I haven't posted in awhile, but I've reading posts again ever since the pre-convention fever started. The recent "Babygate" posts finally stirred my pen to action.
When I was 14 years old, my then-42 year old working mother gave birth to a beautiful baby girl named Karen. She and my stepfather had tried to have a baby for awhile and had nearly given up on having one who was genetically their own when my mother received the wonderful news that she was pregnant. My mother took a slightly longer maternity leave than Governor Palin - she was out for a few weeks instead of a few days.
When my mother returned to work, I took the role that was expected of me as the oldest person in the household who did not work full-time - I helped out with raising my wonderful baby sister as best I could.
I was not Karen's father. I was simply being the best older brother that I could be. My mother was not "covering" for me, nor was she neglectful of Karen by returning to work instead of staying at home to raise her. She simply was a hard-working woman who was doing her best to balance providing for and raising three kids.
There is plenty - and I do mean plenty - of things about which we can and should criticize Palin. Baby Trig is NOT one of them.
I feel a little more background on my family is necessary to understand the complete folly of this line of thought. Many moons ago, my mother graduated college and started graduate school, but had to drop out when she married my father (a doctor) and followed my father to his residency. By the time my dad was done with his residency, I was born. Three years later, my father left us and my mom became a single mother. Since she decided that raising me was more important than achieving her own full potential, she couldn't go back to school. She worked 40 hours a week and spent time with me 30 hours a week.
When I was 12, she married my stepfather and decided that she wanted to try to have "another" family - this time confident that with me and my stepfather around, she would be able to finally pursue the career she abandoned twenty years earlier while still having the complete family she so wanted.
My mother did not have the money for a gym membership and has never been as image-obsessed as politicians invariably are. Though she, like Palin, is a former beauty queen, her career did not demand that she appear flawless in public at all times. As a woman in the public eye, Palin's does.
That's not Palin's fault. That's our fault. It's our society's fault. We're the ones who expect women in the public eye to retain their physical appeal. That's why most other Hollywood moms try their damndest to look like a young Kate Moss during their pregnancies. I remember watching Will & Grace years ago and marveling at how thin Debra Messing looked when she was in her third trimester. In many scenes of some episodes right before she took maternity leave, there was no way I could have told she was eating for two.
So this whole "Babygate" BS is not only absurd. It's offensive.
It's offensive to me because showing pictures of a happy teenage sibling (even one with an oddly-shaped stomach in some photos) taking care of an infant sibing and citing said pictures as proof that the sibling is actually a parent belittles the efforts of older siblings like myself who became a "third parent" for the good of the family.
It's offensive to women because showing pictures of a woman looking thin late in pregnancy and citing said pictures as proof that the mother is actually a grandmother ignores the fact that it is our society's expectations that force women to look thin rather than "healthy" even during the late stages of a pregnancy.
And most importantly to me, it's offensive to my mother, because criticizing a woman for returning to work instead of staying a housewife (or citing a quick return to work as proof that she is not a "real" mother or a "good" mother) belittles the fact that my mother is both a damned good parent AND a damned good HR supervisor - and she has the right to try to be both.
I realize that being VP is a different kettle of fish than being an HR supervisor. But mothers - even ones with infant children - should have the right to try to be both without inviting scorn and without having to be subjected to bloggers who have too much spare time examining every photo of them (and their daughters) for signs of stomach bulges.
We're barking up the wrong tree here. Please, let's stop.