Tuesday, August 14th, 2007...4:38 pm
People Get Paid for This Shit.
I want to be an advice columnist when I grow up. Because seriously? The people doing it now? Are morons. Like this chick. From a recent column:
Q: My job is prone to last-minute emergencies.Two other people have the same position as I do. They both have children; I do not. Whenever one of these last-minute emergencies pops up, my co-workers suddenly remember that “little Johnny” needs to be picked up from soccer or “little Amy” has ballet. I am always (without exception) the one who gets stuck with the last-minute projects. Just because I don’t have children doesn’t mean I don’t have obligations outside work. My boss simply thinks that mine are less important. Recently, my vacation, which I requested three months in advance, was bumped because my co-worker needed to take off the same week because of her children. Should I take this to our human resources department or just look for another job?
A: Neither. Use this situation to your advantage — to increase your salary. You are clearly worth more as an employee because you are there to cover all emergency projects. Keep track of all the projects and their successful outcomes. Write a sales memo to your boss and to HR on yourself: Your skills, your availability and your contributions to the department justify a higher salary. If your boss can’t do more for you, then look for a new job. Don’t, however, complain to your boss or HR about the working mothers in your department. Raising children is a full-time job. They know you have an outside life, but they also know that managing two full-time jobs is more difficult than childless people can imagine. Go for more money, and be happy you don’t have the double responsibility.
Does anybody but me think that this answer is bullshit?
The writer of the letter didn’t bitch about her salary. She bitched about always having to stay late when the people with kids left and about her vacation being rescheduled – because her co-workers’ obligations with their kids were more “important” than her single person ones.
Um, as far as I know, Roe v. Wade is still in effect. If you don’t believe in abortion, there’s adoption. There are also many safe and effective methods of preventing pregnancy. Point is, you have a choice of whether or not to have kids. When you decide to raise a family, you know that there will be sacrifices on your part. Those of us without kids have decided that we don’t want to make those sacrifices, or don’t want to make them yet. That does not, however, mean that we are all alone in the world and don’t have anyone who gives a shit about us. We’re not all going home to an empty apartment. Our friends and husbands and boyfriends and girlfriends and brothers and sisters and aunts and uncles and cousins and nieces and nephews (or some combination of the above) all care about us. When we make plans with them, it’s important….their time is just as valuable as someone’s child’s.
Plus, our vacations? Are sometimes scheduled in advance, around an event. You move it a week, it prevents us from going. Sometimes, plane tickets aren’t refundable. We may be going on vacation with other people, and their vacation may not be able to be moved at the last minute.
All people with kids don’t do shit like this person’s co-workers. Some of them do things like go get their kids, bring them to the office, and sit them down with some office supplies and tell them to play quietly for an hour while work gets done. Or they have the kids’ other parent pick them up. Or ask the babysitter to stay late. Or take work home with them.
The point I’m trying to make is that (a) people shouldn’t get to follow a different set of rules because of their kids and (b) money doesn’t always make up for plans you had to cancel.
I guess my real problem with the whole issue is one of fairness. While I realize, through a lifetime of demonstrations, that life is not fair, we have laws in place that are designed to make the workplace as fair as possible. It’s not ok to discriminate based on gender or disability. It’s not ok to sexually harass or otherwise intimidate your co-workers. But it is ok to use your kids to get out of shit you don’t want to do? Not so much. If you really have childcare issues, try to find a job that either doesn’t require you to stay late or one with a daycare on site. Or find a babysitter who can be on call to pick the kids up if you have to work late sometimes. Point is, you shouldn’t get a free pass because the daycare closes at 6. Your co-worker may have a hot date after not getting any for months, or a sick parent or friend, or tickets to an event, or may just want to go the fuck home and have some chocolate and play Rocket Mania. That is our choice.
My New Favorite Song: Band of Horses - “St. Augustine”
Today’s Time Waster: Harry Potter - Spoilers of a Sort.
What I’m Craving: Lunch - but nothing sounds good.
10 Comments
August 14th, 2007 at 5:16 pm
i know that song! also, rocket mania? i heard all the cool kids are playing jewels of atlantis…
August 14th, 2007 at 5:53 pm
You know, I have the same situation at my job, actually. Out of nine female psychologists, 3 are of nonchildbearing age, and of the remaining 6, 3 have had babies within the last year.
Of the preschool intake team, I am the only one without a baby under the age of 2. Or a baby period, for that matter.
So I always get the harder cases, extra projects, and looked at when it’s time to volunteer for something for the psych team. If I have to hear things like “this job is not going to take time away from me and my baby” one more time, I’ll scream.
It’s not like I can ask for a raise, because government/school employees are on a fixed salary dependent upon experience, not workload. The school district has to give everyone a raise, not just the workhorse without the kids.
What it honestly makes me feel like is that my life outside of work is considered pointless and stupid because I don’t have a kid. So when they get to waltz in late and leave right on the dot after taking 1 1/2 hour lunch, I get to come in early, stay late, and eat at my desk, packing up work to take home.
It’s fucking bullshit.
August 14th, 2007 at 5:57 pm
That advice was worthless. That woman either needs to find a new job or grow a spine and tell her boss “Forget it, I have a life, too!”
