Ah, I see your problem. Your particular offending coworkers happen to be idiots. Personally, I’ve never seen anyone take a 3-month vacation at a time. Does she have that much leave? Or does she have compromising photos of the boss?
I don’t have kids. I don’t plan on having kids. And apparently I’ve had the exquisitely rare fortune to work with people who didn’t completely abuse the fact that they had kids, to get out of work.
Give me a FUCKING break. One, I’ll go ahead and claim you’re exaggerating that people are SHOCKED when you take vacation. Two, the point that fifteen thousand people have made remains and can apply also to NYCTEA:
**YOU. ARE. BEING. TAKEN. ADVANTAGE. OF. **
instead of bitching at US, who have no input into your business’ shitty practices, get your ass out of there. I’ve never worked in an office where maternity leave wasn’t planned (it takes 9 months to cook a baby), and a temp arranged for and/or work properly delegated to keep everyone happy. That’s what good companies do.
Yes, and you, who have told us twice that you give up all of your free time to go to work and are overworked so hard with no ability to change it, you’re not a martyr at all.
Hear HEAR! Couldn’t have put it better. Also the person who said that the begrudgers can all just find another country that doesn’t care about raising a new generation to pay taxes and care for us and run the country when we’re too old to and move there was right too.
Here in Ireland we still have work to do in this area (Canada sounds much better as is France and Sweden and Finland etc.) but I’m still constantly astonished at how harsh the USA seems to be in this regard. While the government might talk the talk they certainly don’t walk the walk with regard to so-called family values. The seeming lack of a clear and socially responsible policy on this is just so screwed up.
I’m also surprised at how, for a country that talks a lot about how women have been emancipated, women aren’t out marching in the streets to demand better conditions for mothers. For that matter men should be out protesting too as fathers.
I don’t have any kids yet but I definitely see the value of bringing children into a secure and healthy society. You just can’t leave these things up to businesses. Profit is their most important aim. The government needs to enshrine these rights into law and support American women. Otherwise employers might very well be privately turned off by the prospect of hiring/promoting a woman over a man and surely this makes a complete mockery of the assumption of equal rights for all.
I’d love to see people in the US stand up and be counted on this. Comiserations to those who are finding current conditions difficult and my full support for anyone who wants to work for change.
Bullshit.
Bullshit. Bullshit.
I gaurantee you a lot of Dopers, even Doper parents whop “took advantage” of these "cushy’ leave policies recognize the inherent unfairness of an employer who makes accommodations to parents and pregnant women but is inflexible towards other employees. And a lot of people recognize that “maternity leave” can seem unfair, even if disability is available to every other person in the company, because it’s one group of persons that seems to “benefit” from this. We’re not coming down on catsix and missbunny because they’re revealing profound truths that no one else wants to own up to. Catsix and missbunny are being “severely” criticized because they’re being jerks.
Your employer has a problem. Your boss has a problem. If they are offering telecommuting and flexible time to employees with children, they must offer it to all. If they are not, they are wrong. And employees who take advantage of the leave policies are also wrong.
Okay then, and people who work for employers who make them so unhappy and treat them so unfairly are idiots, not martyrs to the great mommyhood conspiracy.
Hmmm, isn’t bitching what the BBQ is all about? This paragraph could just as easily apply to the OP as it does to Catsix. Maybe it only applies to the unpopular opinions, who knows?
Oh please. You should get a job in a fucking pretzel factory. Anyone can bitch about anything…but ASSIGNING BLAME to PREGNANT WOMEN TAKING LEAVE when the actual problem is SHITTY MANAGEMENT, is martyrdom and idiocy.
I’m out of work right now, and I think I’ll blame it on all the young kids and their hair.
Why thanks but I’m allergic to incense and votive candles can be so messy.
Apparently you suffer from a selective reading disorder, nyctea scandiaca.
That’s the only reason that I can see for your failing to note the examples that I gave of how my co-workers rallied around when I needed time off to sit with my dying mother, drive my crazy father all over Austin or even zip off to the barn during the afternoon so that my horse could be get her shots.
Seems to me that you and all the others squealing “Unfair unfair” in this thread are being taken advantage of because you lack backbone to dispute unfair practices in your place of work, not because woman who go on maternity leave are milking the system.
