MSNBC’s Melissa Harris-Perry, who has a new baby, spoke recently with ThinkProgress about motherhood and the need for better policies for working parents. As usual, she says a lot of on-target, sensible things — but I have to amend her on one point.
In the interview, she discusses her own personal challenges as a working mother, but also recognizes her privilege in having a well paying job. She observes, “The greater challenges are faced by parents who work long hours for minimal wages, no health insurance, no retirement benefits, and little opportunity for advancement. . . .We do very little as a matter of public policy to fill those gaps.”
She offers a number of policy suggestions for tackling the problem, including universal health care not attached to employment, universal paid maternity and paternity leave [though can we please call it parental leave?], universal Pre-K for four-year-olds, raising the minimum wage, investing in poor communities to provide safe, inexpensive transportation to job-rich areas, and more. They’re good ideas, and I recommend reading them all.
One of her suggestions, however, is “marriage equality so that same-sex couples can enjoy existing parenting rights obtained in marriage.”
That’s where I have to quibble. Don’t get me wrong — I’m a fervent supporter of marriage equality, and recognize that at the current time, marriage provides immediate and necessary protections for many families by giving both parents a legal connection to the child. Here’s the thing, though — different-sex couples don’t need to be married for their parenting rights to be recognized, so same-sex couples shouldn’t have to be, either. What Harris-Perry might have said is: “marriage equality and broader recognition of de facto parents so that same-sex couples can enjoy existing parenting rights obtained by different-sex couples.” (On de facto parents, see Nancy Polikoff’s post on how Delaware implemented a de facto parenting law.)
Overall, though, hers is a must-read article that also discusses how motherhood can be a source of political power, and how race, class, and sexual orientation impact society’s views and expectations of different mothers. Good stuff.
I agree with your broad point, and I also think MHP would agree. I think that as progressives (you, me, MHP), we are struggling to balance a truly inclusive politics with effective rhetorical arguments. MHP certainly understand the stigma that Black women, in particular, have faced as unmarried parents, and the dangers of respectability politics, however, the “rights through marriage” and “one love” arguments are really effective with a popular audience. Many progressives appear to be using whatever arguments will sway hearts and minds, although they may have privately hold more nuanced ideas about what constitutes equality and fairness.
Good point. Nuance isn’t something that works well in many media venues, alas.