Life is a Job

From the New York Times,  Our Mommy Problem., by a woman who objects to random adults addressing her as "Mom".   As usual, the comments are more interesting than the article. I was struck by this one:

Bismarck North Dakota

I am a Mom but also sooooooo much more - runner, spouse, head of a department at a Fortune 500 company, motherhood does not define me. I'm not up to my eyeballs in my kids stuff. I monitor their grades, their work and occasionally turn up at their athletic, dance and orchestra events. They are building their own lives with my and their Dad's support. The author hit the right tone - something has to change and it starts with us. We can take the conversation back and redefine ourselves as a mom, not as "Mom". This is the first salvo - thank you.

For this commenter, motherhood is a low-level managerial job. The mother's responsibility is to monitor her kids' performance and ensure that it's up to snuff. If their assessments are high, she's managed them well.

I see a lot of this where I live. The corporate paradigm is the filter through which we see the rest of life. School is a job for kids, which prepares them for adult jobs by forcing them to be show up on time, put in their hours (plus extensive overtime!), and get their paperwork filled out correctly and submitted to the appropriate supervisor. The kid who performs well at school is rewarded with a credential which will eventually result in a well-paid adult job.

In my high-achieving professional-class district, we have "good schools", which means that a lot of our kids go on to competitive colleges and high-salary jobs. Are the kids knowledgeable in real subjects, like math and history? Can they write clearly and intelligently? Are they happy? Do they have friends? Do they have a sense of purpose and meaning in their lives? Who the hell cares? All we need to know is the name of the highest-ranked college they got into and we know where they stand.