(no subject)

[whitefootwolf.livejournal.com]

So here's a question. It's not really tech supporty, except in the fact that I work tech support. :D

Was in a long distance long term relationship with my ex-bf. At some point, we had that discussion about getting married and who moves to where who is and the v. silly discussion of whose job was better. At some point in the discussion, he asid something along the lines of "well, it doesn't really matter because you'll just be quitting in few years anyway to have our kids." (Background on that v. silly comment is that I don't want kids. Although, i'm open to changing my mind, the feeling has persisted for a good 4 years and is only getting stronger. I'm a grumpy onld woman and I'm only 23! DAMN KIDS GET OFF MY YARD.)

It really struck me as a 'one day, you'll grow out of wanting to play career woman and go bck to raising babies as God intended.'

Anyway, that can be pretty easily written off as a one-off thing, except that someone else I work with recently expressed a similar opinion when talking about our futures at our current company.

This feeling seems to be more prevalent than I thought...has anyone else run into it recently?

Comments

[matgb]

Sometimes, you get that sort of attitude, but it's horribly dated to my mind; sounds like that relationship ended for a good reason anyway.

Planning to have kids with my current g/f, also currently long term, but there's no way I'd expect her to give up work, for starters she'd go nuts, but she's also already got a 4 year old and a perfectly good job.

Cultural differences, but in the UK that sort of attitude expressed within a workplace would count as discrimination.

[jahbulon.livejournal.com]

How is it discrimination?

[matgb]

An expectation within a firm that women will leave to have kids is treated as a de facto denial of opportunity to them, it's expected of employers to ensure women are given equal access to everything and that cultural expecatations are not built up.

If you don't believe you can get a promotion because everyone expects you to leave soon, you might not even bother applying or working towards it, so it's treated as a bad thing.

[superbus.livejournal.com]

I don't think it's prevalent in the tech community any more than it is in our backwards, God-fearing society.

If anything, my experiences with women in tech support are refreshing. Maybe having every run of the ladder above my own in the chain of command being occupied by a tech-savvy woman helps.

[hangar.livejournal.com]

I don't think it's prevalent in the tech community any more than it is in our backwards, God-fearing society.

Unless the tech support is based in an extremely backwards, god-fearing town.. like mine. I live five miles from a town called "Cut N Shoot" - and Google it, I WISH I was kidding.

[gotica.livejournal.com]

Australia is backwards.. or at least Perth.

"You can't be a girl in IT, you must be the secretary or something, get one of the guys to help me."

I get that type of response fairly often and I've noticed it comes from the women more often than not.

[trixtah.livejournal.com]

Mmmmm, I don't know if I agree with that (although I am living in Australia right now). I don't think it's more prevalent in the tech community than any other industry which comprises about 80%+ men. Which leaves us with defense and engineering.

While most of the guys I work with personally know I'd rip their goolies off if they said anything like that, there is often an underlying expectation that women will go off at some point and sprog, especially the more "girlie" members of the team.

[mouser.livejournal.com]

In the last year where I work with non-tech folk, we've had two women go from "non/no more" to "Well, now that I *am* preggers I want one!"

[kyidyl.livejournal.com]

Well...that doesn't mean they ALL will. Some do. Or, they adapt when they have an accident. *shrugs* But it's stupid to assume a woman will want to change her mind.

[whitefootwolf.livejournal.com]

Amen to that. If there was a baby, I'd certianly be quitting my job and taking care of the creature until it was atleast in grade school...possibly high school, depending on the child. (And with the current S/O, it'd be me quitting cause he makes/can make better bank than I currently do.)

Thing is, I'm not planning to, so it'd have to be an accident. :)

Thing is, staying home and parenting is just not an attractive career choice for me. Sure, I'd do it if circumstances required it, but that's not how I plan my life to go.

