Did the womens movement kill the family unit?

[pam]

My wife had 2

The question was have YOU. I went back to work right at 4 weeks and that was after having a C-section. Wish I hadn't. I wish I had taken the last two weeks. Between the surgery itself and dealing with twin baby boys...I really needed the rest.

[pam]

It doesn't take 6 weeks to recoup from surgery.At least cesarean, i don't have any natural born kids.Breast feeding isn't necessary, preferential but not necessary.

That being said i have on problem with giving women paternity leave.I think it is very important. But getting the same salary while taking more time off because they choose to have kids in not right.

Actually I would have a really difficult time giving women "paternity" leave

[hordak]

The question was have YOU. I went back to work right at 4 weeks and that was after having a C-section. Wish I hadn't. I wish I had taken the last two weeks. Between the surgery itself and dealing with twin baby boys...I really needed the rest.

My wife was good to in 3 weeks.Both times. And since i have been a a stay at home dad since my kids were born you wont meet another guy who is more understanding to demands of child rearing. I'm just saying if you take an extra 6 weeks of a year you have no right to complain about having smaller pay checks.(I know all women don't have kids so they might have the right)

[funkymonkey]

Hordak

Dude that is SO descriminatory. Your sense of entitlement is seriously out of balance. Do you seriously understand what you're saying?

You obviously have never been in a house with a single mom and 5 kids. Go spend even just a week in a single mom family and then come back and tell me that you feel justified in descriminating women's pay. In this day in age, there should be nothing (other than experience on paper) that makes anyone have to prove that they are worthy of equal pay.

In my case, I don't have any kids...so does that mean that I might have the right to equal pay? That doesn't make any sense.

Even if your theory was right, should women be paid less their entire lives because they have a few kids a few years out of their life. How on earth does that make sense to you?

In my honest opionion you don't have enough work experience to even understand what you're saying here.

Oh, and by the way... the FMLA does not demand this country PAY women when they are on maternity leave, it only holds their job for 6 weeks...and as you now (hopefully) understand, 6 weeks very well could not be enough recovery time. This is the same exact program that protects you if you fall deathly ill for up to 6 weeks, your company is required to hold your position...but not pay you a cent.

It is completely up to the company you work for to pay out maternity leave or dissability benefit. Those are the same companies that usually have some kind of dissability insurance.

I have never had the privilege of using maternity leave, but am sure glad my company offered some kind of dissability pay when I needed it.

If you seriously have some problem with women getting paid by your company to recover from having a kid, then you should probably work for a different company that doesn't offer benefits to their employees because I'm sure they will pay you what you "deserve".

[WANDERER]

Hordak...and if they don't have kids...then you have no right to complain about having the retirement age moved up to eighty or just not retiring altogether (laws to what age you can access super funds are moving up...in some countries by a month per year....yes really..due to this factor). There's a good economic reason for maternity leave...people are tending towards working rather than having children. Thus, maternity leave and whatever else is needed to support the economy from having no replacement working force. The maternity leave legislation wasn't made in order to be generous to women or mothers..just from economic neccessity. We have a baby bonus of thousands of dollars for new mums here...birth rate is up...yes it's blunt, we know why we have it...the government is concerned about an aging population and no new workforce to balance it. No one thinks we should drop it. Although there is some concern about teen mums just wanting the money and not realising that a couple of thousand doesn't really cover the costs of child raising and loss of income and opportunities...so parents of fifteen year old girls complained. $5000 per child. No assets test required...any mother gets it. Plus maternity leave it that's available through their work...plus supporting parent payments...plus tax cuts...plus funding for childcare to assist...oh my.

And it's all because...it will benefit everyone financially if there isn't a zero reproduction rate. It's no laughing matter. If you want to make it tough for people to be parents and mothers to be mothers...they just don't.

[hordak]

Hordak

Dude that is SO descriminatory. Your sense of entitlement is seriously out of balance. Do you seriously understand what you're saying?

Yes.

Worker A ) works 50 weeks a year with a 2 week vacation

Worker B ) works 44 weeks per year with a 2 week vacation and 6 weeks of maternity leave .

Worker b doesn't deserve the same compensation that worker A gets because B does

less work.

You obviously have never been in a house with a single mom and 5 kids. Go spend even just a week in a single mom family and then come back and tell me that you feel justified in descriminating women's pay.

I'm not talking about all women, I'm talking about women who take payed maternity leave

In this day in age, there should be nothing (other than experience on paper) that makes anyone have to prove that they are worthy of equal pay.

In my case, I don't have any kids...so does that mean that I might have the right to equal pay? That doesn't make any sense.

If you have the same responsibility, experience, education(give or take) then yes you deserve the same compensation

Even if your theory was right, should women be paid less their entire lives because they have a few kids a few years out of their life. How on earth does that make sense to you?

I didn't say that nor do I advocate that. My point is that if a women or even a man (but we are not unusually offered it) take 6 weeks more of payed "vacation" time they don't deserve the same compensation their coworkers. In that year, not for life.

