Deconstructing Motherhood Madness<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />
 
There was an extremely bizarre article in the Australian recently (May 11, 2007). It was about mothers and Mother's Day, except the whole gist of the article was that mothering really has nothing to do with mothers. Yes, that's right. Anyone can mother, and anyone can be a mother.
 
Thus the old dictionary definition of a mother as a female parent (a woman who has children) has to go. Instead, we need to thin<?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />k outside the biological box, these authors claim, and see a whole new world of what motherhood means.
 
Confused? I certainly am. Indeed, it is hard to know what to make of the convoluted argument by Giuliana Fuscaldo and Sarah Russell in "Mother of all myths that only mums mother". A few representative quotes set the stage:  "[Y]ou don't need your own kids to mother." Indeed, to suggest that a mother is a woman who has children is to "perpetuate the myth that motherhood is defined by biology, breast feeding and buckets of nappies".
 
In fact, a "child can have many mothers". Moreover, with "so many women mothering, why limit Mother's Day lunch to only one mum?" The authors argue that we should "acknowledge that there are lots of ways to mother and place less emphasis on biological definitions of mothering".
 
It is certainly clear that they are claiming that mothers are not necessary to mothering. Presumably then parents are not necessary for parenting. Nor are Prime Ministers needed for Prime Ministership, nor football coaches for football coaching, etc. Anyone can do anything, or be anything, they seem to be arguing.
 
What all this nonsense is, it seems to me, is just an exercise in verbal engineering, designed to result in social engineering. The authors are trying to convince us that the biological two-parent family is just a social construct, and that any sort of relationship is just as good, even for the well-being of children.
 
Never mind the 10,000 plus social science studies from the past 30 years that tell us the exact opposite: that family structure very much does matter, and children do best when raised by their own biological mother and father. They want to overlook the mountain of data on this issue, and confuse us with their silly little word games.
 
Indeed, anyone familiar with the agendas of the radical feminists and homosexual lobby will instantly recognize what is going on here. It is an attempt to radically redefine the nature of family, and to convince us that gender is simply a social construct. Such people argue that there are far more than just two genders: many claim that there are eight or ten different genders. And plenty of different sexualities as well.
 
Thus one can be a homosexual today, a transgendered person tomorrow, a bi-sexual the next week, and so on. One can be male today, female tomorrow, and some other permutation the next day. Sexuality and gender are fluid and changing, with no biological basis whatsoever. Notice the number of times the authors try to poo-poo the idea that motherhood has anything to do with biology.
 
One certainly suspects an agenda is being pushed here. Indeed, the Australian was very coy about who these authors in fact are. This is how they are described: "Giuliana Fuscaldo has two daughters and Sarah Russell sometimes mothers them". I leave it to the reader to draw his or her own conclusions as to what that might mean.
 
Wherever the authors are actually coming from, the whole thrust of the article tries to point to one conclusion: motherhood has nothing to do with mothers, and anyone can be a mother. Children will be just fine with any sort of parental arrangement. Whether it is no mum, or six mums, or a committee, it all qualifies as family, and it does no harm to kids at all. This is the standard argument of homosexual activists and the radical feminists, as they attempt to dismantle the family altogether by redefining it out of existence.
 
What these authors are really doing is simply playing word games here. Indeed, after reading this curious circus of words, one is reminded of Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland:
 
Humpty Dumpty: When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less.Alice: The question is, whether you can make words mean so many different things.Humpty Dumpty: The question is: which is to be master - that's all.
 
The authors are so intent on arguing that mums can be anything anyone wants them to be, one might as well argue that mums can be dads, and dads can be mums. Oops, sorry – that is exactly what the homosexual activists have already been arguing.
 
Social engineering is always preceded by verbal engineering, and this is one of the better examples to have appeared in the mainstream media in recent times.
 
