I locked myself in the basement to get away from those toddlers, because I couldn’t stand them being dependent on me. I wouldn’t come out until my mother left work to pick me up - which landed me in a severe case of depression, and then lasting social anxiety. This all happened when I was 9. shrug I freak out if I can’t have a conversation with someone with the mental ability to realize when they are pulling my hair and I say ‘stop, it hurts!’ they should stop. I’m just elaborating on my situation. I’d rather not take the risk of another episode like that happening.
And in the workplace, I can’t really remember my mom taking any time off for me other than emergencies. If I need to get picked up from school but one of her employees isn’t there, too bad. I’ll wait at the school until she can come. She doesn’t take a traditional lunch break - her lunch break is going across town, running errands and picking me up from class. She eats at her desk when there aren’t any clients. When I was young, if I needed to go to the office with her, I was expected to sit down in the back room with a book and shut up and not bother any other workers.
I understand having kids means that they become the center of your life. But my generation grew up just fine and loved when our mothers (and father) took 2 or 3 months of maternity and worked right up until our births, instead of a year. We did just fine without the jumbo strollers. I survived without a booster seat. I survived with wooden playground equipment. No one sued if your kid got a broken arm jumping off the jungle gym. You didn’t leave work early to go to your kid’s recital unless you booked it off far in advance or traded shifts. Mothers and children bonded without spending every minute of every day together. My parents ran the farm machinery fine with crying babies and little sleep. My parents socialized fine while toting around us when we were little - we’d pass out at 8pm on the pillowed chairs they’d leave out for us when they played cards with the neighbours.
Really, I’d like children a lot more if I could communicate and reason with them. But I can’t.
In reference to the original post, it seems that he feels that mothers with small children are disproportionately rude and/or self-centered compared to other people.
I can unscientifically confirm that I see plenty of oblivious rudeness every day from people without (visible) small children. You see, I commute.
I am not sure what the big drama ordeal is against catsix and Binarydrone, but I have noticed the same thing is ALL the places I have worked, not just the current one.
Yeah, I am single. Yeah, I am young (22). Yeah, I am expected to be able to come to work at the drop of a hat because Little Timmy has a soccer tourney or someone needs to take their kids to their father’s or what the hell ever.
I work on a so-called team, and of three people, I do about 60% of the work. The other two women I work for cut out early to pick up their children, although I have been told by their manager that this wasn’t proper use of company time. No one will say anything because their decision to have children over-rides their responsibility to be at work when they are scheduled to be.
AND don’t get me started on the woman who brought up her 4 year old daughter to work and how this cute little girl managed to pour Dr Pepper into my PC accidentaly.
I have worked at different places that tried to solve the problem of parents’ tough schedules at home conflicting with their scheduled work times. Job sharing was decent for lower level type of jobs but it didn’t work so well in a team environment. Flex time worked well for some of the upper level positions but when it came to being in a team setting, the flex timer couldn’t keep up with the rest of us because she couldn’t be around for the meetings with the government and such. There has to be a happy medium in there somewhere perhaps.
I do realize that there is nothing wrong with being a working parent, but I will be damned if someone is having to make me get up at 4:30 in the AM to cover so you can take Little Timmy to school because of whatever. Once or twice, hey thats fine, but not several times a week. There is no slack to be given for that, I don’t care if you are trying to raise the Baby Jesus.
Working parents need to have their work schedules adjusted so that they can be at work reliably and deal with their children.
Oh, and to further dispel the myth that young guys like me don’t have any responsiblities, I am a primary care giver to my dying mother. That is what I do when I am not at work. But I do make sure my ass is in my office logged on to the government mainframe when it is supposed to be there.
Do you have a problem with having and enforcing a policy for all employees that specifies a certain number of late arrivals or early departures before a written reprimand and before termination of employment?
I really don’t, and I am sorry that I might have come off that way. I am actually the Godparent and Uncle for my brother’s two children. I really kids. I don’t like having to repeatedly cover for individuals that have kids because I should have to, because I am not a “dad.”
My brother is the primary care giver for his children, their mom isn’t around. He is always there at work and doing what he is expected to do and holding up his end of the stick. I don’t know why other working mothers and fathers can’t do the same.
Glad we agree on something, but if people could just be aware of their surroundings and notice this might not be the best spot to stand and chat, this wouldn’t happen. Most people are aware, but idiots, even with strollers, who can’t take a megasecond to consider that standing one foot off to the side is common courtesy - well, rudeness breeds rudeness. I’ll bet if someone walked over and started smoking directly next to said child, mother wouldn’t hesitate to suddenly declare an insult to her personal space.
The most dysfunctional office I was in was one where no one had kids.
One woman came in hung over regularly - and late consistantly. She was in her early twenties, single, without kids and lived a party lifestyle.
One had an abusive boyfriend. Which meant she would regularly stay home “sick” and show up a day or two later with a black eye. No children involved. When she did come to the office she was particularly fond of two hour lunches and business errands that took twice as long as they should have.
