President Obama supports a woman’s choice.

Unless that choice is to be a stay-at-home mom, then he doesn’t want you to make that choice. He would rather you choose your job and earn more money than to stay home with your children.

That’s the main take away from his recent speech at Rhode Island College in Providence, RI recently. It sounds as though our president would like the government to discourage mother from staying home with their kids. As though money, career advancement, and those things the business world offers are more important than raising children. The President said:

“And sometimes, someone, usually mom, leaves the workplace to stay home with the kids, which then leaves her earning a lower wage for the rest of her life as a result. And that’s not a choice we want Americans to make.”

Historically, stay-at-home moms have been a foundational element to society. Mothers instill values and morals in children from a young age and set children on a course to success. In recent years our society and culture have emphasized the need for women in the workplace as an aspect of gender equality. This has led to a trend in mothers placing their kids in day care and early education programs so they could work. The lure of double income in the household has also led to similar trends.

For people to make such a choice is one thing, for the president to decide women need to make this choice is quite another. One is the outcome of a personal family decision, the other equates to government advocacy intended to sway minds. As the liberal left advocates for equal rights, and gender equality (often this is nothing more than thinly veiled feminism) they simultaneously make statements – such as the presidents – that denigrate the choice of millions of women. The inconsistency shows their true colors.

Stay-at-home moms are not taking the president’s comments well. A post at The Christian Post by stay-at-home mom and attorney Kristi Burton Brown epitomizes the feelings of many women:

“I hope you misspoke, but let me tell you how this comes across to stay-at-home moms. You’re telling us that the money we earn is more important than our kids. You’re telling us that leaving the workplace to stay home isn’t a choice American moms should be making. Well, first off, we care about the choices our husbands and kids want us to make; about the choices we ourselves want to make – not the choices you claim we should be making. I can guarantee you that, when given the choice, kids would choose their moms over money.

“And, as a stay-at-home mom myself, who is also an attorney, let me tell you that I want to choose my kids over my career. I honestly don’t care if missing two decades in the work force means that I’ll never make as much as a male attorney over the course of my lifetime. My kids – people – are much, much more important than my money – mere possessions. And my choice is just as valid and just as equal as the choices of the single mom who needs to find a quality daycare and a high performing school to put her children in.”

Mollie Hemingway, a senior editor for The Federalist, says that what the president said amounts to little more than “shaming” women for their decision to care for their kids:

“I hate the suffix of -shaming, but if we’re going to use it for looking askance at a teen girl dressing like a Kardashian at school, we can certainly use it for the type of rhetoric that shakes heads at women trading income for care of children. Every time you look at us with disappointment for our decision to stay at home with our children, that’s what you’re doing. People also do it with women who choose to provide for their children in other ways. Neither is a good look. But it’s particularly disappointing to see some of those bad traits in a speech from the president.”

Sadly, the comments by the president show that he, and many who hold his view, do not value the work of stay-at-home moms. They see women in this role as wasting their lives. Ironically, a woman who works at a daycare caring for children is seen as a “strong, successful, career driven woman.” But a mother who does the same thing with her own children in her own home is seen as wasting her life. The irony is both sad and absurd.

How can it be acceptable for a woman to care for other people’s kids in a “business” setting and be considered successful when a woman doing the same thing in her own home with her own kids is not given the same respect? That’s a stretch of logic that is hard to rationalize.

The reality is that mother’s, both historically and biblically, are essential for children. All the money in the world can’t teach values and morality to kids. And Burton-Brown is right, given the chance to make a choice, kids will take being at home with mommy over money any day.

I have no problem with a woman working. And if she does work her work ought to be rewarded equally to that of men in monetary earning and recognition. But I also believe that God intended a woman to be home with her kids when they are born. I believe it was the Creators intention for a woman to teach and train her kids from the moment they are born in order to instill the family values and morals into those children. It’s not someone else’s job to raise my kids, it’s mine and my wife’s job. So the president’s comments come across as encouragements to let someone else raise our kids while we work. (Because SOMEONE will raise them.)

The truth is that stay-at-home moms work very hard. Compensation surveys have, on more than one occasion, shown their work to be valued in the hundreds-of-thousands of dollars each year. Their work in the home, then, is far more valuable than their work outside the home as the character and morality of our kids is at stake.

Maybe before President Obama’s next speech on stay-at-home moms he can collaborate with Kristi Burton-Brown:

“So next time, Mr. President, please think about all women before you speak – not just the ones that fit your personal model. The choices of stay-at-home moms are indeed the choices we want Americans to make: the choice to put our kids first, the choice to value kids ahead of money, and the choice to spend quality, personal time with our kids. After all, what could be a better choice than actively raising the next generation?”