Childless women should get maternity leave

[Anonymous]

Humanity is doomed.

[Anonymous]

Birthing moms should also get maternity leave!

I have 3 kids and never had maternity leave.

[Anonymous]

I never had maternity leave either. I used up all of my unused sick days and then back to work it was!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Everybody should be able to take a lengthy amount of time off work, every so often. Don't make this about women vs men or parents vs non.

Many workplaces now offer sabbatical for employees who have been there x years. This is a nice retention perk and a way to refresh someone who's been there a long time.

Some workplaces lock employees out of the system (paid) for a week or so every year to do audits and make sure no inside info has been shared or misused.

Easiest would be to get the amount of PTO increased, and make it normal/encouraged/mandatory to use some each year. Take 2 week vacations unapologetically, and encourage your reports to do so. Insist of staffing and cross-training sufficient to cover someone being out. The latter is just good planning but companies try to shirk it.

I completely agree about this. It would also make non-parents less emotional.

I am not sure what mental load OP is talking about though. The load and gender disparity are really exacerbated with kids.

[Anonymous]

Who gets 90 days of paid maternity leave? 90 days paid isn’t even common in most of Europe

[Anonymous]

Lol.

I adopted, multiple times, and didn't get any maternity leave. Company said it maternity leave was for a medical condition, not for becoming a parent.

My husband got more leave than I did (4 wks paternity leave).

The system is rigged against women.

[Anonymous]

I think this is a troll post. But if not, as a childless woman I apologize for the clueless childless individual who wrote it. I cringe sometimes at the things that some fellow childless people say. It's embarrassing.

Some of us without kids have common sense and "get it"-I promise! I never in a million years would view maternity leave as a relaxing vacation.

[Anonymous]

Compared to my male co-workers, the women in my office carry most of the mental load and do all of the emotional labor. [i]

Would you please cite the evidence supporting your thesis?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think this is a troll post. But if not, as a childless woman I apologize for the clueless childless individual who wrote it. I cringe sometimes at the things that some fellow childless people say. It's embarrassing.

Some of us without kids have common sense and "get it"-I promise! I never in a million years would view maternity leave as a relaxing vacation.

The only clueless person is you, who apparently doesn't understand that if the benefit is available to everyone then it makes zero material difference whether it is used for maternity, paternity, or drinking margaritas on a beach.

If a coworker took maternity leave and the rest of the office adapted and got everything done they needed to, and it later was revealed that they were faking it and never pregnant to begin with, does the work everyone else did undo itself? Do the deadlines retroactively miss themselves? Of course not. There is absolutely no difference. To make a more extreme example, what if the person was actually pregnant, took their time off, everything got done at work just fine, and their baby dies of SIDs the day they go back to work. Would you be mad at them because they took maternity leave but they don't have a baby? Again, what exactly is the material difference? There is none.

Literally the only reason to oppose giving the same leave to everyone is childish whining - "but it's not FAIR!" And even that is plain wrong because it's actually the most fair to provide the same time off to everyone regardless of the reasons. If anything it's not fair that parents get extra time off simply because they chose to have kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I never had maternity leave either. I used up all of my unused sick days and then back to work it was!

I worked for the government and we didn't have maternity leave until 2020. I had to take sick leave and pre worked comp time. Because of course using up tons of sick leave is great before you have an infant is a great plan. My friend's daughter was in the NICU and she ended up having to take LWOP, even with her returning while her kid was still in the hospital AND getting leave donations from colleagues.

But why aren't Americans having kids, right?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Compared to my male co-workers, the women in my office carry most of the mental load and do all of the emotional labor. This increased stress recently caused me to snap at the office and I started crying in front of some of my direct reports. I don't have children but could really use a 90 day break to fully refresh. I think all women should get something similar to maternity leave, even if they don't have kids. How can I go about making this a policy in my office ?

You didn’t have to state that you don’t have children, it’s obvious. Newborns feed an average of 8-12 times in 24 hours, and wake more often during the night than day. That was waking every few hours at night to nurse and then pump and clean the parts in my case.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think this is a troll post. But if not, as a childless woman I apologize for the clueless childless individual who wrote it. I cringe sometimes at the things that some fellow childless people say. It's embarrassing.

