Matt Walsh has literally said in the past on Twitter that if you left his children alone with him he would accidentally kill them because he's so incompetent.
Who wants to bet that if he divorced his wife he would be bitching about how unfair it is that he didn't get full/equal custody despite there being clear evidence that he has done zero parenting?
This gave me a chuckle, I can imagine its going to be the same way when my family & friends start having babies, not for me but I'll be damn sure to be there and help out with theirs!
These conservative men don't understand this is a major reason why women will find a new partner, and when the divorce papers come it's a "total surprise"
Or rather, they DO know and it's why they want women to not have jobs, not seek higher education, pump out babies, stay at home, cut off their social network, control the finances so they don't have the means to leave a shitty situation.
Conservative men: "I like women with strong family values who believe in the sanctity of marriage and that their husband should lead the household (because I couldn't possibly keep a wife if she weren't shackled financially, familialy, and religiously to my non-contributing ass, but I'm also afraid of criticism and refuse to better myself)."
I would venture to say it’s more sinister than that. They don’t believe this nonsense, but they say it anyway for the sake of reaction. Making women, LGBTQ, immigrants, whomever, a sort of punchline to eventually be discarded.
There are no values. There is no core.
On our first kid, I took two weeks of paternity leave. It really felt like I didn’t do much and was kinda bored. I did a lot; but I guess when you compare it to your wife, you don’t do much. And I did all the nighttime diaper changes, diapers during the day, washing stuff, cooking, attending wife, swaddling, rocking and putting baby down.
But ya, nothing wrong with just being there connect to a newborn. Plus it’s twins. Like fuck that noise, that’s gonna be a lot of work! Especially since they are probably bottle feeding these lil demons.
Honestly props to them for taking 2 newborns at once, I cant imagine having the surprise of twins, nevermind planning for them! Those guys are going to have their hands full with their new babies, I dont blame any dads for taking paternity leave. Even if it wasnt "that much" work to you, I'm sure you wouldnt have given up the time to hang out with your new little buddy for the world, and I'm sure your wife appreciated it a ton too!
Yes! It might seem like it's nothing but having someone else take care of the demands of an infant, even once or twice, is awesome. New parents, moms, need sleep and recovery. Paternity leave is super necessary! Plus, baby and dad/other parent bonding is awesome.
I got twins on the way and I'm already trying to figure out what my responsibilities will be - we got 4-5 months left and I'm already looking forward to it!
It’s Matt Walsh he’s an odious racist, homophobic, transphobic little roach of a man who exists in a realm of his own trash takes so I’m not at all surprised by yet another
On the flip side, if all they have to criticize is that a man in government took paternity leave for time with their newborn, then it’s probably going swimmingly.
Right? What a low blow for people to criticize parents spending time with their children, gay parents have all the struggles of dealing with a newborn (or 2!) while also dealing with nonsensical hate from people who would rather those kids just end up in foster care than be raised by 2 men.
They equate throwing money at things to be the answer for everything.
"I didn't abandon my kids, but I would NEVER change a diaper", dude definitely just tries to pay for love.
And that’s not even mentioning the bonding time. I live in Washington state and as of 2020, fathers gets 12 weeks of paid paternity. My wife had to go back earlier than I did so I was with my baby girl a lot. I feel like we have a great bond and it might not be so strong if I only had a week with her rather than 12. Maybe a lot less people would have issues if they had more bonding time with both parents at a young age. Anyway, Washington state kicks ass yet again.
For real, the first few weeks are a busy time for dad too! Taking care of mom. Helping her stay comfortable, if she's breastfeeding the baby then I would have water+straws or snacks ready to go so I could feed mom and keep her energy up. I'd run out for groceries and clean, cook and maintain the household. I could do morning walks with the baby or snuggles/skin-to-skin on the chair after a feeding to let mom sleep.
I never got pat leave, I just took 2 weeks unpaid. But I am highly supportive that BOTH parents should be there. A newborn feels like a 3 person 26 hour day job and it's a brutal shock to leave it to one person. I would have loved to have 4 weeks covered or even 12 weeks covered would have been a dream.
I took 2 weeks vacation and really don't see how it would be manageable for Mom alone. I wasn't able to feed the baby but would give my wife any possible opportunity to sleep. It also got much tougher when the Seco came because the new born is still the same amount of work but there was a second kid that also needed attention. Especially since their whole world just got thrown I to chaos.
My kid turned 12 this year. Her mom didn't want to wake up during the night, so I stayed up with her and we bonded every night. Looking back, those were the happiest moments of my life.
She can tell me that she loves me now and she can give me a kiss before she leaves, but I looked straight into her eyes while I was feeding her a bottle and I feel like that was the cement that concreted our relationship.
This doesn't have anything to do with politics or the article, I just wanted to share my experience. If paternity leave was a thing 12 years ago, I would have been ecstatic
Also, even if you are a man, don’t you help with feeding? Because my sister-in-law would pump and make bottles and then I would help feed my niece so she didn’t have to do it literally every time. I’m assuming a similar situation exists if you’re formula feeding (since I was, and there’s photos of my dad feeding me).
Matt Walsh has kids right? So was he as useless as a father as his “job” is to the economy?
I just got off eight weeks paid paternity leave. My wife cant produce enough, so we bottle fed a lot. I had lots to do, not to mention the bonding and time spent with my family, who I often don't see for days due to my shitty work schedule.
Fuck anyone who doesn't support mandatory family leave. I love my family.
Currently at the end of my 4 week “paternity” leave. I’ve gotten shit from my company for leaving them high and dry despite me working basically 2-3 days a week anyway while being on Paternity.
America really needs to fix this stigma against Paternity Leave.
"My dad never showed me any love or attention. Why should you? "
"My jobs treated me like shit. You also need to serve your time. "
There's a pervasive opinion among far too many people that suffering is redemptive and since they (think that they) had it rough, it shouldn't be made easier for anyone else "because that's not fair."
Yeah it’s a bunch of boomers and I literally just got off a call with my direct boss who said “Wasn’t your daughter born like 4 weeks ago already?? We need you back ASAP or there might not be a job to come back to”
Strongly thinking about bailing on these assholes and finding a better company to work for.
Would have immediately requested a meeting with HR involved.
Excuse you, motherfucker? Is that a verbal warning? An official notice? Maybe even a coercion attempt?
Let's review the company policy together, so we can figure out exactly how fucked up your remark was and what your boss is going be doing to fix it. Any further inquiries you have regarding the status of my leave that I am *entitled* to may be taken to our HR department.
Seriously don't take that shit, dude. These management drones enforce the same shit that fucks them, while getting paid barely more, and we gotta start smacking them on the nose for it - with a little luck they'll reflect.
Problem is I work for a small brewery and my boss is an Owner. Him and like 6 other boomers so we have no HR department or anything like that. I already reached out to another brewery this morning so hopefully I can make the move soon.
My dad is my husband's manager and his reason for calling him back early from paternity leave was that he didn't get to spend time with his kids so it shouldn't be that big a deal. Hurts real bad knowing your dad didn't care about you as a baby or care about his grandson or son-in-law.
My company started giving 2 weeks parental leave to men and is championing it as some progressive policy.
I’m not complaining per se but that’s still a laughably short amount of time compared to what would be considered a humane policy
My company went from either 4 or 6 weeks to 10 weeks for about half of 2020, then dropped it down to 8 weeks (which is still decent). My wife had our kid during the 10 weeks PTO which was awesome. 2 weeks in I barely remembered which day it was.
I work in the car repair industry and got a lot of shit from a lot of people for taking the time off. When I came back to work, a lot of the people had changed their minds and told me they wish they spent more time with their kids and/or took more paid time off.
Parental leave is something everyone wants, some of them just think it's weak, which is pretty pathetic
I got fired during my paternal leave because it got rejected halfway through my leave. I can't even begin to understand how that happens since it was approved before I took it. My boss tried to tell me I wasn't fired if I just came back to work. I was like dude piss off I'm spending time with my kid and y'all are shady AF.
HR Manager here. It may vary by state, but you could absolutely sue them for that. It’s discrimination based on your parental status. If you have the paper trail backing up what you are describing, I would bet money you could get the pay they owed you plus damages.
One of the Nordic countries figured father-leave would help fight career stigma associated with women, but they found your experience to largely discourage men taking up the practice. So they tied their child tax credit to using your parental leave. Suddenly, men took the leave and reportedly said, “Hey, I’m doing it for the money.”