You’re exactly correct. It is absolutely as vital for someone to take two months off to recover from illness as it is for a new mother to be with her baby. I have seen the error of my ways. It is nothing but pure selfishness and mean-spiritedness which motivates women to want a few weeks with their newborns. Women deliberately and with malice get pregnant just to inconvenience childless people.
I agree with several others in this thread: If your employer is treating you unfairly because you don’t have children, you are being taken advantage of. And that, my pretty, is your problem.
She has kids. She won’t get paid for the three months that she doesn’t work, because nobody there has three months of vacation, but she will expect to step right back into the exact same job she had before she left, which supposedly myself and another coworker are going to do for her, in addition to our own jobs, while she’s gone.
Unfortunately for her, my other coworker and I have already come to the conclusion that we’re not doing her job for her so she can take a three month vacation and then just waltz back in.
I have three coworkers who abuse the hell out of it. They themselves are asshole enough to say to me ‘But it’s OK if you have to stay late because it’s not like you have a family to go home to.’
That part I expect. The part that always amazes me is that they’re surprised after saying something like that, that I refuse to help them. I used to be the kind of dumbass who would stay late and get someone else’s work done. I don’t do that anymore. What bothers me is the balls with which these people will tell me to my face that they expect it.
No, I’m not a martyr at all. I’m someone who is tired of being unfairly asked to do someone else’s share of the work because of a choice that person made. Whether I actually do their work or not, I think it takes balls the size of grapefruits to just walk out of the office for an entire afternoon every week and expect that someone else will do what is your responsibility to do, or to take three months or six months leave (which is longer than what is medically necessary) for something you chose to have and then say you don’t understand why it’s thought of differently than another short-term disability.
If a trucker breaks his leg and can’t drive for six weeks, he’s off for six weeks on short-term disability. The amount of time it is medically necessary for him to be off because he is unable to do his job. In here there are people who think that the short-term disability for having a kid should be a full salary paid for the entire time the mother (or father) takes off, even time that is not medically necessary.
I’d really like to know how thinking someone’s a stupendous bitch for leaving work for four hours a week and expecting someone else (specifically me because she and I are in related departments) to just pick up the slack without complaint qualifies as a ‘jerk’?
Shit, I thought the person who expected their scheduled time at work to include ‘leave the office and go to junior’s soccer game despite not having all my work done and just leave that for someone else to do’ was the jerk.
For all those who have jumped on me, you have misunderstood my post.
I am not annoyed with pregnant coworkers or any coworker who has to take extended time off. I am annoyed with employers who shove the burden of covering their jobs on to other people, and making it pretty clear that people who complain at having to work more hours for the same pay aren’t “team players.” And I do resent having to cover their jobs - but it’s the extra work I resent and the employer I resent, NOT the women themselves. Anyone who can have a kid AND work, keep a home, take care of a husband/partner, take care of other kids, has my utmost admiration. Just thinking about having a child leaves me weary. I can’t understand how all of you mothers do it! I would die of exhaustion.
I’m all for maternity leave. And paternity leave. I just wish the FMLA that mandates leave would also mandate that the employer replace the employee for the time she’s gone. Since nobody is “telling” employers they have to do this, they aren’t going to.
I think maternity leave should be even longer than 12 weeks. We’ve got people who could only stay out 6 weeks because that’s all our disability policy covers. I feel very bad for them having to leave their child like that.
Assigning blame to the pregnant woman? I read some people bitching about a SITUATION. I’m not sure Catsix was getting out her knives to carve up the pregnant woman, I think (I can’t assume like many others seem to be) Catsix was just presenting another side of the story and venting about her situation.
And thank you for the suggestion regarding employment but alas, I have a job.
Meant to include this…
IMNPFHO, then you should start a thread about how much other people’s maternity leave frustrates you…not piss all over a thread complaining about something totally different. The OP was complaining about inadequate maternity packages; you are complaining about pregnant people having a package at all. Different thread.
If you wander into a thread BY a parent ABOUT a parenting issue, don’t be so shocked and appaled at the reactions of other parents. And don’t be amazed that your views are not received with open arms and bouquets of roses.