One spent a lot of time on the phone - using our 800 number to talk to relatives in Pennsylvania. Young married woman without kids who had relocated here for her husband’s job.
One guy - single - was freelancing out of our office. I think he worked about half time for himself and half time for us. We paid him for full time, though.
I wasn’t the most dependable worker at that job either - a college student working part time with a flexible schedule.
Not shockingly, the jobs there didn’t pay well. Anyone with skills left rather quickly.
There are people who take advantage of situations. Where this is not corrected, you tend to get a lot of people who take advantage - since if they took a different job they might have to actually work. Your office seems to be filled with parents who take advantage, catsix, but that seems to be the makeup of your office - perhaps the personal prejudice of the president of the company is to be “family friendly.” If that is the case, then leaving is the best - and only - thing you can do. Hopefully, your next job will be run by someone more fair.
Right. The mother would say something. See how that works? “Excuse me, but please don’t smoke next to my baby.” “Excuse me, can I get by here?” Same thing, really.
Translucent Daydream I’m so sorry about your mother. I think you’re right. I wonder if, in your case in particular, it doesn’t have a lot to do with it being a “government job”. That work environment has a terrible reputation; you sound like the only responsible person around.
All of these anecdotes seem to have a certain similarity: someone without children being inconvenienced, or screwed at work, by those who do - and then complaining about it, rather than (say) taking any positive steps to help themselves - either by leaving the employer who is unfairly burdening them, or (as you say) simply speaking up for themselves.
They have something else in common: an astonishing obliviousness to the things that they probably do that irritate their coworkers, and an assumption that their own work habits are beyond reproach.
Yeah, lets all quit our jobs when we experience something that isn’t right happen to ourselves or someone we know because, you know, there are, like, so many jobs out there. To cut one’s nose off to spite their face doesn’t seem to be a solution to the problem.
Sometimes speaking up doesn’t do much either because the employer is afraid of being sued by said parents for discrimination or some other shite (like previous employer was for me.)
I think that we have come from one extreme, where nobody had any rights, to these days where some well intentioned people are getting raked over the coals by people whom are professional system screwer-and-abusers.
Like I said before, there has to be a happy medium in this whole thing.
Binarydrone , you actually got me on that one, duh…
As has been pointed out, there are very strong forces preventing this.
As far as I can tell, this is some sort of a cult thing where people that have reproduced have greater value and, by extension I guess, so does their time. See if the co-worker is off early to take care of their child they are performing the holy task of caring for the fruit of their loins and fulfilling their destiny by projecting their DNA into the future. Indeed, they are participating in the very salvation of our species.
If I, on the other hand, simply wish to go home when it is my time to do so and do my job without covering for the blessedly fertile I am not a team player and dear gods above why can’t I see how hard it is for the poor parent and please oh please won’t somebody think of the Chiiiiiiiiiildren?!
Couple that with the threat of the company being sued for daring to ask people to do what they are hired to do and to work for the hours that they were hired to work and you really just have an unjust situation on your hands.
Now I do get that you and apparently other posters have never seen this behavior. Personally, I have seen it every single place that I have worked and enough other posters have encountered it as well. Is the theory that I should either keep moving from job to job in some endless quest for a situation where this is not the case (because experience has show it to be prevalent) or should I be in a constant state of conflict with HR and my supervisors over the issue (not really smart either)? Is it a strange request that I have that there should be one attendance policy followed by all?
As has been pointed out…how is that the problem of the coworkers with kids? I’d say your gripe is with the employer. If you’re not being treated fairly, then you have a fairly strong case for a suit of your own.
No…more along the lines of “sorry, I don’t have time, you’ll have to get someone else.” It isn’t all that difficult to say.
And as I’ve said, I’ve encountered the opposite. Is there any reason I shouldn’t receive a promotion merely because I have reproduced? No. OTOH, I don’t blame the childless woman who got the promotion; it’s not her fault my ex boss was a doofus. It’s his. I went and found somewhere better to work.
Not at all. But is there any reason why should your coworkers with kids be at fault just because you’re getting shafted, when they aren’t the ones making or enforcing the policies? Other than you’re getting shafted and you need someone to blame?
An elderly female coworker who repeatly locked her office door to sleep.
A male coworker who left 30 minutes early every other day so he could get to the gym early.
A young, single, childless female coworker who took “sickies” four to five times in a year to attend “scrapbooking parties”
A young male coworker who regularly took two hour lunches to wash his van.
A female coworker who took two hour lunches three times a week to meet with her “sororities”
A female coworker who left work early once a week to have her nails done.
None of these people were reprimanded or fired. So I’m to assume that the elderly, those with neat hobbies, those involved in community groups, the fit, the cleanly, and the well-coiffed also have more value?
Or we can just realize that for every parent that takes advantage of the system due to their parental responsibilities, someone can also present a non-parent who is also taking advantage of the system.