[apparent]

A couple reasons:

Moms often nurse past infancy, and once she's taken 18-24 months off work, it makes more sense for her to continue the pause.

On average, moms seem to derive more enjoyment from spending time with babies. I have some male friends who had almost zero desire to spend time with their babies/toddlers. I don't know many women who feel similarly (I'm sure there are some, just many fewer).

[timcambrant]

Don't you dads take any parental leave? Maybe that's why they don't find enjoyment from spending time with their kids. Kids and parents need time together to bond properly, regardless of gender.

And why would the mom even continue staying at home at all once the kids are past infancy? Just drop the kids off at daycare and go to work, have lunch with colleagues, do inspiring work (compared to doing laundry or sitting by the playground), plan your career, make some money, save for retirement. Most kids are fine playing and learning with other kids at daycare unless they get picked up too late. I don't get why having a kid and staying home means being doomed to take 5-10 years off work. Unless it's a money thing of course - I get that not everyone has the luxury of paid parental leave, basically free daycare, etc.

[apparent]

I'm guessing from your handle that you're not a mom, and I'm guessing from your comment that you haven't talked to many about what they want. Most mothers of young children do not want to work full time. They want to work part time, or not at all. Telling them that they should drop off their kids at daycare and go further their career is just tone deaf. Some women want to do that (and don't need to be told to), but the vast majority of women do not. They love their babies/toddlers very deeply, and they take immense pleasure from being with them, taking care of them, and imprinting on them. My wife has a superstar career, but she regrets every work trip, misses her little ones so much when she's gone, and always calls to facetime them while she's away. I don't know any dads who feel that way.

As for

> Don't you dads take any parental leave?

Yeah, I sure did. I spend tons of time with my kids. Some dads like doing this, but not nearly as many as moms.

> Maybe that's why they don't find enjoyment from spending time with their kids. Kids and parents need time together to bond properly, regardless of gender.

This misunderstands the order. For moms, the desire to be with their baby is present from day one. For some dads, it is not. For some dads, it does not ever come. They only want to spend time with their kids when they are no longer babies, or even toddlers. Mothers, on the other hand, tend to be much more maternal out of the gates. That's literally why the word "maternal" comes from the root word for mother.

To be sure, there are some women who are not maternal. Generally they do not have kids, and they do not pair up with men who want kids. That's why in almost every family, the woman is more maternal than the man (which is one of the reasons that when deciding who will take more parental leave, the mother is usually the one).

[timcambrant]

> I'm guessing from your handle that you're not a mom

Correct.

> I'm guessing from your comment that you haven't talked to many about what they want.

Wrong.

I think we live in different cultures, which is fine. But I reject your notion that the norms of the culture you live in is somehow the globally correct one, and that it's biologically true somehow. I'm Scandinavian and I acknowledge that we have been early adopters of a free thinking discussion of what gender roles could be. We have both a (male and female) feminist avantgarde and a strong conservative block, all taking part in this conversation. Almost no-one are saying that the biological mission of females are to spend so much time with their kids that it affects their abilities to pursue a career. We tend to celebrate those who overcome hardships and make something of themselves, whether it's becoming professional workers, becoming published authors, launching brands, pursuing higher eductation and taking part in the societal discourse, etc.

I talk to parents all the time. In the private workforce, in the public sector, members of churches, workers in academia, founders of companies, as well as young people hoping to become parents one day.

Everyone agrees that being a parent is difficult, and that time management is a huge problem. Most people acknowledge that they might not be able to work full-time when their kids are small, but most absolutely do. This goes for men and women. I've had very successful male entrepreneurs brag about how much time they spent with their kids off and on work, much like you would imagine a woman do. The one outlier that I see are divorced women who especially struggle to find a way to combine being a parent when their former partner don't step up to the plate. They talk about this all the time, at work.

Men still generally suck at taking responsibility when their kids live with them 50% of the time. This goes for buying clothes, planning birthday parties, or But we are engaging when it comes to school, sports and leisure activities. Most kids pop into their dad's offices all the time to do homework or wait for a ride. But this is becoming more and more rare. Most divorced dads I know seem to be quite on par with their wives. Though I guess they clean their windows less often and are generally late when planning the winter wardrobe.

> This misunderstands the order. For moms, the desire to be with their baby is present from day one. For some dads, it is not. For some dads, it does not ever come. They only want to spend time with their kids when they are no longer babies, or even toddlers. Mothers, on the other hand, tend to be much more maternal out of the gates.

The word here is "some". I agree with you. But this doesn't have to be the norm, just like dads being violent or alcoholics doesn't have to be the norm. We can acknowledge the work it will take to shift from a society of male drunks with a tendency to get into fights and not feeling a genuine bond with their kids, and aim for a society where these former norms are mostly history. Until there is a backlash of course, then we start again.

I would like us to agree that the norm has been for a very long time that mothers have been engaging with their kids far more than dads have. And also that society isn't static. It changes all the time. Some things are biological and many things are not, and we don't need to see past societal truths as hard rules that force us to live a certain way. I'm sure there is a biological factor that can be proven to nudge this behavior in a certain direction, but I don't believe this should be seen as proof that some norms in society affecting most of the population are static and should be left unquestioned.

