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In many species (other than mammals) the "father" cares exclusively for the young or helps care for the young. One can not compare humans to other animals, the animal kingdom is too diverse.
Also, humans are social creatures. We are, too, defined by the society that we live in. Social constructs like maternal instinct have been sustaining society for a long time. Its hard to deconstruct this constructions but we are not NATURALLY like this.
According to opinions i ve been reading in other threads in this forum, it seems that people here seem to assume WOMEN are responsible for raising kids for the most part. They might have a job or work few hours but they expect them to do the most part of the raising. They assume its gonna be like that. I get it, this is a highly conservative forum, and those are for the traditional values of family, etc.
But if you think like that, can you justify it? Is it from a biological point of view? Purely social? Why?
Every couple should decide - but the father and mother should both have a say in how responsibilities are balanced. Raising children is very much about compromise, and it's very unfair to assume that the mother will be the primary caregiver. It's fine if that's the case as long as both people agree to the terms.
Conversely, there is nothing wrong with the man staying home or spending more time with the children (say, if the mother has a more demanding job).
It's 2017 - this is how it should be. And ideally, both father and mother want to share equally in the responsibilities associated with raising children.
Not necessarily 50/50. I think two should come up with an agreement, as long as both agree with the "plan" (for lack of a better word), who spends more time with kids shouldn't matter.
For example, my older brother is an attorney who works a lot, my sister in law decided to be a stay at home mother (because she wanted to). She has two children from previous marriage; my brother puts both of them in private schools.
I cried a river for my brother when he decided to marry her. She was older, a single mother, but now I realize she is the best choice my brother ever made. It is really none of other people's businesses how each couple handling their own businesses.
Obviously, this is just my opinion so I'm not saying I'm correct, it's just what I believe: I don't think there is a "maternal instinct." I think women are just traditionally brought up to be nurturing based on society's view of roles. It starts very early with the types of toys as well as the types of activities that women are expected to participate in.
I believe that, going WAY back, the roles were set this way mainly based on survival (hunting, defense). Let's face it, for the most part, the male of the species is larger, faster, stronger, etc. So the males went out to do the dangerous stuff, while the females participated in roles more suited to their physicality.
When it comes to emotions, though, I think either gender can be molded by society to be nurturing and a caregiver. We just don't traditionally encourage that in males. It's not natural as their are many women who do not handle nurturing well at all, don't want it, not good at it, etc.
Every couple should decide - but the father and mother should both have a say in how responsibilities are balanced. Raising children is very much about compromise, and it's very unfair to assume that the mother will be the primary caregiver. It's fine if that's the case as long as both people agree to the terms.
Conversely, there is nothing wrong with the man staying home or spending more time with the children (say, if the mother has a more demanding job).
It's 2017 - this is how it should be. And ideally, both father and mother want to share equally in the responsibilities associated with raising children.
I know. This is how it should be and how it is in some cases (mine for example. I purposefully had a baby with a man with who i agree 100% on this topics) but not in most, thanks to many preconceived notions that are pure BS, like maternal insticts and other social constructs.
My husband is waaay better than me at cooking and cleaning the house. Should i return my reproductive organs? Cause last time i checked im still a woman.
Science has proven for a long time that the so called "maternal instict" is a social construct.
Yes, we can bear children in our bellys and have the abilty to produce milk.
But, other than that, we are not naturally better at raising children than men
For every research out there that claims to prove it is a social construct there is equal, if not more, research that claims to prove it is innate. It would be reasonable that mothers have a greater instinctual drive to care for young, they had nine more months to bond with the child than a father and, prior to current societal constructs that are capable overriding instinct and easy access to usable nutrition created outside the human body, if the mother didn't sacrifice her wellbeing to care for the child that child died - unless some other woman appropriated the child. Prior to formula a child could survive without a father, they could not without a mother. I know these days we like to pretend biology doesn't matter when it comes to anything related to gender, well sorry, it absolutely does unless our intellect has contrived a way to bypass natural functions.
So, we have created a social construct that negates innate gender roles. Based on that, it is no longer an automatic assumption that a mother should spend more time child rearing than the other parent.
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Obviously, this is just my opinion so I'm not saying I'm correct, it's just what I believe: I don't think there is a "maternal instinct." I think women are just traditionally brought up to be nurturing based on society's view of roles. It starts very early with the types of toys as well as the types of activities that women are expected to participate in.
I believe that, going WAY back, the roles were set this way mainly based on survival (hunting, defense). Let's face it, for the most part, the male of the species is larger, faster, stronger, etc. So the males went out to do the dangerous stuff, while the females participated in roles more suited to their physicality.
When it comes to emotions, though, I think either gender can be molded by society to be nurturing and a caregiver. We just don't traditionally encourage that in males. It's not natural as their are many women who do not handle nurturing well at all, don't want it, not good at it, etc.
It's VERY rare that the male animal cares for the offspring exclusively. ALL animals, including humans, the male takes on a role and has responsibilities but the main one is the female when it comes to raising offspring.
This doesn't even make sense.
In some it is the male exclusively (seahorse, he even gets pregnant), some species both parents incubate eggs and care for the young , some it is female exclusively, some offspring are left to fend for themselves. So you cant set a standard for humans based on what some species of animals do.
Last edited by Oldhag1; 05-12-2017 at 02:33 PM..
Reason: Fixed formatting
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