Sophie, you didn't tell us you had been replaced!

[Libertarian666]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/celebri ... riend.html

[dualstow]

Oh no! I agree with the feminists. Out with Denise!

[WiseOne]

Kermit's not admitting it, but Miss Piggy dumped him and this new bit of arm candy is a rebound affair.

Miss Piggy has moved on to bigger and better things.  More later after I've had a chance to make up more of this story.  It may possibly involve cats.

P.S.  Don't these feminists have more important things to do???  Like, get a job and put in the time and effort required to be successful?

[MachineGhost]

I fail to understand how dumping a piggy piggy for a skinny piggy has anything at all to do with feminism.  Is feminism becoming justification now for women to revel in their mediocrity???

[MachineGhost]

P.S.  Don't these feminists have more important things to do???  Like, get a job and put in the time and effort required to be successful?

Let me take a gander at that....  unless feminists can use their beauty to manipulate all the frogs to get ahead economically in the business world with minimum effort, they would otherwise rather comisserate all together on the couch in their sweatpants as lazy fat piggies (with lots of cats for company!!!), railing endlessly against the frogiarchy.

[Libertarian666]

Kermit's not admitting it, but Miss Piggy dumped him and this new bit of arm candy is a rebound affair.

Miss Piggy has moved on to bigger and better things.  More later after I've had a chance to make up more of this story.  It may possibly involve cats.

P.S.  Don't these feminists have more important things to do???  Like, get a job and put in the time and effort required to be successful?

No, jobs are a plot of the patriarchy! Or something like that; my feminist translator is broken at present...

[WiseOne]

I'm feeling rather down on "feminism" at the moment, but I'm sure the next time I get dissed by a male colleague for no obvious reason, I'll appreciate it once again.

This is because there are a lot of women in my division and no less than three of them are pregnant.  When they go on maternity leave, they leave a 3 month gap that the rest of us have to cover.  I had been planning to take a short sabbatical overseas and even have funding in place for it, but this effectively nixed it.  And then of course, after they come back they're always out the door by 4:30pm, so anything that comes up after hours has to be handled by someone else.

[jafs]

What would you propose about that situation, WiseOne?

[MachineGhost]

This is because there are a lot of women in my division and no less than three of them are pregnant.  When they go on maternity leave, they leave a 3 month gap that the rest of us have to cover.  I had been planning to take a short sabbatical overseas and even have funding in place for it, but this effectively nixed it.  And then of course, after they come back they're always out the door by 4:30pm, so anything that comes up after hours has to be handled by someone else.

That really sucks!  Are these pregnant woman consciously aware of their negative actions on others or do they simply consider their increased freedom a "feminist" entitlement?

[jafs]

Same question for you, MG.

[Pointedstick]

There is no good answer. A working women who gets pregnant is simply down for the count, work-wise, for weeks to years (depending on her desired level of parental involvement). There's no way around it.

Then again, it's not like the workplace has been destroyed by people taking paid vacations. Although typical pregnancy/parental leave usually lasts longer than a typical long American vacation (2 weeks), but it's still the same deal: someone is going to have to pick up the slack from your absence.

[jafs]

Right.

Many other countries offer much longer maternal/parental leave than we do, in fact.

I understand it's a bit of an issue for the business, but there must be ways to handle it that don't put undue stress on other workers - the idea of maternal leave is a very good one, if we care about children.

[MachineGhost]

Same question for you, MG.

I suggest that if we had a federal Family Leave standard for pregnancies, the issues would be institutionalized and addressed ahead of time, such as hiring temporary workers, etc..  But we don't have anything like that because of right-wingers/Wall Street always being obsessed about any external interference with making a profit.

I wonder how Silicon Valley handles it because they're on the bleeding edge of implementing such progressive policies.  The problem I see with that though is such workers are in the Top 1% socio-economically and are actually in a position to be able to afford having children as opposed to them being 50% unwanted accidents with the lower socio-economics classes.  Should we just let the free market sort it all out?  You can freely choose not work at a company that is stuck in the past with its (or none) family leave policies.

[MachineGhost]

I have no issue with the leave, as long as it is UNpaid. This is a choice that the woman makes, not her employer, so I don't see why the employer should bear the financial burden.

I know that sentiment very well but you are an anti-feminist now.  We have to pay for everyone's poor choices, especially their inane breeding.  Suck it up.

[Pointedstick]

Silicon Valley tech companies generally offer good pretty paid family leave by American standards. I recently took 6 weeks of paid family leave myself following the birth of my daughter. It didn't affect my team much because I've worked very hard to automate most of my work, so the majority of it kept on humming while I was gone. In practice what the 6 week leave meant was that everything I do that actually requires me was simply delayed by that long. As soon as I got back I had a huge backlog of challenging, unique stuff to knock out quickly. But that kind of thing is expected and after 6 weeks of vomit and poopy diapers, I was ready. 

I can see how this would be much more of a problem for jobs where everything you do requires face-time and none of it is automated, especially small teams. If 20% or mote of your labor disappears for months, that could be a major problem.


The real solution for this is for everyone to work under the terms of an independent contractor, preferably remotely. You get paid when you work, you're mobile, you're flexible, you can choose your workplace and your heath insurance and retirement investment vehicles are portable, etc. A lot of companies are already moving in this direction to get out of paying for health insurance and their share of the self-employment taxes.

[jafs]

It's often a choice that a "couple" makes, including a man.

Would you feel the same if it were a male in some analogous situation?

And, calling minimum wage "crap" reflects a pretty nasty sentiment to me.

[Pointedstick]

It's often a choice that a "couple" makes, including a man.