Wow, people sure get hostile over a difference of opinion. Catsix expresses the opinion that he/she resents working extra for the parents in his/her line of work and people have to take that and run with it huh? I can’t believe I saw someone take that opinion and insinuate that someone who believes that might want forced sterilizations and forcing women to be SAHMs. Helllooooo, talk about taking things to the extreme?
I think it comes down to the fact that most parents (and I can see why) think the rest of us care as much about their child, their birth experience, their family more than we all do. Before the harpies jump on my back, saying that does NOT make me hate humanity or make me an anti-social person. I simply think that it is a human trait.
I too have experienced things along the lines of what Catsix and Nyctea have experienced so I can relate to their feelings. I’ve also worked at jobs where everyone is treated fairly so I can understand where everyone else just blames the employer. So far I’ve seen good points made on both sides of the discussion. I just don’t understand why everyone thinks it’s “Breeding people” vs “People who hate kids” but maybe I’m just one of the few people who don’t see things as either black or white.
Lastly, I’ve worked in Labor & Delivery and I didn’t (not one time) hear anyone talking about how they were having their child for noble reasons. Rightfully so. Let’s not pretend. People have children because they WANT them (the lucky children anyway).
[QUOTE=Hamadryad]
It is nothing but pure selfishness and mean-spiritedness which motivates women to want a few weeks with their newborns. Women deliberately and with malice get pregnant just to inconvenience childless people.
[QUOTE]
I never ever said anything like this, so I don’t know where you’re getting that from. They can and should take all the time they want. But I shouldn’t have to be inconvenienced because of that. I think we can all agree on this. And I am not blaming the woman, she has all the right in the world to do whatever she wants. And I am sure all responsible parents have taken the appropriate measures beforehand to make sure they are prepared to do this. People shouldn’t have to rely on their employer’s benevolance (or their coworkers picking up the slack) when having children, because as is made clear by this thread, most employers are not very benevolent and most coworkers don’t like having to do extra work for no extra pay.
But what is an employer supposed to do? Someone has to give up something in these scenarios: either the employer, the coworkers or the mothers. And guess who it usually is? It’s the coworkers, because they are essentially powerless. The employer is already having to pay an employee (the mother) for work not being done, or hold open a spot for them, and if they hire a temporary replacement, that is twice the amount of money they lose. Employers might argue it is unfair they have to do this because of their employee’s personal life choice. So what does the employer do? As the rest of the employees to chip in. And what choice do we have? If the employer had to hire a replacement and pay them AND the mother, that would be less money to go towards, let’s say, raises or benefits or whatever. So the childless coworkers are stuck in a quandry.
I agree, it is a problem with the system. I really don’t know the answer, I wish there were a way to make it fair to all parties involved. I just wish some people would be a little more tolerant of our position, instead of getting all riled up and angry at us. I know this is the pit, but please, we’re not being jerks, we’re people in a quandry, people in what we view as an unfair position, and we’re just trying to find a solution.
It seems that to the critics, the only solution would be for us to just quit our bitching and suck it up…
OOPs I screwed up on my coding there, sorry.
Because we see the reasonable and logical response to such a position here in this thread.
If someone resents being expected to shoulder another person’s work because that other person made a choice to have a baby, and then made a choice to stay home for six months, it’s not just the boss expecting the first person to do more work.
Unless of course the women on maternity leave or who (as is the case with three of my coworkers) take at least one afternoon a week off (in addition to two of them refusing to work Friday at all, thus making their full-time hours 28 instead of 40) think the work they leave behind is magically finished by the work-fairies by Monday?
It was just as reasonable as this thread when I went to see my boss (president of the company) and calmly explained that I found it unfair that I was scheduled for 40 hours a week but expected to work fifty because someone else who was scheduled for 40 was only working 28 and still getting a full time salary and benefits. It was at that point that the ‘Well, she has kids…’ started to flow, and I said a few rather harsh things I’m amazed I didn’t get fired for saying. I did make it clear that I will not work one minute over forty hours to cover for someone else’s voluntary time off, and although I have not since then, and my boss no longer asks me, the ‘mommies’ still expect it. They don’t so much ask me if I will do their work, they kind of state that I will in that ‘Oh my I’ve got to go to kiddie’s softball game. You’ll file this paper work for me so I can get there on time. I mean you’re going to be here right?’
