editor:
If you’re not careful women will get the vote too. I thought this letter was a joke at first, maybe like an article from the Onion, but it appears to be real. This patronizing and colonializing view of women and children is exactly shared wrong with Maine and our economy. What young, educated family would want to move to Maine thinking their neighbors would have these points of view? Like racism, sexism is also an institutionalized injustice whose outcomes and messages normalize riduculous implicit biases and overt beliefs such as the ones described in this letter from the heart of Harmony. Instead of a woman at home raising children in the free woods of Harmony – how about parent-friendly workplaces and child-focused education – with funding, policies and practices that truly support this. By the way, the very policies that create standardized schools and workplaces hostile to children and families were put in place by mostly white, wealthy men who have been entitled to a seat at the power-table for centuries. In addition to teaching “home-making” skills – why not teach power-weilding and wealth attainment skills so that those without wealth and power understand the systems intentionally built and put in place to keep them from accessing wealth and power in this state and nation. Courses in school about how to access civic rights and how systems of economy actually work would lift a new generation ready to lead this state. In Maine, women and children are the the majorityof the citizenry living in poverty. Wealthy white men have overwhelmingly been in power that created the systems described in this letter designed to keep women and children as “have nots.” The very fact that you feel emboldened enough to write this letter and the fact that it was published is a clear indication women in Maine have more points to prove. In case you wonder- I have lived in Maine my whole life, was raised by a mother and grandmother from Maine, and have raised children who now live in Maine.
We publish nearly every letter we receive, as long as it is readable and does not personally attack anyone. Thanks for your comment!
Do you know Aesop’s story about the grasshopper and the ant? Basically, Grasshopper enjoys the lovely weather while Ant does the work of two; then in winter, the starving Grasshopper is turned away by the well-prepared Ant. There is no mystical force inhibiting a man’s access to traits like social skills, avoiding/guarding against vice, nurturing care, guidance, bonding, or making food. If the women in Vessecky’s life are better at these, it is because they have practiced more, been forced to practice by patriarchal social expectations in order to succeed. They have picked up slack in these areas where men like Vessecky refused to practice because those men did not value those qualities for themselves. Simultaneously, women have been practicing workplace skills. Because many women are competitive in those skill sets AND have the extra edge of honed interpersonal skills Vessecky’s brand chose not to practice, those men are threatened and now perceive the world is not their personal, endless supply of low-hanging fruit. Sure, it’s easier to put us on pedestals as having natural gifts in “soft skills” than to recognize our work and admit you neglected to do that work yourself. However, the hollow flattery didn’t work on the Ant, and we reject it, too. Vessecky is learning the Grasshopper’s lesson. There is no matter of natural skill; it was work (that well-rounded men practice, too, albeit not under the same compulsion). It is not a matter of “making a point”, but of collecting what is past due on unrecognized, devalued, unpaid work.
I also thought it was a joke. But nope, it isn’t. I have studied history a lot and while it is true that family values have declined constantly since women got out of the house to work, what other choice does a mother have but to work.
This view neglected to say why many women have gone to work.
Men used to worship their wives, used to appreciate how much the wife did at home, and were happy to support the family.
Nowadays men will walk out and leave their wives and kids, fight tooth and nail to NOT pay child support. Men openly cheat, abuse, and walk away from their responsibilities without a second thought. Most men aren’t in it for the long haul. Women know that and have to be prepared to fend for themselves.
Millions of women wish they had more time with their kids but have to be both mom and dad with one income.
If you’re tossing blame as to why today’s family dynamics are slim to none, blame the man manly enough to leave his children and their mothers, give zero financial assistance, and take no responsibility what so ever for the family they created and destroyed.