Would you feel the same if it were a male in some analogous situation?

And, calling minimum wage "crap" reflects a pretty nasty sentiment to me.

Imagine that you think the minimum wage actually hurts workers, in the aggregate--especially the least skilled and employable ones. Does thinking that it's "crap" still seem "nasty" in that circumstance?

[drumminj]

Many folks here seem focused on the cost to the company (rightly so), but as someone choosing to be childless, I struggle with paid leave policies as I don't get extra paid "vacation".  It's a benefit that only mothers and fathers get, and the rest of us actually have to work 48 weeks a year (depending on the company's policy).

I get it -- kids are important.  But what if I want to take 6 weeks off to help go rebuild after a natural disaster, or go donate my time to an animal rescue?  That has to come out of my personal vacation time, of course.  But choose to further overpopulate the planet?  Here, have six weeks paid leave!!!

As tech companies give more paid leave to employees (new mothers *and* fathers), I find myself developing more and more animosity towards them.

Standardize time off and be done with it. Or allow unpaid time off.

[Mountaineer]

I have no issue with the leave, as long as it is UNpaid. This is a choice that the woman makes, not her employer, so I don't see why the employer should bear the financial burden.

I know that sentiment very well but you are an anti-feminist now.  We have to pay for everyone's poor choices, especially their inane breeding.  Suck it up.

I am not anti-feminist, I am pro-small business. This is the kind of crap, just like minimum wage, that makes me want to not hire people.

I recently lost an employee to motherhood. I was willing to hold her job for 6 weeks [unpaid] because she was a good quality, long tenured employee. But can you imagine the havoc this would have created for me?  I only have 2 employees, so one out means working with a 50% reduction in staff. In the end, she decided that she wasn't coming back anyway.

I'm with you on this one re. paid maternity leave and minimum wage and the consequences thereof.  I'll offer my view (probably rather unpopular).  I think one of the most valuable vocations a person can have is that of mother.  So valuable in fact, that I think our families and society would be far better than it is if the mothers spent all their time raising children and caring for family instead of working and thus having to hire nannys or daycare services.  Fathers also have a very important vocation - providing (e.g. money, shelter, security, food) for their wives and children.  Things begin to go downhill when roles are blurred.  And very downhill when the desire to keep up with the Joneses across the street becomes more important than raising the next generation.  I also understand that our current "system" does not foster that view and two income families are sometimes a necessity instead of a luxury.  We have traded strong families for two car garages, McMansions, fancy vacations, throw away spouses when they get boring, and eating out daily.

... M

[Pointedstick]

Many folks here seem focused on the cost to the company (rightly so), but as someone choosing to be childless, I struggle with paid leave policies as I don't get extra paid "vacation".  It's a benefit that only mothers and fathers get, and the rest of us actually have to work 48 weeks a year (depending on the company's policy).

I get it -- kids are important.  But what if I want to take 6 weeks off to help go rebuild after a natural disaster, or go donate my time to an animal rescue?  That has to come out of my personal vacation time, of course.  But choose to further overpopulate the planet?  Here, have six weeks paid leave!!!

To be fair, the people overpopulating the planet probably aren't the ones working for tech companies and getting paid leave for their one or two children. It's the people who make Idiocracy seem like a documentary.

[jafs]

It's often a choice that a "couple" makes, including a man.

Would you feel the same if it were a male in some analogous situation?

And, calling minimum wage "crap" reflects a pretty nasty sentiment to me.

Imagine that you think the minimum wage actually hurts workers, in the aggregate--especially the least skilled and employable ones. Does thinking that it's "crap" still seem "nasty" in that circumstance?

I believe MangoMan's post further down illustrates well that that's not his attitude/concern.

[MachineGhost]

The real solution for this is for everyone to work under the terms of an independent contractor, preferably remotely. You get paid when you work, you're mobile, you're flexible, you can choose your workplace and your heath insurance and retirement investment vehicles are portable, etc. A lot of companies are already moving in this direction to get out of paying for health insurance and their share of the self-employment taxes.

That was a fad for a while in the 70's (I think) until the IRS shut it down.  There is a test you must pass to determine whether or not your IC's are actually IC"s and not employees.  It's only going to work if your "employees" are working for other companies, including your competitors and a bunch of other rules.  No free lunch.

[MachineGhost]

As tech companies give more paid leave to employees (new mothers *and* fathers), I find myself developing more and more animosity towards them.

That's an excellent point!  We should have definite leave for rescuing the poor, unwanted animals that breed through no fault of their own.  Humans?  Pah!  They should know better.

[MachineGhost]

Minimum wage is more of the same. I believe people should be paid what they are worth and what the market dictates [Are we not capitalists?], not what the government randomly decides. Why $15 and not $25/hour? Please. And the smaller the business, the more difficult these burdens become.

Do you think there is a certain business size where minimum wage laws no longer have such a potentially negative effect?

And do such laws even matter to you if you only hire skilled employees whose market-based wage is higher than the minimum to begin with?

[MachineGhost]

To be fair, the people overpopulating the planet probably aren't the ones working for tech companies and getting paid leave for their one or two children. It's the people who make Idiocracy seem like a documentary.

I haven't seen that movie, but India has 1.2 billion people.  And 99.99% of them are religious fucknuts that spend 99.99% of their personal time worshipping and/or ritualizaing nonexistent animal-gods.  In other words, what the hell useful purpose do they really serve in advancing civilization as a whole?  None at all that I can see other than that they have a tremendous opportunity to engage in serious first order animal welfare and conservation if they would stop reducing their habitats and/or killing them.  If any place needs mega-serious birth control, it is India.  Superfluous was a term invented just for that country.