Recently, I’ve seen a few articles about women and families. About how women were told they could have children and careers, and excel in both. I’ve seen it presented that it’s impossible.

I agree that it’s impossible to be a fully involved in both parenting and career. You only have so many hours in a day. All the same, it feels like a sucky choice. Like I get two so-so options to choose from, and the option I really want is. . . nowhere?

So I was very angry to run into this comment on the internet.

This needs to be said more often. The mommy mafia wants you to believe that mothers can “have it all” and they create myths such as the so-called “pay gap”. Jones is absolutely correct- if you CHOOSE to have a child and don’t choose your career, you will fall behind in your career.  
 
Less work = less pay. Yet the mommies want us to believe this is a gap. Breeding is a choice, not an absolute. It’s time that we stop giving any credibility to people that try to make us believe they are entitled to something because of their choice.

So here’s how it works. You have two children, a son and a daughter. They both want to play soccer, and they both want to learn piano. You say to your son, ok, you can do both. You say to your daughter, no, you need to wash dishes, clean the house, do laundry, and make dinner, so you only have time for one hobby. Soccer or piano, pick one.

How unfair is that?

And if your little daughter tries anyways, she’ll fall behind your son in soccer, tired from her chores and without adequate time to practice. Then you say, well that proves it. Girls just can’t have both soccer and piano for hobbies. She chose to take piano, so it’s her fault she doesn’t have time to practice soccer.

How unfair is that?

We generally don’t expect our men to choose between careers and family. They can be fathers and executives, all at the same time. But that’s not because their children magically don’t need care; someone else is doing it for them. Increasingly in the modern world, someone whose time is valuable too.

The problem, as far as I can tell, is raising the child falls disproportionately on the women’s shoulders, even if she’s a high-powered executive. A hardworking father can usually take for granted that his wife will care for the children during the day. His career won’t suffer. Meanwhile, can a hard-working mother count on her husband having the kids all taken care of? Men and women alike would insult her, calling her a bad mother and questioning her morals. And so, by failing to support our mothers, by our ingrained assumption that childcare is women’s work, we handicap mothers in the working world.

My friends who are male, my father, my boyfriend, my coworkers, no one expects them to choose. They already get it all. Why should my choices be different?

I’ll try to have everything because I want the same choices as everyone else. But really, I have no choice at all. If I fail, I’ll become an internet moron’s data point while he argues why I’m just not suited for the professional world.