I'd disagree. As a whole, our country has an entirely split personality on the subject of child-rearing and work; we can't decide if having and raising children is the most important work a person can do and so should be a higher priority than one's for-pay career, or if it's a selfish hobby that should no more interfere with your work hours than if you were, say, playing with model airplanes during that time.
Whichever way you believe should be true, the way this split gets played out in the workplace is sexist. If your work partner is to get any sympathy for only taking off three hours for his wife's baby, then we're in the world where kids have priority over work and you're entitled to your time off and reduced workload for having them. If we're in the world where kids are a selfish hobby, then your partner is *just doing his job* by not spending more time at home and shouldn't be noticed for it. But the double standard about it always makes the woman the selfish one and the guy the hero. (At *work*. I'm not talking about the child-rearing realm, which is incredibly sexist in the other direction.)
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Date: 2010-06-02 03:17 pm (UTC)Whichever way you believe should be true, the way this split gets played out in the workplace is sexist. If your work partner is to get any sympathy for only taking off three hours for his wife's baby, then we're in the world where kids have priority over work and you're entitled to your time off and reduced workload for having them. If we're in the world where kids are a selfish hobby, then your partner is *just doing his job* by not spending more time at home and shouldn't be noticed for it. But the double standard about it always makes the woman the selfish one and the guy the hero. (At *work*. I'm not talking about the child-rearing realm, which is incredibly sexist in the other direction.)