IWF policy director Carrie Lukas was quoted in a Washington Post article about Susan Douglas’s book The Mommy Myth: The Idealization of Motherhood and How It Has Undermined Women.
“Women are going to face different choices and certainly some women have no choice,” says Carrie Lukas, director of policy for the Independent Women’s Forum. “We should be thinking about ways for those women to balance the real trade-offs they must make.”
That said, though, Lukas does not agree with what she saw as the book’s central conclusion.
“They come down with the same idea of big government — that the federal government should take responsibility for a whole host of social issues,” she says, “and I think that’s the wrong direction. We should be making it easier for women to make it on their own.” And Lukas really doesn’t agree with the way the authors spend most of the book ranting about the media. “Frenzied,” “shrill” and “overblown” are all words she uses to describe the text.
“A lot of the media that they were so upset about, I thought involved things that were trying to help women,” Lukas says. “Sure, it can go overboard sometimes with all the suggestions about how to educate your kid and turn everything into an enriching experience. But most women are able to put this in perspective and won’t go completely crazy at any media study that suggests this or that is a threat to their kids.”
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