One has to ask: why is the Australian so intent on redefining the family, and pushing alternative lifestyles? If that is not the intention, then why in the world did they print this atrocious piece? So much for the theory that the Australian is somehow part of a so-called right-wing media.
 
This is the sort of piece one would expect to find in numerous far left publications. It is a pity that a national newspaper should sink to such lows and succumb to such outright foolishness and lunacy.
 
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,21708556-7583,00.html
 
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Giuliana Fuscaldo and Sarah Russell: Mother of all myths that only mums motherYou don't need to have 'your own kids' to help nurture our nation's children
Australian, 11 May 2007LOOKING for the perfect gift for Mother's Day? Forget the dust buster. It's a myth buster.
Motherhood is a fertile breeding ground for myths. Take the myth implicit in Bill Heffernan's recent comments about Julia Gillard: that women who don't give birth are barren. When we put this myth into the myth buster, we find that there are many reasons that women don't have children. Calling these women barren denies the rich and fruitful relationships that many women nurture with children - you don't need your own kids to mother.
When people talk about mothering the way Heffernan does, they perpetuate the myth that motherhood is defined by biology, breast feeding and buckets of nappies. This limited definition of motherhood assumes that mothering is exclusive to biological mothers. It ignores the fact that women without children can also be good mothers and that there are many ways to mother.
 
There are many other myths about motherhood that we should feed to the myth buster. Take these old favourites: "only women who give birth are mothers"; "children can only have one mum"; "there is no substitute for a mother's love" and, the mother of all myths, "that only biological mothers are 'real' mothers".
When the myth buster does its work we see that lots of women mother children - adoptive mothers, step-mothers, social mothers, foster mothers, aunties, friends, neighbours, nannies, and so do some men. It is simply not true that all this mothering is second best or that these contributions to raising a child are less real or less motherly.
 
A child can have many mothers. In fact, there are many days when many, many mothers are needed - to get the kids to footy or netball training, to prepare dinner and get to the dentist on time, to make costumes for drama club, to drive kids to music lessons and parties, to take a turn with the wheelchair, the shopping trolley or the pram, to help with maths homework, to remove nits from hair and dispense first-aid to the guinea pig. From childhood to adulthood, lots of people provide mothering which could take the form of sex education, learning to drive, or mentoring about responsible drinking.
 
They also share tears, reveal secrets, provide hugs and support children through the rites of passage. Yes, it takes a village. The myth that only mothers mother denies the important way that women without children can and do contribute to children's lives.
 
With so many women mothering, why limit Mother's Day lunch to only one mum? Every Mother's Day, a lot of women who mother miss out because the traditional celebration of Mother's Day excludes women without children. This exclusiveness can make Mother's Day a sad day for some women. However, by expanding our view of mothering, and by moving an apostrophe, we can share the celebration and make it a mothers' day.
By acknowledging that mothering doesn't just come from mothers, we provide opportunities to welcome more women to mothers' day lunch and, in some families, we might also welcome a man or two to the celebration. It is not only women who benefit from motherhood myth busting. There are some children who feel sad on Mother's Day because it focuses on the notion of "real" mums. Kids who do not know their biological mothers, or cannot be with them, may not feel like joining in.
 
However, if we acknowledge that there are lots of ways to mother and place less emphasis on biological definitions of mothering, we could make the lives of some kids happier. If we expand our rules about who is a mother, we might find that more children can enjoy the mothers' day stall at school.
 
This mothers' day, let's put all the myths in the myth buster and buy a toaster for Philomena for taking kids to the footy, a perfume gift pack for Auriol for all her school holiday baking, gardening gloves for Tina for telling the kids a bedtime story and chrysanthemums for Julia Gillard for caring about the future of work for kids.
 
This mothers' day, the myth buster is the perfect gift for people who want to share the ritual of breakfast in bed. Perhaps we should send one to Bill.
 
Giuliana Fuscaldo has two daughters and Sarah Russell sometimes mothers them.