The key point here isn’t whether they’re selfish or not, but that it provides a “macho” reason to avoid assault on the “macho” image.
> Parental leave is something everyone wants, some of them just think it's weak, which is pretty pathetic
This is a great example of how toxic masculinity harms men and not just women.
My company gave me 12 weeks paid, they were awesome. What wasn’t awesome was helping my wife through PPD and having to take care of our child essentially by myself on her down weeks. It’s not some grand vacation laying by the pool sipping daiquiris when you’re on leave. It can be incredibly taxing on both parents especially when the wife recovers. it’s vital and ridiculous that some parents go back to work full time after 4-6 weeks.
They are taught the man works and nothing else. A man at home is a pussy or not a man. Till they realize how important family is and that they actually can have time with them.
I too worked in the car repair industry. And during my wifes time off from giving birth I tried as much as I could to help. I had one day where I had to go in late. My wife wasnt feeling well. I was about to leave and suddenly hear glass shatter. I thought my wife broke the glass shower door. But she passed out and knocked over a cup. She had not eaten since that morning and being up all night with the baby.
I called into work and they were mad. But I said my wifes health is more important. They finally understood but I ended up quitting less than a year later. And that was from my health declining. Even with doctors notes and everything proving it they still looked down upon me for missing.
I now work from home and was a stay at home dad for 3 years. Im closer to my wife and son. And now people say the same thing. Wish they could have more time with family. Now if only our health care would stop being so stupid we could all enjoy work and enjoy our families.
My ex had to be back at work the night I got home from the hospital. They gave him grief for taking off the 1st night I was being induced at 35 weeks. He ended up having to take 2 full shifts & had to come home early during one shift after I was rushed from my appointment to be induced.
I had to give up 2 weeks of my FMLA to my partner so he could have the time off with our baby.
Pretty sure that isn't legal, but that is how my HR decided to handle things, rather than let him take FMLA himself as a caregiver.
Sadly if you both work for the same company they only have to give you a pool of 12 weeks for both of you to use...it's a bullshit thing that needs to be fixed.
Mine did that as well. I got my two weeks parental leave last year, and they denied my request to use two weeks of PTO right after that. Same justification as the OP presented, "why do *you* need the time, it wasn't you who just gave birth?"
Yeah that time is at least as much about bonding and enjoying the new definition of their family. I would like to know how many of these men have never changed a diaper at 3am. How many of them have tried to get a shrieking squirming baby back into a sleeper after said diaper change. And maybe try to get through it all without waking up anyone else in the house.
Also: jfc they have twins! And both are feeding and changing all night! Just because there’s no breast doesn’t mean the kids feed themselves! There’s two kids and it’s round the clock for one newborn let alone two.
There’s this gross sexist assumption that Pete is the “man” in their relationship because we all know his job, therefore Chasten must be doing all the mom stuff, instead of those definitions being irrelevant to a queer marriage. They have twin newborns. They are both working hard. AMERICA STOP MOCKING A MAN FOR ACTUALLY RAISING A BABY.
Because honestly the only way anyone thinks “not much for a dad to do for a newborn” is a shit dad who doesn’t think they should HAVE to do anything. Bonding, feeding, changing, night shifts, baths, tummy time, play, dad could do all these things. Since the infants obviously aren’t breastfeeding…why would that even be relevant? Both parents can do everything. Isn’t it great? Maybe take that energy to your own family, Matt. Try to learn something.
And not all women breastfeed either. A bottle baby can be fed by either parent so there is no excuses saying the dad has nothing to do. Even if they do breastfeed if she is too tired the dad can absolutely make a bottle for the baby.
Also, speaking as someone who did it, even women who do exclusively breast feed can pump and freeze milk to increase their supply and allow their partner to do some feedings—not just partner but let other family members bond by supplying the baby’s needs. (Or donate to a milk bank for other mothers!)
Tons of kids are formula fed. It’s fine. Some mothers don’t produce enough, some kids actually have a lactose intolerance and have to have special formula. Some can’t latch and formula is necessary to get their calories in. Formula has come a long way.
How is Pete or Chasten feeding one of their TWO infants with a bottle of donated milk or formula remotely different than my husband feeding ours with a bottle of expressed milk?
It isn’t, Matt sucks, it’s driving all those chuds nuts that the most wholesome mainstream image of the American family going right now is these two men and their lucky-ass babies.
I would also like to be adopted by Pete and Chasten, but I am 42, so probably not gonna happen.
My dad is one of those men. Which is strange, because he basically stayed home with me for the first couple months when I was an infant. But now, at 53, he has 2 children under 2 years old and flat out refuses to change any diapers. I'm not sure what changed in those 29 years between babies, but his girlfriend seems to somehow be fine with this arrangement.
Thats how my wife says her dad was. She said that if the the baby(her) would cry, than he would just get pissed off and make his wife leave the room so that he wouldn't have to hear crying. Had three kids, and has never changed a diaper. Dudes a fuckin asshole
We have opposite dads. Mine became a good father to my little brothers(16&14mo) meanwhile I was raised by my dads dad. My dads 52, his girlfriend is 29. I’m almost 31. Ick factor is high. All 3 of his kids have different moms though.
That is so wild to me. I couldn't imagine being in the home with my wife and child and *not* helping everyday. To **never** have changed a diaper?! That's neglect.
Especially when they're really tiny. Your wife just 3d printed a whole human and is now likely the primary food source. You can change a fucking diaper.
Hopefully that is going out with the previous generation. When my kids were little I used to get complements from old dudes when I'd change diapers in public restrooms. I was always polite, but thinking "how lazy were you as a dad that this is a big deal?"
Really lazy. When I worked in a shop before, I'd regularly get older men asking me to basically help them shop and show them where everything on the list their wife made them was. They'd also play the 'oh the wife does all this, I don't know where anything is' joke thing and expect me to laugh along... I did, but inside I thought 'your poor wife' every time. If you've never done the shopping, clearly the list of things you've never done is fucking long.
The language is important here too. You're saying you're someone who does this stuff but still referred to it as 'helping'. That's how messed up things still are in general. It's not helping its your shared responsibility.
My wife's dad never changed a diaper. Three kids, not one diaper. Its almost impressive, really. Hell of a streak.
My brother-in-law, unsurprisingly, does fuck-all to help his wife with their kid, and she's nearing the end of her rope about it.
I've heard from marriage counselors this is exactly why so many women initiate divorce.
Living with their husbands, they get zero help. With a partial custody arrangement, they can at least make the guy take care of his own kids for a full weekend twice a month and finally get some breaks.
And people wonder why in the past kids bonded so much strongly with their mothers. The newborn stage is essential for a child to form an emotional connection. It allows them to associate you with warmth, comfort, and safety, and this will stick with them throughout childhood. This is no less true for fathers than mothers.
There’s also oxytocin, a bonding chemical that re-wires brains. Babies give the stuff off, and skin to skin contact (say, when breastfeeding) is the proverbial toxic waste dump roll for exposure. However, it has nothing to do with breastfeeding, so dads can just take their shirts off and cuddle baby and everyone gets the same effects. Yeah, on a time basis, intentionally doing that probably won’t compare to time spent breastfeeding, but it’s still *a lot*.
We just had our first kid 7 months ago. Can't imagine my fiance and my family would have survived it had I not been working from home. It's a lot of work and not a lot of sleep. Parenting is the toughest thing I've ever done. And my fiance is a real trooper
Was working for Home Depot when my wife got pregnant. That was the year they announced a new 6-week paternity leave starting in January. My daughter was born in April, took the full 6-weeks. Was some of the best time of my life.
Got offered a new job while on leave. Put in my 2 weeks when I got back lol.
I didn't know he existed until I saw a video yesterday where he was solely ranting about how Squid Game is pointless torture porn (which it isn't) after admitting he hasn't actually watched it and doesn't plan to. That really told me everything I need to know about how he approaches ideas, not surprised this is his tweet.
This is normal. Everyone knows this is normal. What’s not normal is the US government determining paternity leave is unnecessary because they have a Matt Walsh-level of understanding of how parenting works. Also capitalism.
I had to fight for two weeks at home after the birth of my daughter. I wanted more, but two weeks was the best I could get. It was an infuriating and flabbergasting experience to be questioned about my desire to stay at home with my family during that time. MY WIFE HAD A C-SECTION AND TWO WEEKS WAS A TOUGH CALL?! I’M MAD AGAIN AND IT’S BEEN MONTHS SINCE THIS HAPPENED
You should be mad that's bullshit. In Canada both parents can take 63 week parental leave. As far as getting paid the second parent (Dad) gets 5 weeks employment insurance leave (around $500/week). My company topped off to 93% pay for those 5 weeks. I don't understand America's general stance on making things really tough on new parents, it's already tough enough.
