The dad privilege checklist

[Iis]

I saw this linked to on a Reddit thread and I see so many similar threads here I thought I’d share it. Many people advise to share with their husbands the blog post ‘my husband left his glass next to the dishwasher’ or something like this, but this may help as well.

If you don’t want to click an unknown link just google the dad privilege check list Zawn Villines.

https://zawn.substack.com/p/the-dad-privilege-checklist

I had to stop reading the list. Started to feel physically sick.

All those reasons and more that DH turned into ExH.

My EXDP could tick every one of those on the list.

As I got closer to leaving him, I pretty much stopped doing anything on the list that related solely to him.

Ex didn't pressure for sex after I gave birth...

But the rest, and more...

Was a good read thank you for sharing.

I felt it here - DH has no idea our children shoe sizes or when they need to go to the dentist. Or buying a birthday present.

He had done some of the things of the list.

RE PP who said what are men meant to do about breastfeeding? It’s not getting them to do it so it equal, it’s about acknowledging privilege and recognising the breastfeeding parents efforts. Saying thank you, being supportive etc

.

If the kids uniform is creased people judge the mother, same if the house is messy.

You could equally argue that women are privileged because they get to breastfeed and build a physical bond with the child which is simply not available to men.

I think the main crux of the matter is that fathers can get down time and completely detach and yet everything still gets done. Mothers rarely experience this. If you did just check out for a day you'd return to a messy house, no laundry done, the kids eating pizzas or ready meals, no school admin/homework/clean uniform etc. done, no reading practice, they'd just be parked in front of the TV. Not all dads perhaps, but a lot judging by what people post about here. I've also experienced it myself and seen friends deal with it.

Oh yes, I didn't get that far or glazed over it.

Yes after having DC I was about as desirable to the Ex as a cold bucket of sick, so there wasn't any pressure for sex to worry about at least.

Ticked plenty of the other boxes though.

I know a great many men who are this way. I saw it off at the pass and 30 years of hard work and relentless boundary holding mean that even though it has been a very rocky road at times, I have a husband who is as much of a wife as I am 😂he does all the cooking and cleaning and 50% parenting - he does practical I do emotional 😂

And get to experience pain, mastitis, leakage and engorgement. Not forgetting the fun of pumping and cracked nipples. Plus bras that don't fit.

Yep.

Good to let all the women who couldn't breastfeed for whatever reason that they were in fact experiencing dad privilege though, that'll be a nice comfort to them.

Do not forget the possible guilting that comes from a man who feels undermined by the natural ability of the breasts to provide the milk.

Re the shoe sizes etc, there was a trend on social media a while ago where people would ‘interview’ people in the street and upload the videos to social media. They would ask couples questions about each other or ask parents questions about their kids. There were men who didn’t know anything about their wives and children: their children’s ages, birthdates, best friends, favourite subject, favourite food etc. One man didn’t know his wife’s parents names, birthday, her favourite food, the kids birth months or ages and more. And loads of women in the comments saying their dad/husband is the same and men saying men can’t be expected to remember trivial things…

This makes me sad that there are women in relationships where the majority of the these boxes are ticked.

My DH wracks up a couple of them - like me sorting the kids school uniform etc but overall we are very balanced and he is an extremely caring, supportive and kind partner and dad. He doesn’t always get it right but neither do I.

breaks my heart that many women and kids don’t live with a decent, emotionally intelligent man.

This list didn’t ring true with me and DH either. A crisis when I leave the house?! Absolutely not!

"I feel entitled to become angry and resentful when my partner asks me to do household labor."

My ex once told me in an argument to stop asking him to take on so many tasks related to our DD because “no child in this country will ever go hungry” - I’m assuming he thought if he stopped parenting his DD would be fine. I don’t think he realised that his child isn’t going hungry because I’m the one doing all of the work! Some men have a horrible mindset. Sadly he was very enabled by his family.

When I met my current partner it was so important for me to see his attitude towards housework. However I think that it’s important for couples to have the conversation about splitting responsibilities early on as some men can easily continue with business as usual if they assume that their partner will take on all of the responsibility. Society still normalises women giving it all up for children.

I do a lot of the mental load, but I delegate a lot of the doing part to Dh. He's never planned a holiday or researched childcare and presents, but he's much better at wrapping presents, he meal plans and does 90% of the cooking etc. I believe it evens out for us.

I can believe that this list is some women's experiences. 😐

Me & my DH are pretty even too (and almost to the point that I wouldn't want him to read the list as he'd likely have something to complain about me!)

Surely men can only get away with this if women allow them too so women need to say no. I struggle to understand how women do enable this behaviour as I'd spend my time in an absolute rage, so couldn't live that way?!

That's a great list
My own list would consist of most of that, plus -

• I do not know the dates of birth of my children, so I will give the pharmacy we use a close enough date in the months I'm pretty sure they were all born. If I had ever picked up a prescription for any family member, including myself, I would know that this would cause huge problems. But I've never picked up a prescription for a family member, including myself.

When my wife picks up medications prescribed for the children at the pharmacy and the clerk needs her to state the date of birth of the children in order to hand over the medication, she will say the right date but it won't be the date on record, so she'll have to go home empty handed and then spend half an hour on hold with the pharmacy and an hour on hold with the health insurance company trying to straighten out the dates. It won't be possible for her to talk to the insurance company because I didn't name her as an authorised individual on the policy, and it will take me ten days to get around to doing this so that she can phone them again and spend another half hour of the one life she's been given telling them the DOB of our children, which I still dont know, natch... In the meantime, my wife will have the doctor phone the prescription to the hospital pharmacy and she will make a round trip of an hour, not including the half hour spent finding a parking spot or the time spent hiking from the car park to the pharmacy, and pay out of pocket for the medications and the parking.

True story. We are divorced.

Yep…only a few that wouldn’t be ticked

I agree.

"I can leave the house and, without me giving my spouse instructions, they will care for my children properly and ensure the house is clean."

"If I have surgery or a medical crisis, someone else will take care of my children"

These being "dad privilege" implies they don't apply to mothers - if you can't say this about yourself, wtf is your partner playing at??

A couple apply to DH - I generally cook, but it's balanced out by other stuff he does (and I don't do all the meal planning and shopping). And he doesn't do the DDs' dentist appointments, but that's because he's medically not allowed to drive and it would be a pointless faff for him to take them on two separate buses to get to the dentist when I could just drive.
Oh and he didn't breastfeed. Obviously.

Oh and the guilt when it doesn't work out! How privileged we are.