Cartoon: The Wage Gap and Women’s Choices

Click on the cartoon to see it a bit bigger.

[spoiler]The scene: Two women talk. One wears a black skirt, the other has a ponytail.

Panel one
BLACK SKIRT: the WAGE GAP has nothing to do with SEXISM! women are paid less because they make different CHOICES.

Panel two
BLACK SKIRT: HAVING A FAMILY, for example. many women take time off from work to take care of children or elderly relatives…

Panel three
BLACK SKIRT: so women work less. or work part-time. or need more flexible jobs. and as a result, they get paid less. but what does that have to do with SEXISM?

Panel four
PONYTAIL: couldn’t MEN do half of that unpaid work?
BLACK SKIRT: that’s CRAZY TALK!

Panel four, tiny subpanel in the corner
PONYTAIL: okay, i’ll let someone ELSE raise my kids.
BLACK SKIRT: what kind of LOUSY mother does THAT?[/spoiler]

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122 Responses to Cartoon: The Wage Gap and Women’s Choices

  1. 101
    chingona says:

    Aoirthoir … All your questions about Swedish parental leave and its many implications for family, the society and businesses are answered if you read the same linked article that I did. Yes, the leave is paid. Yes, it’s sometimes a burden on small businesses. No, no other benefits are stripped. The only benefit that is “stripped” if you don’t take it is the amount of the leave that is reserved for the father.

    You misunderstood my point about divorce. It has nothing to do with the custody arrangement. It’s that women who have experienced a significant impact on their careers after having kids often don’t earn very much money. As part of a household, they were middle class. On their own, they’re poor. Some of them would have been poor anyway, even if they’d never married, but some of them would not be poor if they hadn’t sacrificed their careers for the sake of the household enterprise.

  2. 102
    Aoirthoir says:

    Chingona

    I based my statement on benefits being stripped from this statement:

    “Introducing “daddy leave” in 1995 had an immediate impact. No father was forced to stay home, but the family lost one month of subsidies if he did not. Soon more than eight in 10 men took leave.”

    If that meant that they just would not get paid for not taking off if they did not take off, well then there’s no real force involved, as I inferred from the comment. Since the amount of leave taken increased so dramatically, I am loathe to believe that the men that do not take leave, to be with their new infants, are doing so only because it’s not “manly.” We’d have to know more of course, but I bet many of them are ones that are extremely financially well off, and those that any interruption would be devastating to their employer or their business.

    “You misunderstood my point about divorce. It has nothing to do with the custody arrangement.”

    No, I fully understood your point. You mentioned that “we see statistics about how divorce frequently sends women into poverty, well, this is **one** of the reasons.” (Emphasis mine). I pointed out that as the circumstance you mentioned is *one* of the reasons, there are also *other* contributing circumstances. Solutions can rarely be singularly focused.

    So, a number of solutions to solve the problem of divorcee povery would include, but not be limited to: better relationship training for all parties in a relationship, more help to maintain a relationship rather than end it, more help to end a relationship amicably rather than with friction, more help when having children so mothers and fathers spend time with their children AND BOTH continue in their careers, more fatherly involvement after divorce, shared custody, shared PARENTING (taking turns taking care of children when sick etc), a move away from single and dual parent families and a move towards community involvement in child rearing, etc.

    So I was not dismissing your claim as one of the causes of the problem. Just adding additional elements. When it comes to poverty though, we sometimes act as if divorced mothers are the ones experiencing it and men are not. What’s actually happening is, the divide between the extremely wealthy and the poor is growing rapidly. The middle class has slowly been disappearing, more rapidly recently. As more persons become impoverished (by design), more mothers and fathers will become impoverished.

    “some of them would not be poor if they hadn’t sacrificed their careers for the sake of the household enterprise.”

    Then they should STOP right now sacrificing their careers. This might seem unfair. Some will accuse me of blaming women. But when I know someone runs the potential of taking things from me, I can be upset after they have done so, or I can do all within my power to prevent them from doing so. It’s why I won’t ever be married, to a man or a woman. Since I know the courts are willing to financially devastate both parties in a divorce, which according to statistics is more likely to come than not, I see no reason to involve the government in my personal relationships. This means I regretably lose some things that I see as should be rights to EVERYONE, regardless of romantic status (who gets to see me in the hospital, who gets to share my health care, who gets my sh$t when I die). But, I’ve weighed the consequences and decided those benefits are not worth the risks.

