Chapter 27: Mother

Keeping the Stars Alight: Breaking the “Sacrifice Narrative” and Reconstructing the Social Value of Mother's Day

Every year on the second Sunday of May, the aroma of carnations and the “Most Beautiful Mother” contest on social media arrive as scheduled. However, after the flowers and traffic have faded, a study conducted by the China Women's Development Foundation (CWDF) in 2024 reveals a thought-provoking reality: 68% of mothers believe that holiday blessings are “just a formality”, and 92% of working mothers still have to work overtime late into the night on the day they receive gifts. This “ritual touching” involving billions of people around the world seems to be trapping the value of mothers in the middle of commercial marketing and moral kidnapping - on the one hand, there is the myth of mother's love packaged as “eternal sacrifice”, and on the other hand, there is the myth of mother's love, and on the other hand, there is the myth of mother's love. On the one hand, there is the myth of motherhood packaged as “eternal sacrifice”, and on the other hand, there is the survival dilemma that mothers have to face in reality.

The dilemma illuminated by data: the triple deprivation of time, opportunity and self

According to the UN's Global Gender Equality Report 2023, Chinese mothers spend an average of 5.1 hours of unpaid labor per day, which is equivalent to working 116 more working days per year. These invisible contributions, which are transformed into hot meals on the table and neat stationery in children's schoolbags, are seldom counted in the measurement system of social value. Wisdom Union Recruitment's “2024 Women's Workplace Report” further tears away the veil of warmth: the interview invitation rate for women of childbearing age has dropped by 37%, and the probability of mothers of two children experiencing stagnant promotions is as high as 63%. In the psychological counseling cases of a tertiary hospital in Shanghai, 42% of the postpartum depression originated from “the tearing of social expectations and self-realization” - the monologue of Lin Wen, a project manager of an Internet company, pierced the heart: "I feel like I've been ‘stuffed’ into ‘motherhood’. Lin Wen, a project manager at an Internet company, said in a heartbreaking monologue: original shape.”

These figures are not cold numbers, but a picture of the existence of millions of mothers who spend their spare time piecing together their lives after putting their children to bed late at night, squeezing into the commuter subway, or hiding in the bathroom to milk their babies. While society holds mothers in high esteem with the crown of “motherhood is strong”, it tacitly recognizes that they have to suffer from discrimination in the workplace, the struggle to raise children, and the pressure of the “perfect mother” persona.

Global Experiment in Breaking the Situation: Systemic Reconstruction from Institutions to Culture

When the plight of mothers has become a global commonality, the spark of change is being ignited in different corners.

In Sweden, the policy of “gender-equal parental leave” has made it mandatory for fathers to take at least 90 days of leave, which has boosted the rate of mothers returning to work after childbirth to 91%, and the rate of fathers' participation in childcare to 89%. This system has not only changed the division of labor ratio, but also reshaped the social cognition - childcare is never a “one-man show” for mothers. In South Korea, a new policy in 2024 will provide a 3% tax break for every 10% increase in the proportion of female executives, directly translating the value of motherhood into a quantifiable economic indicator.

Chinese companies are also exploring ways to break the mold. A technology company in Hangzhou pioneered “flexible KPIs for childcare stages”, allowing employees to convert multitasking, emergency coordination and other childcare skills into performance points, and the percentage of female executives jumped from 12% to 34% in three years; a law firm in Shanghai introduced “childcare performance points”, which allows breastfeeding female lawyers to receive 3% tax breaks for every 10% increase in motherhood value. A law firm in Shanghai has launched a “childcare performance points” program, in which breastfeeding female lawyers complete case studies through online collaboration, and the results are directly factored into promotion reviews. These innovations prove that when the workplace allows for a multi-threaded life, mothers don't need to “hide their star attributes,” but can instead unleash galactic creativity.

Changes at the community level are equally profound. Chengdu's “Shared Grandmothers” program pairs retired teachers with dual-income families, freeing up 1,500 hours of professional development time per year for young mothers; Beijing's “Dads' Parenting Boot Camp” has increased the participation rate of men in parenting from 29% to 67%, by teaching fathers how to braid their children's hair and how to deal with separation anxiety. By teaching fathers to braid their children's hair and deal with separation anxiety, it has increased the participation rate of male parenting from 29% to 67%. A father who participated in the camp said, “I didn't really understand the weight of my wife's words, ‘I'm tired’, until I spent three days alone in the night watch when my child had a fever.”

Action roadmap: let the tribute land from slogans to mechanisms

The significance of Mother's Day should go beyond the single day of moving marketing and be transformed into a continuous system building and cultural awakening.

For enterprises, the development of “Mother and Baby Friendly Workplace Standards” is the first step - from internationally certified lactation rooms, to incentives such as “parental leave return to work bonuses”, to "non-linear promotion paths "Design. A listed company in Shenzhen launched the “Star Plan”, which is quite inspiring: mothers over the age of 45 serve as mentors to help working mothers turn the crisis management and resource coordination skills they have cultivated in childcare into career advantages, and the program has reduced the company's female mid-level turnover rate by 40%.

Within the family, the sharing of responsibilities requires more refined solutions. A “Family Responsibility Convention” can quantify the division of household chores (e.g., fathers are responsible for 60% of homework tutoring and 70% of weekend baby walking), while the “Mother's Life Restart Fund” allows children to divert 10% of their holiday red packets to support their mothers' learning of new skills. Chen Nian, a college student in her late teens, launched the “Mother's Old Photo Revival Project”, which has taken social networks by storm. Through restoring her mother's old pre-wedding photos, young people are asking the woman she was before she became a mother: “What is your unfulfilled dream?”

On an individual level, breaking the “perfect mother” filter is a gentle revolution. On social media, tens of thousands of mothers have participated in the “Real Mothers Campaign,” sharing their daily lives of being so angry at homework helpers that they swallowed antihypertensive pills, and of having workplace social gatherings that collided with parent-teacher conferences; and in the Douban group “The B Side of a Mother's Life,” 56-year-old Wang Meiling showed off her doctoral acceptance letter. --With the support of her daughter, she restarted her astronomy dream that had been interrupted for 30 years. “Society always emphasizes that mothers are the starting point for their children, but forgets that we ourselves should have a sea of stars.” She wrote in her post.

Conclusion: From stars to the Milky Way, it takes the whole universe to lift

Mother's Day should never be an annual “punch line” of thanksgiving, but should become a coordinate for reviewing social progress. When companies begin to calculate the “mother employee retention rate”, when fathers are no longer called ‘help’, when the job posting to delete “limited to 35 years of age, unmarried and childless”, we can really Read the essence of this holiday:

It is a promise for a world where women don't have to burn themselves to illuminate others, but always have the freedom to be the Milky Way and not hide the light of the stars.

We invite you to take action:

Sign the Family Responsibility Pact to quantify warmth with data

Join the “Working Moms Supporters” corporate alliance to make systemic changes visible

Participate in the “Listening to Mothers' Stories of a Life They Didn't Choose” storytelling program to rediscover the light behind a mother's name. The Light Behind a Mother's Name

Because the best gift of all is never a fleeting flower, but a world that dares mothers to be “not great”.