AMAC EXCLUSIVE
The corporate media has a new punching bag – so-called “tradwives,” or women who choose to embrace a more traditional role as a homemaker and mother. As the “tradwife” trend has grown in popularity on social media, so too have leftist critiques of this supposedly “sexist” and “dangerous” conception of womanhood.
One recent hit piece from Time Magazine entitled “The Truth About the Past That ‘Tradwives’ Want to Revive” is indicative of the media panic over the idea that women might not want to work outside the home.
In the article, author Jacqueline Beatty, a “historian of early American women and gender,” warns that tradwives “are exploited as pawns of the right, laundering extremist views and transforming them into ostensibly more palatable packaging.” She further worries that women who promote the tradwife lifestyle on social media “entice their followers with soothing videos of sourdough bread baking and #OOTDs [‘outfits of the day,’ a popular trend on social media] evoking prairie chic or Donna Reed, with dangerous consequences.”
And just what are those dangerous consequences? According to Beatty, “advocacy for the ideology and principles of so-called ‘traditional’ gender roles in marriage ultimately have the effect of promoting a return to the days of coverture and an erasure of the hard-fought (if incomplete) gains of women’s rights activists throughout American history.”
In other words, if you dress conservatively, bake bread, and care for your children, watch out – you might be peddling extremist right-wing ideology and destroying women’s rights.
But Jacqueline Beatty is hardly the only one concerned about the “dangerous consequences” of the tradwife lifestyle. Back in February, Time ran another piece from psychologist Vanessa Scaringi on “the false escapism of soft girls and tradwives.” According to Scaringi, the “decline in young women’s mental health” is directly connected to the tradwife trend. She further calls it “troubling” that women are being drawn “back into such traditional roles.”
(Notably, Scaringi never stops to consider whether the reverse may be true; that young women are anxious and depressed because society is pressuring them to eschew being a devoted wife and mother, while embracing traditional gender roles may alleviate anxiety and depression rather than causing it.)
Teen Vogue is sounding the alarm about tradwives as well. In late April, they warned that (gasp!) the tradwife lifestyle promotes “fundamentalist religious values.” The Washington Post, The New Yorker, and The Sun have all also recently lamented the supposed horrors of the tradwife phenomenon.
But despite the corporate media scolds warning about the supposedly sinister nature of being a homemaker and stay-at-home mom, tradwife influencers on social media are only continuing to gain popularity. Estee Williams, whose Instagram bio reads “Traditional Wife,” has garnered 120,000 followers on Instagram and nearly 200,000 on Tik Tok for her content. Hannah Neeleman, a mother of eight who posts baking and gardening content, boasts 8.9 million followers on Instagram and 7.1 million on TikTok.
For the left, the tradwife trend presents a direct and existential threat to their cultural dominance – hence the media’s rush to condemn tradwife influencers. While the left has for decades sought to erode traditional gender roles and the family as the foundations of society, the tradwife lifestyle re-asserts those values and, more concerningly for the left, makes them appealing to the youngest generations.
But in attacking tradwives, the left unintentionally reveals that it has no real interest in “empowering” women or “liberating” them from traditional gender roles.
In Beatty’s Time article, for instance, she dishonestly insinuates that more women becoming homemakers and stay-at-home moms could lead to a rollback of laws against marital rape and the return of coverture, an 18th-century marriage law whereby a woman was legally under her husband’s protection and authority.
Of course, tradwife influencers do not promote any erosion of women’s legal rights, and the idea that being a homemaker means giving up protections against abuse and violence is ridiculous on its face. The purpose of Beatty’s argument is transparently to scare female readers into believing that embracing traditional gender roles means giving up all autonomy and agency.
The characterization of traditional gender roles as inherently oppressive is also an insult to women who choose to prioritize their roles as wives and mothers. The message from the left to traditional wives seems to be, “choose to live your life however you want, but don’t choose that.”
Unfortunately for the left, the media freakout over tradwives may only succeed in making the content more popular on social media, thereby making the lifestyle more appealing to more women.
For decades, the left has tried to convince women – and men, for that matter – that individual achievement, defined by financial and career success, is the ultimate path to happiness. But as more and more people discover that to be an empty promise, the country may be on the verge of a great resurgence of the value of family and marriage as the true path to fulfillment.
