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Linus/Miss Othmar/salary - amusing adult slant
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leno...@yahoo.com
Sep 20, 2014, 4:05:58 PM9/20/14
to
I was thinking of the classic storyline of Linus' horror at finding
that Miss Othmar....gets PAID for teaching! (For those who don't
remember, he convinces himself she's giving the money back. :) )
It appears in The Complete Peanuts 1961-1962. Does anyone know if
Schulz invented that story or was it based on a real child's experience?
Anyway, I suddenly remembered the parallel between that story and
a Miss Manners Dec. 1987 column on women who work for pay. Enjoy!
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1298&dat=19871218&id=XP1NAAAAIBAJ&sjid=tYsDAAAAIBAJ&pg=2776,3661487
Dear Miss Manners-I would like your opinion on how to show appreciation
for services rendered by the very helpful staff-two secretaries, a
head maintenance man and two or three maintenance men under him-at
the fairly large complex in which I rent an apartment.
The custom of the few people I know is to give something at holiday
time. They give $10 each to the men and cookies to the women. I wonder
how many cookies the women can eat. And why the sex difference? One
person said he gave money to the men and gift certificates to the women.
Gentle Reader-Money for men and cookies for women? And where are the
smelling salts for poor Miss Manners, who has just fallen over in a heap?
She would have thought that the practice of treating workers according
to their gender would have been stamped out by now. But your horrifying
example illustrates how deeply ingrained is the misunderstanding on
which this is based.
It may even be that the ``gift certificates`` one person gave the
women were equal in value to the cash he gave the men. That still
wouldn`t make it right.
The distinction is based on the idea that it is not quite nice to
give women money. And why is that? Because people have long held the
myth, in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, that women
properly belong only in the social realm (where there is plenty of
work, but without wages), while men divide their lives between that
and the workaday world (where money is the chief measure of achievement).
The fact that poor women worked for whatever money they could get
since the world began did not interfere with this idea, but Miss
Manners thought that the influx into the market of women from all
levels might have.
In the social world, money is a crass present. It means you have no
idea what your friend would enjoy. In the business world, it is
inappropriate to try to guess how an employee would enjoy having
the money spent.
Miss Manners urges you to give cash bonuses to all of these valued
workers. If you can't bear to hand money to a woman, by all means
put it in an envelope.
(end)
Lenona.
that Miss Othmar....gets PAID for teaching! (For those who don't
remember, he convinces himself she's giving the money back. :) )
It appears in The Complete Peanuts 1961-1962. Does anyone know if
Schulz invented that story or was it based on a real child's experience?
Anyway, I suddenly remembered the parallel between that story and
a Miss Manners Dec. 1987 column on women who work for pay. Enjoy!
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1298&dat=19871218&id=XP1NAAAAIBAJ&sjid=tYsDAAAAIBAJ&pg=2776,3661487
Dear Miss Manners-I would like your opinion on how to show appreciation
for services rendered by the very helpful staff-two secretaries, a
head maintenance man and two or three maintenance men under him-at
the fairly large complex in which I rent an apartment.
The custom of the few people I know is to give something at holiday
time. They give $10 each to the men and cookies to the women. I wonder
how many cookies the women can eat. And why the sex difference? One
person said he gave money to the men and gift certificates to the women.
Gentle Reader-Money for men and cookies for women? And where are the
smelling salts for poor Miss Manners, who has just fallen over in a heap?
She would have thought that the practice of treating workers according
to their gender would have been stamped out by now. But your horrifying
example illustrates how deeply ingrained is the misunderstanding on
which this is based.
It may even be that the ``gift certificates`` one person gave the
women were equal in value to the cash he gave the men. That still
wouldn`t make it right.
The distinction is based on the idea that it is not quite nice to
give women money. And why is that? Because people have long held the
myth, in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, that women
properly belong only in the social realm (where there is plenty of
work, but without wages), while men divide their lives between that
and the workaday world (where money is the chief measure of achievement).
The fact that poor women worked for whatever money they could get
since the world began did not interfere with this idea, but Miss
Manners thought that the influx into the market of women from all
levels might have.
In the social world, money is a crass present. It means you have no
idea what your friend would enjoy. In the business world, it is
inappropriate to try to guess how an employee would enjoy having
the money spent.
Miss Manners urges you to give cash bonuses to all of these valued
workers. If you can't bear to hand money to a woman, by all means
put it in an envelope.
(end)
Lenona.
Tim Chow
Oct 18, 2014, 12:23:19 PM10/18/14
to
On Saturday, September 20, 2014 4:05:58 PM UTC-4, leno...@yahoo.com wrote:
> It appears in The Complete Peanuts 1961-1962. Does anyone know if
> Schulz invented that story or was it based on a real child's experience?
Interesting question. I don't recall hearing anything one way or the other on this particular topic.
> It appears in The Complete Peanuts 1961-1962. Does anyone know if
> Schulz invented that story or was it based on a real child's experience?
> Anyway, I suddenly remembered the parallel between that story and
> a Miss Manners Dec. 1987 column on women who work for pay. Enjoy!