    And women (and men) should do that more. They should stop sacrificing their careers. They should find companies that allow them to maintain their career before, during and after childbirth. Or just start their own. In our startup, we’re already making plans to how we can best support everyone that works or contracts for us. Work at home, set your own hours, define what you’re able to output, remote meetings. We’ve even begun discussions to see how we can contract for things like bulk rates for house cleaning services for employees to ease their burden.

    At this stage we’re just brainstorming and we’re just a tiny start up. But we’re not the only ones. There ARE companies out there that are willing to help their employees. The number of such companies could be increased by women working together to form their own companies with such offerings. And they have a LOT of government resources to help women owned businesses (or partially women owned) to get going. And yes, it’s hard. Very hard. But it’s better than allowing others to define the value of our work and leave us in poverty should our circumstances change through divorce or death of a mate.

  3. 103
    chingona says:

    In response to Ron asking: “Why is it desirable, or proper, for the government to intervene to bring this about?”

    Aoirthoir said:

    Because other people in their relationships make choices that we would not make in our relationships. Since they could not possibly really want to make such decisions, we must force them to make the same decisions we would make.

    This answer is total and complete bullshit.

    Again, go and read the article on the Swedish parental leave law. The law does not regulate people’s relationships or determine how they divide up the domestic labor. It establishes the criteria for eligibility for a government benefit that relates to employment. That is a perfectly legitimate realm for government intervention.

    The effect has been to increase the rate at which women are employed AND their pay. It has worked to reduce the wage gap that we have spent nearly 100 comments discussing. Why? If men are as likely to take leave as women, there is less “rationality” in discriminating against women. It normalizes the idea of taking leave, so it’s not something only done by people who don’t care about their jobs.

    Government intervention to reduce discrimination is not remotely the same thing as telling people who should do more cleaning and who should do more handy-fixer type work or who should have a full-time job and who shouldn’t. It does absolutely nothing to force people to arrange their lives in the way society approves of, and it has jackshit to do with what I or anyone thinks other people should do.

  4. 104
    chingona says:

    Then they should STOP right now sacrificing their careers.

    Right. And that would be a lot easier to do if more couples had more equitable division of labor. But when people say that it would be good for women if men did more of their share and if women’s careers weren’t treated as secondary and unimportant, you tell us we’re just upset because some people make different choices than we would have them make.

  5. 105
    Aoirthoir says:

    “This answer is total and complete bullshit.”

    Perhaps you read me as to say “Government should not intervene in encouraging men to take the same leave as women.” That’s not what my answer addressed. Rather, it addressed specifically the *inside* of the house division of labor. Some persons view it as a bad thing if one or the other does more cleaning, cooking and what not than another. Yet others are perfectly satisified if this is the case, willing for instance to allow the other partner more of the *outside* of the house division of labor (roof repair, yardwork, automobile repair etc). It is my belief that I don’t need the government telling me I clean too much and my partners don’t clean enough.

    That’s entirely and only what I was refering to when I said: “Because other people in their relationships make choices that we would not make in our relationships. Since they could not possibly really want to make such decisions, we must force them to make the same decisions we would make.” I should have made that more clear.

    “Again, go and read the article on the Swedish parental leave law. The law does not regulate people’s relationships or determine how they divide up the domestic labor.”

    Right. And if we were only discussing that law in all of these comments, I could see someone coming to the conclusion that you did about my statement. But we’re not just talking about THAT law. We’re talking about a range of issues related to the amount of work romantic partners face inside and outside of the home.

    “Why? If men are as likely to take leave as women, there is less “rationality” in discriminating against women.”

    Which presumes that someone being replaced because they are no longer there (for any reason) and thus no longer able for a time to perform their job, it is in fact discrimination. Sometimes it’s just cold hard reality. Now, what will demonstrate this to be discrimination, is if men start to take the same amount of leave as women, under the same circumstances, and they come back with their jobs waiting, while women are unable to come back.

    “It normalizes the idea of taking leave, so it’s not something only done by people who don’t care about their jobs.”

