Please don't give my husband longer paternity leave

mrnosyparker · 2025-06-23T05:02:36+00:00

Ok, I’m going to skip my rant about all the insultingly condescending sexist quips this author injects and get right to the glaring ignorance undercutting all of it:

Parental leave doesn’t need to be taken immediately in the first 6 months. The best way to use extended parental leave is to stagger both parents’ leaves.

Dad takes two weeks and Mom takes 3-6 months, then dad takes his remaining leave as mom goes back to work.

That gives the family a FULL YEAR without having to pay for childcare and/or stick the baby in daycare. The baby gets to bond with both parents and both parents split the parental caregiving load evenly.

There’s no reason why both parents need to stay at home for the same 6 month period, and it’s arguably not even advisable to do it that way, so that entire point she’s trying to make (sexist contempt aside) is completely superfluous and a straw man.

SuperIntegration · 2025-06-23T09:35:01+00:00

Why get married if you hate your spouse?

...why then post sexist shit on the internet like your experience is universal?

What an insipid article.

MonkeyCartridge · 2025-06-23T12:09:17+00:00

"six months of paternity leave is not an act of support; it amounts to domestic invasion."

Imagine being considered a home invader in your own home with your own family. And they wonder why men work more overtime and aren't as involved in the home: We're supposed to provide for the home while not actually living in the home.

Altruistic-Hat269 · 2025-06-23T12:37:03+00:00

90 percent chance this woman is also the kind of mother/wife who will complain bitterly that her husband hasn't built the same relationship of trust with her kids as she has.

diagnosissplendid · 2025-06-23T07:25:38+00:00

On the bright side, look who is saying it: the Spectator's writers are always politicians who hate democracy, rich people who hate poor people, men who hate women, and - because by their own standards they're egalitarians now - women who hate men. It is a gross view, but where it is coming from should be a comfort to us. If you see it in the Guardian, that's when it is time to worry.

I will say as an aside that when I heard this view in the Labour party, the person who uttered it was sympathetically but definitively disagreed with and support was shown to people advocating greater leave and equality. That was circa 2017. I doubt things have changed in the places that matter.

Fan_Service_3703 · 2025-06-23T12:44:52+00:00

It’s not that I’m against fathers bonding with their babies. Far from it. I’m all for help with bedtime stories, bath time, and nappy changes at 3 a.m. What unsettles me is the idea of my husband being in the house. All day. For months on end. Anyone who lived through lockdown with a furloughed spouse, or whose partner works from home, will understand that having your other half home all day does not always mean domesticated bliss.

Both the right wing and feminism think males fulfilling their judeo-christian-islamic provider role is more important than bonding with their children. Vile.

Competitive_Side6301 · 2025-06-23T13:02:19+00:00

This is why we need more men in writing in journalism.

And not the “feminist approved” type of men.

I hope one day this woman frees her husband so he can go find a woman who truly loves him.

Femi_gnatzee_hunter · 2025-06-23T10:35:18+00:00

Women often speak about men like slave owners about slaves

Spiderinahumansuit · 2025-06-23T15:43:38+00:00

As a bit of context for non-Brits, The Spectator is absolutely a right-wing news magazine. Since longer paternity leave is a social good which would cost companies more, there's no way in hell they'll support it unless compelled to.

That said, the writer's contempt for her husband is palpable.

Designer-Property684 · 2025-06-23T15:09:48+00:00

More proof that women don't really support other women, they support women's hatred of men. Extended paternity leave will absolutely help women, but anything that appears to benefit men is automatically categorized as a bad thing.

gaut80 · 2025-06-23T18:34:22+00:00

Yes. Let's keep giving uneven parental leaves. So employers will think twice before hiring a woman, especially before 50 and even more if childless. Great think for women employment.

Do these people even have functioning brains?

TrickyAudin · 2025-06-23T18:03:40+00:00

Either the author is a horrible wife or she has a horrible husband, there's no in-between. No sane person in a healthy marriage would want their partner absent more, especially when it comes to childcare. Early childhood can be a logistical nightmare, imagine actively pushing out the one person who would split that responsibility with you.

PenLive6887 · 2025-06-24T14:00:24+00:00

Genuine question. Why on earth is this journalist repeatedly being called a feminist in this thread. Just because she is a woman? She's demonstrably not a feminist as she keeps denigrating her husbands parental and domestic skills purely based on his gender. That's just reinforcing traditional patriarchal views. It's not like the spectator is known for its feminist takes.

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