[throwaway010718]

Well if you casually observed the last two generations of my Hispanic family, you would say we made it work too. But that is because the culture pushes the youngest daughters to not get married and have no children. So now we have multiple women in our family who are bitter, boring, poor, and have destroyed their careers prospects because "it works" for the rest of the family.

[toomuchtodo]

Would those career prospects be substantially different if those women chose to have children? Or if they chose to postpone their careers to care for aging parents when the time came? Maybe their career goes well but to remain in it becomes a financial hardship so care can be paid for while they still work. Hard to say, lots of variables.

[DoreenMichele]

That framing comes across like "Women are losers with no lives anyway, amirite?! So, fuck em!"

Ideally, a healthy social contract benefits all involved parties and doesn't sacrifice some particular subgroup so that everyone else can be happy, but they're screwed no matter what they do because all options open to them are horrible.

[toomuchtodo]

We don’t have a healthy social contact. My impression was that’s what this thread was about, and what my comment you’re responding to observes (I don’t call women “losers”, nor do I believe that they are or that they have no lives).

Most options are poor options, through little fault of the individual. You’re doing the best you can with the hand you’ve been dealt.

[DoreenMichele]

I was a homemaker for a lot of years. It's a thing I've thought a lot about.

When 1+1=3 and you divide the pie such that everyone gets more than they would have on their own, no, it's not all downside and it's not unhealthy.

It's all downside when 1+1=3, but one party consistently gets less than what they would have on their own. Then, why should they go along with this?

That's where you get bitter people.

Edit: For the record, you've done a lot of editing of both of your comments here, which potentially changes how my replies look. I did my best to not personally accuse you of anything and to only state that the way the comment was written was not coming across well.

[toomuchtodo]

No worries, I wish HN tracked edits. I tried to keep my comments as non directed as possible to focus on ideas, not people.

Your comments stand on their own, and it has been pointed out I have made edits (which I’ve attempted to make in good faith).

[watwut]

Their prospect would be around similar to prospects of older daughters or sons. Who are not bitter, poor and boring.

They would not be in loose loose "we blame you for not choosing this and then blame you for consequences of choosing this" situation.