Ottawa (AFP) – Yahoo reports that Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's wife set off a social media firestorm on Tuesday, the eve of International Women's Day, by suggesting that men should be celebrated too. https://www.yahoo.com/news/pm-trudeaus-wife-wants-celebrate-men-womens-day-020836419.html
"As we mark International Women's Day, let's celebrate the boys and men in our lives who encourage us to be who we truly are, who treat girls & women with respect," our neighbor to the North, the first lady of Canada, Sophie Gregoire Trudeau, wrote on her Instagram account.
One frequent complaint of American women on Women’s Day regards unequal pay. However much unequal pay makes good headlines, renowned economist Walter Williams carefully dissects the argument and disavows the misconception that pay is unequal. https://www.creators.com/read/walter-williams/04/14/wage-discrimination
As a personal example, I chose a career in Education while the man in my life took a much more arduous path to an Engineering degree. He chose to work up to 60 hours a week when needed, which enhanced his final pay.
I chose to stay home with my children for 10 years. I chose to spend winter breaks and summers with my children. Each of these choices affected our incomes. I was fortunate to have a man who supported my choices.
Instead of taking a day off to protest, let’s focus on helping single moms raising children alone to be enveloped in love and support .
Children ache for absent dads, or granddads, coaches, mentors, big brothers (and I don't mean Big Brother). EBT cards, rent assistance and child care vouchers have become pathetic government sponsored substitutes for many dads.
"Children who grow up without a father are five times more likely to live in poverty and commit crime; nine times more likely to drop out of schools and 20 times more likely to end up in prison." –Barack Obama
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2008/jun/23/barack-obama/statistics-dont-lie-in-this-case/
Not only does missing one's dad leave emptiness in a child’s heart, add more stress to single women and create strain on federal resources but often also results in lower overall pay for these moms who have to choose jobs compatible with single parenthood.
Instead, let's develop government programs that incentivize men to become responsible for their families rather than continue to offer the perverse liberal rewards of the past 60 years that moved men to the sidelines, made their involvement irrelevant so some completely vanished from family life.
And, please, let’s stop being eternally grieved, pitting one sex against the other.
Instead, let’s ask American and Canadian women and men to protest against 12 year old girls marrying old men, female genital mutilation, child-sex trafficking and ripping fully formed babies from the womb, limb by limb to (depending on your perspective) while calling this gruesome, barbaric, deadly procedure "a woman's right."
Let’s work together, WOMEN and MEN, to acknowledge how far we have come to improve women's rights in America rather than how far apart we are - and how we can welcome the return of more men to family life.
Let's celebrate the yang AND the yin of life with Canada’s First Lady, Sophie Trudeau today.
by Joan Alagood