No More Dopey Disappearing Dads!

Like Rodney Dangerfield, dads do not get enough respect. A father who is active and involved in his children’s lives is emasculated with the title, “Mr. Mom” which implies that what he is doing is really feminine. With some notable exceptions, Dads on television and in other forms of popular media are portrayed as bumbling fools who put the baby’s diaper on the dog. Why is positive fathering so maligned? What is it about a man who is as present in his kids’ lives as their mother that is so threatening that we turn him into a clown?

There may be several answers. The easy and pat one is that we don’t have good role models for this kind of fathering. Most of us had fathers who spent most of their lives working and were only home in the evenings, sometimes arriving after the rest of the household had finished dinner and often when the children were already asleep. Some of these families had stay-at-home moms. And even in the households with working mothers, the wife was still in charge of all the traditional parenting responsibilities. So we men haven’t seen this kind of fathering in action.

Baloney! Involved fathers have been around as long as there have been fathers. Not all fathers who were the primary breadwinners were distant and invisible. As our mothers took advantage of their new found freedom to leave the home, many households were forced to rebalance parenting functions. I would concede that the highly active father in the past stayed underground. He may have seen himself in a negative light. Why is that? Same question.

What about the “men make more money” argument? While it is true that, statistically, men earn higher wages than women, I know many families where the wife earns as much or more money than the husband. If the reason were entirely economic, we’d see families with high earning moms with stay at home dads. Why are stay at home dads so extremely rare? Again, same question.

One real reason that active Dads are undervalued is that many households are still stuck in the 1950s (or it could be 1850s) gender role rut. I still can’t figure out why, when a family goes out in Mom’s vehicle (sometimes a mini-van) that Dad has to drive. Does Mom drive when they go out in Dad’s car? Why do so many professional women take time out to raise their families when their husbands would not think once about doing so? Even in homes where both partners work, it is often mom who is solely in charge of the child related responsibilities. Why?

Because, let’s face it, men just aren’t good at those tasks. Women are more naturally maternal and they can better schedule the babysitter, drive the carpools, call the doctor and attend the school nights. Wait a minute! What is maternal (or paternal) about any of those things? None of those tasks is at all based in anything biological or even sociological. Men can schedule, drive, and go to meetings just as well (or badly) as women.

One real reason is that moms have kept dads off their turf. For a long list of reasons, many men get the clear message that they shouldn’t tread on their wives parenting territory. No one is good at changing the first dozen diapers. No one is born knowing how to confront parenting challenges. We learn by doing and if we don’t do, we don’t develop parenting skills. Men get this message from their wives, mothers, and the popular media. However, they get this message from each other as well and that is really sad.

Every couple has its divisions of labor. Sometimes these are divided by aptitude. One is just better at certain tasks. Sometimes these are divided by desire. One likes or dislikes certain chores. However, sometimes there are those plum or poison tasks that both partners want or want to avoid. Parenting is both of these and frequently mom takes them all.

Shouldn’t the main goal be what is good for the children? Is it good for the kids to have both parents active and present? Is it good for the kids to have positive nurturing female and male figures? Wouldn’t kids benefit from role models of both genders?

Men need to take responsibility and insist on being as active in their children’s lives as any other adult (including mom). Women need to welcome men as their equal partners in parenting. When they do, the big winners will be families!

My School Year in Tweets

This year, I tried an experiment. At the end of each class period, one student in class would write a tweet that summarized the class period, captured an important moment or connected to something we were doing. Once in a while, I wrote a tweet too. Here is my school year in tweets:

