What good mothers and fathers instinctively feel like doing for their babies is usually best after all.
Benjamin SpockRead
I was, in reality, bred by my parents as my father's concubine... What we take for granted as the stability of family life may well depend on the sexual slavery of our children. What's more, this is a cynical arrangement our institutions have colluded to conceal.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote highlights the hidden complexities and sacrifices within family structures, suggesting a critique of societal norms regarding family dynamics.
Sylvia Fraser's quote challenges the conventional perception of family stability by revealing that it may often be built upon uncomfortable truths, such as the exploitation and oppression of individuals within familial relationships. It underscores the often unseen realities that can underpin family life, illustrating how societal institutions might contribute to the normalization of such arrangements, ultimately calling for a critical reflection on familial and social structures.
Themes
FamilyExploitationSocietyStabilityRelationships
In practice
Example use cases
During a lecture on family dynamics, one could use this quote to illustrate the hidden sacrifices that families may endure.
Similar quotes
A Message to Children Who Have Read This Book - When you grow up and have children of your own, do please remember something important: a stodgy parent is no fun at all. What a child wants and deserves is a parent who is SPARKY.
Roald DahlRead
I finally made friends with my father when I entered my twenties. We had so little in common when I was a boy, and I am certain I had been a disappointment to him. He did not ask for a child with a book, off in its own world. He wanted a son who did what he had done; swam and boxed and played rugby, and drove cars at speed with abandon and joy, but that was not what he wound up with.
Neil GaimanRead
Time does not really exist for mothers, with regard to their children. It does not matter greatly how old the child is-in the blink of an eye, a mother can see the child again as they were when they were born, when they learned how to walk, as they were at any age-at any time, even when the child is fully grown or a parent themselves.
Diana GabaldonRead
In Morocco, there is an insistence on authority. Children are not encouraged to speak up in front of their parents. My parents were not like this. I was the kind of girl who could tell her father, 'No, what you are saying is totally untrue, and I don't agree with you.'
Leila SlimaniRead
My father was sleepless most of his life. So by the age of five, I was awake with him all night long, watching bad television or we'd lie in the same bed, and I'd read my comic books while he read his latest spy or mystery novel.
Sherman AlexieRead