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Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

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Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#401

Post by Aerroon »

klik99 wrote: post #229
FeistySkink wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a 5:1 male:female suicide rate in my home country. This has been going on for decades. "Temporarily" saying "men suck" doesn't help.

I really hate to be put in the position of looking like I'm minimizing this, because I made the same point in my post that suicide rates are an obvious indicator that there is something wrong here. But just want to point out that this is not a new thing, and I don't think it was caused by people saying "men suck". https://www.statista.com/statistics/187478/death-rate-from-s... But I'm with you in the frustration that…

To add: a 3-5x ratio of male to female suicides exists in almost every other country too: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_suicide_r...

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#402

Post by glandium »

theoldlove wrote: post #280
foogazi wrote: post #240

> Fathers are also more likely to sing to and soothe their toddler daughters at night when they cry. 100 years ago father’s wouldn’t even talk to their kids. I don’t think dads even went into the delivery room Dad’s didn’t get time off from work to be with their wives when the baby was born or get bonding time Things are definitely getting better on this front

I was recently wondering about who was typically in the delivery room 50+ years ago. So when I saw my elderly grandmother last week, I asked her whether my grandfather was there when my father was born in the late 50s. She was a little offended by the question (itself interesting), but said it was just her and the medical staff. No other support people. She thought my grandfather was at the hospital, but wasn’t sure.

offended in what sense?

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#403

Post by dumpsterdiver »

legostormtroopr wrote: post #387
abracadaniel wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US it depends heavily on the state, but as I understand it, the stats on the mothers getting custody are misleading. Overwhelmingly, the fathers are giving up custody and not fighting for it. When they do, it is roughly equal, though some studies suggest bias one way or the other. I’m not finding great primary sources, but here’s some articles on it https://legaljobs.io/blog/child-custody-statistics/ https://w…

> Overwhelmingly, the fathers are giving up custody and not fighting for it. Couldn't that be confirmation bias - if you don't think you are going to win, and it will cost lots of money - why fight? Which is why when fathers fight for custody they may win more - because they have a stronger case.

> Couldn't that be confirmation bias - if you don't think you are going to win, and it will cost lots of money - why fight?

Confirmation bias is defined as "the tendency to interpret new evidence as confirmation of one's existing beliefs or theories."

What you're describing is not confirmation bias, because there is no "new evidence" which one could interpret as confirmation of their existing beliefs or theories. If the father doesn't even try to obtain custody then they haven't discovered anything new that would reinforce their existing beliefs.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#404

Post by NoMoreNicksLeft »

jl6 wrote: post #11

> New research shows that when fathers are present and emotionally invested in children’s lives, they are more likely to develop a stronger sense of self-worth and excel in everything from school to relationships. Regardless of the debate on how tough (or not) love should be, the absent fathers issue seems like something concrete and impactful that we should be trying to address.

> Regardless of the debate on how tough (or not) love should be, the absent fathers issue seems like something concrete and impactful that we should be trying to address.

Where would we even start? The only circumstances where we could hope to do anything at all are those where it's either not a problem, or is still only a minor one... if daddy's doing 20 for murder or dealing at the kilo level, are we supposed to let him out so he can sing lullabies?

There exists an entire class of problems that people only seem to comprehend the causes of once those same problems have escalated far beyond the capacity for comprehension to allow us to fix them. Perhaps the universe hates us. Or maybe we just deserve it.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#405

Post by lapcat »

anon291 wrote: post #382
underlipton wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Without evidence, I'll suggest that this is an oversimplification. In a model where boys require masculine modeling from older, adult figures, "absent fathers" are most an issue when a boy's regularly-accessible social unit has been whittled down to the nuclear family. That seems to be a crisis in-and-of-itself. When I look at socially-successful men, they often have had multiple older men in their lives to model the…

There is no such thing as an extended family unless there are strong nuclear families to begin with. this concept is lost on so many people... But it's simply easier to raise your kids with their grandparents aunts and uncles if grandma and grandpa had a good relationship and aren't divorce to begin with. Divorce is ultimately at the root of so many social ills but it's verboten to even mention

> but it's verboten to even mention

You just did.

I find it curious, though, that a number of commenters seem to focus almost entirely on the "present" aspect and not on the crucial emotional investment aspect discussed in the article: "when fathers are present and emotionally invested in children’s lives", the title of which says "what boys really need is emotional support from their dads".

Presence alone is not necessarily helpful, and indeed can be harmful, as demonstrated by countless abusive parents. On the other hand, an emotionally invested parent can make a positive impact regardless of whether they're married.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#406

Post by corinroyal »

_8j50 wrote: post #311

It is not a father's job to be the person a child goes to for emotional support. A father is indeed supposed to pass down masculinity and how to manage it and how to become a socially functional and acceptable man. Mothers on the other hand are supposed to be the primary person that provides emotional support and care. But, the immediate community is supposed to provide that support as well. This is how human society…

Be careful not to confuse nature with nurture. Naturally humans have a high degree of variation. The traditionalist system you refer to is a construction, if a long-standing one. We can critique the success of this system like any other human construct.