August 14th, 2007 at 6:14 pm
I am allergic to children! Oh, and I have the excuse of “I have to go home and give my kats their medication”. *cheese*
August 14th, 2007 at 9:29 pm
Once I cut the tip of my finger off with an exacto knife at work. Had to get 7-8 stitches. Was in severe pain, but I came in the next morning, but typing proved to be too painful so I went home. The day after I returned and typed and stayed even though in pain. Everyone glared at me for missing the previous day. My co-worker with a 13 year old son, then had to drive him to summer camp. Did she get time off? Yup! Did anyone glare at her and bitch behind her back? Nope. Definitely some double standards working there.
August 14th, 2007 at 11:50 pm
On the other hand, these women could have shittards for a husband who think it’s a woman’s job to do ANYTHING with the kids, therefore she must be the one to change her schedule when something comes up. At least that’s how it is in my marriage. Add to that Hubby chuckling at any job I’ve ever had as “cute” and “a hobby” because I don’t make nearly as much as he does, yet I HAVE to get a job now.
Of course, this woman could just say “sorry, I’m taking my vacay NOW! See you in two weeks!”
August 15th, 2007 at 1:03 am
I call BULLSHIT. Fuck that dope and her advice. Have sympathy for the parents with two full-time jobs? Kiss my ass. I’m so sick of the self-righteousness of people with kids toward those who do not. (can you tell I’ve had a few run-ins with this lately?)
August 15th, 2007 at 2:17 am
Allow, for a moment, someone who has worked both sides of this issue to have a little say.
That advice was NOT complete bullshit. A job is a job, and it’s what you do. If the nature of the beast is that there are always little fires and the people with the kids aren’t there to put them out, then you should get more money for being the one to do it.
Bottom line - If it needs done, someone needs to do it. If it isn’t the ones with families, then the one that is doing it needs compensated accordingly. The vacation thing was extremely unfair, and I would’ve taken that time off and left with my middle finger high in the air. For all the other times though, it’s just a matter of getting the fucking job done, and if you’re the one getting it done while others don’t, you should get more. If she doesn’t want a job where the shit needs done in crunchtime, then she should get a new one.
That said, I’ve been the victim of a prevailing philosophy that “this just needs done”. I’ve had to tell my boss that, “while I appreciate deadlines and all, it’s not like we’re curing fucking cancer here. I’m going home to my FAMILY, and what I don’t get done today I will get done tomorrow. If you want Schmoe in the other cube to stay late and do it, then remember that when it comes time to handing out bonuses and forego ME for HIM.”
I can fully respect everyone on this page’s sentiments about not having a family and feeling like they’re the ones making up for those who do. I’ve been there and I resented the hell out of it as well.
Thing is though, for every one job (or person) who is slagging off work because of some bullshit-sounding excuse, there are more who are catching shovelfulls of shit and taking pay cuts because their kid got legitimately ill, and there really wasn’t anything else they could do but stay home and take care of them.
And you know what? There are a fair few of us out there that think it needs said, and said loudly, that a job is just a job 95% of the time, and it will NEVER take priority over “little Johnny’s” soccer game.
I forget who said it, but I love and live by the quote that “nobody ever said on their deathbed, ‘I sure wish I spent more time at work instead of with my family.’”
August 15th, 2007 at 2:37 am
Tag!
This brings to mind a subject that I am fairly passionate about - family friendly workplaces.
So, we have engineered a society that pretty much makes a woman choose between career and family. If you think you can have it all, trust me, you are fooling yourself. While it is entirely possible to have the career and then shoot sprouts, you are not ‘having it all.’ No, you are sacrificing time spent with the kid, not concentrating entirely on the job, and worst of all I think, you have to attend to emergencies at home via leaving the office with the demeanour of a puppy that has pissed on the carpet. It shouldn’t be this way!
Whatever country you live in, the government has an interest in keeping the middle and upper classes breeding. We need that next generation of thinkers and doers. It is an unattractive prospect however, so many women are either choosing career first, baby later (which results in, whoops! Infertility! more often than you know) or they are choosing a career alone.
Anti-family attitudes, whether they be from the worker, the boss, or the corporation perpetuate a bad situation. It needs widespread tackling - in-building daycare, whatever. I have the questions, not the answers… but they are definitely questions that need asked. Put it this way - ‘welfare’-type families have a lot less hesitation to procreate. What does this mean for the future?
August 15th, 2007 at 9:31 pm
Me again. I did forget about the time I scheduled a 10 day vacation for the last ten days of the year (i.e., Christmas/New Years). I was working in 2 dept. at that same job and way underpaid. Anyways, woman with kids got a hangnail or something and had a total emergency (cough, Christmas shopping) and I ended up only getting 3 days off and losing my earned 10 day vacation. You had to take the vacation before the end of the year you see. And my boss also suddenly threw me this massive project. I had to put together a 120 page book in like 2 days, while Princess went to the mall. It was shortly after that I had a breakdown and eventually went on disability. Sometimes its just sheer mismanagement that screws everything up. Or bosses with no balls who will fold when they have a prima donna demanding things (and we certainly had several where I worked. I was constantly getting hit with their flack). So maybe its a combination of everything, Loop!
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