Here's your medal

Here is something I've noticed: If you are a man walking around alone with your baby, you will be showered with endless kudos and treated as if you deserve a medal for actually spending time with the offspring you voluntarily brought into the world. My husband takes care of S. every afternoon for several hours while I work part-time at home, and he has been stopped in the street numerous times by women (usually older) who say something along the lines of how wonderful it is to see a man taking care of a child.

If you are a woman spending time with your baby out in public, however, you will be treated to a lecture about how you dressed him wrong. I always heard chicks talk about this and wondered if it was really a thing. It most definitely is a thing. (FWIW I don't dress him up in plastic carrier bags; we're talking weather-appropriate togs and hats.) Gah.