Venture Capitalist Labels Men Who Take Six Months Of Parental Leave ‘Losers,’ Faces Criticism

Venture capitalist Joe Lonsdale has sparked a debate on Twitter after saying any prominent man who takes time off to care for his newborn was “a loser.”

Lonsdale, who is the founder of Palantir Technologies, was responding to U.S. Transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg taking time off to be with his child.

"Wow. Great for fathers to spend time w their kids and support moms, but any man in an important position who takes 6 months of leave for a newborn is a loser. In the old days men had babies and worked harder to provide for their future - that’s the correct masculine response," Lonsdale's tweet read.

The post was met with several rebukes, including one by the founders of another venture capital firm, Initialized. Alexis Ohanian and Garry Tan defended their parental policy, which is four months. Tan, who had taken the leave, said he hoped his employees would follow the same, Bloomberg reported.

"Initialized has 4 months leave, and I took all 4 months to make sure everyone at Initialized felt like they could do it. Respect that people have different choices, but being a dad is awesome and there is more to life than work and money," Tan wrote on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, Lonsdale responded to several comments criticizing his views.

"Sad that apparently lots of men actually believe in pretending they are the same as a woman and taking 100% time off for six full months for a newborn, vs some weeks and part time off and then investing their time off with family in more logical and measured ways," Lonsdale wrote in response to a comment on his post.

Reacting to comments in which people who hadn't taken the six months leave slamming him, Lonsdale wrote: "I’m slightly confused why those who didn’t take six months off themselves as fathers are so offended by this - it’s clearly nonsensical for a leader, & even the most woke responders here take less. You can love your kids and spend lots of time w them without irresponsible leave."

Lonsdale’s venture investments include Flexport Inc., Joby Aviation Inc. and Oculus, which was acquired by Facebook Inc. He also runs an advocacy group with his wife called the Cicero Institute, which focuses on criminal justice, health care and other causes.