I’m about to start my 12 week paternity leave next week thanks to a state program and almost everyone that I’ve told has had their jaws on the floor that I would even want to do that.
Today I witnessed a group of coworkers almost bragging how little time they took after their kids were born. I’ve heard stuff like “Most men are hard working and want to support their families so they don’t take leave”.
To me it was a no brainer, I’m getting ~85% of my normal pay and I get to take care of my wife, our son and our newborn for 3 whole months. and for someone who hasn’t taken a day breathe in the past 3 years I think I deserve it.
I’m in the US so I know it’s a “strange” concept, but people have seemed genuinely upset, people it doesn’t affect at all. Again, it’s a state program available to almost anyone who’s worked in the past 2 years, I’ve talked to soon to be dads who scoffed at the idea and were happy to use a week of pto and that’s it.
I feel like I’m missing something.
In the deceptively simple, yet seemingly complex social conundrum, you’re practically insulting two or several of their generations.
You see, their daddy and granddaddy before them didn’t need no paternity leave and their kids (as in themselves) turned out to be just fine! Now here you are coddling and spoiling your children rotten, proving everything wrong with the newer generations!
How can a man provide food on the table, a roof over their heads and clothes on their backs by sitting at home and playing with their kids? Unthinkable! Unconscionable! Un-American!
Or so a theory goes…