    Agreed. But in some cases, if you’re not there, it doesn’t matter that you DO CARE about your job. I’ve seen employees just not show up. They might or might not call. It’s been my experience that the ones that don’t show up, will do so over and over and over again. Each and every time they will be have a reason. No matter the reason, no matter how legitimate it is, the thing that we were depending upon them to do, does not get done. Period.

    So that means either replacing them permanently or losing work or having another employee do their work. Upthread someone suggested all the other employees “pull together” to do their work. This is an INCREDIBLY unfair thing to expect considering that many ALREADY have a FULL workload. If it is for a day or too it’s unfair to expect, if it is for a couple months or longer, it’s even more demanding. We’re already working more for less in return. Especially in a small business it’s just not that easy. In government, maybe, because government often makes up resources (money) and can hire more, but not in the private sector.

    “Government intervention to reduce discrimination is not remotely the same thing ”

    Right. And I no where objected to Government offering to men THE SAME LEAVE OPTIONS that women have. I might object to FORCING them to do so. Which if your read of the law is correct, then they are not being forced to. But if other options are withheld from them, then they are being forced.

    “Right. And that would be a lot easier to do if more couples had more equitable division of labor. But when people say that it would be good for women if men did more of their share and if women’s careers weren’t treated as secondary and unimportant,”

    No we’re not saying that at all. In fact, that is the entire dispute here. Is the household division of labor REALLY inequitable, are men really NOT doing “their share”?

    If a person (ME) thinks that the house should be clean to such and such a degree, dusted, things not on tables, vacced, clothes washed, nothing on the floor, everything wiped down daily, etc. but the other partner (my partner) think that things are just fine if there is no food or trash around, we have a circumstance that neither of us is happy with.

    One of us (me) is going to feel that the other isn’t doing “her share” of the housework. The other (my partner) is going to feel that he is too fastidious and demanding. One of us (me) is going to spend a LOT more time cleaning than the other (her). So then I can point to the fact that I do work a lot more hours domestically than she does. ANd yet I still have to maintain my outside work schedule. Is this because she’s a sexist and discriminating against me? No. It is simply we have different agendas.

    I have wrestled with this problem since my first relationship. I have felt bad, cheated and abused because my partners do far less domestic work than I do. (Whilst often telling me it was the other way around). I finally had to conclude that my desires are simply not everyone else’s. So I have a choice. Since the sit-ee-ations kept interfering with my career, I could either find different partners, hire outside help (undoable) or simply reduce my standards of cleanliness. No matter what I choose, I will always feel that my partners just refused to do “their share.”

    And so, just as you are not telling me that my work or housework is secondary and unimportant, because I want things more clean than she, we in this discussion are not telling women that their work or housework is secondary. What we ARE saying is, when you choose a mate, and employment, you have to take all of these things into account. You ESPECIALLY have to take them into account BEFORE you create a child with them. Just because I was always the one doing the housework, is one of the reasons why I NEVER had a child, despite expressed desires of my partners. If I have to do this much of the cleaning now, what’s going to happen when we have a child?

    Stating these facts is not saying in any way, what you want you should not have. You SHOULD have it. But SHOULD and CAN and WILL are regretably not always three things that will line up. And that means we can no longer rely on OTHERS to make decisions that effect us, without FIGHTING BACK. That’s what I did by protectly myself from the added work of child rearing which I would have likely done entirely on my own. It’s what women should be doing as well.

    “you tell us we’re just upset because some people make different choices than we would have them make.”

    No. I’m not telling you at all why you are upset. I try desperately not to tell people what they think or feel. I object entirely when people tell me what I think or feel and I am entirely loathe to tell another person what she or he thinks or feels.

    I can however see that some have stated they are not satisified with their own personal circumstances. And to others I suggest, LEARN BEFORE you find yourself in those same circumstances. I’m sorry the world is like that. But the only ones really looking out of us, are we ourselves.

    And yes that includes STOPPING the sacrifice of their careers. Make damned well sure that the partner you are with WILL BE there the way you NEED and WANT when you raise children together. Make sure you DONT HAVE to find another job when you finish your leave, because you’ve found a good company. Think about what will happen to you and the child if your wife falls ill, or moves on to the next life. Because all of these things can adversely affect you if you don’t plan for them. Take someone’s word who has been there in some of these cases.