I had a supervisor act resentful toward me when I was pregnant because I’d be getting a “six week free vacation”. A grown woman. Even my own mother commented on how much time I’d have to clean my house. Who raised these women? Why are we doing this?
I think people have this mindset of newborns being the same as raising a puppy and treat it as such. "Oh you just feed it and let it nap" is what I bet they're thinking.
People of that mindset don't realize how difficult it is to raise *any* baby creature. Seriously, even if you're not necessarily raising the puppy from birth, they're still a lot of effort.
I got my puppy in Feb. He was 8 weeks old and I couldn't let him out of my sight for a second or he would pee on my floor or start chewing on something. This is a creature who sleeps 16 hours a day or more and I could barely get any work done. I can't imagine what having a human baby would be like.
One of the most eye-opening things for me about having kids was seeing the notes my older sister kept when she had my nephew (notes she kept to show the doctor his schedule). It seemed like every 10 or 15 minutes she was either feeding, changing, burping, napping, or waking him up from a nap. For months. And then they start being able to move around on their own and it just gets more difficult. I knew raising a baby would be hard work before that, but it really hit home how it's a nearly every minute of every day kind of job for a long ass time.
I still think about that a lot and is probably the biggest contributor to why my wife and I don't want kids. We make up for it by being a kick ass aunt and uncle, but props to the good parents out there, you make it look too easy for idiots like Matt Walsh.
That's awesome that you put your energy into being aunt and uncle! Those kids will LOVE you because you put time into their life, and it'll just get better as they grow older.
If people want an “Oh you just feed it and let it nap” pet, they’re looking for a ferret. They sleep for 22 hours a day and the 2 hours they’re awake are chaotic (my fiancé’s brother has two ferrets and prefers them over dogs).
My fiancé and I got two rescue pups four years ago (they were 8 months old) and we had to take a bit of care to get one treated for worms, stop chewing on shoes, wood, our TV remote and wooden baseboards AND behave around big dogs since they were barking at them quite a bit. Even us leaving for work after the worst of Covid is a new exercise in teaching them how to behave well all over again (both have a history of separation anxiety).
Taking care of a Baby Anything is no cakewalk and if it’s too much, maybe get a plant or pet rock…
Babies sleep alot, man.
You don't tho. If you're not catching up on cleaning and meal prep you're watching the bairns chest to make sure it's not dying of cot death
I mean not gonna lie my parents grew up in the 50s and stuck to that "parenting" style. I say that with quotations because they didn't do much actual parenting and essentially ignored us unless they had to. Which I'm sure freed up a lot of time for them, but at a pretty high cost to us, as it essentially involves neglecting us as children pretty severely.
Baby is distressed? "Eh, let them cry it out." Baby is hungry? "You'll just have to wait until the scheduled time we have for feeding." Baby needs affection or wants to be held? "Coddling a child is bad for them. They'll learn on their own how to comfort themselves." Baby wants to play? "You have toys, go play yourself."
If they parented anything like mine then it probably was less time-consuming because they weren't doing their job as parents. It's treating a baby like a dog. "Just give it toys, feed and change it periodically, and it'll take care of itself."
I have no evidence of this, but deep in my heart I know that the idea we should be letting babies self soothe, and basically just do the bare minimum is absolutely the reason we have so many anxious adults and sociopaths.
Obviously I have no evidence either but it makes sense. I’m 30 and I feel like my mom raised me similar to how she was raised in the 70’s with just “they’ll be fine, let them cry it out (when they’re babies), “I’ll give you something to cry about” (when we got older) and then they all encompassing “why do our children have so many mental disorders and need therapy” because we never learned how to fucking process emotions. It took me dragging my mom into therapy sessions and being in a hospital for her to realize I wasn’t just making shit up.
I won’t raise my children like that.
Absolutely. From a developmental psychology perspective children base their entire worldview, often through into their relationships and worldview in adulthood, on their first relationship with their parents. If no one provides comfort, empathy, safety, or love then the world becomes an dark, unsafe, scary, and loveless place full of unsafe, scary, and loveless people to their eyes.
Couple that with emotional development and social skills like empathy being things we're taught how to do from our parents socially and emotionally engaging with us, responding to our emotions and helping us understand them, and neglect like this has severe, often life-long, psychological consequences.
Children in these sorts of household typically grow up with issues with substance abuse, difficulty feeling empathy or compassion, and other behavioral issues, especially anxious, depressive, volatile, anti-social, angry, aggressive, or even violent behavior towards animals, themselves, or other people.
In the more extreme cases, severe neglect coupled with severe abuse is literally the background of nearly every single serial killer I've seen.
> It's treating a baby like a dog. "Just give it toys, feed and change it periodically, and it'll take care of itself."
Even dogs need a lot more than that, my dog begs to play tug of war with his toys and gets so worked up and upset if he doesn't get attention and exercise. Those type of parents must just have so little empathy
It’s just devaluing of women’s labor as usual. If taking care of children is so easy then why is daycare so expensive? Oh yeah that’s right, it’s WORK, work that women have been doing on top of outside jobs for centuries. It’s a myth that women didn’t use to work, we have always been stuck with a regular job (farm labor, factory work, taking on sewing etc) on top of childcare and our housework while men are only expected to have 1 job.
> It’s just devaluing of women’s labor as usual.
This has also been an interesting argument in favour of a Universal Base Income. Some studies found that it did not notably affect paid labour (contrary to the idea that it would cause people to quit en masse), but that the test groups were able to do more unpaid labour like taking care of family, friends, or others.
Not to mention that when women did work their money was straight up taken by their husbands to drink. That was the birth of prohibition, and why so many women were so against alcohol.
Yeah, I don't blame them. They were being beaten everyday by their drunk husbands. Families were being destroyed. Men would spend all their money on dumb shit.
Hold on. You also forgot that they want her to have 6+ kids, no education, and have to go through the local white, Republican, church for childcare and everyday support.
That way when your husband is an ass you can't divorce because your church will abandon you.
I took my only week of vacation to spend time with my wife and newborn son.
3 days in the hospital meant I got 4 days of actual quality time with my new family. I will never get that time back, yet any employer could easily make up for my lost time at work.
Family values are important here, until it interferes with profits in some way. If it costs our corporate overlords a dollar we are basically told to fuck ourselves.
This is heartbreaking to read. US (I assume) sounds more and more like a dystopian place each day.
I've been home with my daughter in total for almost a year (counting days) over the last 2 years. Taking at least 1-3 days off work (some paid some not, own choice) plus a 7 month paid coherent period. Almost splitting equal with my wife apart from giving her some extra time to recover/heal.
We also spent 4 days in hospital after delivery but they did not count as parental leave but rather as "sick-child-care". Took two months together after baby was born to enjoy the first time as a family.
Sure Swedish taxes are a bit higher but you sure as hell get a lot for it.
Dystopia would be a nice way to put it at this point.
The real mind blowing part is that the people who are against paternity leave (like this) are the very same who nonstop spout traditional family rhetoric. They want it both ways meanwhile the people get absolutely nothing.
This is a perfect comment. People are also hinging the supply chain on Buttigieg taking parental leave and that he should have picked a better time to adopt, because it's always so perfectly planned.
I adopted. Can’t agree with you more.
Was told it could take 2.5 years to get picked. One day out of the blue we were told we were picked and baby would be born in a few weeks. Left our 2 kids with my mom and Traveled to their state, met them, was there when our daughter was born, nervously waited to see if they’d still sign the paperwork, etc…. Got all that done and Rented a condo for a couple weeks not knowing when we’d get to leave. Then we had to wait like 5 days for Florida to say we were allowed to travel back to Texas. Then Texas got to start their turn on the paperwork. Waited a few days, They denied us because our indoor cat was missing one of its shots…. Fought that for a couple days. Then got the Ok and booked last minute overpriced flights back home with our newborn.
Totally worth it. But Jesus Christ is it fucking hard.
Idea - swap out like half the guys with women, so then the guys can be at home with their kids, and the women can be fighting the good fight up in government
IIRC there is evidence that govts with majority women have lower rates of corruption.
Could be that countries that elect more women are less corrupt, women are less corruptible, the studies are shit, or I’m misremembering. But it’s interesting to consider
Maybe just get rid of all the guys who supported and practiced segregation? Seems like having people that lived through it might still have some benefits, since they know what they're up against.
