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

When I read threads on here about lazy man, it really winds me up. And then women caveat it all by saying it oh but they are a great Dad. In my eyes you cannot be a great dad if you are modelling that it’s okay to do nothing and let the kids’ mum run around doing it all.

Lots of this is simply down to being a decent human. Surely a kind and good person doesn’t let one person take on the whole load without refusing to help? Men who do this are not good people.

But you can make all life sound a terrible chore that way if you start listing every tiny sub-task and decision that must be made. Going to work isn't going to work, it's: researching and considering all available transport and parking options and routes, selecting a departure time, ensuring that the car has petrol and is well-maintained, considering the weather conditions and whether de-icing is needed, remaining alert and responsive to all possible changes and hazards through the drive, selecting a suitable parking spot considering your needs both now and when you leave, completing any payment or registering the car needed, securing the car before it is left... With all this it's surprising anyone can work after.

Or, if you're a normal person, you consider this to be the task 'driving to work' and a bit of a pain but hardly a massively taxing set of mental loads. Just like for most people 'buying a birthday present' just really isn't a massive deal.

Like a mother.

You do all the hard work and then allocate him jobs, whilst at least he is doing something it is still pretty crap.

And this is the problem, if men do something women feel we should be grateful.

So why doesn’t the dad do it then? If it’s sooo easy? Because it’s beneath him to consider something as basic as his child’s friendships and social life and he knows his wife will buy the present anyway?

Thankfully DH ticks very few of these boxes.

In our relationship there are also quite a few "mum privileges" - mainly around not being the one to organise tradespeople or deal with bills etc (nb I still help to pay them, just not the admin!).

It's very sad that it still applies to so many relationships 😔

My DH and I always agreed be 50/59 and has been

Things that helped

• hes in part time army so good around the house eg does laundry ironing
• split core tasks at outset eg i buy food and do cooking and buy everythinf; he does all laundry hoovering maintenance IT
• split the kids up. So i had girl he had boy. Esch has to do all presents socials parties activities for esch. We do swap bit forces if- so hes passed on whatsapp details and i dont join the groups/ emails. Had sexist comments over the years eg 'heres the mysterious mum of X' but who cares

- stages where uf slips always confront

Things that helped

• both live nr work school nursery after school club
• threw cash at any childcare early days eg cleaner would min toddlers if i had to go out shopping (not precious)
• he v supports my career agreed turn down high travel jobs
• both exercise same ngts and meet friends max 1-2 a fortnight ie so is fair
• cleaner twice a week
• i confront laziness and inform hos family members to put pressure
• never iron

Hope this helps someone! Key is being local to kids things, divide up kids and marry an egalitarian man. Outsource whatever u can afford

Honestly, I have needed felt all those things are on me alone either.

We discuss those things together. And again, honestly, I think my 4 children have either given me a very easy life, or I am very laid back because I’ve never felt a huge mental load or that we are extremely busy. I hear women talk about the mental load and it doesn’t feel that way for me.

School uniform? As and when. We will just pick up some polo shirts or get some new bits over the summer. For example, one of us will notice ds has a hole in a polo shirt, we’ll just pick one up from Tesco. Ds came home with a hole in his school shoe last week - told dh who picked up a new pair with the shopping that night. It’s not a big deal.

Parents eve? They just send a link on a school app, an evening appointment is booked in about 3 seconds. I’ve been to the past few years alone as we have had a baby/toddler who would have been a nightmare to bring along. Dh is going to the one in feb though while I stay with the 3 year old.

Dh does homework, sadly, my children surpass my knowledge in maths by the age of 7 and he has a degree in it, so that works out and he enjoys doing it with them. He mainly works from home and when he does, he does the school runs (only 10 min walk away) as a) he likes the chat with them and b) it gets him away from his desk for some fresh air or he’d be stuck in the box room all day.

School choices? you don’t really get a choice,
do you. We just sent to the local school with a space, you get the one you are given, I’ve never seen any point in stressing over a school if you give your children help, support and encouragement at home.

My eldest is now an adult, GCSE choices were hardly a headache. she just did what he was interested in and would do well in. We are close as a family, we talk about friendship problems etc.

As far as any dentist/dr appointments again, seconds to make a phone call. Birthdays/Christmas, we know what our children like, want and need and it’s only a few clicks to order stuff, we have a quick chat about it and order things. it’s not a big deal or time consuming.

And the only ironing that goes on in this house is dh work shirts, which he does. He’s only in the office once/twice a week though so it’s not much.

Same.

There were things my DH didn’t do (play dates mostly as mums hosting was preferred where we lived) but there’s a list he could write that would also be true: all gardening, bike maintenance, watching football..

Out of interest… which ones do you think are made up?

Some of the examples are common and I'm sure problematic if you live with them.
But some of them are silly. Holiday cards and scheduled family photos? If you want or need these things and your partner doesn't then why do they need to contribute to organising them? People make a rod for their own back with this sort of stuff and then complain about it....

Think you've completely missed the point of the list tbh

Hmm. I gave up reading the list because I got bored. I have always done all the domestic stuff and children stuff (the DC are grown up now). DH has always done the bins and the outdoor paintwork.