  6. 106
    rain says:

    chingona @ 92
    What I was getting at is probably explained more clearly in this section on nursing and vocation from The Sociology of the Caring Professions (p. 62-65). Note especially the discussion of pay on page 64 (the paragraph starting, “The ramifications. . .”). There’s a history of exploiting caregivers’ feelings towards their charges and their sense of vocation, that it’s not “just a job”, to justify lower pay, or devaluation of the work.

    To put it another way, imagine for a moment that caring for your children was a paid position. Would you really negotiate to exclude those functions that you find enjoyable? Including those tasks in the definition of work and getting paid for them does not mean you can’t enjoy them or perform them with any less love and enthusiasm, nor does it mean you’re reducing your children to a job description. It also doesn’t prevent us from having a conversation about how the guys hog all the fun jobs. In the context of this type of discussion, where we’re tallying up who does what in broad categories of paid and unpaid, it is important to be a bit cold-blooded about it. Otherwise, you end up erasing unpaid (women’s) work when it’s enjoyable, but not paid (men’s) work when it’s enjoyable. There’s a double standard in how you scrutinize one kind of work, but not the other. And while in a narrow sense, excluding the fun jobs disadvantages men and devalues their contribution, overall, because unpaid work is considered the purview of women, most of the negative impact of removing the fun jobs, no recognition of the work you’re doing, will attach to unpaid labour, and by extension, how much work women are doing.

    The quoted comment @ 93:
    The ability to breastfeed hasn’t meant that women are “wired” or “born” to nurture since we invented the wetnurse. In fact, breastfeeding rates make a great case against the argument that nursing means women are the nurturers. The low point for breastfeeding in Canada was in the early sixties, when only a quarter of women breastfed (and that’s an average; I recall reading that for one Maritime province, it was 10%). Now it’s about three-quarters. Add to those large fluctuations the variance between provinces and it’s hard to see how “because biology” explains why women are or should be the ones to raise children.

  7. 107
    chingona says:

    @ rain … I’m familiar with that phenomenon. The management certainly exploited it at the residential facility where my husband worked as an aide in college.

    I understand what you’re getting at, but I think what matters in any given analysis of men’s and women’s childcare labor is that there be some sort of definition of childcare that is consistent. If you ask 100 men and 100 women to record how much time they spend on childcare every day for a week, but you don’t define what childcare is, you don’t really know what you’re looking at.

    I’m really not trying to dismiss women’s unpaid labor that happens to be fun. I’m just not sure it makes sense to count every minute that I’m in the presence of my children and they aren’t asleep as childcare for the purposes of tallying worked hours. And I’m not saying this because I feel guilty about admitting that sometimes I wish that story would read itself. I don’t feel guilty at all about admitting that. But it is complicated.

  8. 108
    Aoirthoir says:

    “In fact, breastfeeding rates make a great case against the argument that nursing means women are the nurturers.”

    Good point. As I mentioned upthread, my experience is that neither men nor women seem to be more or less nurturers by desire or action than the other. I’d say the same about most jobs as well. There was a time in our history where I might have believed certain jobs were more suitable for certain men rather than other men or women. However, since the industrial revolution on, industry and technology have become the great equalizers.

    “The management certainly exploited it at the residential facility where my husband worked as an aide in college.”

    Yup. I cared for my mother after her several strokes, when she was made infirmed and suffered from aphasia. Her needs were so complete that I lost two jobs and one side contract because of the time requirements needed for caring for her. I had to move in with her because she could hardly ever be alone during this period. During this period she was on disability, and was in public housing.

    My staying with her cost them not one dime more. In fact I saved the Government the incredible expense of moving her to a nursing home. Even my food was not an expense for them as persons from the church made sure we had meals. Despite this the public housing office demanded I come in for a meeting, and show proof of income. When I had none they demanded I apply for welfare, which of course I was turned down for. So they threatened to end her public housing assistance.

    The entire process was so prejudicial and such a fiasco that at one point (after I was working again, albeit part time) the visiting nurses threatened to turn me into Adult Protective Services for under false claims of abusing my mother. Why? Because I demanded that they wash their hands when drawing her blood, because they refused to take this basic needful step EVERY time they drew her blood. I immediately personally contacted APS and was thankfully informed that they had aleady been out to visit us when I was working. And they knew well and good the accusations of the visiting nurses were false.