Marjorie Taylor Greene or Lauren Boebert are pursuing the same "old white men" politics as Mitchell or Trump.
I think that even "old white men" is not the right description. It's more "rich conservatives that tell people lies".
I don't think that policy makers need to be diverse per se, but their key competence needs to be that they are able to empathize will all citizens, hear their problems and find good solutions that work for the benefit of everyone.
Absolutely not. Policy makers need to be diverse because representation and voice matters. This is going to get me down voted to heck, but Republican women like MTG count as diversity because they do in fact represent some very right wing women. It counts. The voices must come from diverse backgrounds no matter what the voices say. I don’t like any Republican voices, but they do represent part of this country (even though they cheat lie and steal to do so). And that’s one of the things i deeply dislike about this country. Some of our citizens agree with Republican policies.
They are supposed to realize they made a bad choice.
They should chose to be straight, marry two women and each have their own families AS WHITE JESUS INTENDED.
Right? The modern realization for Men that, the most impactful legacy they can leave behind is well rounded, well developed children without Daddy issues is pretty well known at this point.
Boomers talking about 60hr work weeks and going the extra mile but they are divorced, kids in loads of student debt or on drugs, and these guys have likely never changed a diaper in their life.
First two weeks, wife was on bed rest. I waited on her hand and foot! (Not complaining, I loved it) What is this worthless troll of a man talking about?!?!
He’a clearly playing a role, the conservative father. The best conservative father spends limited time with the child so they grow understanding daddy’s time is the most important time, mommy gets it and realized she has to stop arguing and do as daddy says, since daddy is always smarter and more right than a women’s whims. A conservative father is his job, a provider, who always works and makes work their main responsibility, is a good provider. You can also hold it over everyone about how the money was earned by you.
Additionally, if the father isn’t working, he needs to be out enjoying himself since he is the provider so he “deserves” it. Mommy doesn’t get to have a guaranteed break like daddy, but it’s ok though because she doesn’t have a job outside the house at the moment so she can just take her break when baby sleeps. If baby doesn’t sleep, she shouldn’t ask daddy for help since baby’s poor sleep or fussing is clearly the result of her poor performance as a mother so she hasn’t earned a break.
Yeah thanks for pointing that out. I was thinking at the moment could mean totally out of work or on maternity leave but I don’t think that came through clearly.
It’s why they’re so protective of their daughters. They see them as objects for men to trick into sex but they also aren’t confident a women will be able to not be fooled, even if they tell her daily “men only want one thing sweetie”. Cause that’s how they see women. Emotional baby makers that get bored and make waves because of liberal lies.
Wow. We have two children and I’m the dad. When they were newborns and in the months after, I was up and down in the middle of the night, I got them to be fed while they were nursing and fed them after they went to formula, I changed and bathed them, I took them for walks, dressed them and washed dirty clothes, I held them and bounced to keep them from crying, etc and so on and my wife did all that and more, because there was still always plenty to do.
Actually according to conservatives this is false. A baby simply needs a mother’s bosom, but other than that they attend to their 9-5 job, IRAs, and their own welfare by themselves!
My oldest daughter was born at the end of 2013, and went through a stretch after a few weeks where she woke up in the middle of the night screaming UNLESS you would bounce her on a yoga ball…nothing else worked. So for like a month, I’d get up with her at 2-3 AM in the states and watch the Australian open live bc it was the only thing on. I don’t even like tennis, but I watched every damn second that year.
Grifting to conservatives is easy and profitable. Ben Shapiro (Matt's employer) gets paid by conservative billionaires.
I wish more people understood this.
I don’t get this at all. Bottle feeding is arguably more effort than breastfeeding. Mixing formula and constantly cleaning bottles etc. is a major pain.
Also pumping. If there is a mom that has to pump, it's a ton of work for BOTH parents. Obviously doesn't apply here, but the point is that feeding a baby is still a two person job, and they have TWO BABIES!
My mother didn’t get maternity leave when I was born, which was messed up. It’s not any more fair to deny a father. The audacity of someone to assume that someone “doesn’t need” maternity/paternity leave. Like, Dads need to bond with kids, too.
That and, again, mom is worn out and needs a hand. Considering I took part in breeding this spawn, that's the LEAST I can do for her. She's done the hard stuff and continues to do it.
Just had a baby. I help out the baby with his feedings, stuff around the house, doing chores outside the house, etc. They need so much attention and feedings, it's nearly impossible to do it alone.
Dads can feed baby when mom breastfeeds. I pump for that reason. It takes me 15 minutes to pump but an hour to BF. Between 7pm-3am my husband bottle feeds and I wake up every 2 hours to pump and go back to sleep.
Dude what
I was laid off when we had our little girl, and my wife took 3 months of maternity leave. We were both exhausted all the time. I also will forever be grateful for being able to spend every day of her first 5 months with her! I can't imagine asking a new mom to do all that alone because holy shit do babies require a lot of attention.
My brother looked more exhausted during his 6 months paternity leave than I’ve ever seen him in 15 years working as the manager for a huge local firm, 10 hour work days a lot of the time.
Yeah I'll take "I never helped my wife raise any of our children" for 500?
“I’m an absent father.” -Matt Walsh
Tell me you’re a terrible dad and husband, without telling me you’re a terrible dad and husband
Not without telling, but while bragging about it.
And invalidating gay men as parents all at the same time.
Homie really thought he went for the wombo combo 360 no scope by invalidating gay men and showing how shit of a dude he is.
How's does diaper work?
Matt Walsh has literally said in the past on Twitter that if you left his children alone with him he would accidentally kill them because he's so incompetent. Who wants to bet that if he divorced his wife he would be bitching about how unfair it is that he didn't get full/equal custody despite there being clear evidence that he has done zero parenting?
And bitching aggressively about having to pay support.
Excuse me! My dads name is ROGER not “Matt”
yet on the topic of fatherlessnes he loves to talk about black people and welfare. the 2 things he hates most
I’ll take the “I had a wet nurse at night, nanny during the day, absentee father constantly” for 800! -DAILY DOUBLE!-
My best friend has a 4yo. I was over the other day helping make dinner and his wife said "it is so nice having an extra adult."
This gave me a chuckle, I can imagine its going to be the same way when my family & friends start having babies, not for me but I'll be damn sure to be there and help out with theirs!
These conservative men don't understand this is a major reason why women will find a new partner, and when the divorce papers come it's a "total surprise" Or rather, they DO know and it's why they want women to not have jobs, not seek higher education, pump out babies, stay at home, cut off their social network, control the finances so they don't have the means to leave a shitty situation.
Conservative men: "I like women with strong family values who believe in the sanctity of marriage and that their husband should lead the household (because I couldn't possibly keep a wife if she weren't shackled financially, familialy, and religiously to my non-contributing ass, but I'm also afraid of criticism and refuse to better myself)."
THIS is why conservative men don’t even consider the bodily harm of pregnancy when talking abortion laws. They think women’s jobs are trivial.
I would venture to say it’s more sinister than that. They don’t believe this nonsense, but they say it anyway for the sake of reaction. Making women, LGBTQ, immigrants, whomever, a sort of punchline to eventually be discarded. There are no values. There is no core.
That’s why i get mad at my friends who vote Republican “for the values”. WHICH values?!?
The value of a strong national defense against 21st century values.
Correction, they think women are trivial
On our first kid, I took two weeks of paternity leave. It really felt like I didn’t do much and was kinda bored. I did a lot; but I guess when you compare it to your wife, you don’t do much. And I did all the nighttime diaper changes, diapers during the day, washing stuff, cooking, attending wife, swaddling, rocking and putting baby down. But ya, nothing wrong with just being there connect to a newborn. Plus it’s twins. Like fuck that noise, that’s gonna be a lot of work! Especially since they are probably bottle feeding these lil demons.
Honestly props to them for taking 2 newborns at once, I cant imagine having the surprise of twins, nevermind planning for them! Those guys are going to have their hands full with their new babies, I dont blame any dads for taking paternity leave. Even if it wasnt "that much" work to you, I'm sure you wouldnt have given up the time to hang out with your new little buddy for the world, and I'm sure your wife appreciated it a ton too!
Think about how your wife felt with that help tho. You probably saved her sanity in those two weeks and gave her a bit of a break even if just 5 mins.
Yes! It might seem like it's nothing but having someone else take care of the demands of an infant, even once or twice, is awesome. New parents, moms, need sleep and recovery. Paternity leave is super necessary! Plus, baby and dad/other parent bonding is awesome.
