Childcare is bloody expensive!

Comms69

choccielover wrote: »

I couldn't disagree more with this. - that’s ok, that’s why we’re discussing this

My husband is our daughters primary caregiver and is without a doubt a better parent than me, and according to all our female friends and all the school mums, them too. - great. That isn’t my experience, but like I said, individual experiences are sometimes not the norm

He gets her up, makes breakfast, makes her packed lunch and ensures she has the appropriate school kit for the day's activities, drops her off whilst practicing her spag or maths in the car, picks her up and then feeds her a cooked meal, does her homework with her, baths her and puts her to bed. If she is ill or restless it's him she goes to, if she is ill it's him that takes the day off. - but you’re, presumably given the context of the discussion, capable of doing all those things? I’m assuming that you don’t have a disability of some sort. In which case what do you disagree with?

We both adore her, but he is the most "parenty" and whilst I accept he may be in the minority's he isn't the only one. It isn't a women's right to be the "better" parent, either can do it. How many men aren't given the choice or option to do this by women who assume they can't

Ok, before you go putting words in my mouth, benefit of the doubt that you weren’t.

You accept he’s the minority, so you agree with me?

I never claimed it was a right, just a reality.

I don’t know how many men aren’t given this option.

And finally, I did say early years development. You said your daughter is at school, which to me isn’t early years ( I classify it as 0-4/5 ).

But thanks for sharing your position.

Red-Squirrel_2

Comms69 wrote: »

Like I said, can I please have some actual studies, with controls and stats and graphs and background information.

Aw, you want graphs! Bless.

You can find the studies easily enough if you want to read them and you have an account that gives you access or are willing to pay

Not that it matters, I suspect none would be good enough for you and you'd just delight in coming up with reasons not to believe them. Your views appear to be set with no need or desire to consider evidence that you may be wrong.

You are the one of the most disturbing kinds of man.

Comms69

Yes, sorry for wanting to see the evidence behind these claims, how silly of me for considering the idea but asking for info.

I’m asking for impartial scientific studies, as I said two of links you posted were clearly asvertising their own services.

I’m perfectly happy to consider actual evidence. HOWEVER, the point I’m making is that the state, society if you will, does not encourage inequality against women. In fact the opposite is true.

You clearly refused to actually debate any points I raised about validity, probably because you can see I have a valid point on that front.

Instead you resort to attacking me personally- something I haven’t done.

Frankly your opinion of me is irrelevant. We don’t know each other and I suspect I would consider you ‘ the most disturbing kind of woman ‘ were we to meet, the difference is I wouldn’t say that you you.

Savvy_Sue

Comms69 wrote: »

The main point for me is that careers which deal primarily with caring and with nurturing are dominated by women. Nursing ( the most trusted career just coincidentally ) is massively dominated by women, a role which is very similar in the basic requirements to early years parenthood. - it doesn’t appear to me to be a coincidence.

Correlation is not causality. Surely nursing is dominated by women because it was traditionally seen as an acceptable line of work for women, and was not open to men! One might wonder too how many nurses wanted to be doctors before that line of study was open to them.

Admin and secretarial work also used to be seen as 'female' jobs - the early lady typists were called 'typewriters' and it was felt that the work was better suited to women than to men!

Comms69 wrote: »

I believe that on the whole men are less suited to the role of early years parenthood, whether by psycological, physical or societal barriers - I wouldn’t like to pick as there’s arguements for all.

You didn't see those recent programmes on the BBC "No more boys and girls"? From a very early age we treat boys and girls differently - put a toddler in a dress and carers will offer 'girl' toys; put a toddler in dungarees in primary colours and carers will offer 'boy' toys. But actually they're not developmentally different - apart from whether they can wee in your face when you change their nappy!

It was a very interesting watch.

Comms69

No it’s not, but it is interesting that it continues to be so dominated. Teaching is another example, and not one where that same argument applies

I think going that far back is counter productive, the jobs were seen as female jobs because in many cases jobs were split into manual/physical jobs and admin style jobs.

That does sound interesting. However I think we should treat children differently to a point. Something I’d certainly take a look at

ViolaLass

Comms69 wrote: »

No it’s not, but it is interesting that it continues to be so dominated. Teaching is another example, and not one where that same argument applies.

Teaching is female dominated as it is seen as a caring profession and that's an area that has been traditionally thought of as female. Look at STEM subjects - far more male teachers there than in, say, primary schools. STEM is traditionally a male area, caring is traditionally female.

All of this is just society, not genes, not 'natural ability', just society telling us what we're supposedly better at. You can say "But you can study whatever you want" and that may now be true but children are adults are affected by societal expectations.

Try reading some Cordelia Fine or any research into supposed innate differences between men and women and you'll see where I'm coming from.

Incidentally, no, there is no need to treat boys differently to girls, apart from teaching boys to stand up when they wee. Children are children foremost. They don't play with their toys using their genitals.

Comms69

But that’s my whole point. Women tend to go into caring professions due to their nature. Teaching used to be male dominated, but not anymore.

Who in society? Where is this societal pressure? Women consistently achieve better qualifications, why do they not choose these subjects? Why do countries with more oppressive and conservative societies have more women in STEM careers than more free and liberal societies?

I am genuinely asking you how is society forcing women away from these decisions? Perhaps you can share your chosen career and how you made that decision?

I will do, but presumably there is a lot to read, can you summarise the position or point me in the right direction?

Just to be clear though, the differences between boys and girls are far more than their genitalia.

Tabbytabitha

Comms69 wrote: »

But that’s my whole point. Women tend to go into caring professions due to their nature. Teaching used to be male dominated, but not anymore.

Who in society? Where is this societal pressure? Women consistently achieve better qualifications, why do they not choose these subjects? Why do countries with more oppressive and conservative societies have more women in STEM careers than more free and liberal societies?

I am genuinely asking you how is society forcing women away from these decisions? Perhaps you can share your chosen career and how you made that decision?

I will do, but presumably there is a lot to read, can you summarise the position or point me in the right direction?

Just to be clear though, the differences between boys and girls are far more than their genitalia.

Teaching of young children was never male dominated because it was lower paid.

Most of your questions are just naive and written as if by someone living in the 70s or earlier. It must be strange to live in such a time warp.😕

Comms69

The data I found suggest female teachers from 1975-2016 went from around 49% to 65% of the workforce. I can look further back, but aside from times of war during the first and Second World War, I would expect that the trend continues similarly going further back.

If my questions are so naive, surely you should be able to quickly explain it?

It’s very easy to dismiss someone opinions, I could do the same. To be honest it’s a position often taken when you can’t actually give an answer.

I would however suggest that women make different choices in life to men - on the whole. And it’s not societal pressure, but rather choice that is the reason.

It’s funny that your viewpoint is automatically the correct one and mine is somehow automatically old and therefore bad.

Why not engage in a discussion?

ViolaLass

"That article suggests that men and women may, for various reasons, express compassion in different ways. That doesn't mean that the woman should be the one staying at home and the man going to work. - huh? I didn’t claim it was. Can you please read read what I said; to clarify it was that men and women are different in this case in the way they experience compassion. "

Except the article doesn't claim anything about how the genders experience compassion, only how it is expressed. That expression is heavily influenced by society.

Choices are also heavily influenced by societal pressures. There is research to support this view. Try reading Cordelia Fine, for example.