    Each step along the way it was made very clear to me that not only was my caregiving not appreciated because I was [ostensibly] male, but by virtue of the sex of my birth I was always and immediately SUSPECT. After all, WHY would a man want to care for his ill mother? He must have some underhanded motive.

    So having nannied my nephews and neices, and given care to my mother, I understand how it is that our work in care giving is not only under-appreciated, but UNappreciated by some. That, combined with some reasons mentioned earlier, is why I have had to be strict in my relationships with women in refusing under all circumstances, to father a child with any of them. The care will most likely fall to me, it won’t be appreciated and it will additionally be suspect. NO THANKS.

    “But it is complicated.”

    Ain’t that the truth!

  9. 109
    mythago says:

    RonF @66: If we’re going by anecdata, and you are so I can’t see why I shouldn’t, the couples where the man was more vocal about children I’ve seen are couples where there was no risk to the man for being less-than-vocal. That is, his wife wanted kids, so he was perfectly free to play the “aw, heck, give the little woman and her biological clock” card and pretend it was all her idea; after all, his ‘reluctance’ wasn’t going to make her not want children.

    But when the woman was doubtful or antagonistic, boy howdy did that change.

    As for biology, again, we’re not operating in a vacuum. It’s a bit specious to point to The Maternal Imperative when we know that women in agrarian/hunter-gatherer societies don’t stop work and stay home sweeping the hut; they put their babies on their backs and go right back to work, because they have to. Funnily, that’s not an option available in our non-biologically-required Western culture for most jobs.

    Aorthoir: It’s easy to say ‘well stop doing that!’ if you assume that stopping does, in fact, have the desired effect. But not marrying or having children will not help a woman whose employer figures “It’s just a matter of time until she gets married and quits” anyway.

  10. 110
    mythago says:

    Guh. Should be ‘less vocal’ there.

  11. 111
    Aoirthoir says:

    “Aorthoir: It’s easy to say ‘well stop doing that!’ if you assume that stopping does, in fact, have the desired effect. But not marrying or having children will not help a woman whose employer figures “It’s just a matter of time until she gets married and quits” anyway.”

    Mythago,

    I didn’t say only “don’t have children with men that won’t give you the support you need and want.” I also emphasized the need to find companies that don’t treat women like this, or to open one’s own company. With the help available, such has become a truly viable option for women. I forget the exact statistics, but the number of new women own companies has approached or surpassed the number of men owned companies in recent years. I hope that women owned companies are more keen in supporting women, if men owned companies are not. Additionally the number of women owning voting rights stock in public companies has likewise approached the number of men owning stock. Those rights voting women need to make their voice heard.

    “That is, his wife wanted kids, so he was perfectly free to play the “aw, heck, give the little woman and her biological clock” card and pretend it was all her idea”

    I don’t know ANY MEN that refer to women as “the little woman”. I often hear feminists claim we speak like this. I’m not denying that there are men that say this kind of thing, I’ve just never heard it. Ever. Not from men anyhow. (TV from 1950 or from shows mocking TV from 1950 don’t count.) If my friends were these sorts of people, unless they had some really good qualities besides, I’d eventually be forced to find new friends.

    As far as your anectdotal evidence, maybe that’s how the men felt. I’m hard pressed to believe that’s how they felt unless you heard them say it yourself. I get told all of the time how I feel as a man and how I think. (Not to mention how I feel or think personally). As I mentioned upthread I HATE this and so really strive not to do the same thing to others. So when someone tells me that men they know felt such and such a way, I tend to not automatically believe it.

    In the cases of couples and persons who claim or not to want children, or more specifically which of the pair PRESS the OTHER for children, despite vocal resistance, in my obvservations it has mostly been women. In ALL cases, if you have to press your mate for children, or your mate is pressing you for children, DON’T HAVE THEM. If they cannot respect your wishes on so important an issue, you can be sure they won’t respect your wishes once you have the children.

  12. 112
    mythago says:

    Aoirthoir @110: Kinda missing the point there. Yes, it’s great that women are demanding better treatment and starting their own businesses. But “don’t do that” doesn’t help a woman who is going to be treat as if she has done, or is about to do, “that” anyway. “Don’t have kids” or “don’t put your kids before your career” is meaningless to a woman who finds out that her employer – or a number of employers, even – will simply assume that female employees are ticking time bombs.