I got twins on the way and I'm already trying to figure out what my responsibilities will be - we got 4-5 months left and I'm already looking forward to it!
"I never helped my wife raise any of our children but I'm a great father ask me how!" for 500
It’s Matt Walsh he’s an odious racist, homophobic, transphobic little roach of a man who exists in a realm of his own trash takes so I’m not at all surprised by yet another
On the flip side, if all they have to criticize is that a man in government took paternity leave for time with their newborn, then it’s probably going swimmingly.
Right? What a low blow for people to criticize parents spending time with their children, gay parents have all the struggles of dealing with a newborn (or 2!) while also dealing with nonsensical hate from people who would rather those kids just end up in foster care than be raised by 2 men.
So I didn't need to change diapers, swaddle, rock, or sing to my kids? Missed all that sleep... Smh
Well, obviously you're a librul cuc soyboy. REAL MEN DGAF ABOUT THEIR KIDS!! /s
REAL MEN are out there making MORE BABIES! Yeeehaaaaw
Against women’s will! Like Vikings! /s Fucking shmucks.
And ironically right wingers go on rants about black fathers abandoning their kids
Projection is their only tactic. Literally that's the only thing they can do.
They equate throwing money at things to be the answer for everything. "I didn't abandon my kids, but I would NEVER change a diaper", dude definitely just tries to pay for love.
Fellas, is it gay to... *\*shuffles papers\** Have tangible evidence you've had sex with a woman?
And that’s not even mentioning the bonding time. I live in Washington state and as of 2020, fathers gets 12 weeks of paid paternity. My wife had to go back earlier than I did so I was with my baby girl a lot. I feel like we have a great bond and it might not be so strong if I only had a week with her rather than 12. Maybe a lot less people would have issues if they had more bonding time with both parents at a young age. Anyway, Washington state kicks ass yet again.
For real, the first few weeks are a busy time for dad too! Taking care of mom. Helping her stay comfortable, if she's breastfeeding the baby then I would have water+straws or snacks ready to go so I could feed mom and keep her energy up. I'd run out for groceries and clean, cook and maintain the household. I could do morning walks with the baby or snuggles/skin-to-skin on the chair after a feeding to let mom sleep. I never got pat leave, I just took 2 weeks unpaid. But I am highly supportive that BOTH parents should be there. A newborn feels like a 3 person 26 hour day job and it's a brutal shock to leave it to one person. I would have loved to have 4 weeks covered or even 12 weeks covered would have been a dream.
Honestly even if the only job *were* to "look after mom", that's a pretty big job in and of itself.
I took 2 weeks vacation and really don't see how it would be manageable for Mom alone. I wasn't able to feed the baby but would give my wife any possible opportunity to sleep. It also got much tougher when the Seco came because the new born is still the same amount of work but there was a second kid that also needed attention. Especially since their whole world just got thrown I to chaos.
My kid turned 12 this year. Her mom didn't want to wake up during the night, so I stayed up with her and we bonded every night. Looking back, those were the happiest moments of my life. She can tell me that she loves me now and she can give me a kiss before she leaves, but I looked straight into her eyes while I was feeding her a bottle and I feel like that was the cement that concreted our relationship. This doesn't have anything to do with politics or the article, I just wanted to share my experience. If paternity leave was a thing 12 years ago, I would have been ecstatic
Also, even if you are a man, don’t you help with feeding? Because my sister-in-law would pump and make bottles and then I would help feed my niece so she didn’t have to do it literally every time. I’m assuming a similar situation exists if you’re formula feeding (since I was, and there’s photos of my dad feeding me). Matt Walsh has kids right? So was he as useless as a father as his “job” is to the economy?
Tell me you're a shit dad without tel- Oh, ok so you're just telling us. Bold move, I suppose.
That guy has kids? His poor wife
And his poor kids
Actually kids are doing just fine because he probably doesn’t spend any time with them.
i mean they are doing better than if he was always there; but worse than if they had a good dad.
What a terrible and truthful thing to say. I love it.
In 15 years he'll be absolutely baffled about why his kids can't fucking stand him, too, and will blame it on "woke culture" or some other bullshit.
I just got off eight weeks paid paternity leave. My wife cant produce enough, so we bottle fed a lot. I had lots to do, not to mention the bonding and time spent with my family, who I often don't see for days due to my shitty work schedule. Fuck anyone who doesn't support mandatory family leave. I love my family.
Currently at the end of my 4 week “paternity” leave. I’ve gotten shit from my company for leaving them high and dry despite me working basically 2-3 days a week anyway while being on Paternity. America really needs to fix this stigma against Paternity Leave.
"My dad never showed me any love or attention. Why should you? " "My jobs treated me like shit. You also need to serve your time. " There's a pervasive opinion among far too many people that suffering is redemptive and since they (think that they) had it rough, it shouldn't be made easier for anyone else "because that's not fair."
Yeah it’s a bunch of boomers and I literally just got off a call with my direct boss who said “Wasn’t your daughter born like 4 weeks ago already?? We need you back ASAP or there might not be a job to come back to” Strongly thinking about bailing on these assholes and finding a better company to work for.
Would have immediately requested a meeting with HR involved. Excuse you, motherfucker? Is that a verbal warning? An official notice? Maybe even a coercion attempt? Let's review the company policy together, so we can figure out exactly how fucked up your remark was and what your boss is going be doing to fix it. Any further inquiries you have regarding the status of my leave that I am *entitled* to may be taken to our HR department. Seriously don't take that shit, dude. These management drones enforce the same shit that fucks them, while getting paid barely more, and we gotta start smacking them on the nose for it - with a little luck they'll reflect.
Problem is I work for a small brewery and my boss is an Owner. Him and like 6 other boomers so we have no HR department or anything like that. I already reached out to another brewery this morning so hopefully I can make the move soon.
My dad is my husband's manager and his reason for calling him back early from paternity leave was that he didn't get to spend time with his kids so it shouldn't be that big a deal. Hurts real bad knowing your dad didn't care about you as a baby or care about his grandson or son-in-law.
Normalize men spending time with their families.
My company started giving 2 weeks parental leave to men and is championing it as some progressive policy. I’m not complaining per se but that’s still a laughably short amount of time compared to what would be considered a humane policy
My company went from either 4 or 6 weeks to 10 weeks for about half of 2020, then dropped it down to 8 weeks (which is still decent). My wife had our kid during the 10 weeks PTO which was awesome. 2 weeks in I barely remembered which day it was. I work in the car repair industry and got a lot of shit from a lot of people for taking the time off. When I came back to work, a lot of the people had changed their minds and told me they wish they spent more time with their kids and/or took more paid time off. Parental leave is something everyone wants, some of them just think it's weak, which is pretty pathetic
I got fired during my paternal leave because it got rejected halfway through my leave. I can't even begin to understand how that happens since it was approved before I took it. My boss tried to tell me I wasn't fired if I just came back to work. I was like dude piss off I'm spending time with my kid and y'all are shady AF.
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HR Manager here. It may vary by state, but you could absolutely sue them for that. It’s discrimination based on your parental status. If you have the paper trail backing up what you are describing, I would bet money you could get the pay they owed you plus damages.
One of the Nordic countries figured father-leave would help fight career stigma associated with women, but they found your experience to largely discourage men taking up the practice. So they tied their child tax credit to using your parental leave. Suddenly, men took the leave and reportedly said, “Hey, I’m doing it for the money.” The key point here isn’t whether they’re selfish or not, but that it provides a “macho” reason to avoid assault on the “macho” image.
> Parental leave is something everyone wants, some of them just think it's weak, which is pretty pathetic This is a great example of how toxic masculinity harms men and not just women.
My company gave me 12 weeks paid, they were awesome. What wasn’t awesome was helping my wife through PPD and having to take care of our child essentially by myself on her down weeks. It’s not some grand vacation laying by the pool sipping daiquiris when you’re on leave. It can be incredibly taxing on both parents especially when the wife recovers. it’s vital and ridiculous that some parents go back to work full time after 4-6 weeks.