• Ready to go! I am looking forward to meeting everyone and learning together!
• Wow! An all male Freshman English class!
• First day of Senior Year!
• Keep Sesame Street clean!
• Ewww, college essays and recommendations. Personality not generality.
• All guys and we all got A's for today!
• We read together. It was weird but awesome.
• Started off OF MICE AND MEN. Loved it!
• Broken Gourd, culture, personal essays: personal and show me, don't tell me.
• Bad essays!
• Taste test of essays - boy was that boring.
• Use your phone, take pictures of notes.
• “Grammar Girl and grading system.
• Success today does not guarantee success tomorrow.”
• " The best laid schemes o' mice and men go astray.
• Who got in" activity was helpful
• Looking back, self grading, feedback; our fingers are exhausted!
• We wrote essays and expanded our minds.
• Spoilers don't always spoil.
• Extreme thesis writing!
• Pull the trigger on Facebook
• Ayn Rand is confusing; being great is bad? :)
• We controlled the Dominican Republic - twice.
• The stapleless stapler saves staples.
• What is politics? We were political.
• Not enough pink!
• Kick me, literary terms, puzzle, and name game.
• Inner-outer discussion and super sheet fantastical quiz.
• Principal visit!
• What do you watch? Mr. Hirsch loves Star Trek, a little too much.
• Musical chairs with responding to the book. Grammar Girl is coming!
• Dictatorship bad!
• Aliens in Toronto.
• We are powerful!
• Silence is golden....or is it?
• Blithe Spirit presentation: Love Triangles!
• Mr. Hirsch is a frightened freshman, WERCS visit.
• Quiz (which was pretty fun)
• EEEEdipus's acting is a tragedy.
• Brain vomit
• No plagiarizing! Don’t tell freshmen!
• Is it Thursday yet?
• Major research. Shakespeare is fun!
• "Ethnomusicology is the study of music of ethnic groups."
• There is a Raisin that is in the Sun
• Grammar Girl is coming to town!
• Major work, major questions, major grades.
• Scene cut because of racism.
• Protestant or Catholic ghosts?
• Previously on RAISIN IN THE SUN...
• Modern Shakespeare, 2009 lingo!
• Ouch! RAISIN Act 3 Quiz didn't go well.
• Thanks for a fantastic visit, Grammar Girl!
• "More than kin but less than kind."
• Hamlet and his women!
• Live the Creed!
• "Hamlet is a whipper snapper."
• Read Creed.
• "Oh, no. Here comes Dad."
• Hamlet in a hurry.
• Is Creed dead?
• Yorick!
• Hamlet's dead!!!
• Creed questions and Creed connections!
• In class essay test: WWHD?
• I support school chest!
• Influences on Torey, quiz, NO SNEEZING!
• Heads!
• Everyone's here! We took a picture.
• Chocolate (and questions and killing a fly and themes and rubrics)
• "There were answers everywhere you looked."
• Clever Hans is a smart - - - donkey.
• I'm on a boat!
• Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead - for real!
• Santa is magical, he breaks all rules of physics!
• Snow day, PLEASE!
• Projects, projects, projects
• The final: put up or shut up.
• Work, work, work!
• Online grading is crazy.
• For my senior project, I will be stalking my ex-boyfriend.
• Poetry is..
• Dandelions? Really!
• You're insane if you don't vote for McMurphy.
• Romeo loves himself.
• We want the radio voice!
• Pimped out Romeo and Juliet.
• Dead people everywhere!
• Research makes us have to go to the bathroom.
• What about Officer Krupke?
• New people Mr. Hirsch scared away.
• Herro very botiful Amellican girl!
• Watch that sarcasm!
• No one has any ideas about what they want to say in their graduation speech.
• Mr. Hirsch is a _____ teacher. Feedback survey.
• Sack to your beats, gadies and lentlemen.
• Light’s out, school’s off!
• Mr. Scott killed with lots of knives in the elevator
• Recalled to life.
• (creative and thoughtful tweet)
• We got grilled!
• Fake quiz; scared us all!
• Weedy for the geekend!
• Echoes, shadows and colours, oh, my!
• The end is nearer.
• Still knitting!
• "Bush Pigs"
• Quotes, quotes, quotes, and more quotes!
• What does catfish mean?
• Senior Project day 386543
• Shopping for essays.
• Darney – should he stay or should he go?
• This essay is bad, this one is good
• We were small but mighty!
• Unexpected no school day. How nice!
• Senior's last day! Thank you for flying Senior English!
• Tale of Two Cities is heating up!
• Congratulations to the Deerfield High School class of 2010!
• May the farce be with you!
• Our last class. Thanks for flying Freshman English! It has been a fantastic year.