I absolutely love that you're doing this and I think paid leave for this, child and family care up to 30 weeks should be easily doable, as well as quality education and quality affordable health care and quality, affordable food, housing, clothing and utilities. Livable wages too.
Ask Lemmy
A Fediverse community for open-ended, thought provoking questions
Rules: (interactive)
1) Be nice and; have fun
Doxxing, trolling, sealioning, racism, and toxicity are not welcomed in AskLemmy. Remember what your mother said: if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. In addition, the site-wide Lemmy.world terms of service also apply here. Please familiarize yourself with them
2) All posts must end with a '?'
This is sort of like Jeopardy. Please phrase all post titles in the form of a proper question ending with ?
3) No spam
Please do not flood the community with nonsense. Actual suspected spammers will be banned on site. No astroturfing.
4) NSFW is okay, within reason
Just remember to tag posts with either a content warning or a [NSFW] tag. Overtly sexual posts are not allowed, please direct them to either !asklemmyafterdark@lemmy.world or !asklemmynsfw@lemmynsfw.com.
NSFW comments should be restricted to posts tagged [NSFW].
5) This is not a support community.
It is not a place for 'how do I?', type questions.
If you have any questions regarding the site itself or would like to report a community, please direct them to Lemmy.world Support or email info@lemmy.world. For other questions check our partnered communities list, or use the search function.
6) No US Politics.
Please don't post about current US Politics. If you need to do this, try !politicaldiscussion@lemmy.world or !askusa@discuss.online
Reminder: The terms of service apply here too.
Partnered Communities:
Logo design credit goes to: tubbadu
Clearly you're missing some huge hairy balls, what type of man takes time off work to be with their family!?
(/s if it wasn't obvious)
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.
That's actually getting close to the amount some of the worse countries in Europe give.
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
The only reason I could see not to do that is if that 15% would leave finances so tight you couldn't turn on the heating. But as you probably spend more that that on comminuting absolutely no brainer.
My company in the UK only gives 2 weeks paternity so most guys save and use all their holiday for the year to bring their total time off to 9 weeks.
That's actually getting close to the amount some of the worse countries in Europe give.
Wrong. Statutory paternity leave in most European countries is less than a month, with a minimum of 2 weeks or 10 working days mandated by the EU. Of course companies may decide to give you more, but that highly depends on your place of work and thus is not a fair source of comparison.
Source: just came from 14 working days of pat leave and am European. My friend who works for a different company got 2 months, part of which he's able to take at a later date (not immediately after child birth) if he so chooses.
Yeah, it's a no brainier for me too. The whole "men don't take leave!" sounds awfully convenient for businesses. But providing for your significant other should be more than just providing money.
Don't feel bad. I'm a man in the USA working in a corporate office. When my son was born I took my time off and it was fantastic for bonding with my son and helping my wife out. Honestly IDK how so many women do it alone.
I'd feel worse about making my wife work extra hard than my colleagues... That said, the person covering my area screwed everything up so badly I decided it was better to find a new job vs fix it. So I took my three months, worked a week and put in my notice and got paid out for another two months of accrued leave.
I was really close to my dad and I LOOOOVEEE that you're doing this. You're showing your child and the world that dad should take an equal share, especially post birth when mum is likely to need additional support. Your post is nothing short of inspirational!
I just got back from effectively 17 weeks of paternity leave- my company provides 12 weeks (or they did last year when I started, it's now only 8), and then I had 5 weeks of PTO, sick time, and floating holidays.
Take all the time you have. Easily the best decision I've made for the past few years. Not only does it remove the "did I get enough sleep during the night" stress, but the time I spent with our new child was amazing.
I'm an software engineering lead for a team of 8, they did fine without me. The boat's still floating, as it were.
I don't intend to get kids but my coworkers have them once in a while.
I think you should have some. I don't think it should be a matter of pride to not take any.
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...
I did it and it never occurred to me to even ask what other people thought about it. It was a benefit available to me, so I took advantage of it. If your coworkers said that real men don't care about their teeth, would it stop you from going to the dentist? Coworkers come and go but family is for life.
Oh I had never thought to not take my leave (or care for my teeth) because of what the people around me were saying. The only person whose opinion matters about this is my wife.
I'm just absolutely dumbfounded why people would be so against something that is just plain good for them and their family? I know that's naive, I just can't comprehend it.
All countries should give one year of paternity leave. I do believe though there needs to be a cool down period of a year and a half because then you would have people that just have five in a row taking advantage.
there needs to be a cool down period
This seems like a solution in search of a problem. I’m sure Republicans will take it and run, like with “welfare queens, “anchor babies”, trans people in sports, etc, but is there even a point? How many women will there be willing to pump out baby after baby, just so the father doesn’t have to work? While I’m sure it’ll happen, I just don’t see it happening enough to worry about. Plus someone will gamigpfy it by timing things to the cooldown period: you can’t win but sometimes the edge cases are just edge cases
Or maybe, do you think this is a legit scenario? We have two kids. We intentionally had them close together to both simplify our lives and give them a “peer” to grow up with. Should I have been allowed paternity leave, or is two children close in age somehow a problem?