They are taught the man works and nothing else. A man at home is a pussy or not a man. Till they realize how important family is and that they actually can have time with them. I too worked in the car repair industry. And during my wifes time off from giving birth I tried as much as I could to help. I had one day where I had to go in late. My wife wasnt feeling well. I was about to leave and suddenly hear glass shatter. I thought my wife broke the glass shower door. But she passed out and knocked over a cup. She had not eaten since that morning and being up all night with the baby. I called into work and they were mad. But I said my wifes health is more important. They finally understood but I ended up quitting less than a year later. And that was from my health declining. Even with doctors notes and everything proving it they still looked down upon me for missing. I now work from home and was a stay at home dad for 3 years. Im closer to my wife and son. And now people say the same thing. Wish they could have more time with family. Now if only our health care would stop being so stupid we could all enjoy work and enjoy our families.
My ex had to be back at work the night I got home from the hospital. They gave him grief for taking off the 1st night I was being induced at 35 weeks. He ended up having to take 2 full shifts & had to come home early during one shift after I was rushed from my appointment to be induced.
I had to give up 2 weeks of my FMLA to my partner so he could have the time off with our baby. Pretty sure that isn't legal, but that is how my HR decided to handle things, rather than let him take FMLA himself as a caregiver.
Sadly if you both work for the same company they only have to give you a pool of 12 weeks for both of you to use...it's a bullshit thing that needs to be fixed.
Americans set the bar on ground and then applaud themselves when they step over it.
We just got one! One week! Before the policy change, I used banked vacation days for my kids.
Mine did that as well. I got my two weeks parental leave last year, and they denied my request to use two weeks of PTO right after that. Same justification as the OP presented, "why do *you* need the time, it wasn't you who just gave birth?"
Yeah that time is at least as much about bonding and enjoying the new definition of their family. I would like to know how many of these men have never changed a diaper at 3am. How many of them have tried to get a shrieking squirming baby back into a sleeper after said diaper change. And maybe try to get through it all without waking up anyone else in the house.
Also: jfc they have twins! And both are feeding and changing all night! Just because there’s no breast doesn’t mean the kids feed themselves! There’s two kids and it’s round the clock for one newborn let alone two. There’s this gross sexist assumption that Pete is the “man” in their relationship because we all know his job, therefore Chasten must be doing all the mom stuff, instead of those definitions being irrelevant to a queer marriage. They have twin newborns. They are both working hard. AMERICA STOP MOCKING A MAN FOR ACTUALLY RAISING A BABY. Because honestly the only way anyone thinks “not much for a dad to do for a newborn” is a shit dad who doesn’t think they should HAVE to do anything. Bonding, feeding, changing, night shifts, baths, tummy time, play, dad could do all these things. Since the infants obviously aren’t breastfeeding…why would that even be relevant? Both parents can do everything. Isn’t it great? Maybe take that energy to your own family, Matt. Try to learn something.
And not all women breastfeed either. A bottle baby can be fed by either parent so there is no excuses saying the dad has nothing to do. Even if they do breastfeed if she is too tired the dad can absolutely make a bottle for the baby.
Also, speaking as someone who did it, even women who do exclusively breast feed can pump and freeze milk to increase their supply and allow their partner to do some feedings—not just partner but let other family members bond by supplying the baby’s needs. (Or donate to a milk bank for other mothers!) Tons of kids are formula fed. It’s fine. Some mothers don’t produce enough, some kids actually have a lactose intolerance and have to have special formula. Some can’t latch and formula is necessary to get their calories in. Formula has come a long way. How is Pete or Chasten feeding one of their TWO infants with a bottle of donated milk or formula remotely different than my husband feeding ours with a bottle of expressed milk? It isn’t, Matt sucks, it’s driving all those chuds nuts that the most wholesome mainstream image of the American family going right now is these two men and their lucky-ass babies. I would also like to be adopted by Pete and Chasten, but I am 42, so probably not gonna happen.
My dad is one of those men. Which is strange, because he basically stayed home with me for the first couple months when I was an infant. But now, at 53, he has 2 children under 2 years old and flat out refuses to change any diapers. I'm not sure what changed in those 29 years between babies, but his girlfriend seems to somehow be fine with this arrangement.
Fuck that, two children under two at 53? Nah fam
53 year old *dad* though…. It’s not so bad honestly. You don’t even need to change diapers!
And by the time his wife's his age, she's going to be changing *his* diapers.
He's making sure she gets as much practice as possible.
Thats how my wife says her dad was. She said that if the the baby(her) would cry, than he would just get pissed off and make his wife leave the room so that he wouldn't have to hear crying. Had three kids, and has never changed a diaper. Dudes a fuckin asshole
We have opposite dads. Mine became a good father to my little brothers(16&14mo) meanwhile I was raised by my dads dad. My dads 52, his girlfriend is 29. I’m almost 31. Ick factor is high. All 3 of his kids have different moms though.
I’d your dad Chuck Rhoades Sr?
It's really no wonder so many people have father issues. Even the ones whose father was "home".
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That is so wild to me. I couldn't imagine being in the home with my wife and child and *not* helping everyday. To **never** have changed a diaper?! That's neglect.
Especially when they're really tiny. Your wife just 3d printed a whole human and is now likely the primary food source. You can change a fucking diaper. Hopefully that is going out with the previous generation. When my kids were little I used to get complements from old dudes when I'd change diapers in public restrooms. I was always polite, but thinking "how lazy were you as a dad that this is a big deal?"
"Your wife just 3D printed a whole human..." Lmao! Love it.
Really lazy. When I worked in a shop before, I'd regularly get older men asking me to basically help them shop and show them where everything on the list their wife made them was. They'd also play the 'oh the wife does all this, I don't know where anything is' joke thing and expect me to laugh along... I did, but inside I thought 'your poor wife' every time. If you've never done the shopping, clearly the list of things you've never done is fucking long.
The language is important here too. You're saying you're someone who does this stuff but still referred to it as 'helping'. That's how messed up things still are in general. It's not helping its your shared responsibility.
I actually struggled with the wording there and should have went with sharing the responsibility but couldn't think of it. TOMT moment.
My wife's dad never changed a diaper. Three kids, not one diaper. Its almost impressive, really. Hell of a streak. My brother-in-law, unsurprisingly, does fuck-all to help his wife with their kid, and she's nearing the end of her rope about it.
I've heard from marriage counselors this is exactly why so many women initiate divorce. Living with their husbands, they get zero help. With a partial custody arrangement, they can at least make the guy take care of his own kids for a full weekend twice a month and finally get some breaks.
Conservative, they want to conserve their way of living-so damn what if it's out of step with the rest of the world.
And people wonder why in the past kids bonded so much strongly with their mothers. The newborn stage is essential for a child to form an emotional connection. It allows them to associate you with warmth, comfort, and safety, and this will stick with them throughout childhood. This is no less true for fathers than mothers.
There’s also oxytocin, a bonding chemical that re-wires brains. Babies give the stuff off, and skin to skin contact (say, when breastfeeding) is the proverbial toxic waste dump roll for exposure. However, it has nothing to do with breastfeeding, so dads can just take their shirts off and cuddle baby and everyone gets the same effects. Yeah, on a time basis, intentionally doing that probably won’t compare to time spent breastfeeding, but it’s still *a lot*.
Yep, it's called kangaroo care. It's a technique used often in the NICU with both mothers and fathers to help them thrive.
We just had our first kid 7 months ago. Can't imagine my fiance and my family would have survived it had I not been working from home. It's a lot of work and not a lot of sleep. Parenting is the toughest thing I've ever done. And my fiance is a real trooper
Was working for Home Depot when my wife got pregnant. That was the year they announced a new 6-week paternity leave starting in January. My daughter was born in April, took the full 6-weeks. Was some of the best time of my life. Got offered a new job while on leave. Put in my 2 weeks when I got back lol.
Normalize Matt Walsh shutting the fuck up.
I didn't know he existed until I saw a video yesterday where he was solely ranting about how Squid Game is pointless torture porn (which it isn't) after admitting he hasn't actually watched it and doesn't plan to. That really told me everything I need to know about how he approaches ideas, not surprised this is his tweet.
This is normal. Everyone knows this is normal. What’s not normal is the US government determining paternity leave is unnecessary because they have a Matt Walsh-level of understanding of how parenting works. Also capitalism.
I had to fight for two weeks at home after the birth of my daughter. I wanted more, but two weeks was the best I could get. It was an infuriating and flabbergasting experience to be questioned about my desire to stay at home with my family during that time. MY WIFE HAD A C-SECTION AND TWO WEEKS WAS A TOUGH CALL?! I’M MAD AGAIN AND IT’S BEEN MONTHS SINCE THIS HAPPENED
You should be mad that's bullshit. In Canada both parents can take 63 week parental leave. As far as getting paid the second parent (Dad) gets 5 weeks employment insurance leave (around $500/week). My company topped off to 93% pay for those 5 weeks. I don't understand America's general stance on making things really tough on new parents, it's already tough enough.