Some of us without kids have common sense and "get it"-I promise! I never in a million years would view maternity leave as a relaxing vacation.

The only clueless person is you, who apparently doesn't understand that if the benefit is available to everyone then it makes zero material difference whether it is used for maternity, paternity, or drinking margaritas on a beach.

If a coworker took maternity leave and the rest of the office adapted and got everything done they needed to, and it later was revealed that they were faking it and never pregnant to begin with, does the work everyone else did undo itself? Do the deadlines retroactively miss themselves? Of course not. There is absolutely no difference. To make a more extreme example, what if the person was actually pregnant, took their time off, everything got done at work just fine, and their baby dies of SIDs the day they go back to work. Would you be mad at them because they took maternity leave but they don't have a baby? Again, what exactly is the material difference? There is none.

Literally the only reason to oppose giving the same leave to everyone is childish whining - "but it's not FAIR!" And even that is plain wrong because it's actually the most fair to provide the same time off to everyone regardless of the reasons. If anything it's not fair that parents get extra time off simply because they chose to have kids.

lol ok.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think this is a troll post. But if not, as a childless woman I apologize for the clueless childless individual who wrote it. I cringe sometimes at the things that some fellow childless people say. It's embarrassing.

Some of us without kids have common sense and "get it"-I promise! I never in a million years would view maternity leave as a relaxing vacation.

The only clueless person is you, who apparently doesn't understand that if the benefit is available to everyone then it makes zero material difference whether it is used for maternity, paternity, or drinking margaritas on a beach.

If a coworker took maternity leave and the rest of the office adapted and got everything done they needed to, and it later was revealed that they were faking it and never pregnant to begin with, does the work everyone else did undo itself? Do the deadlines retroactively miss themselves? Of course not. There is absolutely no difference. To make a more extreme example, what if the person was actually pregnant, took their time off, everything got done at work just fine, and their baby dies of SIDs the day they go back to work. Would you be mad at them because they took maternity leave but they don't have a baby? Again, what exactly is the material difference? There is none.

Literally the only reason to oppose giving the same leave to everyone is childish whining - "but it's not FAIR!" And even that is plain wrong because it's actually the most fair to provide the same time off to everyone regardless of the reasons. If anything it's not fair that parents get extra time off simply because they chose to have kids.

Aside from all of the other points you're missing, you're missing the point that we as a society want to encourage people to have babies because it continues the human race. We as a society don't need to encourage people to drink margaritas on a beach.

[Anonymous]

I'm a single mom who had a colicky baby, and I didn't get any maternity leave. I used my vacation and sick time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think this is a troll post. But if not, as a childless woman I apologize for the clueless childless individual who wrote it. I cringe sometimes at the things that some fellow childless people say. It's embarrassing.

Some of us without kids have common sense and "get it"-I promise! I never in a million years would view maternity leave as a relaxing vacation.

The only clueless person is you, who apparently doesn't understand that if the benefit is available to everyone then it makes zero material difference whether it is used for maternity, paternity, or drinking margaritas on a beach.

If a coworker took maternity leave and the rest of the office adapted and got everything done they needed to, and it later was revealed that they were faking it and never pregnant to begin with, does the work everyone else did undo itself? Do the deadlines retroactively miss themselves? Of course not. There is absolutely no difference. To make a more extreme example, what if the person was actually pregnant, took their time off, everything got done at work just fine, and their baby dies of SIDs the day they go back to work. Would you be mad at them because they took maternity leave but they don't have a baby? Again, what exactly is the material difference? There is none.

Literally the only reason to oppose giving the same leave to everyone is childish whining - "but it's not FAIR!" And even that is plain wrong because it's actually the most fair to provide the same time off to everyone regardless of the reasons. If anything it's not fair that parents get extra time off simply because they chose to have kids.

Aside from all of the other points you're missing, you're missing the point that we as a society want to encourage people to have babies because it continues the human race. We as a society don't need to encourage people to drink margaritas on a beach.

also missing … employers give maternity leave (paid or unpaid) because they want to retain female workers at the peak of their productivity (30s) - most of whom have or plan to have babies. Maternity leave is a way to keep them in the workforce. It is not a perk.