In my honest opionion you don't have enough work experience to even understand what you're saying here.

you know nothing of my work experience

Oh, and by the way... the FMLA does not demand this country PAY women when they are on maternity leave, it only holds their job for 6 weeks...and as you now (hopefully) understand, 6 weeks very well could not be enough recovery time. This is the same exact program that protects you if you fall deathly ill for up to 6 weeks, your company is required to hold your position...but not pay you a cent.

Nothing wrong with that. I think it is great.If they are not getting payed during the leave then it is equal.(provide the get the same salary) However if they take payed leave and spend less time in the work place employers have the right to pay them less.

Again I'm not talking about ALL women, just the payed maternity leave group.

[havejoy]

Saying or implying that woman don't deserve equal pay when most will only use maternity a paid leave once or twice in their entire career is pretty sad.

I guess you could base individual wages on how much sick time the average man or woman takes. That would automatically make smokers and alcoholics, more of whom are men, have lower pay for the same job.

And let's not forget those few men and women who are recovering from cancer or other serious illnesses. Based on number of sick days they've taken in the last year they should have to pay to come to work. (sarcasm intended but not meant to be mean)

[hordak]

Saying or implying that woman don't deserve equal pay when most will only use maternity a paid leave once or twice in their entire career is pretty sad.

I guess you could base individual wages on how much sick time the average man or woman takes. That would automatically make smokers and alcoholics, more of whom are men, have lower pay for the same job.

And let's not forget those few men and women who are recovering from cancer or other serious illnesses. Based on number of sick days they've taken in the last year they should have to pay to come to work. (sarcasm intended but not meant to be mean)

That's not what i am implying

[havejoy]

You said:

Worker A ) works 50 weeks a year with a 2 week vacation

Worker B ) works 44 weeks per year with a 2 week vacation and 6 weeks of maternity leave .

Worker b doesn't deserve the same compensation that worker A gets because B does

less work.

The 6 weeks of maternity leave is not vacation, it comes out of the sick time bank that all employees at the same level will have. What you are talking about is penalizing someone for using more paid sick time.

[Misshalfway]

I see the wage issue as something that has nothing to do with family unit at all. To me it is an honest days work for an honest wage. The gender gap in this area is still blows my mind.

Thank you Havejoy for you last comment. Whether or not someone has a c-section is irrelevant. What they do on their maternity leave is also irrelevant as well. The fact is that women do get pregnant and have babies. Men tend to help with that!!!! So, why not go with the process....facillitate and support the process. I think there are at least a few people left in the US.....and certainly a lot in other countries that understand that work is not our lives!!! It is there to support our lives and hopefully make our lives better. I can't see how maternity leave or any other kind of leave for that matter has anything to do with gender. It is about looking at the general needs of populations and employees and giving them a compensation package that will encourage them to stay with the company long term.

The family is the core of any society and employers and government should be making choices that support the institution if they are at all interested in preserving itself.

[MarginOfError]

I think when people talk about equal salary, they have in mind the base salary. As pointed out, a company is not under legal obligation to pay an employee when she goes on maternity leave, only obligated to hold her job. So, if her company doesn't pay her while on leave, then she is in fact being paid less for working fewer weeks. Now, if her base salary is the same as a man's everyone is happy.

Some companies, in order to appear more 'family friendly,' and as a perk to draw better talent, will offer paid maternity leave. If you think this is unfair to the people who don't take maternity leave, then I suggest you neither work at such a company, nor give it your patronage. That would seem foolish to me, however, because most companies that offer paid maternity leave also offer paid paternity leave. So why are we complaining again?

[hordak]

I think when people talk about equal salary, they have in mind the base salary. As pointed out, a company is not under legal obligation to pay an employee when she goes on maternity leave, only obligated to hold her job. So, if her company doesn't pay her while on leave, then she is in fact being paid less for working fewer weeks. Now, if her base salary is the same as a man's everyone is happy.

Some companies, in order to appear more 'family friendly,' and as a perk to draw better talent, will offer paid maternity leave. If you think this is unfair to the people who don't take maternity leave, then I suggest you neither work at such a company, nor give it your patronage. That would seem foolish to me, however, because most companies that offer paid maternity leave also offer paid paternity leave.

now thats equality.

So why are we complaining again?

Nothing good on tv;)

[MarginOfError]

So why are we complaining again?

Nothing good on tv

Well in that case, let's really open up about how men are discriminated against. Women get all the cool stuff.

[unixknight]

I think the problem is that in many ways the womens' movement went from an effort to bring equality to an effort to being equivalence. (I honestly believe that those who instigated the womens' equality movement would be shocked at what it's become today.)

What I mean by that is this: Men and women are different. This is to be celebrated. We are equally valuable, but we each have our own strengths and weaknesses which, when combined in a family unit, are greater as a whole than the sum of their parts.