[superbus.livejournal.com]

Which is why most SMART couples wait until they're to the point where they can get by on one salary for awhile before having kids~ :)

[falnfenix]

mmmm yeah, if anyone at work brought up my future with children and how it would affect my ability to work they'd be taken to HR. it's none of their business what may or may not happen.

if my significant other expected me to quit working to have babies, well, he'd have a rude awakening as well...i'm not planning on having anyone's children, and am seriously considering getting some form of sterilization procedure to ensure such a thing.

quite a few people out there have what i like to call "baby rabies," and assume everyone else around them will want kids just because they have them or want them.

[gotica.livejournal.com]

They're cute for like 30 mins, then the parentals can have em back.

Was going to have one just to keep the bloodline going but now I'm even rethinking that.

If you're a guy, don't ride a motorbike after the proceedure :P

[tecie.livejournal.com]

It's a lousy attitude for your BF to have -- if he seriously thinks that you'll throw away your career to pop out some rug rats for him and then raise them while he does "real manly work" then I would suggest you seriously reconsider your relationship. It sounds like a lack of respect for you and the work you do.
That said, many women can and do manage to balance having a career and kids. If you want to not have one or the other, then get rid of one -- but you CAN have both.

[whitefootwolf.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah, that's one of the main reasons he's an ex. :)

Also, there was the discussion of last names....his is the most common in the US, and mine's like....the 9000th most common. His reason for not wanting to take my last name? "Well, I've been a Smith all my life." Funny how that works--I've had my last name all my life too! ;)

[jill-idle.livejournal.com]

people change their mind. and there may be a physiological/hormonal drive that kicks in that may have you changing your mind once you hit a certain age. I've personally witnessed this happen enough times to know that a person should never say never. the bf should not have any expectation that you'll change your mind, but you should also not be certain you won't either.

the future is unwritten.

[gilmoure.livejournal.com]

Wife and I were looking at long term tech support jobs over in Europe, when, a few weeks after Y2K (really good party), found out we had a little one on the way (weird that daughter has 3 cousins all born within 2 weeks of her). That scrapped our plans of working overseas but wife only took 6 weeks off work here in states. She doesn't like any one else taking care of her servers!

[gracewanderer.livejournal.com]

Break up with him. Seriously. You don't want the same things.

[fruitylips.livejournal.com]

Of course. The reason is that it's largely accurate. We have no idea if it will be accurate in your case, but I've known lots of women who swore up and down that they were never going to have kids when they were under 25 who suddenly changed their minds at 29-35.

I've been working in Silicon Valley for going on 15 years now. I can think of dozens of women who've changed their minds and are now mommies. I can think of 4 who haven't.

For the record, my VP is a mother of two. About half the execs in my company are women and mothers, so it doesn't seem to be holding them back.

[jamoche]

I've been working here for 15 years too. Still not interested in having kids, and I am now, obviously, past 35.

[wrench0626.livejournal.com]

You know, for a while there I thought this was an entry on Childfree, since that's on my flist too...

[sputtertoo.livejournal.com]

It's society at large. We ran into that when my wife got pregnant, first was the horror that we weren't going to move our wedding forward when we found out and second was the fact that my wife went right back to school while I took over the duties of primary caregiver and bread winner. Don't get me started on the last name thing, it was a lotta back and forth, we finally agreed to keep our names, as I was enlightened. However, the family refuses to acknoledge it, as we still get stuff addressed to Mr and Mrs LastName. I keep asking people who that is, I've only recently discovere dthat annoyance, so I think we are going to hyphonate our names so people can put Mr and Mrs and keep em happy, that and maybe they will acknowledge my wife's last name.

[devilkitty0.livejournal.com]

I've had the university students working on the help desk with me ask me when I was going to have children. Most of them are Asian, so I understand where they are coming from, but I haven't had them yet and there are cobwebs on the overies, so I don't think that it's happening.
They are all horrified though. No one to take care of me in my old age. I tell them that I can put myself in a home.

DK

[ateji.livejournal.com]

I hear about this sort of thing in hiring practices a lot, but I'm in cf_hardcore (that is, Childfree Hardcore) as well, so it comes up as a normal topic.

Honestly...it sounds like asshattery on the part of your ex to expect that you're not going back to work if you have kids. Like there's no choice.