    I notice you’re happy to jump on my quite admittedly anecdotal evidence, but not RonF’s. I’m very much not saying all men believe X or do Y; I’m referring to what some men, in my experience, have said and how they have behaved. (And I certainly agree with you that pressure has no place in as big a decision as parenthood.)

    But yes, I have heard men (I didn’t say they were my friends) speak of women in condescending ways that suggest their wife’s or SO’s brain is in her uterus. Or suggest that the only reason they had kids is because she wanted them. I’ve also known some women whose male partners were interested, devoted dads throughout the pregnancy and up until the child was named “Dad Jr.”, but when the newness of parenthood wore off, retroactively decided they had never wanted to be dads anyway and it was all her idea.

    Something I found out the hard way, though, in my dating years, is that when your partner says “I really want X”, then you don’t have to say you want X, even if you really want X. You know the other person is going to keep wanting X even if you say you don’t want X as much, or are even a little ambivalent about X; so you can pretend that really, X is something they wanted a lot more than you did and you’re just kind of indulging them. It’s a slightly more sophisticated version of the high-school relationship game “I have to like you less than you like me.” But if you want X and your partner suddenly says “Nah, changed my mind,” well then what?

  13. 113
    Aoirthoir says:

    “But “don’t do that” doesn’t help a woman who is going to be treat[ed] as if she has done, or is about to do, “that” anyway.”

    I don’t work for companies that treat me as if I have or am going to do something I have not and will not do. At a certain point I have to say, NO I won’t allow you to treat me like this, and walk away. It doesn’t usually take me more than a few weeks or a couple months to determine that an employer is just not a fit for me. More persons, including women, need to take these stands. They need to do it early on, and not wait until we find ourselves in sit-ee-ations like we’ve got now, where the economy is bad and workers’ choices are few.

    “will simply assume that female employees are ticking time bombs.”

    Yeah, I won’t work for companies like that. And yes it is true that a lot of companies don’t respect their employees. But you know what, there are also a damned lot that treat their employees with respect. I’ve found I would rather be an important fish in a tiny tank (small company) that is willing to offer me options because they damned well value what I bring to them. I’m amazed at the number of folks who insist on starting out at large, dull, grey corporations and spend unhappy years, year after year after year going no where. This isn’t just women experiencing this crap. It’s men too. And at a certain point you have to wake up and realize you need a different kind of employer.

    “I notice you’re happy to jump on my quite admittedly anecdotal evidence, but not RonF’s.”

    Here you go telling me what my emotions are. If I have told you what your emotions or thoughts are, I apologize. Considering I have emphasized how much it bothers me to have people tell me what I am feeling or thinking, I hope we can eliminate this line of discussion in the future.

    Now, I’m not “jumping” on your anecdotal evidence. I am not even DISAGREEING with it. If you have had an experience in your life, that experience is VALID. It is YOUR EXPERIENCE. I have had different experiences, and my experiences do not invalidate yours, nor do yours invalidate mine or either of our’s RonF’s.

    In your case anecdotally it is the men that are wanting the children, I don’t doubt that. I know there are men that want children and the women not. In MY anecdotal experience it’s been the women that have wanted the children and the men not. Neither of us is wrong. NEITHER of us. In each case, men wanting children and women not, or women wanting children and men not, (or either not AT THIS TIME) in no case should they have children. We shouldn’t let our mates pressure us into something as important as child rearing if we are not ready. In this case when I say its one or the other wanting or not wanting, I am talking about times they have EXPLICITLY SAID they wanted or didn’t want. I’m not going on what I think they feel or think.

    Indeed, that’s the one thing I did disagree with you on. Unless the man SPECIFICALLY TOLD YOU (or another, even though that’s hearsay) that he let “the little woman” think it was her idea, I won’t accept that’s what he thought. Because I never accept the claims people make about OTHERS’ feelings or thoughts.

    “But yes, I have heard men (I didn’t say they were my friends) speak of women in condescending ways that suggest their wife’s or SO’s brain is in her uterus.”

