Each Person Should Have Their Own Beer
The title of this post is a direct quote from Stefanie Wilder-Taylor of the Cocktail Playdate saga that made me want to stand up and cheer for her and her humorous but unwavering stance that parents are adults and should have the right to partake responsibly in an alcoholic beverage of their choosing without guilt or judgment.
Wilder-Taylor was just on the Today Show again this morning in a rebuttal-type segment that was obviously devised to help Vieira and the Today Show save face after insulting women the previous week with the suggestion that mothers and babysitters are interchangeable, which was wrong on SO many levels. The blogosphere was set afire with indignation from women who found the comparison insulting and unforgiveable and they didn’t hold back criticizing the Today Show and Vieira, in particular, for trying to pass that piece of tripe off as good journalism.
Today Vieira and her guest expert had toned back the judgmental rhetoric considerably, as well they should have after blindsiding mother and blogger Melissa Summers last week with the babysitter nonsense as well as the not-very-subtle suggestion that all women who drink are problem drinkers and thus are a danger to their children. It should be noted that today Vieira and her expert still had difficulty grasping the “it’s ONE freaking drink” concept.
Furthermore, having your expert state the obvious over and over (that mothers need to be constantly evaluating themselves and make sure they aren’t self-medicating. No, really? DUH.) tells me that while Vieira and her expert may be a teeny bit embarrassed for acting like asses in the first interview, their stance remains much the same and appears to encompass the following:
• Mothers lose their ability to think critically the second they give birth
• Mothers need to be told how to be a good parent because they’re too stupid to figure it out for themselves
• Mothers should harbor considerable anxiety about their status as a “good parent” at all times
Christ…it’s no wonder we’re NOT all self-medicating after dealing with such nonsense for two weeks in a row.
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No shit. Those morons make me want to self medicate.
Sounds like they gave these “experts” a chance to redeem themselves, and instead, they just dug their proverbial hole a lot deeper!
Didn’t watch either weeks of this drama. I’ve been following it across blogs though and this post definitely makes very powerful points to counter all that nonsense the Today Show was trying to peddle. Good for you, Izzy!
Shit! I thought the segment got bumped to FRIDAY. I missed it! Hope someone puts it on YouTube.
ooh. i’ve been waiting to see what the outcome of this next interview would be. can’t say i’m not surprised that things did not change much–i’m just glad stephanie is the one representin’
thanks for this.
God. I think I need a drink.
I saw it this morning, too, and I’m working on my own response, so I won’t take up all of your comment space. In summary, I agree with you. A little less harsh this time, but still holding the line that moms can’t drink around their kids.
Who’s NOT self-medicating?
*grin*
I caught just part of this, including the part about each person having their own beer. Which was perfect.
I totally agree that the sub-text of the segment was that mothers are unable to think critically and that they need to be told how to parent. But I also think that there is more to this. There’s a qualifier there that isn’t being said out loud by anyone, yet seems to exist. I think when we (moms/bloggers) say that this is okay for moms to do, we only mean it’s okay for “moms like us” to do — middle class (or higher), educated moms who are married, with seemingly stable lives. I don’t think we would all respond so positively if the mom in the Today Show hot seat was a single/divorced mom who works nights and lives in a crappy apartment complex. Would we trust her judgment as well as we trust our own?
I loved how Viera didn’t want to be put on the spot by Matt Lauer during the intro … This is such a farce it’s sad. Journalism is dead. It’s all just infotainment.
I do agree that the realm of socioeconomic status has not been explored but nobody in their right mind would touch that with a ten foot pole.
Infotainment…what a great way of summing it all up.
I didn’t want to freak out too much because I’ve been accused of drama mongering this thing to death.
But yes: • Mothers should harbor considerable anxiety about their status as a “good parent” at all times
The media is EXTREMELY invested in keeping us insecure about our role as mother.
More good points on the subject. I couldn’t write on my blog about it because I would self-combust.
God, it’s like junior high never ends…the judging goes on and on (just ask my grandma about the gossip & shenanigans at her assisted living facility).
And I heartily agree that good, investigative journalism is in a state of decay in this country. Infotainment indeed.
I saw both segments, and I don’t agree with your assessment of either. But let’s just focus on today’s, ok? First, they said clearly that they got letters for BOTH sides of the issue, and read letters saying that people believed that drinking was wrong period. Not just women, men too. Parents shouldn’t drink was the message. Second, I think Stefanie did a MUCH better job speaking, interrupting, and stating her opinons clearly without looking sullen and cross. A lesson to us all about communicating effectively.
I think both segments were fairly balanced. I don’t happen to agree with Dr Janet, and she’s a bit stiff, but it’s her opinion and she’s entitled to it. Why isn’t she allowed to state that she disagrees with drinking while watching kids, regardless of the gender of the drinker? She said that whomever the primary caregiver was, drinking on the job (and parenting IS a job) isn’t a great idea. Like drinking on ANY job. It gets you fired, right? So what’s the difference?
