T. writes:

I had to send this to you. I read your blog daily and am always curious to see your take on the modern world. So much has changed with regard to men and women. Your blog is a reminder that I’m not crazy after all. Anyway, I don’t really have much to add to the article I’ve sent you; the lunacy speaks for itself. A Canadian female member of Parliament doesn’t actually show up to vote in the Parliament because …. well, she has kids.

What more can I say? Who knows, maybe one day we will have on-site daycare in our houses of government. It’s not impossible. I guess I just find it strange. She won’t stay late in Parliament, only during normal working hours will she stay … because she has kids.

Laura writes:

Actually, it is even stranger than that. Babies are now allowed on the floor of the Canadian Parliament.

In 2012, Sana Hassainia, the Quebec MP in question, brought an infant to the floor of the House of Commons during a vote. She was asked to remove the child but made such a fuss in the press that the Speaker of the House of Commons later announced that babies are welcome — as long as they are not disruptive.

So maybe someday there will be playpens in Parliament. Hassainia says:

I think it’s important to allow females – certainly among them mothers who want to spend time with their children – the possibility to either bring [babies] in to their seats, as we see in the European Parliament, or find a way to allow (voting) for people who can’t be there when they have a family responsibility.

This sends the message that mothers are not needed at home. If it’s all just a matter of fitting babies in with work, there is no role for women at home.