    Well that’s a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT thing than what I commented on. Yes I too have heard people say that a woman’s brain is in her uterus, or that her genitalia does her thinking for her. I’ve heard exactly the same thing about men. I’ll make it clear in case I have not, I LOATHE it when people tell others WHAT THEY THINK, WHY they think, HOW they think, or feel. Such language, whether meant as a slur or not is INSULTING. We ought not do it.

    “Or suggest that the only reason they had kids is because she wanted them.”

    I’ve heard the same from persons, male and female. I AGREE with you that men (and women) say such things. I’ve heard them myself. In one instance I heard them BEFORE he agreed to get her pregnant, THROUGH the pregnancy, and long after the birth. And yet he still loved the child and cared for it. However, his caring for the child won’t change my mind that he should not have had it.

    “I’ve also known some women whose male partners were interested, devoted dads throughout the pregnancy and up until the child was named “Dad Jr.”, but when the newness of parenthood wore off, retroactively decided they had never wanted to be dads anyway and it was all her idea.”

    People typically have no idea what it’s REALLY like to be parents. We’re told, it will make us the happiest we could ever be. Yet study after study after study has shown that parents generally report being less happy than non-parented persons, and less happy than before they became parents. Then their happiness is reported by parents to increase once the children are grown and gone.

    This “retroactive” decision is something I, like you, have seen time and again. I’ve seen it from persons birthing children, persons adopting, persons helping with the foster care system, persons male and female, and various other genders. The problem with [so-called] buyer’s remorse in the case of having children, is you don’t get to undecide the decision. And again that’s why it is so important to evaluate the circumstances in detail (and practice with real live children????) BEFORE diving in.

    “It’s a slightly more sophisticated version of the high-school relationship game”

    Damned right it is.

    “But if you want X and your partner suddenly says “Nah, changed my mind,” well then what?”

    Step one, stop treating relationships like a game, high-school or otherwise. Stop being in relationships with people that treat it like a game. I know, that’s far easier to say than to do. I think our entire system of choosing a mate is flawed from the start. We go in with no experience, no help, no community, no knowledge of their past, no idea of their reputation, they none of ours, etc ad naseum, wash, rinse and spit.

    And even if we have all of that, and we’re all on tap, all in agreement TRULY, well there is the potential that a mate could really change their mind (none of the game stuff, but an actual change of mind or heart). In the end relationships are a chance thing. Still, though this chance exists, minimize our risks by keeping our eyes open.

    Since I don’t want kids it is a bit easier for me. Generally people who don’t want kids are KNOWN BY OTHERS to not want kids. If a woman told me emphatically she didn’t want kids, I’d find out from conversations with her friends if she did. Since organization and cleanliness are important to me, visiting her at her apartment (ONLY at HER invitation) would inform me of her assent or disent from my view. But, since I am fine living alone, and her having other boyfriends (I’m polyamorous), if her place is not the style I prefer, it is no longer an issue for me.

    The solution then? I can’t say what it is for others, other than EXAMINE EXAMINE AND EXAMINE. But for me, the solution has been an understanding that I am going to be a bachelorette for the rest of my life. It’s no biggie for me.

  14. 114
    mythago says:

    Aoirthoir @112: It is fortunate to be able to walk away from a job and find a new one easily, and fortunate to find out that a company is less than fair early on.

    I am, indeed, talking about what people say and how they behave. And I mostly agree with you on how people should behave. But what I was talking about with RonF was the perception that women just naturally want babies more than men do. As you say, nobody’s anecdata is more ‘right’ than anyone else’s.

    But the anecdata I’m talking about is not men wanting or not wanting children, really, but about what people say they want. And in a culture where women are expected to want children – and are treated as a little odd if they say they don’t – a man who wants children needn’t pipe up.

  15. 115
    Aoirthoir says:

    “It is fortunate to be able to walk away from a job and find a new one easily, and”

    Mythago, The only fortunate thing in any of those episodes, is that I’ve been willing to walk away from one low-income, no benefits job, whilst not even having another low-income, no benefits job lined up, because I knew I would bang on doors as soon as I left until I got one. There was no easily about the quiting or the finding a new job. Both created anxiety. But, being made aware early on my value in this classist system, that anxiety and the risks of quiting were more tolerable than working for a business that did not treat me the way I needed to be treated.