Allison Schuster is a contributor for AMAC Newsline, the Federalist, American Greatness, and the Conservateur, as well as a proud 2021 graduate of Hillsdale College.
Tradwives are home schooling their children. At least there will be some children with common sense and values…
As usual, there is a “BUMP” in the road that might ruin the Left’s agenda, so they are putting out more propaganda to discourage women rights to make a choice of what kind of life they would like to pursue. The Left would prefer women to follow their agenda so they can control women in the long run. Talk about “BRAINWASHING”.
I am very pleased that my mother was a stay-at-home mom. With two sons, we needed guidance and tender loving care. My mother shaped our character and helped develop us into moral adults. The woman’s movement has sold women an impossible task of being a mother, a wife, and a working person. I have worked with women who regretted later in life not having children because the job came first. There is more to life than chasing the dollar.
it is laughable that the left condemns women who choose a traditional role in the home, but they scream support for hamas and muslims who treat women worse than animals. Seriously???
Clean, wholesome, satisfying, doing what’s right, respectful, respectable, responsible to spouse, children, church, & the like are what left, woke, demoncrats, satanic hate. Makes sense. 1st sentence is godly, to be admired. What the OUTGOING REGIME want is the opposite of Godly = UNgodly. Simple. . . .
Those were the days when women cared about their children and not money.
I applaud the women who are choosing the most important career: being a Mom. There is no higher calling and that is a fulltime job. Katherine Hepburn was once asked why she had never married and had children. Her answer was that you cannot do your best if you try to split yourself between too many jobs.
The fulfillment received from your choice will tell you if it is right for you. But I must say, that gooey kiss from a grateful child for that mixing bowl of cake batter is very rewarding.
Dr. Leila Denmark, a very accomplished pediatrician said there is no greater freedom than being a housewife and enjoying a spontaneous cup of coffee with a drop-in neighbor. And having Mom at home when the kids come home from school is a great way to keep them out of trouble.
I notice no mention is made that the same people criticizing these women are the same ones destroying women’s athletics.
I’m so glad this movement is happening and these young women are finding the joy their grandmothers had raising a family.
Libs feel threatened by anyone who has views or opinions that don’t line up with their agenda (which discards “family values”). Our daughter has 2 children, and the best years of her life was being able to be a stay at home mom and wife, as she sees her role as setting the “heart of the home.” A woman has to have a lot of sacrificial love for her family to chose that lifestyle, and sacrificial love for anyone but yourself is a rarity in our current culture. But this is not to say that women who have to work outside the home lack that kind of love. It’s just that she’s probably pretty “spent” by the time she gets home, fixe dinner, etc.
Women and men are both coming to the realization that working hard all their lives is not fulfilling their dream to obtain a house or a good education for their children or a good retirement. The left has taken all those dreams away. Traditional family values is not in the liberals platform. Control and keeping people dumb is their objective. So they go back 100 years that women will become slaves of their husbands again. I think raising your kids and be there for them when they are growing up is more important than the paycheck. Which is with daycare and inflation and gas prices, diminished to not much in todays ole Joe’s economy. Plus the stay at home parent can keep a close eye on what is being taught in schools. Like luring children into trans surgery. Teach Anti semitism and trans in many schools while music and art is taken away. All this change is good for America only not good for Obiden and the gang. They don’t want the family bond. They want to divide the family, brainwash the kids to not listen to their parents. Through division and making men and women enemies they think to rule the country. Heaven forbid they would be a church going family. Listening to another God. No no the liberals are the only God you have to obey and idolize. Every day they show more and more what their plan is for the future of America. And it is not for the American citizens, or USA. It is for the power of the liberals via the democrat party and senile Obiden.
As usual, “pro-choice” women and their eunuch supporters offer women only one “choice.” Desert your children (or kill them before birth) and let the government “experts” brainwash them into good-little Commies!
Are these the folks who can’t define the difference between a man and a woman?
Why does the Left have to judge what others do yet can’t look in the mirror. I could care less what they do within their personal lives, why do they feel a need to care what any of us do?
The left sees this as a threat because they believe the state should raise and indoctrinate the kids.