Yeah. I’m supposed to be leaving in ten minutes, but I’ll stay an extra thirty to complete and file someone else’s paperwork so they don’t miss any of the softball game? I leave it on their desk, unfinished.
I am sorry I’m being an asshole. I could make the same points without so much snark.
I came back to repeat a point: I understand what some are saying when they suggest “pregnancy is a choice, and employers shouldn’t give anyone a break for it; parents who decide to have kids should live with the career and income consequences of having no leave.” It certainly ends up being more fair to the other people who, due to not having children, will never get that same break.
However, from an employer’s standpoint, I am sure they think this is a losing proposition. They’d have to plan on losing (or possibly firing) some number of female employees who got pregnant (possibly some new dads, too). It’s expensive to lose and replace valued employee. Or, they’d have to do all their hiring with an eye to just employing confirmed single people or those committed to being childless (they couldn’t do this legally, but I am sure they could make an effort on the sly). That’s cutting themselves off from part of the workforce. It just doesn’t make good economic or business sense.
Neither does it make sense for them to unfairly burden other employees, or to hurt morale by not offering leave policies that accommodate other needs (like dental care). That’s also bad business.
In response to some follow ups that I just saw on preview:
catsix, as far as “jerk” goes, it was not your complaints. It was the way you put them. missbunny, thanks for the clarification. It sounds like frankly we’re all a lot closer in opinion than it seemed at first blush. There are employers out there who are not being fair.
I’m a little puzzled by what, exactly, the OP is bitching about. Is the issue that she was misinformed about her company’s policy, or that she considers the policy inadequate? If it’s the former, it’s merely an expensive and annoying object lesson. Never trust your supervisor to interpret HR policies. Never. Always get your info straight from HR, and get it in writing. This is especially true when policy is in flux. If you trust information from someone other than the person who makes the official decisions, and that information turns out to be wrong, you don’t really have anyone to blame but yourself. If the problem is the perceived inadequacy of the policy, well, that’s between her and her boss, and something she really ought to have considered before planning to get pregnant.
Now then, while I’ll agree with the “slackers is slackers” argument (and god knows I’ve known plenty of those on both sides of the parenthood divide) to a certain point, a lot of workplaces do indeed make a difference between parent slackers and non-parent slackers. Parent slackers tend to get a lot more slack because of the whole “won’t someone think of the children” thing. It’s shitty, disgusting, and unfair to those left to pick up the slack, but what are you supposed to do?
If you complain to your boss about always having to work unpaid overtime while a parent is always off early to go do this or that for or with her kids, you get the whole, “I can’t believe how petty you are to begrudge her time with her kids, kids who are the FUTURE” spiel that’s already been unloaded in this thread. You also run the risk of the dreaded “not a team player” label, which is often all it takes to put you out of a job, especially in a market like this. You can quit and get another job, but jobs aren’t so easy to come by these days and most people have a habit of living indoors and eating. Those habits require money, and it’s hard to have money long-term without a job. Really, about the only feasible option is what folks like catsix are already doing: you suck it up while you look for another job where you’ll be treated more equitably, and you bitch about it when you get home.
My mother takes three months off (unpaid) every summer to play golf. She hasn’t had a child at home in something like 15 years, and my “baby” sister sure didn’t need her at home when she was in college (the baby is now 32).
This is an arrangement that my mother has with her company. The summer isn’t busy for them, they’d rather not lay people off, so they let her take time. Its a great deal for both of them, and to my mother’s co-workers who need to “pick up the slack” since its so quiet, it means their hours aren’t slashed.
Catsix, your company is not obligated to let this woman take the summer off because she has kids. She take it off because either they don’t have the backbone to can her, or because the inconvienience to them (you being upset) is worth the benefits (they don’t pay her, her work still gets done, and she may (or may not) be a valuable employee the other nine months.)
It sounds to me like you are being taken advantage of, but not by the Mommy’s. Your company has figured out that you can be depended on to pick up the slack and they won’t have to pay you for it. On the other hand, when layoffs happen, you are in the sweet spot.