To argue that stoic fathers tend to produce better sons requires evidence. We might ask, "Better for what?" Better to be a disposable cog in a rich man's machine, perhaps? There's quite a bit of evidence that stoic fathers produce sons with emotional problems. There is quite a bit of evidence that expecting fathers not to express intimacy with their sons is destructive for both. There's quite a bit of evidence that men who don't understand their emotions and have not been supported in expressing them safely tend to act out in dangerous ways.

Yours is a recipe for an exploitative, dangerous world. Intersectional feminism offers a path toward a safe, loving, and moral world.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#407

Post by lapcat »

Natsu wrote: post #389
jimbob45 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you even address something like that? Even if you paid each father $10k to stick around to age 18, that doesn’t guarantee that they wouldn’t become domestic abusers, suicide victims, or would even be good role models. It’s possible that father presence for kids is only so valuable because the only fathers that stick around are the ones that care.

It used to be done by promoting marriage and stigmatizing divorce. Now, that has obvious costs for the parents in many cases and certainly isn't always the right approach because of problems like domestic abuse. But the good of the children is part of why past societies have incentivized keeping parents together to care for their children and maybe we've gone a bit too far in the other direction, away from a happier…

> It used to be done by promoting marriage and stigmatizing divorce.

Stigmatizing divorce does absolutely nothing to make fathers emotionally invested in their kids. If anything, it can make them resentful of their kids.

The article was about how boys need emotional support from their father. A father who is present and married but still demands that his son "man up" and bottle up every problem is of no help.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#408

Post by theptip »

NoMoreNicksLeft wrote: post #404
jl6 wrote: post #11

> New research shows that when fathers are present and emotionally invested in children’s lives, they are more likely to develop a stronger sense of self-worth and excel in everything from school to relationships. Regardless of the debate on how tough (or not) love should be, the absent fathers issue seems like something concrete and impactful that we should be trying to address.

> Regardless of the debate on how tough (or not) love should be, the absent fathers issue seems like something concrete and impactful that we should be trying to address. Where would we even start? The only circumstances where we could hope to do anything at all are those where it's either not a problem, or is still only a minor one... if daddy's doing 20 for murder or dealing at the kilo level, are we supposed to le…

A simple answer (the one other developed countries tend towards) would be to emphasize / invest more in rehabilitation than in retribution/deterrence in the criminal justice system.

Another set of approaches would be to fund pro-natal/pro-family initiatives such as child income tax credits, to make it easier for fathers to participate in family life; at the margin economic instability drives families apart among other things. (More paternity leave (and better maternity leave while we’re at it) would help a lot here too).

I think you can look to other countries for examples here, Scandinavian countries for example have much better pro-family programs we could copy if we were really serious about this.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#409

Post by throw3823423 »

underlipton wrote: post #92
jl6 wrote: post #11

> New research shows that when fathers are present and emotionally invested in children’s lives, they are more likely to develop a stronger sense of self-worth and excel in everything from school to relationships. Regardless of the debate on how tough (or not) love should be, the absent fathers issue seems like something concrete and impactful that we should be trying to address.

Without evidence, I'll suggest that this is an oversimplification. In a model where boys require masculine modeling from older, adult figures, "absent fathers" are most an issue when a boy's regularly-accessible social unit has been whittled down to the nuclear family. That seems to be a crisis in-and-of-itself. When I look at socially-successful men, they often have had multiple older men in their lives to model the…

A big part of this in the US is our continued evolution in suburbs: In practice, in person contact with others is a lot more work than historically. This makes children have very little contact with adults other than teachers and their own parents. Even contact in businesses is depersonalized, given this world of chains, large stores and many employees with changing shifts, leading to minimal recurring contact, and interactions that very rarely get personal.

More communal countries, both in Europe in Asia, still have some personal contact: From a pharmacist to an ice cream man, a town or a neighborhood can have community, and with that community come the children seeing those workers as people, and having a relationship with them. When most business is done on foot, people see each other down the street, or in the park, and there's a chance of community. With suburbia an cars, all social contact takes effort: Community get expensive, and few pay the price.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#410

Post by throwaway2037 »

NoMoreNicksLeft wrote: post #404
jl6 wrote: post #11

> New research shows that when fathers are present and emotionally invested in children’s lives, they are more likely to develop a stronger sense of self-worth and excel in everything from school to relationships. Regardless of the debate on how tough (or not) love should be, the absent fathers issue seems like something concrete and impactful that we should be trying to address.

> Regardless of the debate on how tough (or not) love should be, the absent fathers issue seems like something concrete and impactful that we should be trying to address. Where would we even start? The only circumstances where we could hope to do anything at all are those where it's either not a problem, or is still only a minor one... if daddy's doing 20 for murder or dealing at the kilo level, are we supposed to le…

It is strange that you immediately went the criminal route. I was thinking more about fathers who work too much, which is most in my world. They spend far less time with their children than their wives, maybe 5x to 10x. My father had a grueling commute as a child that was 90 minutes each way. What a waste. I hardly saw him during the week, then he was exhausted on the weekends. I cringe every time I hear senior (_ALWAYS_ male) executives say: "I do it all for my kids." Yeah right; work less and spend more time with your kids -- that is what they really want, not another fancy ski trip.
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