My observations at work were that generally speaking, those families where both parents worked had more issues with their kids at home. And to be clear, it didn’t matter which parent stayed home. Having someone there for you is not a necessity for every kid, but if you just happen to have one of those kids – and you won’t know until it’s too late – having a loving parent at home makes all the difference in the world.
I thought the whole point of feminism was to give women choices in life, but it turns out feminazis want to control women more than the worst MCP* ever did, just in different ways.
So if a woman wants to declare herself to be a man, or a giraffe, or a tropical rainforest, it’s ‘You go, grrrl!” But if she wants to make marriage and a family her priorities, she needs constant, intense vilification.
Right…
*”Male Chauvinist Pig”, for you youngsters out there.
I say to those who choose the non trad, raise you sons to be the kind of man you want your daughter to marry.
Yes, I’m a bona fide curmudgeon. I was raised by the old maxim that the success of a person was based on the income of the father and the education of the mother. I’ll be damned if I have to hold the ladder while women climb down from their pedestal to lower themselves to be an equal to man’s level .
When women want children, the best interests of the children should be considered.. My mother had to work and she had little time for her children. When I got married, I volunteered to work, too. However, my husband wanted me to be in the home with the children. Children are great teachers. I am glad that I was a stay-at-home housewife and mother for 21 years. I learned a great deal more than I would have ever learned…than having a career and working for a salary.
I mean MORONS
Don’t you dare call me a TRADWIFE YOU MORINS!!
We see the results of liberation and freedom of choice all around us Feminists many of whom were lesbians or very well to do with outside help sold the shoddy goods Abortions ,out of wedlock children fodder for federal penitentiary system ,failed grades in school and street for the parent Could not do better if they tried So many children damaged Where is the justice for them? Deliberate destruction of the family promoted by the state should be treated as the crime against humanity
The only reason these liberal putzes bash a woman who chooses a more traditional housewife role is because they fear loosing members of their cult. Tow the line or we will destroy you is their mentality. They purposely use words that are degrading and belittling to the women who do not choose the liberal way of thinking. So who is the really small minded one in all o this, the woman who decides for herself what to do or the liberal herd mentality that an not accept a woman making a choice to ignore the liberals? If they were truly concerned about the rights of women to choose something, anything, wouldn’t they support their choice rather than chastise it? Freedom to choose is only acceptable to liberals if you choose their way. Otherwise you are attacked relentlessly. My wife is a traditional wife in the sense that she values family first and everything else second. But don’t misunderstand, she is a strong woman and I pity anyone or anything that interferes with her family, and that includes me. I don’t dare step out of line. A little fear is a good thing, so I don’t mind. It keeps me on the straight and narrow and focuses me on what’s most important. I am biased of course and believe that I have the best wife in the world. I would not trade her for a thousand of the best looking liberal women you could present to me. She would simply outshine them all. And yes, I have her permission to say so.
Maybe you will see a resugence of more respectful well behaved children and young adults with mom being home. My mother was home until I was out of the house as was my wife until our children moved out and that’s a good thing the way our children turned out.
Hats off to the women who can do it! Can’t imagine supporting a family on one salary though…
What is the “outrage” about “embracing traditional wife roles” versus the career women who do everything to forget that to have a successful life which may include working for money outside the homecare role of the traditional wife may mean total dependence on the sole provider of the finances of the household. Nothing is being said about the pressure put on that household earner and their view of their household. The whole picture is portrayed in an ideal setting, where there are no financial worries, and every household is a picture-perfect setting–sparkling clean house, well-behaved children, and the stay-at-home person is so content with the role that they love cooking and cleaning. etc. It is ASSUMED that being a traditional wife is the perfect life. SORRY there’s no PERFECT life, especially if life today needs a certain level income to have that idealized lifestyle
I never heard the term “tradwife” before reading this interesting article. It surprises me that some are so scornful of family devotion, though I’m not surprised by many I know who are more than accepting of it. How people relate to families often boils down to whether and how much they love their own.
It never surprises me to see the cynicism of those who were raised in uncaring or abusive households, but, in the course of living beyond those troubled years, many discover a peace that they hadn’t imagined while in or even well past their upbringing. I guess a lot of that comes from not wanting to relive any of it, but, also feeling the power of being able to make your kids a lot happier than you were. A different life awaits anyone who can feel the difference.