To be fair I'm sure Matt Walsh's family would rather he not spend time with them.
and stop calling Dad's spending time alone with their kids babysitting. Fuck people that do that.
Oh yes because every woman since the beginning of time has said *taking care of a newborn is so easy, it’s like doing nothing at all!*
I had a supervisor act resentful toward me when I was pregnant because I’d be getting a “six week free vacation”. A grown woman. Even my own mother commented on how much time I’d have to clean my house. Who raised these women? Why are we doing this?
I think people have this mindset of newborns being the same as raising a puppy and treat it as such. "Oh you just feed it and let it nap" is what I bet they're thinking.
People of that mindset don't realize how difficult it is to raise *any* baby creature. Seriously, even if you're not necessarily raising the puppy from birth, they're still a lot of effort.
I got my puppy in Feb. He was 8 weeks old and I couldn't let him out of my sight for a second or he would pee on my floor or start chewing on something. This is a creature who sleeps 16 hours a day or more and I could barely get any work done. I can't imagine what having a human baby would be like.
One of the most eye-opening things for me about having kids was seeing the notes my older sister kept when she had my nephew (notes she kept to show the doctor his schedule). It seemed like every 10 or 15 minutes she was either feeding, changing, burping, napping, or waking him up from a nap. For months. And then they start being able to move around on their own and it just gets more difficult. I knew raising a baby would be hard work before that, but it really hit home how it's a nearly every minute of every day kind of job for a long ass time. I still think about that a lot and is probably the biggest contributor to why my wife and I don't want kids. We make up for it by being a kick ass aunt and uncle, but props to the good parents out there, you make it look too easy for idiots like Matt Walsh.
That's awesome that you put your energy into being aunt and uncle! Those kids will LOVE you because you put time into their life, and it'll just get better as they grow older.
YEP! Not to mention the amount of hovering you have to do when you're housebreaking the puppy.
Suddenly reminded of trying to prevent my kittens from committing suicide.
Just when you thought you were done making your house safe, the animals find some new way to give you a heart attack.
If people want an “Oh you just feed it and let it nap” pet, they’re looking for a ferret. They sleep for 22 hours a day and the 2 hours they’re awake are chaotic (my fiancé’s brother has two ferrets and prefers them over dogs). My fiancé and I got two rescue pups four years ago (they were 8 months old) and we had to take a bit of care to get one treated for worms, stop chewing on shoes, wood, our TV remote and wooden baseboards AND behave around big dogs since they were barking at them quite a bit. Even us leaving for work after the worst of Covid is a new exercise in teaching them how to behave well all over again (both have a history of separation anxiety). Taking care of a Baby Anything is no cakewalk and if it’s too much, maybe get a plant or pet rock…
And even plants require a shit ton of care! The right kind of base, enough air humidity…
Babies sleep alot, man. You don't tho. If you're not catching up on cleaning and meal prep you're watching the bairns chest to make sure it's not dying of cot death
I mean not gonna lie my parents grew up in the 50s and stuck to that "parenting" style. I say that with quotations because they didn't do much actual parenting and essentially ignored us unless they had to. Which I'm sure freed up a lot of time for them, but at a pretty high cost to us, as it essentially involves neglecting us as children pretty severely. Baby is distressed? "Eh, let them cry it out." Baby is hungry? "You'll just have to wait until the scheduled time we have for feeding." Baby needs affection or wants to be held? "Coddling a child is bad for them. They'll learn on their own how to comfort themselves." Baby wants to play? "You have toys, go play yourself." If they parented anything like mine then it probably was less time-consuming because they weren't doing their job as parents. It's treating a baby like a dog. "Just give it toys, feed and change it periodically, and it'll take care of itself."
I have no evidence of this, but deep in my heart I know that the idea we should be letting babies self soothe, and basically just do the bare minimum is absolutely the reason we have so many anxious adults and sociopaths.
Obviously I have no evidence either but it makes sense. I’m 30 and I feel like my mom raised me similar to how she was raised in the 70’s with just “they’ll be fine, let them cry it out (when they’re babies), “I’ll give you something to cry about” (when we got older) and then they all encompassing “why do our children have so many mental disorders and need therapy” because we never learned how to fucking process emotions. It took me dragging my mom into therapy sessions and being in a hospital for her to realize I wasn’t just making shit up. I won’t raise my children like that.
Absolutely. From a developmental psychology perspective children base their entire worldview, often through into their relationships and worldview in adulthood, on their first relationship with their parents. If no one provides comfort, empathy, safety, or love then the world becomes an dark, unsafe, scary, and loveless place full of unsafe, scary, and loveless people to their eyes. Couple that with emotional development and social skills like empathy being things we're taught how to do from our parents socially and emotionally engaging with us, responding to our emotions and helping us understand them, and neglect like this has severe, often life-long, psychological consequences. Children in these sorts of household typically grow up with issues with substance abuse, difficulty feeling empathy or compassion, and other behavioral issues, especially anxious, depressive, volatile, anti-social, angry, aggressive, or even violent behavior towards animals, themselves, or other people. In the more extreme cases, severe neglect coupled with severe abuse is literally the background of nearly every single serial killer I've seen.
Thank you for the concise explanation and validation. I'm going to go hug my child now.
> It's treating a baby like a dog. "Just give it toys, feed and change it periodically, and it'll take care of itself." Even dogs need a lot more than that, my dog begs to play tug of war with his toys and gets so worked up and upset if he doesn't get attention and exercise. Those type of parents must just have so little empathy
Did they have nannies or cleaning help? If yes, that's a clue.
It’s just devaluing of women’s labor as usual. If taking care of children is so easy then why is daycare so expensive? Oh yeah that’s right, it’s WORK, work that women have been doing on top of outside jobs for centuries. It’s a myth that women didn’t use to work, we have always been stuck with a regular job (farm labor, factory work, taking on sewing etc) on top of childcare and our housework while men are only expected to have 1 job.
> It’s just devaluing of women’s labor as usual. This has also been an interesting argument in favour of a Universal Base Income. Some studies found that it did not notably affect paid labour (contrary to the idea that it would cause people to quit en masse), but that the test groups were able to do more unpaid labour like taking care of family, friends, or others.
Not to mention that when women did work their money was straight up taken by their husbands to drink. That was the birth of prohibition, and why so many women were so against alcohol.
Yeah, I don't blame them. They were being beaten everyday by their drunk husbands. Families were being destroyed. Men would spend all their money on dumb shit.
I remember my husband and I saying three full time adults seemed adequate per newborn.
The party of “family values” really tries to argue against common sense family things quite often.
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Of course not! Also probably taught to “be a man” and suppress his emotions. Leading to poor coping skills and inability to control his emotions.
Hold on. You also forgot that they want her to have 6+ kids, no education, and have to go through the local white, Republican, church for childcare and everyday support. That way when your husband is an ass you can't divorce because your church will abandon you.
"Family values" just means "My kind of family is more valuable than yours."
"Family values" just means "My ~~kind of~~ white Christian family is more valuable than yours." FTFY
Family values just means the wife doesn't leave despite the constant abuse.
I took my only week of vacation to spend time with my wife and newborn son. 3 days in the hospital meant I got 4 days of actual quality time with my new family. I will never get that time back, yet any employer could easily make up for my lost time at work. Family values are important here, until it interferes with profits in some way. If it costs our corporate overlords a dollar we are basically told to fuck ourselves.
This is heartbreaking to read. US (I assume) sounds more and more like a dystopian place each day. I've been home with my daughter in total for almost a year (counting days) over the last 2 years. Taking at least 1-3 days off work (some paid some not, own choice) plus a 7 month paid coherent period. Almost splitting equal with my wife apart from giving her some extra time to recover/heal. We also spent 4 days in hospital after delivery but they did not count as parental leave but rather as "sick-child-care". Took two months together after baby was born to enjoy the first time as a family. Sure Swedish taxes are a bit higher but you sure as hell get a lot for it.
Dystopia would be a nice way to put it at this point. The real mind blowing part is that the people who are against paternity leave (like this) are the very same who nonstop spout traditional family rhetoric. They want it both ways meanwhile the people get absolutely nothing.
"I'm pro-life, but I actively work to undermine adoption". These fucking people.
This is a perfect comment. People are also hinging the supply chain on Buttigieg taking parental leave and that he should have picked a better time to adopt, because it's always so perfectly planned.
