Who is for equal parenthood?

Marriedinwhite if you've read any of this thread you'd see that men can only take their six months after the child is 20 weeks.

In cases like my own where the woman is the main earner and needs to return to work before the 20 weeks, this does not represent equality

All I'm asking for is the same thing you had when you had your child which we do not have.

The percentage is paid on your salary, not on all of your earnings. When you pay yourself a minimum salary and then dividends on profit you effectively get 90% of naff all

xenia - Sometimes it's a bit more complicated than that. childcare costs meant for us actually that on SMP our household income was higher than after returning to work - no mental gymnastics of whose pay is paying the childcare, but just simple income vs outgoings.

Unless you earn about £100 a week or in some job with enhanced maternity rights the 6 weeks at 90% pay (and very very little after that) means mean and women are for practical purposes treated pretty much the same. Obviously the rich can afford to swam around at home for 6 months or more on £135 a week but most people cannot afford that unless they have saved up or have a rich partner.

I completely disagree with your statement that the law as it now stands does not allow for equal parenting. Men now have the right to up to six months of paternity leave.

When our first son was born I was entitled to six months of maternity leave, I think I got 90% of my salary for six weeks and then SMP which then was between £20 and £30pw. I went back to work after three months, part time as a compromise for the company but stopped after a year because I didn't feel that arrangement was affording enough quality of life for the money.

Parenting is about a great deal more than the baby stage and a great deal more than the practical tasks of feeding and changing and school runs. We thought parenting was sufficiently important not to sub-conract any of it to others. I wanted to do it; DH was carving a career - the career that has provided the DC with a fabulous start in life (teenagers now). Most of all our DC have had the security of a happy family, love and an absence of ingrained bitterness and complaint.

Two complete extremes. I quite agree in working hard and expecting little. Also agree that The state shouldn't have to fund people's choices.

The point here is about fairness and I don't think anything you've raised here relates to the topic of this thread which is simply about encouraging equality in parenting.

My husband and I want to share the parenting. I also want to go back to work. I'm very pleased for you that you got what you wanted but when you went on mat leave I dare say you got some mat pay didn't you?

All this thread is attempting to raise is that the law as it stands does not allow for equal parenting.

Msfickle and others above. There are a couple of fundamental issues I just don't get.

I was taught to cook (and love it), to arrange flowers (and hate it but can do it), to be gracious (and it has become second nature), to work hard and expect very little. And I worked hard. I didn't go to university; I wasn't regarded as clever enough in 1978 or actually 1976 when the decision to do a secretarial course rather than A'Levels was made.

My sisters in law who are academically clever, have Russell Group degrees, can't cook, won't iron, don't clean and don't believe in boundaries for their children (one of whom has been expelled from a New Zealand School). They both married men who are non conformist and don't work because they wanted to be "free". They both regard themselves as feminists, as individuals, as people who are "free". Neither has ever done a day of proper salaried work. Neither have freedom, neither have independence, neither have choice in what they do, in their drudgeful jobs and unhappy marriages. But they were individuals and they were above conformity.

In contrast, I started work at 20 and worked without a break for 14 years. By the time I was 30 I was entirely financially independent and could have had a child on my own and been able to provide for us. However, in the meantime I married for love and was able to stay at home, having fulfilled my ambitions (Eurobond Salesman in investment banking, own house, well travelled, good car, great wardrobe and money in the bank) and to chose to spend eight years at home looking after our children and supporting my DH.

I have had choice, love and independence since my late 20's. Can anyone tell me what brand of feminism doesn't include choice and independence. My SILs certainly aren't independent and certainly aren't happy; in spite of telling my world was crap and their brother was a capitalist bastard the week before I married him.

I'd also like to know what the independence that feminism is supposed to bring has to do with expectations that the state should fund and support chosen lifestyles. Independent women chose their lifestyle and fund and support it; if love is part of the equation even better.

Smile and nod, smile and nod, just as I do to the SILs.

Hazelnut I completely agree with you.

Marriedinwhite whilst I agree with some of your points (working hard pays off sometimes) I can't help but feel like you are one of those women who live their life according to a plan

I do have less options than I'd like now but that's largely because I had a very, very good time in my 20's. I travelled the world, went out too much and then married for love not money. I got to 34 and had some material things but not all and decided that I could either keep doing a job I didn't really like so that I could take a full year maternity or bite the bullet and start my own which leave me with less in the short term but more flexibility and satisfaction long term. It also happened to coincide with being 34 and realising that I didn't want to be an older mum.

You might be happy to stay at home for 8 years but I certainly would not and I really hate that negative picture you paint about families putting their children in childcare. Perhaps being in your company 24/7 is not actually the best thing for them!

Oh well we'll have to beg to differ there, Xenia. I get zero thrill out of buying tools/machinery etc. The only way I can persuade myself to do it is by reminding myself of how much easier my life will be once I have the tool that does the job most quickly and efficiently. Dullsville central. I'd much rather buy furniture/clothes/food/flowers/houses.

enimmead, I couldn't help to notice the interesting choice of words. You ask if mothers "let" fathers to do this and that with DC. Exactly as has been discussed here - mothers are the alpha parents and decide what others, like nannies, grandparents, dads etc, are allowed to do with the DC. Even though in theory dads should be equal parents.
And this will not change until fathers actually do take a part of the parental leave and get the chance to be the alpha parent for a while.