---
Tim Chow
leno...@yahoo.com
Oct 21, 2014, 1:58:43 PM10/21/14
to
On Saturday, October 18, 2014 12:23:19 PM UTC-4, Tim Chow wrote:
>
> Nice article! Thanks for sharing.
Glad to oblige.
>
> Nice article! Thanks for sharing.
Of course, now that I think about it, Linus would likely have been just
as horrified had Miss Othmar been a beloved male teacher. Like most(?)
kids under a certain age, Linus is shocked to realize that the world
doesn't revolve around him and his needs - or whims. (If kids are lucky
enough not to have helicopter parents, or parents who act like servants,
that shock really shouldn't be happening any later than age 5. Maybe a
lot earlier, even.)
Lenona.
Lenona
Mar 22, 2021, 3:10:06 PM3/22/21
to
> I was thinking of the classic storyline of Linus' horror at finding
> that Miss Othmar....gets PAID for teaching! (For those who don't
> remember, he convinces himself she's giving the money back. :) )
Even as the adult is exhausting herself.
(But, there are also ADULTS who believe - as MM indicated, 30-plus years ago - that enjoyment should be a woman's only payment for a job well done - and Linus may well have believed that too.)
https://old.reddit.com/r/breakingmom/comments/m81748/moms_dont_do_anything/
ardnaidS: Husband and 5yo were picking up the kitchen after he got home from work. Dh asks kid if she knows the difference between moms and dads. She says, "moms don't do anything all day, and dads work and do stuff."
My heart broke. I'm a sahm, and I know I'm crap at it. I let the kitchen get messy. But we always have clean clothes, a not totally destroyed house. I read to her every day, play with her, feed her. And she thinks I do nothing.
SoFarFrom-YourWeapon: I'm going through it over here too. My little said something similar before bedtime to me. I try not to take it to heart. To little kids going out and doing things is "exciting". But they dont see all the behind the scenes stuff we do.
All the packed lunches with extra touches to make it fun. All the planning put into finding activities they will like. All hours spent making sure they have clothes and paying Bills and setting money away for vacation and college and putting every waking moment into thinking about them and their future...
chrystalight: This is just how little kids brains work. She sees that your husband leaves the house for work and other things, so that is very concrete to her. You're always with her, so she doesn't view what you're doing as anything really different from what she does. Children are also really ego-centric, she cannot imagine that you'd possible WANT to do anything besides take care of her all day. She would then also think well of course dad WANTS to be at home with me but he can't because he has to work. So right now to her, it seems like he's doing "more" because he has the less desirable position in her opinion.
My mom was a stay at home mom too and it wasn't until I was older that I had any appreciation whatsoever about what my mom did being like actual work. Everything she did to make our lives function was just how it was. I didn't even have the capacity to consider that all of her effort wasn't 100% fun and how she would want to spend her time...
LongbowTurncoat: This is when your husband should say “actually, mommy does SO MUCH, even if she doesn’t go to a regular job. She makes sure our house is safe, warm and cozy. She cooks us food and keeps us healthy. She cleans every single thing you see around the house that you never think about, isn’t that crazy! I wouldn’t be able to do my regular job as well if it wasn’t for Mommy working as hard as she does!”
FlakeyGurl: ...I feel you. I went through the same thing. I told my kid she can wash the dishes, do her own laundry, clean the toilet, shower, floors, etc since I don't do anything. For some reason she shut up real quick after that.
rubbermoonrocks
As much as she didn't mean to, she sure said something awfully hurtful.
Just try to keep in mind, the everyday stuff you do--which is a boatload of hard work!--tends to get glossed over as kids are focused on the Fun and Exciting and Different things! She has no idea how much you do. It's not that our kids are mean and ungrateful; they just don't register what it takes to keep a household running.
Sockalaunch: I think this is the same kind of "nothing" that they do at school all day. They don't really understand how to explain those types of day to day actions. And if nothing special or outrageous happens it doesn't really register with them at this age.
If I want to get any information from my 5yos, I have to ask very specific questions, what story did you read, what words did you write, who did you play with in the playground. Otherwise, I can ask "what did you do all day?" and I get the answer "nothing."
13_darkravens : It's really just jacked up perception at young ages. I was a stay-at-home-dad for almost two years. Remodeled 75% of the house, did stuff with the kids, laundry, meals, shopping, cleaning, yard work, etc. My (at the time) 6 year old does a paper at school about getting to know his family- mommy goes to work and works really hard. Daddy doesn't do anything. It kills you...but they don't mean to be harsh.
Takingthingssloow: ... lots of small kids don’t see household chores as work cause they’re children, just something that gets done by parents. So when they hear dads at work, and mums at home. Their little brains usually go, so dad works and mum just stays home.
And a lot of kids also say their parents don’t work, but they actually very much do, and is the reason they drop them off at my daycare centre. I have a kid who’s father, who comes in his military uniform, she doesn’t actually know what her dad does, and therefore doesn’t do anything. Was an interesting parent career day with her dad.
Maximum_Improvement : And my daughter thinks all mommies work outside the home and asks everyone “what is your job?” And gets confused when someone doesn’t have one. Kids are just very black and white.
Lenona.
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