Our father figure?

[fgoodwin 23]

Our father figure?

 

 

http://tinyurl.com/2up8xh

 

Think about what that tells boys about the kind of men they can aspire to be

 

Mary Jacobs:

03:31 PM CDT on Sunday, June 17, 2007

 

If you believe popular culture, the man we're honoring today is a complete idiot.

 

A recent survey by FathersAndHusbands.org reports that, far more often than women, men in prime-time television are shown as inadequate parents, as sources of marital discontent or as "corrupt" and "stupid."

 

You don't have to watch much TV to believe that. The dads who populate the small screen are mostly dorks, dunderheads or dimwits. Recent ads show dad as the ineffective homework coach (who only gets in the way, to his daughter's utter contempt), as the immature moron who gloats when he beats his small daughter at pingpong, or as the klutz who falls down the stairs.

 

And wise, gently authoritarian dads like Howard Cunningham (Happy Days ) and Cliff Huxtable (The Cosby Show) are nowhere to be seen in today's TV lineup. Father Knows Best has been replaced by the Father Who Knows Nothing, Homer Simpson.

 

Even children's books resort to this well-worn cliche. One otherwise well-done series occasionally lapses into the same weary plot: Papa Bear gets a stupid idea in his head and runs with it. Chaos ensues. Papa finally learns his lesson.

 

On Father's Day, I'm tempted to plead to the media: Please, be a little nicer to dads. But what worries me more is how all these images might affect eventual fathers-to-be young men and boys.

 

When we portray fathers as doofuses so relentlessly, what is that telling boys about the kind of men they can aspire to be?

 

Granted, in our current cultural wasteland, a few fathers playing the fools are pretty small potatoes. But there's a reason why the dumb dad joke works. It fills a gap in our collective imagination. In America today, we no longer have a clear sense of the distinctive role of fathers.

 

Kathleen Fischer, a Dallas parenting educator, believes that fathers do have a distinctive role and that it's essential. That's why she teaches a class called "Fathers are Not Assistant Mothers." And she's unearthed some fascinating research.

 

Up until the 1700s, she says, parenting information was directed primarily at fathers. In the 1800s and 1900s, that began to change, and fathers were increasingly marginalized. By the 1900s, for the first time in modern history, boys no longer went to work with their fathers when they reached early adolescence. They spent their days in school or at home usually, with women.

 

Feminism brought even more changes many of them good. Men were no longer necessarily the sole providers, for example. The myth of the "Superwoman" said that women could do it all. But it never really pictured where Superwoman's husband might come in.

 

Yet study after study confirms that children are better off when a father is actively involved in his or her upbringing.

 

"It's politically incorrect to even suggest that there's something about fatherhood that women cannot reproduce," says Paul Nathanson, a researcher on the religious studies faculty at McGill University. "And yet we know that communities in which fathers are largely absent have all sorts of problems."

 

In a recent book, Spreading Misandry: The Teaching of Contempt for Men in Popular Culture, Mr. Nathanson and co-author Katherine Young say that "profoundly disturbing stereotypes" about men are hurting boys, too.

 

"Our basic theory is that, unless someone can make a distinctive, necessary and publicly valued contribution, there is no such thing as a healthy identity," he says. "The implication for boys is if they can't have a healthy identity, they can turn to an anti-social identity."

 

When dads like Ward Cleaver (Leave it to Beaver) and the Steve Douglas (My Three Sons) dominated TV, we all knew what dads were for. They earned the money, and they were the disciplinarians. Mr. Nathanson argues that some aspects of traditional fatherhood, now rendered disreputable, were actually useful, perhaps especially to boys. Dad's tendency to maintain emotional distance usually deemed a bad thing might actually serve a purpose.

 

"Children need somebody who can lead them into the larger world and help them take risks," he said. "To do that, you have to have some emotional distance."

 

Ms. Fischer agrees. In her experience, "dads worry if the kids will be successful; Dad's love is more qualified." And that may not be as awful as it sounds. Young children may need unconditional nurturing, but older kids need a dose of reality.

 

"As children move into the world, performance is a reality," she said. "To have to stand and deliver [for Dad] helps them prepare for the outside world."

 

We lost an appreciation for Dad's essential role, Mr. Nathanson says, thanks to decades of conditioning in Oprahthink. "We've come to believe that the only really significant factor is emotion, and it's all about how we feel," he said.

 

Instinctively, we all know that dads are not just assistant mothers. (Maybe that's why, while Mother's Day is the biggest day for phone calls, Father's Day is the biggest day for collect calls.)

 

Dads know that, too. They can laugh off the dopey dads on TV. They can take a joke they've got that emotional distance.

 

But if you're lucky enough to have a dad in your life who wasn't entirely useless, please, mute those silly ads and give him a call on your own dime.

 

Mary Jacobs is a Dallas freelance writer. Her e-mail address is maryjacobs44@yahoo.com

[Gunny2862 11]

I love it , especially the last 8 paragraphs.

My boss doesn't really care about how I feel about my work but whether or not I can perform it's duties. It's great to be and to feel appreciated and worthwhile in your work but how many of us get that every day? It's the performance and the paycheck that brings us back tomorrow.

 

I think it would be great if my child could get all of the feedback the feminist perspective thinks people deserve from their jobs but the reality is that employers discriminate good employees from bad based on performance. Just like most of the rest of society.