They should and sometimes do.

I read a study (from Rutgers I believe) about men who scale back on work to care for children. The conclusion was that while women are more likely to incur a “parent penalty”, this is partly explained by e fact that many men simply don’t scale back. The comparatively small number of men who do take time off or scale back to care for children face unusually severe career penalties for it. Some ideas explored were penalties for violating gender norms. Employers penalize women but in the end kind of expected this. When the men do it employers treat it as a kind of misrepresentation of intent and respond punitively.

I know a cite would be particularly helpful here, I’ll try to dig it up.