    “fortunate to find out that a company is less than fair early on.”

    Most of us find out early on just what a company is like. However, just like with relationships, we often ignore the signs. While I’ve ignored the signs in my relationships, I’ve had neither the time, nor the inclination to ignore the signs in my workplace.

    “but about what people say they want. And in a culture where women are expected to want children – and are treated as a little odd if they say they don’t – ”

    Truthfully we’re all treated as odd for all sorts of reasons. So much so that my friends and I continually say “no one is normal”, because there really is no “normal.”

    “a man who wants children needn’t pipe up.”

    And I get what you are saying, but that’s a ridiculous premise for any person to start from. Do not start at the proposition that a man’s silence is his assent to wanting children. REQUIRE a DEFINITIVE ANSWER one way or another. SETTLE for NOTHING less. NOTHING. This is one of those decisions, that is frankly THAT IMPORTANT. It is nothing short of life changing. Since it is life changing, why should we put less effort into verifying a prospective mate, which we WILL BE with for a LIFETIME, (even if we are not their mate for a lifetime), than we put into evaluating a prospective business partner?

    I’ve seen persons THINK they were in an LTR after TWO or THREE dates, because the person they were dating did not tell them they WERE NOT in an LTR. Thinking like that just makes me BLINK. The point I am at now in my life, I HAVE to VERIFY that my prospective partners want what I want in greater or lesser degrees. I HAVE to verify what is and is not a deal breaker. Then, beyond just listening to what they say, I pay attention to what they DO. In no case though, do I assume that their lack of a statement, is in fact the positive of such a statement.

  16. 116
    mythago says:

    Aoirthoir: I think you are misunderstanding me. I’m not talking about assuming that silence equals consent; I’m talking about downplaying one’s own opinions or desires because of a gendered cultural script.

  17. 117
    rain says:

    I’m just not sure it makes sense to count every minute that I’m in the presence of my children and they aren’t asleep as childcare for the purposes of tallying worked hours

    Wait, what!? We’re not giving any credit to the parent when they stay at home during naptime instead of slipping out for coffee with friends (call me on my cell when you wake up) or when they’re on call during the night? :-)

  18. 118
    gin-and-whiskey says:

    When I am home and my kids are asleep and I am online, posting here, drinking beer, I am WORKING, dammit.

  19. 119
    Aoirthoir says:

    “I’m talking about downplaying one’s own opinions or desires because of a gendered cultural script.”

    Right. And I said:

    “REQUIRE a DEFINITIVE ANSWER one way or another. SETTLE for NOTHING less. NOTHING. This is one of those decisions, that is frankly THAT IMPORTANT. ”

    So whether it is silent assent, cultural script, anything less than a POSITIVE DEFINITIVE ANSWER should mean DONT allow that man to impregnate you.

    Living life by a cultural script is the same thing as living life by playing the high school game. At a certain point you HAVE to move beyond living by rote if you want your desires to come to fruition. If a woman says “I want children do you?” to her prospective mate and he replies “Unga Bunga children gooooood,” she really needs to MOVE ON.

    Why the hell are people NOT having IN DEPTH conversations about this, one of life’s MOST IMPORTANT decisions? If that many men are being surreptitious about their intents regarding child rearing, then it’s time to get professionals involved. Strap the @*#&@& to a lie detector* test to get the truth out of him if it is required. ANYTHING but just accepting high school games, a cultural script, rote nodding of the head or silent assent. Your HAPPINESS and SATISFACTION in life depend on having ACCURATE KNOWLEDGE of his position, why, oh why, leave it to chance? Seriously.

    * NEEDING a lie detector test from somone means there’s already more trouble in the relationship than a definitive answer would solve and it’s likely time to MOVE ON to another mate. This comment about a lie detector is said [mostly] in jest.

  20. 120
    mythago says:

    So whether it is silent assent, cultural script, anything less than a POSITIVE DEFINITIVE ANSWER should mean DONT allow that man to impregnate you.

    Okay, again, I think we’re talking past each other.

  21. 121
    Aoirthoir says:

    Mythago, maybe we are talking past each other. In a comment on blogs people can afford to do so. But when it’s dealing with their lives, and raising children, people need to not talk past each other, and have clearly understood and expressed positions.

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