to be annoyed that my dp gets paid a fortune and just coasts....

[PosieParker]

Today my dp's equal has been promoted to a new post that makes him my dp's boss and I'm really angry. I'm annoyed that my dp just coasts in his role and complains and doesn't try new things or work his arse off for his pay. Quite ridiculous to be annoyed as it keeps us in a nice lifestyle and I cannot work out why I'm so angry but I could cry with temper.
Is it my business, even? When he told me I went nuts and I can't explain why. Pregnancy? Jealousy? Worry? Over involved because I don't have my own job? I just don't know.
Trouble is I'm sure I've made a horrid situation worse for him but I couldn't help it and told him they'd (his bosses) had made him look stupid.

I agree, I have friends who wait to see the dentist if they're TTC... for a check up not in agony with toothache, although that's funnier! My father has the 'gold' (?) bupa package via his work and because he has narcolepsy (sp) and high blood pressure and in Hong Kong therefore bloody good thorough doctors he has reached his cap....

I don't agree with you Dittany. What you are suggesting is that our reproductive capability in itself is deserving of respect. That's clearly nonsense - should you be congratulated every time you go to the loo? Because your digestive system is fully functional?

What deserves respect is bringing the children up well.

That was taken out of context. Being a good spouse demands respect. Giving birth is hard work but not exactly the same. People get pregnant every night via a quick sexual coupling outside a pub. Getting pregnant and bearing a child is not really something that makes you respect someone. But that's nothing to do with the thread.

If PP thinks her husband should pay more tax why not give £10,000 away tomorrow to workers in a local care home? There is nothing to stop anyone giving more away if they choose and indeed giving by higher earners can mean better use of money than if the state in its highly inefficient wasteful way doles it out.

"no way should people stop paying tax over a certain threshold, that's obscene". I completely disagree. You've more than paid what you should. Why should taxes be redistributive? People aren't the same. Some will always be richer than others. I don't see any problem with that at all. I don't see any moral imperative in ensuring we all have a similar income. Also when taxes get too high the tax take goes down and indeed individuals and companies move to where taxes are lower as we're seeing at the moment with non doms and corporate tax too if Brown isn't careful. Bulgaria's 10% rate sometimes looks very attractive to me.....

I am mystified as to why having babies is deserving of respect. Utterly mystified. Shannon's mother had seven children. On that basis we should respect her lots then, shouldn't we? I always thought respect had to be earned. Like through working hard or doing good or whatever.

Off to the loo now. You can congratulate me on my return.

Well, Dittany: WOuldn't you agree that any bloke can donate sperm which may go on to produce a child but a FATHER is one who nurtures and loves the child to maturity and beyond.

Why is it any different for a woman? I totally agree with Quattro's sentiment. The process of simply procreating does not (and should not) in itself demand 'respect'
And, as for being a good spouse: Yes, sometimes that means being there for your husband when he's being less than reasonable (just as it is for a husband to be there when his wife is being a craz pregnant lady who thinks life is hard! )

Also agree totally with Xenia's post - that's what I was trying to say - you just said it more eloquently!!

Women do not deserve respect simply for giving birth. That's plain daft.

To disrespect them would also be daft.

It's nothing to do with class - it's to do with contribution I think. Someone contributes to society by doing voluntary work, or starting an exciting new business venture, or writing a brilliant novel - I can and do respect all that. Having children? Nah. Anyone can and does do that.

If you'd said raising children and nurturing them well so that they become productive members of society, I might've bought the argument.

But women can't do it alone - should we respect men for their (inherent) capability to reproduce too? What about animals? Should we respect them for their ability to breed? What about trees? Do we respect acorns and stuff too?

I mean respecting people for their ability to reproduce is akin to respecting people for having hair, isn't it? Or should we respect people for having hair? Isn't that a bit unfair to people who are bald?

Where do people with impaired fertility sit in all this? Are we supposed to pity them or disrespect them or what?

are they middle or upper class achievements? Righto. I'll tell the girl in my class who wants to be an author that she's working class so she can't.

What a limited view of life.

just because something is common doesn't mean it shouldn't be respected.

NO-ONE is saying it ought to be disrespected, Dittany. The point is, childbirth (or anything else pretty much anyone can do) isn't an automatic right for respect.

Loving, caring for, nurturing a child - THAT deserves respect whether a man or woman, rich or poor, high class or not.

Rather silly argument over respect, I think.
I never thought in my marriage my ex husband appreciated my having the children at all and yet you see men doing tings like buying their wives a present because of what they've gone through and appreciating their wife for having the child etc Instead every baby was some huge concession to me. So I can see this from both sides. I do think any mother who is bringing up children is doing a tremendous thing (as long as they're doing it reasonably well) and fathers too - most fathers put huge effort into it. I don't think we respect any woman who has happened to have had a child although we don't disrespect them either.

Perhaps the original post comes back to respect - perhaps P should be respecting her husband more for bringing in the £200k a year and keeping her and the soon to be 4 of them and may be the other way round too - there can't be many mothers in the UK whose husbands earn £200k even if the woman stays at home who doesn't have an au pair or nanny. Should be respect someone who works/ looks after chidlren more than a woman who values her leisure, her time to think, to do good works, to relax?

I think it was in the bible they said -imagine the lilies of the field that neither sew nor spin and they did okay which always struck as a bit silly - who is going to feed those lilies who sit around doing nothing?

So do we respect full time mothers and women who are mothers and earn £200k more than women who don't work nor look after their children or are all 3 positions equally deserving of respect and admiration?

i think carrying a child for the requisite no of months and bearing it is worthy of respect.
i dont find it any particular effort to respect it either.

there are women who have done this who for other reasons i do not respect, sure. but the actual having of the baby, i respect. whats so odd about that?

It was Jesus Christ who said Consider the lilies of the field; they neither toil nor spin, yet Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.

In other words, chill out a bit! Only he said it a bit more poetically.

He also said it would be easier to get a camel through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to get to Heaven.

And he said The poor will always be with you.

He said quite a lot of fairly memorable things actually.

Hilarious how this has managed to get onto class issues!! Of course having a baby in itself is not deserving of respect. One of the mums at the school where I teach, churns out a baby a year - and chain smokes through each pregnancy too. What's deserving of respect about that? What's deserving of respect is how BOTH PARENTS care for a child and raise it.

"by doing voluntary work, or starting an exciting new business venture, or writing a brilliant novel"

These are all middle or upper class "achievements".

Bollocks. I would encourage someone from ANY background to do voluntary work, start a business venture or take up writing if that's what they decided to do. I find it pretty offensive that Dittany thinks these activities should be restricted to particular social groupings.

Yes, but the lilies get provided for and the rest of us starve if we don't toil (unless we have rich husbands I suppose or a benign welfare state).

If we have this respect thing do I get more credit and kudos for having 5 than someone who just had one then?

Yes you do, Xenia and also for bf-ing them all.