What bothers me SO MUCH about the coverage the mommy blogs are giving to this is that a) isn’t so not an issue… and I see it as sad that young mothers seem to have to rally around this issue as a “feminist” rallying cry. Maybe because I’m so much older and had to fight for every freaking right you younger women take for granted, but I’m sorry, this isn’t a huge deal. It just isn’t.
And also, I see a huge amount of judgement from all the mommy blogs, much more so than anyone else, about how they’re victims of ‘discrimination’ because people don’t agree with their stance on drinking while watching kids. Well guess what? I’d bet more people are against drinking than for it. They just don’t blog. Drinking while watching kidlets isn’t popular all over the country. But who the hell cares if someone does choose to drink. Just stop making it an issue when it isn’t.
If you need an issue to get all upset over, why not find one that REALLY makes a difference to women. Like helping children get out of sexual slavery, for instance. Or working to find health care for poor women. Or working to defeat the draconian Republican views on birth control overseas and in our own country. We have so much work to do, and honestly, NONE of it involves drinking on playdates.
I think a lot of people are angered, myself included, by the fact that Vieira was not objective and stacked the deck against Summers in an attempt to sensationalize what was essentially a NON-ISSUE before the segment aired.
At the heart of it, this brouhaha is not about drinking at all. I can’t believe you don’t see that. People felt insulted and judged and the undertone of both segments was that mothers must deny themselves the same freedoms every other adult non-mother is free to enjoy for 18 years or else they are a bad and irresponsible parent. They tried to backpedal on that today but in the first segment, that subtext was very clear that the onus was on the shoulder of MOTHERS and frankly, I disagree with you. This IS a feminist issue. The only difference is that it’s women against women instead of men against women.
In short, this whole debacle has obviously tapped into something untold numbers of women identify with and while you are entitled to your opinion and you certainly don’t hesitate to share it, the same goes for those with whom you disagree and whose feelings and views you trivialize by naming other issues YOU feel are more important. They are entitled to be as angry or insulted as they choose to be, regardless of their age. And for the record, I will be forty this year.
My question to you is why don’t you think people can be upset about this AND fight against sex slavery or Republican views on birth control overseas or any number of other issues? I do it every day of my life and I don’t think my fervor has been diminished in the least for thinking Meredith Vieira is a joke and that mothers deserve far more credit and far less sensationalistic, pot-stirring criticism from a TV “journalist” who wouldn’t know objectivity if it came up and slapped her in the face.
Your last sentence summed up perfectly why I think this is an ‘issue’ blown totally out of proporation. It’s TELEVISION. Network frigging televison. At 8 in the morning. WHY do you think that Viera, or anyone else, has to be completely objective on an entertainment show. Is Letterman objective when he makes fun of Dr Phil? Is Jay Leno objective when he makes jokes about stupid people? It’s television, Izzy. It isn’t anything other than entertainment and it’s SUPPOSED to be controversial. Why would you think otherwise?
I don’t think that anyone was non-objective. I think they were a few women on TV that had different opinions. Period. That’s what these kinds of shows are about. When they do fashion segments and only cover thin women, are they fat discriminators? When they show a health concern and don’t give every side of the story, are they wrong? It’s TV in little tiny segments. It isn’t PBS, it isn’t an hour long in-depth show, it’s blurbs designed to entertain people as they’re getting ready for work. Period.
I do believe that people can, and do, fight against other more urgent issues. I know you do. And I know that most of the bloggers who are rabid about this show don’t. I’ve brought this up several times in other places and you’re the ONLY person that took me up on my question. Honestly.
Which bothers me a lot. Heck, I’m not the only blogger that things this is ridiculously overblown. Look around. I think you’ll see a lot of people who ignored it, or said it’s too freaking much. It ISN’T the next coming of Christ here, it’s a little teeny issue that a few people have glommed onto as the next huge feminist issue. I sure haven’t seen any of the feminist organizations frothing at the mouth over it, and yes, I belong to pretty much all of them. In fact, there are hardly anyone other than bloggers who are outraged, and many of those bloggers are outraged because, well, it’s popular.
I’m not saying that’s you in any way, shape or form. I’m saying that it’s a lot easier to identify with the popular girls and support them than it is to reach deep within yourself and says “hey, I think this is silly.” Me, I’m the latter. I rarely if ever identify with the popular kids because it’s been almost 40 years since I’ve been in high school and well, I’m so over it.
Oh, and fwiw, Meridith Viera has NEVER been a journalist. She started on 60 Minutes, left to raise her kids, and then went on to be on entertainment shows within the news department. The View, for example, was NEVER journalistic in any manner, and neither is the Today Show. Nor is it supposed to be.
It’s not something I want to debate ad nauseum. We’ll just have to agree to disagree.
Aren’t there some Republican birth control nazis that need harassing? *snicker*
You know, I hadn’t heard a word about it. How does one get access to television during the daytime, lol? If you wanna know what happened on Sesame Street - that I’ve got the 411 on… Sorry, just too busy taking care of my kids to know or care what the media thinks of my parenting skills. Good Speed, Dr. Janet, Whoever you are.