However, I had eight wonderful years at home when DH was working 12 hour days and out of the house for 14. When I went back to work it was local and I could take the DC to school and be home by 6 so still had ample capacity to pick up domestic stuff.

I have always had a cleaner, even when I was single and when I went back to work more was sub-contracted: cleaner, gardener, au-pair and many other things.

DH and I have rendered an equal contribution to family life in the context of time available. I have always felt the split was fair.

He was and always will be a workaholic and much was and remains on my shoulders. I have worked full-time for the last 17 years but he totally supported me to obtain professional qualifications and a Masters degree when I returned to work.

He has been a loyal, kind and supportive partner to the dc and me, if not always present in the home. His work ethic has provided significant benefits to us:

A beautiful home in the UK
A beautiful home in France
All bills paid - I can barely remember having a mortgage
The very best education for the DC
Property ladders for the DC

He couldn't have done it without me but neither could I have done it without him. We have have provided each other with mutual comfort and unfailing support for nearly 35 years. Marriage or partnership is about team work.

I got this in spades.

Followed by demands that I must express so that he could get out a bottle when he felt like it. Zero benefit to me or to DS. Just a demand to a postpartum woman (DS was less than a week old!) to do more work for his benefit.

He could have bonded over holding the baby who wouldn’t be put down so I could shower or sleep… but no. He didn’t want to do that. That would be boring and inconvenient. The baby should just be convenient and lie quietly in a Moses basket so that everything could centre around what H wanted. Apparently I should leave my newborn to scream til he got with the programme.

I also got the demands for sex. They started less than a week after the traumatic (and most definitely exacerbated by H’s behaviour) emergency section.

I found the list sad and depressing. The divorce is nearly done!

But you had to train him. Therefore making his apparent inability to do things, your problem.

They are allegedly adults, who should know most of this stuff.

No I haven't. It's a long list of things men commonly don't do and women pick up. Some of it is valid. Important stuff that needs to be done. And some items on it are silly to me, aren't valid points and they distract from the argument.

My partner is the absolute epitome of male parent privilege. I call the children ‘my children’ because I do 99% of things for them. To be honest I don’t mind though, as they’re MY kids and are incredibly bonded to me.

@piscofrisco do you mean you don’t buy special clothes for family photos? Shame on you!

My ex could tick nearly all of them, no problem but the one that really resonated with me was the “I can make any number of dangerous or abusive parenting decisions and people will still say I’m a good dad because I’m trying” (something like that). It’s so true. And it sickens me.

Here’s another one actually: if me and children’s mother split up, I don’t have to worry myself with taking care of my children’s basic needs and hygiene on my time which is every other weekend. It doesn’t matter if they’re not fed properly, I forget to put them to bed, they don’t brush their teeth or wash, medication isn’t administered and I’m either ignoring the children for hours or yelling at them. Because I see my kids. I’m giving their mother a break. She should be grateful I see the kids at all. So many other fathers don’t.

I’m fuming now.

If he is your partner and not husband, it is worth getting hitched for the extra financial protection.
In my experience, the men who don’t value the contribution of sole-parenting mums show that when they split up above all.
I’ll give one carve out for the workaholics who see providing for the family as the highest priority and their job. But they’re traditional and tend to be married anyhow.

But… if you actually DO this, and it’s a ‘family tradition’ he expects to happen (and which he gets praise for from his family and friends)… then it does matter that the work falls to the woman and, disproportionately, the benefit falls to the man.

I don’t do this. But you could substitute various other things traditions or activities that I do organise or facilitate.

It’s a bit disingenuous to focus on the surface details. The examples are just examples of a deeper set of inequalities.

It's not like that in our house at all.

Dad privileges are:

• not doing her hair
• not wrapping presents (if they aren't just getting bagged)
• not choosing and buying party clothes/"nice" outfits

The mum privileges list is considerably longer...😅

Yes.

There’s also the male privilege of how, if he’s in charge of children in public, people will not only congratulate him on what a wonderful father he is, they will also tell him how wonderful and wonderfully behaved the children are. Even when their behaviour is actually quite poor.

This does not tend to happen the other way around. People don’t go up to women in play parks and tell them how they are doing such a brilliant job and their children are just amazing little cherubs.

No one prepares you for how infuriating this is. There’s a good tik tok parody song about this: https://vm.tiktok.com/ZGerb9PT1/.

it is even more infuriating when your arsehole ‘partner’ uses this as evidence of how much better a parent he is than you.

@VinegarTrio It seems bonkers because if your partner is so awful and can’t your children fed and safe why would you be flogging yourself to portray a perfect family image?
But someone else on here said it’s a compilation from different people’s suggestions so that actually makes more sense.

Thankfully we're ok on this - pretty much even. There are things I sort out, but I know they would be done if I wasn't around.

This is, however, partly because I insist he does things. And he's an intelligent, reasonable man who appreciates all I do and all women go through, so he does them. (Also he cooks almost all our food, which is a huge bonus as I hate cooking.)

I would (far) rather be single than be with a man like this.