Dutiful Hijas: Dependency, Power & Guilt

In the text Dutiful Hijas, Martinez speaks of an issue that we commonly see throughout hispanic culture. The pressure for young women to live up to the expectations of their mothers and abide by the tradition to take care of them until their dying day. I find this to be quite a peculiar situation in the sense that due to the whole obligation outlook on the topic, it sort of makes the act not genuine. Caring for your mother should not be looked at as a duty. It should be something that comes from your own personal desire to care for someone who has given their all to you. The fact that mothers  place this moral obligation on their daughters and deprive them of the choice on how to live out their lives creates a sense of resentment between the mother/daughter relationship. If they did not feel forced into this life of duty, they would certainly be more willing to do it on their own. They would be living a life they choose and then when it comes time that the mother is sick, a genuine act of love would be demonstrated and they would automatically rush to their mother's side. This is also an act that should be evenly distributed amongst all the mother's children regardless of gender. This is just something that's supposed to come naturally to us, to care for our mothers as they care for us.