This does not mean that every family has to and all SAHMs who are totally happy with how the things are, would be forced to work - you would always have the option not to use the time allocated to the father. Still, as the experience of other countries has shown, a "use it or lose it" paid leave will make a difference.

By the way, according to Swedish research, if the parents share the parental leave with their first child, they are more likely to have additional ones and are 30% less likely to divorce. Interesting.

Buying is tools is huge fun., If I compare the experience with buying a dress to buying all the stuff I have bought for my island from fishing rods to fire making kits the latter is so so much more fun.

Anyway housework and many DIY things are some of the lowest paid stuff in society including childcare because it is low paid and anyone can do it and it is boring and work which some of us do is paid much higher as it is fulfilling and much harder to do. Therefore most adults work and do what cleaning they can't avoid.

Laundry easy?

And the reason the drill example works is because there is nothing remotely hard about changing a nappy, doing the laundry, cuddling a sick child.

Anyone can do it if
a) they want to
b) nobody tries to stop them

There's a lot more to using a drill well than what you do with your arms

I think there's a lot to be said for educating girls together. I loved it.

Outcomes for girls tend to be better too.

The drill example is pathetic. No girl or women needs to be particularly determined to want to use a drill. It's really not difficult. The only thing I found remotely hard was going to buy a drill - it was such a boring thing to have to choose.

I use a drill. Anyohne with an arm can. However peopel tend to split things in marriages. I got the chidlren's school bags ready and he was usually the first person home from work to let the nanny go home. He did (and arranged and was 100% responsible for) the dentist and optician trips. I did our tax returns.

Lots of people and teenagers like to show total incompetence at a task so the other person takes it on. If you are up against one of those then you dump the baby, 1 year old and 3 year old on him for a Saturday aftrernoon, go shopping and say - you'll manage. You'll be much better than I am. Then when you come back you say how well it was all done and if the house is a mess you have a long bath at 9 when the children are in bed and say - "ah you seem to have a bit of tidying left to do from earlier on . I think you'll find it easier next Saturday to do that as you go along."

Widow that was actually my point. I am sure I am totally capable of all of those things but like anything in life that requires a bit of skill, you need to be shown how to do them and then you need to practise to get better.

Women are often discouraged from doing traditionally 'male roles' and vice versa.

Though on a pure talent level I am pretty confident that I am actually quite crap at those things. Not because I'm a woman but because as a person I have no interest and no patience either.

My daughter however will be bought up to have a go at everything whether it be baking a cake or changing a tyre!

I actually couldn't read past "what I was born to do" without being a bit sick in my mouth.

Marriedinwhite- your husband has fulfilled the role the patriarchal society has laid out for him. Go to work and let the wife look after the children.

Sex segregation in schools IMO is a bad thing anyway. It's just reinforcement of stereotypes. I went to a mixed equivalent of a Grammar school ("Gymnasium" in Germany) - no "bottom streams" there.

Woodwork was not offered in my all-girls school.

At my brother's all-boys school it was only offered for bottom streams

Inequality isn't imposed by structures. It's imposed by a lack of independence and too much reliance on others.

I worked very very hard from 20 to 34 and set myself up with a small house that was fully paid for. DH and I married when I was 31, moved to a bigger house and DH has continued to work very very hard. At 34 when I had my first child we had the independence for me to do what I was born to do and to fulfil my ultimate ambition - to give up work and be a mummy and to care and nurture our children. Eight years later I went back to work and have successfully carved a new career which has included professional qualifications and an MBA.

You get what you work for - nothing more and nothing less and part of choice includes making a plan and waiting until you have the means to support your choices.

No - I wouldn't have wanted a month for maternity leave, no I didn't think pregnancy and childbirth were illnesses, no I didn't need my husband to help me with the baby care (I was more than capable and loved doing it), no I didn't want my dc in wrap around care being nurtured and influenced by others or in an institutionalised nursery, no I do not want to live in an Orwellian inspired retrofit City, and no I certainly don't want bribery in the form of free anything least of all chocolate.

Oh - I learnt it in school, as part of wood work lessons (which weren't optional) - I guess it's one of these having grown up in a different culture things again.

"Being able to operate a drill is not some kind of innate skill which is passed on on the Y-chromosome."

No, but being taught how to operate a drill is something less likely to happen to girls.

Having opportunities to use a drill similarly.

A girl/woman who wants to be
a) competent at using a drill
b) accepted as being competent at using a drill
has to be pretty determined.

My MIL is brilliant in her refusal to accept that she can't do stuff, and she brought up her children to be the same. DH sees no reason why he can't cook/sew/keep house as well as anyone. And since his DDs arrived has been totally confident in his ability to care for them.

I love my MIL :)

And people do give in to easily because being assertive can cause friction.