As far as the naysayers who are eternally scornful of close, happy families are concerned, that scorn can be their lifeboat if they ever scrape up enough “balls” to understand it and repurpose it.
I’m a member of the only splinter group that the dems do not include in their revered “coalition”. There’s only one. Dirty old white men . And I’m one One reason that I’m a dirty old white man is that while I worked my wife stayed at home to raise our three children and get them to after school activities ( swimming, horse riding, tennis, cook dinner, etc). I realize that I should be ashamed and so should my wife.
I stayed home with my 3 children for 11 years. That was the hardest job I ever loved I had trouble with society’s push to make money over care for your family. I have a relationship with my grown children that I never would have had if they had been dropped at daycare every day. I am proud to say my older daughter is staying home with her 3 children. She volunteers at her son’s kindergarten and after waiting until almost 30 to start a family, she is enjoying watching her children grow and learn. I am so proud of her. I challenge every mother of young children to give up the extra money and lifestyle and raise your own children. You have no idea what goes on at daycare and that has been proven over and over again. Especially government funded daycare. I’d rather be broke and happy than well off and let someone else indoctrinate my child. Don’t listen to the mainstream media, when was the last time they told you the truth?
The only time the idea of a women as a ‘homemaker’ was the post WW2 period, when people left farms and became urban dwellers. Until then, wives of farmers and ranchers, which was most of the population, were involved in running the farm. It may have been some of the lighter duties at times, but without meals, clean clothes, the cow milked, the eggs gathered, firewood prepped, not much work got performed. they helped with the getting crops in the ground and harvested when it was time. Have seen pictures of branding time, and the figures on the ground doing the actual branding had skirts on—that isn’t the light part! The left is up to its usual game of trying to portray things as static and that change is bad. They need to take care of their own business and leave everyone else to live our lives.
Good grief what will these Nuts cry about next?
Do you suppose this trend might reinstate the ‘man’ into the picture again…and allow him to be proud of being the bread-winner and husband and DAD? We are woefully ignoring the fact that Men are still out there and should be honored and respected. GO TRADWOMEN! GO strong MEN!
Three cheers for the Tradwife!!!!!!!
The lame stream media has a huge problem these days (as do psychologists, psychiatrists and their ilk) because the tables have been turning.We now are beginning to realize that when the media comes out attacking a person that that person is probably a good guy and when they attack a group or a movement those groups or movements are most likely good groups or movements. For them it must feel like they’re punching the Goodyear blimp, no mater how hard they hit the punches do nothing at all, except the opposite of what their goal is. Instead it gets more support for that person, group or movement.
The LEFT is too successful in the arena of education system with regards to the denigrating of students mothers, grandmothers, etc. Strange that women who wanted the freedom to work outside the home now turn on those who wish to remain at home working as housewife and mother. Seems freedom only works one way for them. All sisters are free to do as they wish as long as they wish for what is considered progressive enough.
I find it difficult to understand why the left challenges the Woman who stay at home. They have and always will be the back bone of this country. The instill basic morals and provide a secure point for their children as wall as their husbands. Women were on a pedestal prior to the feminist movement.
this is horrible article & Tradwife gets my vote as the worst new word right after the word “woke”.
Feminism ? What the hell is that ? That movement went the way of the Whig Party and the confederacy. Women stopped standing up for themselves 50 years ago. That’s why they still earn less than men even though they have the majority of degrees. Women earned the right to vote and then quit.
They hate traditional roles because that’s what the Bible teaches. They are Satan followers trying to destroy Christianity.
What….No mention of the Transwife??? LMFAO
That works BUT with the high cost of living being what it is, most women have to be homemakers AND work outside the home. Which makes a very stressful lifestyle and what I had to do the first 38 years of my marriage until my retirement. However, there’s more gig jobs out there women can work, so that helps a little. As long as your priorities are in the right place.
Have never heard this Trad word before & hope this is end of it. All Americans need to quit bashing women rights & give them the credit for all of the good things they have fought for. Remind you this is year 2024 and not year 1864. And I ask AMAC why this article deserves any attention at all with amac MEMBERS. Correct me if I am wrong, but I believe that each of us have a mother & that is what really matters.
(sigh) I wish there was a cure for narcissism.
You would make a great wife to all the men who need a mom lol