[apparent]

> I'm sure there is a biological factor that can be proven to nudge this behavior in a certain direction, but I don't believe this should be seen as proof that some norms in society affecting most of the population are static and should be left unquestioned.

The notion that biology is merely a nudge in this context, especially when huge hormonal surges are at play (both at birth and with nursing) is just not accurate. There is a reason that in basically every culture in the world, for thousands upon thousands of years, mothers have been the primary nurturers.

Could it be different? Sure. But we should be mindful that there is a reason that societies have developed the way they have, and not set our sights on a "goal" of fathers spending as much time with kids as mothers. This ignores the reality that mothers are, on average, more inclined to nurture than fathers. We should not urge them back to work, nor should we pretend that fathers "should" be as nurturing as mothers. That is not in our nature, (on average) quite literally.

[em-bee]

on the contrary, it makes less sense if you want women to get equal chance of a career at work. the likelihood of women staying at home reduces their chances at being promoted, causes them to get paid less, etc. the pay gap, which is supposed to disappear comes from this difference.

if you want to equalize this then you effectively need to force dads to stay at home for the same amount of time as moms, so that their careers are affected in the same way.[1]

of course this won't work without a massive change in culture. men have no interest in spending time with children because that's what they learned from their own parents.

i wanted to stay with my children, but when i did i hated it because i had no role model to draw on. i didn't know what to do with them.

my wife also wasn't very helpful with guidance.

interestingly this is worse in europe than it is in china. i see more men taking care of children in china. of course most of those are grandparents but at least they provide the needed role models. this correlates with more equality of women in the work place. (although it is still far from ideal)

[1]that then leaves the issue of childless people having a career advantage. if you want people to keep having children that advantage must be eliminated, hence making the case for child support for everyone. germany pays almost 300$ per child per month regardedless of income. and even that is not enough. stay at home parents should have their time count as worked for their pension, or they may need a full salary for example. i don't know what would really work here.

[apparent]

> men have no interest in spending time with children because that's what they learned from their own parents.

It sounds like this was the case for you, but it doesn't mean it is the case for other men. It isn't the case for the dads I know who didn't have an in being around their babies/toddlers. They simply did not have an interest.

> if you want to equalize this then you effectively need to force dads to stay at home for the same amount of time as moms, so that their careers are affected in the same way.

This is not possible in a country that values liberty. Even if you could somehow require parity between one parent and another (mom only gets as many weeks of leave as dad takes), you can't effect parity between one family and another. More families have SAHMs than SAHDs, which would disrupt any attempt at parity at a societal level.

Bottom line though, is that moms simply are more maternal than dads. We literally have a word for it, and it's related to being a mother. There is a reason, and it's not all/mostly cultural. It is one of the most genetically-imbued aspects of our beings as humans. Mothers are the predominant nurturers in humans, as in nearly all mammal/animal species.

You can fight against it, but biological reality will not easily be defeated.

[em-bee]

It sounds like this was the case for you, but it doesn't mean it is the case for other men. It isn't the case for the dads I know who didn't have an in being around their babies/toddlers. They simply did not have an interest.

i don't understand how you see a contradiction here. you are observing that men have no interest in childcare, and i am explaining why.

it's a lack of role models.

unless your friends did have fathers who had in interest in child care but your friends had no interest despite that.

the problem with nurture vs nature is that it is difficult to prove one way or the other. beyond pregnancy and breastfeeding everything else can be learned. and it's difficult to prove that it isn't

[apparent]

According to your line of thinking, anything that results from nature can be attributed to nurture because "we can't prove 100% that it isn't nurture". This is a terrific example of an unfalsifiable hypothesis.

Secondly, even your description of your own experience undermines your theory. You say you didn't know what to do with your kids, so you didn't want to spend as much time with them. That is different from what I said my dad-friends have expressed, which is lack of interest that is not related to not knowing what to do with them. They just don't have an interest in being with a baby/toddler. Their experience is not yours, but you try to twist it to fit your narrative.

In general, it makes sense to be open-minded about how others' internal states, perceptions, etc. When someone says they don't have the same reason for doing something that you do, maybe don't tell them that yes they do. This is good general practice, but it's especially important for personal and perceptual matters, where outsiders literally have no idea why someone is doing something.

[em-bee]

According to your line of thinking, anything that results from nature can be attributed to nurture because "we can't prove 100% that it isn't nurture". This is a terrific example of an unfalsifiable hypothesis.

all correct. but the reverse is true too. you can't prove that any of it is nature.

both are beliefs. the reason why i side for nurture is because nature is used as an excuse to defend bad behavior or to discriminate. i have written about this before.

"men should not be teachers because they can not be trusted with our children" or "men should not be single parents because they don't have the capacity to care for children" or "he could not help raping her. her clothing provoked him, and he could not control himself"

the teacher comment was shared by someone in new zealand, the single parent one is common in germany and i believe in the US and many other place too. the last one has been used as a defense before. discrimination and excuses. fortunately much of that is no longer accepted. but only because we accept that nurture matters more than nature.

[apparent]

Look at the animal kingdom, my friend. There is very clear evidence that for nearly all species, mothers are more nurturing.