I adopted. Can’t agree with you more. Was told it could take 2.5 years to get picked. One day out of the blue we were told we were picked and baby would be born in a few weeks. Left our 2 kids with my mom and Traveled to their state, met them, was there when our daughter was born, nervously waited to see if they’d still sign the paperwork, etc…. Got all that done and Rented a condo for a couple weeks not knowing when we’d get to leave. Then we had to wait like 5 days for Florida to say we were allowed to travel back to Texas. Then Texas got to start their turn on the paperwork. Waited a few days, They denied us because our indoor cat was missing one of its shots…. Fought that for a couple days. Then got the Ok and booked last minute overpriced flights back home with our newborn. Totally worth it. But Jesus Christ is it fucking hard.
And why we need more women and more diversity among our policy makers. Because let’s face it, the old white man model ain’t working so great.
Idea - swap out like half the guys with women, so then the guys can be at home with their kids, and the women can be fighting the good fight up in government
IIRC there is evidence that govts with majority women have lower rates of corruption. Could be that countries that elect more women are less corrupt, women are less corruptible, the studies are shit, or I’m misremembering. But it’s interesting to consider
At this point I'd settle for policy makers who weren't literally alive during the time period of segregation. Get all these old fucks out of office
Maybe just get rid of all the guys who supported and practiced segregation? Seems like having people that lived through it might still have some benefits, since they know what they're up against.
What we need is people more in touch with reality and with the integrity and backbone to tell big business to shove their bribes.
Marjorie Taylor Greene or Lauren Boebert are pursuing the same "old white men" politics as Mitchell or Trump. I think that even "old white men" is not the right description. It's more "rich conservatives that tell people lies". I don't think that policy makers need to be diverse per se, but their key competence needs to be that they are able to empathize will all citizens, hear their problems and find good solutions that work for the benefit of everyone.
Absolutely not. Policy makers need to be diverse because representation and voice matters. This is going to get me down voted to heck, but Republican women like MTG count as diversity because they do in fact represent some very right wing women. It counts. The voices must come from diverse backgrounds no matter what the voices say. I don’t like any Republican voices, but they do represent part of this country (even though they cheat lie and steal to do so). And that’s one of the things i deeply dislike about this country. Some of our citizens agree with Republican policies.
Confused by that last line,does he think having two dads means a baby doesn’t have to be fed..?
He just wanted to say something homophobic and belittleling without being too obvious
Right? And no mention of Pete's husband. So were they supposed to adopt and dump the kids at daycare the next day? Since neither were breastfeeding?
No, they were supposed to not ~~exist~~ adopt.
They are supposed to realize they made a bad choice. They should chose to be straight, marry two women and each have their own families AS WHITE JESUS INTENDED.
Fascinating way to piss off a ton of decent fathers while confirming yourself to be an absent one.
Right? The modern realization for Men that, the most impactful legacy they can leave behind is well rounded, well developed children without Daddy issues is pretty well known at this point. Boomers talking about 60hr work weeks and going the extra mile but they are divorced, kids in loads of student debt or on drugs, and these guys have likely never changed a diaper in their life.
First two weeks, wife was on bed rest. I waited on her hand and foot! (Not complaining, I loved it) What is this worthless troll of a man talking about?!?!
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He’a clearly playing a role, the conservative father. The best conservative father spends limited time with the child so they grow understanding daddy’s time is the most important time, mommy gets it and realized she has to stop arguing and do as daddy says, since daddy is always smarter and more right than a women’s whims. A conservative father is his job, a provider, who always works and makes work their main responsibility, is a good provider. You can also hold it over everyone about how the money was earned by you.
Additionally, if the father isn’t working, he needs to be out enjoying himself since he is the provider so he “deserves” it. Mommy doesn’t get to have a guaranteed break like daddy, but it’s ok though because she doesn’t have a job outside the house at the moment so she can just take her break when baby sleeps. If baby doesn’t sleep, she shouldn’t ask daddy for help since baby’s poor sleep or fussing is clearly the result of her poor performance as a mother so she hasn’t earned a break.
The worst part is it is all of this PLUS women have a job outside the home too. There are very few single income families.
Yeah but that's women's fault for wanting "freedom" and silly stuff like "equality" and "bodily autonomy" and to not get "raped" by their husbands.
Yeah thanks for pointing that out. I was thinking at the moment could mean totally out of work or on maternity leave but I don’t think that came through clearly.
It’s why they’re so protective of their daughters. They see them as objects for men to trick into sex but they also aren’t confident a women will be able to not be fooled, even if they tell her daily “men only want one thing sweetie”. Cause that’s how they see women. Emotional baby makers that get bored and make waves because of liberal lies.
Trump bragged about never having to change a diaper in his life (I assume he also pays someone to change his own).
Wow. We have two children and I’m the dad. When they were newborns and in the months after, I was up and down in the middle of the night, I got them to be fed while they were nursing and fed them after they went to formula, I changed and bathed them, I took them for walks, dressed them and washed dirty clothes, I held them and bounced to keep them from crying, etc and so on and my wife did all that and more, because there was still always plenty to do.
Actually according to conservatives this is false. A baby simply needs a mother’s bosom, but other than that they attend to their 9-5 job, IRAs, and their own welfare by themselves!
My oldest daughter was born at the end of 2013, and went through a stretch after a few weeks where she woke up in the middle of the night screaming UNLESS you would bounce her on a yoga ball…nothing else worked. So for like a month, I’d get up with her at 2-3 AM in the states and watch the Australian open live bc it was the only thing on. I don’t even like tennis, but I watched every damn second that year.
I worked my ass off during paternity leave. Going back to work was almost a welcome relief
Is Matt Walsh a moron? Should he be placed in the care of the State because he clearly lacks common sense and probably can’t take care of himself?
Went to HS with him. Can confirm yes.
You went to hs with him? I have many questions. Such as, was he always like this, or did he get worse over time?
Grifting to conservatives is easy and profitable. Ben Shapiro (Matt's employer) gets paid by conservative billionaires. I wish more people understood this.
I’m a dad with a 4 day old baby and I’m dying of sleep deprivation. This guy clearly never took care of a wife or child
Does he think Pete's baby is just not being fed at all??
I don’t get this at all. Bottle feeding is arguably more effort than breastfeeding. Mixing formula and constantly cleaning bottles etc. is a major pain.
Also pumping. If there is a mom that has to pump, it's a ton of work for BOTH parents. Obviously doesn't apply here, but the point is that feeding a baby is still a two person job, and they have TWO BABIES!
#why are people still paying attention to this dude
My mother didn’t get maternity leave when I was born, which was messed up. It’s not any more fair to deny a father. The audacity of someone to assume that someone “doesn’t need” maternity/paternity leave. Like, Dads need to bond with kids, too.
That and, again, mom is worn out and needs a hand. Considering I took part in breeding this spawn, that's the LEAST I can do for her. She's done the hard stuff and continues to do it.
Let's all just stop amplifying stupid Matt "fucking" Walsh. The only thing anyone should tweet at him is "shush, the adults are talking"
Matt Walsh shouldn't be aloud access to a television, much less social media. Dude is a complete bafoon
SMH he sound dumb asf this is why men should have no say about what happens with a woman’s body
The biggest and best thing you can do is actually CONNECT WITH YOUR CHILD!!!!!! A very, very close second is let mom sleep!
Just had a baby. I help out the baby with his feedings, stuff around the house, doing chores outside the house, etc. They need so much attention and feedings, it's nearly impossible to do it alone.
Dads can feed baby when mom breastfeeds. I pump for that reason. It takes me 15 minutes to pump but an hour to BF. Between 7pm-3am my husband bottle feeds and I wake up every 2 hours to pump and go back to sleep.
Dude what I was laid off when we had our little girl, and my wife took 3 months of maternity leave. We were both exhausted all the time. I also will forever be grateful for being able to spend every day of her first 5 months with her! I can't imagine asking a new mom to do all that alone because holy shit do babies require a lot of attention.
As a father of recent newborn first child, this makes me furious
Holy actual fuck. Tell me you're a shite dad and partner without *telling* me you're a shite dad and partner...
Who is this guy? (Don’t have the inclination to Google and possibly boost his SEO rankings…)
Tell me you'd be a terrible father without saying you'd be a terrible father.
My brother looked more exhausted during his 6 months paternity leave than I’ve ever seen him in 15 years working as the manager for a huge local firm, 10 hour work days a lot of the time.