As Mother’s Day approaches, we ask, “Do you love your children because you have a college degree? Or because you live in a rich country? Do you do what is best for them because you have electricity and running water? Do you get up with them in the middle of the night when they need you because you have access to professional medical care? Do you invest in their well-being because you are literate? Do you strive to give them opportunities because you are able to travel freely? Or because you can vote? Or because you have access to professional legal assistance? Are those the reasons that you are a good mother? “
Certainly not.
It is absurd to try to give credit for mothering to the infrastructure of Western society, and as mothers living in the United States, we would never credit our society for the care of our own children. Rather, judging from the intensity with which we discuss the minutia of parenting in this era of blogs, forums, self-help books and parenting magazines, we are pretty interested first and foremost in our central role as the parent in what is known as ‘raising our children’.
But try this mental exercise as you consider what it means to be a mother to you and to your peers: Strip out all the trappings of winning life’s lottery and being born in the United States, or even in a Western country, and imagine being dropped with your husband and children into grinding, merciless, tireless third world poverty. Now ask yourself: will you do everything in your power to elevate the fortunes of those you love most in the world, especially your children?
Naturally, the answer is Yes.
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Source: Sow Hope
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