I was recently taking my friend Tracey and her Siamese cat to the vet, and as we drove along the boardwalk, she turned on the radio to listen to Woman’s Hour. We couldn’t believe what we were hearing. The presenter was asking Yvette Cooper whether or not she felt that she could become the labor leader of the Labor Party thanks to her husband, Ed Balls. When did a woman’s husband begin to define her and her career prospects?
It seems that more and more women are choosing to have babies later in life for various reasons. I can tell you from my own experience that the financial burden of having a baby is often mentioned as a major factor. Women are now much more focused on developing their own careers than having children, compared to 15 or 20 years ago.
After being so alarmed by what I was hearing, I decided to ask my own group of friends to see if they had ever experienced maternity discrimination in the workplace. Most of them were able to recall a story about themselves or friends of theirs who had been unfairly treated for being pregnant. It bothered me to hear all kinds of examples of sexism and discrimination. Many of them had to put up with all sorts of negative feedback upon their return to work and even claimed that the opportunities available to them in the workplace had diminished upon their return as well.
Despite the strides that we as women have made towards equality in the workplace, it seems that maternity discrimination is still alive and well in 2015. Young women are worried about having a baby due to the fact that taking maternity leave is frowned upon and rarely allows women to simply pick up where they left off. The sad reality is that 54,000 women a year lose their job because of having a baby. It seems that I am not the only one and even Yvette Cooper has spoken about the exact same thing.
It’s amazing that such attitudes towards women still exist in 2015. My husband and I have recently been talking about having a baby together. I really wanted to have one of my own before discovering the scope of attitudes facing women today. Hopefully, now that the true extent of the discrimination pregnant women face has been made public, more can be done to ensure that all women are treated fairly and equally, whether or not they are pregnant.