I was the first in my workplace to take paternity leave when it became law in my state. I didn't take it in one chunk, but used every single day I was entitled to. I got many similar comments as you from older guys, and I believe they came from a place of jealousy at worst and self-rationalization at best, since those people weren't afforded the same rights when they had kids.
Pay then no attention, the first few months as a dad to a new kid are some of the most important and precious moments you'll ever have, and if you miss them you will never ever get a do over. Take every second you can without an ounce of shame.
You may also find yourself setting an example, as I noticed none of the new Dads in my workplace after me had any reservations about taking their full leave, and I work in construction with some needlessly macho guys.
In Sweden each parent get 240 days of parental leave, per kid. I love our parental leave system. I'm very fortunate to be able to spend all that time with my son!
Would you be happier doing what those people did? I don't think so. But they might have been happier doing it that way. You do you, you've earned it! Enjoy the extra time with your family, you may not get another chance like this for a long time!
I think maternity and paternity leave should both be compulsory six months, to be taken as desired between pregnancy and 2nd birthday
I wish I had paternity leave - I feel like I missed out on so much plus it was unnecessarily difficult for my ex. Back then we only had one week. However my mother-in-law came for that week and my ex “wanted her Mom”. So I sat at home for a week doing what I could while my mother-in-law took care of my ex and kid, then week two I had to go back to work and mil had to go back home, and my ex was home alone with the baby, no support
FYI - a bit eye opening on who some feminists actually are (in a good way) - a feminist group at work used me as a poster child to demand more paternity leave.
I'll be getting 20 days time off and on top of that I can choose between 4 months of time off if I so wish.
Other options are 1 day off for 20 months or half a day off for 40 months.
The thing I'm truly desiring from this is that the flemish government is protecting me from being fired the moment I request this extra parental leave.
If they cannot prove that they fire me for good reasons, then they'll have to pay me 6 months wage on top of the rest.
So if they are going to downsize, or whatever, they'll be less prone to pick me.
I'll take either the 20 or 40 months on this one.
My wife doesn't have a choice, she's 7 weeks pregnant now. Taking off work until 1 June. Then maternity leave starting 1 august (is what her HR said, even though internet says 6 weeks instead of 12, but perhaps it's cuz it's a physical job) until 15 weeks after the birth.
Personally I will do anything I can to make sure we have a long term source of income.
Keeping a good relationship with the place that pays me my wage will be beneficial.
I'll take a bulk of 1 or 2 weeks of paternal leave when the baby is born. Take one day off afterwards for 2 years.
Paternity leave is awesome, did so myself (male). Even though it was 2010 and in Europe a lot of paperwork came up because it was not my wife...
If you can live on 85% then it's an awesome opportunity, and super rare in the US. I'd be trying to find something to bridge the financial gap, some under the table gig or something because I already don't make enough.
We are in a very fortunate situation. We're not well off by any means but have saved pretty well. We paid off the car last year and started putting that extra money we were paying into a seperate account which turned into our backup account to bridge that 15% gap.
I'm also pretty close with the guy who owns the corner store around the block and can usually pickup a few night shifts a week there when I need to since it's in a rough neighborhood and they haven't been able to find a steady nightshift clerk for 5 years.
We're very lucky that aspect.
I love my wife and kid, but I was ready to get outta the house after two weeks and go back to work
Not sure what this post is about, OP... What are you actually asking?
Paternity leave is obviously vital if you're a decent parent and partner. If you have it available you take it and you focus on your family. Your mentioned group of coworkers sound like fucking degenerate scumbags stuck on a pointless treadmill. I feel sorry for their partners and their children.
You should take some time to consider why you didn't have a visceral reaction of outright disgust and had to come here and ask for others to chime in. Tune in, bud. It's all about your kids now. Don't look for worthless approval from worthless people.
That's some assumption, I never said I agreed with them or was looking to take their advice or gain their approval. I said all of the things people are saying in here, I offended a few people who thought I was calling them bad dads which I never directly said, but that's their short line to draw to their own conclusion.
I more so was looking for input on the concept of paternity leave from people outside my small work circle because I thought the overwhelming hate on it was wild and for a minute felt like I was some new age radical who had just discovered the concept of taking care of your family. I knew I wasn't, but I don't hear much about it where I'm at so I figured I'd ask the general community.
Not assuming. I just didn't see you express that disgust, so even the omission says something.
IMO you need a lot more passion in your response, here and IRL to colleagues. These are obviously broken people around you. You smiling and nodding and coming here to quietly discuss away from them helps perpetuate their nonsense. Alternatively, if you had a gut reaction of "Dude, what the fuck are you talking about? How are you supporting your partner if you aren't taking that full leave? A newborn is 24/7 physical/emotional/mental gauntlet. Are you just leaving them to deal with all that, that's horrible, man... Do better." might have knocked some sense into them.
We break these toxic cycles by speaking to our peers with confidence and putting idiots on the spot by holding a mirror up to their childish bullshit. Sounds like you have the right position generally, I'm encouraging you to express it openly and forcefully to be a part of the change you seem to be in support of.