Modern 'progressive' thinking is hostile to this notion. We are expected to believe that the difference between a man and a woman is strictly physiological, and that while averages in areas like language or math may tend toward one side or the other, we are to behave as if the two sexes are equivalent, not just equal.

In fact, my wife and I recently heard a radio show guest who insisted that any woman who CHOSE to be a stay at home mom was brain-washed by traditional male dominated thinking. My wife, understandably, took offense, pointing out that this person was essentially saying that women were, by definition, too weak minded to be ABLE to choose to stay at home with the kids if they so desired.

This, of course, is a way to break down the perception of what the core family unit is. We'd define it as a husband, wife, and some number of children. Extended family may include grandparents, siblings, etc. Modern liberal thought, however, wants us to accept that there IS no set idea of a core family unit, which in turn opens the way for non-traditional combinations like gay couples becoming adoptive parents, etc.

[MarginOfError]

...opens the way for non-traditional combinations like gay couples becoming adoptive parents, etc.

what's wrong with this. I know several gay couples that would make better parents than a LOT of the straight couples I've met.

[lilered]

My view is that Satan has been attacking the family unit for a long long time. He has really made some headway in my lifetime. It seems to me that the tools he has used to accomplish his latter year success has been the T.V., movies, video, pornography, advertisments, music,drugs, booze, etc.. Additionally, women are bombardied with notions that suggest that they can have it all. Somehow they can be superwomen. The job, family, a wonderful wife, mother, etc.. then when they can't seem to obtain it all, they feel like failures. Then many of them lose their self-esteem as a result.

Many homes now have "latch key kids", whereas noone is home when they get out of school, mom and if there is a Dad, both are working. This leaves a considerable amount of free time in these kids' lives.

Which is not a good thing. Many homes have only single moms as the head of the house. She is working as hard as she can to raise her kids alone and do the right thing. However, when she does come home, she is wore out, tired, and really can't spend the quality time she desires with her kids.

Not only is she tired, but stressed because of worrying about kids, money, etc. and having to do it alone. Her chances of finding a good husband replacment diminish, with the number of children present.

Ex- Dad is living somewhere else, doing his thing, and doesn't have the necessary influence on the kids that he should. Probably not making his support payments as he should either.

God designed the family, to have a mom and a dad at the head. Sadly, that is not todays standard family in America. IMHO

Todays society seems to view a stay at home mom as an oddity and unfulfilled.

[Jenamarie]

what's wrong with this. I know several gay couples that would make better parents than a LOT of the straight couples I've met.

Then that means that we as a society need to try to support and strengthen hetero marriages, not make it easier for children to be denied access to both a father and a mother. (and I feel this way about single-parent adoption as well, not just gay adoption)

[MarginOfError]

Then that means that we as a society need to try to support and strengthen hetero marriages

Actually, I'm all for that. Wouldn't it be nice if you had to have a license to be a parent? lol

[RachelleDrew]

My wife was good to in 3 weeks.Both times. And since i have been a a stay at home dad since my kids were born you wont meet another guy who is more understanding to demands of child rearing. I'm just saying if you take an extra 6 weeks of a year you have no right to complain about having smaller pay checks.(I know all women don't have kids so they might have the right)

Your wife being "good" in three weeks is EXTREMELY rare, you are aware of that right?

Your family needs to count their blessings. Most women are barely able to walk at three weeks after their birth.

And until you've popped out a couple of your own, then you have no right to complain about getting paid the same as a woman who uses maternity leave.

Edited July 30, 2008 by RachelleDrew

[Jenamarie]

Most women are barely able to walk at three weeks after their birth.

I think men AND women find it difficult to walk three weeks after their birth.

But I agree, feeling "normal" so quickly after a c/s is more the exception than the rule. I was still able to be up and about while recovering, but it wasn't nearly to the level of activity I was at prior to the surgery. It took a month to get back to that level.

[MarginOfError]

My wife was up and cleaning her hospital room after her c-section. I'm guess that isn't normal.

[Truegrits]

My wife was up and cleaning her hospital room after her c-section. I'm guess that isn't normal.

:lol: Toooo funny! :lol:

I want the vitamins she takes...

[Jenamarie]

I agree, pass me the pain killers they were giving HER! I spent the majority of my 3-day hospital stay either in my bed, or in the rocking chair they had in my room. I managed to take a 3 minute shower the second day, but just barely. I almost had to pull the nurse-call cord in the shower stall because the water was making me shiver, which HURT LIKE HECK! The shower was causing me pain, and the pain was making it difficult for me to move. Not fun.

[unixknight]

what's wrong with this. I know several gay couples that would make better parents than a LOT of the straight couples I've met.

I don't want to sidetrack the thread into a debate on gay marriage or adoption but suffice it to say that isn't a family structure that is compatible with LDS beliefs and values.

[MarginOfError]

I don't want to sidetrack the thread into a debate on gay marriage or adoption but suffice it to say that isn't a family structure that is compatible with LDS beliefs and values.

I'm not disputing that. All I'm saying is that there are situations that exist where a gay couple might be preferable to a straight couple.