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American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

derekthompson.org

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Re: American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

#81

Post by em-bee »

mothballed wrote: post #65
ipsento606 wrote: post #57

I can't help but wonder about the relationship between fathers (and, in fact, all parents) spending more time with their children, and people choosing to have fewer children, and later. I think it's unquestionably true that fathers spending more time with their children is, on the whole, much better for those children. But it's also true that it's a huge problem for society that people are having fewer children. And…

I think it is. It's discouraged and unspoken, but a lot of men don't like spending time with children. I mean for weeks or months, sure, but when you have a kid it drags on for years 24/7 and nothing but having your own child will really reveal to you how that turns out for you. As it turns out, I don't enjoy extended time with children. My bad, but I power through it for the sake of the child. In older times that wo…

the question is, where does that feeling come from? from your own time growing up, based on how your own father interacted with you? from your friends/peers? others?

i can relate. when my kids were young i didn't know what to do with them. but it's not that i didn't like spending time with them. before we had kids, working part-time so i could spend a lot of time at home was my dream. it was what i wanted. when the dream became real my inability to initiate play with the children was unexpected.

i figure it was because i had no rolemodels from my time growing up, no childhood experience that i could replicate because i grew up with a single dad who wasn't as close to me as i wanted to. every interaction was initiated by my children. it got easier as they got older because our interests became more compatible. (we could play games together that i also enjoyed, etc)

all the other stuff, taking care of them, feeding, putting them to sleep, etc. was easy because it's clear what needs to be done. and it wasn't/isn't exhausting either. i relish every interaction and moments of success where we achieve something together.

Re: American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

#82

Post by krapp »

compiler-guy wrote: post #63
michaelchisari wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except "trad" households (full time SAHM in a nuclear home) are not traditional. Tradition is not something only the upper-middle class in a post-war boom attained for a short period of time. Throughout human history, it was rare for only two people to raise a child, let alone one. Or for women to not bring money into the home. Like many "trad" trends, it's based more on advertising and television than history.

At the very least, you need a whole society of aunts and uncles and grandparents and cousins, and deep friends to truly do any kind of traditional family structure in the traditional way. Otherwise it's just emulating an extremely narrow portion of the trad that didn't exactly exist in the first place.

I remember when Hillary Clinton said "it takes a village to raise a child" and she was mocked by conservatives and accused of undermining parental rights and wanting governments to control families.

And when BLM made it part of their charter to encourage community support for children beyond the typical nuclear unit they were accused of a radical Marxist agenda to "destroy families."

For some reason the very concept of extended families and community engenders deep anger and hostility from some Americans, and that's odd for a nation of immigrants considering how common the "whole society of aunts and uncles and grandparents and cousins" is in the rest of the world.

Re: American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

#83

Post by brewdad »

david-gpu wrote: post #72
giantg2 wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The number of mums who say their partner is not involved really at all in their child's care is so sad." While that can be true, I wonder how much of it is true. It's pretty common in therapy to hear partners saying the other one doesn't contribute, but further investigation can often turn up observation biases.

Without proper statistics we can't know. But I do wonder why is it that if you spend any time on parenting websites you find lots of mothers complaining about deadbeat husbands, and so few fathers complaining about deadbeat wives. Purely anecdotal, but it is very lopsided, and it has made me wonder why is it. I am a dad, FWIW.

It depends on the site but when I was a SAHD, I found many of those parenting sites were not welcoming to dads, even dads doing the exact same work as the moms. Moms there wanted a place to vent about their husbands and men who were pulling their fair share or were handling most of the parent duties simply weren't allowed.

Re: American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

#84

Post by dgudkov »

rhubarbtree wrote: post #34

Just a note for Dads doing more than their parents - it’s quality more than quantity. Be fully present with your kids more than trying to kill yourself fitting more hours in. That’s what matters. Bad parenting tends to be more of the type that isn’t engaged. Kids don’t hate you for going to work. They are hurt if you come home and ignore them.

Yeah, what's the point in technically spending more time with kids if half of that time you stare at your mobile phone.

Re: American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

#85

Post by giantg2 »

brewdad wrote: post #83
david-gpu wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Without proper statistics we can't know. But I do wonder why is it that if you spend any time on parenting websites you find lots of mothers complaining about deadbeat husbands, and so few fathers complaining about deadbeat wives. Purely anecdotal, but it is very lopsided, and it has made me wonder why is it. I am a dad, FWIW.

It depends on the site but when I was a SAHD, I found many of those parenting sites were not welcoming to dads, even dads doing the exact same work as the moms. Moms there wanted a place to vent about their husbands and men who were pulling their fair share or were handling most of the parent duties simply weren't allowed.

This, it's well known that women want to vent and men want to fix the issue. This difference in communication and perspective has been supported in various research.

Re: American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

#86

Post by IcyWindows »

watwut wrote: post #38
mothballed wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know if it's the parent that is neurotic so much as that it only takes 1 of 1000 assholes, who now have their little snitch device in their pocket 24/7, to call the child snatchers (CPS). And the child snatchers are legally barred from revealing who your accuser is, so the anonymous cowards can fuck up your life for weeks at no cost to themselves and with the utmost convenience. This effectively means every s…

The actual threat of CPS 8s grossly exagerrated here. And the fear is one of the symptoms.

I've had CPS call me up and question me about about play someone observed through a window.

It's a real thing.

Re: American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

#87

Post by mc3301 »

david-gpu wrote: post #72
giantg2 wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The number of mums who say their partner is not involved really at all in their child's care is so sad." While that can be true, I wonder how much of it is true. It's pretty common in therapy to hear partners saying the other one doesn't contribute, but further investigation can often turn up observation biases.

Without proper statistics we can't know. But I do wonder why is it that if you spend any time on parenting websites you find lots of mothers complaining about deadbeat husbands, and so few fathers complaining about deadbeat wives. Purely anecdotal, but it is very lopsided, and it has made me wonder why is it. I am a dad, FWIW.

I'm a dad, too. The lopsidedness could come from many places: mothers being drawn to parenting websites (marketing), women feeling more compelled to voice complaints online (if they are stay-at-home-moms, they don't have coworkers to chat with), women actually getting treated unfairly (very true... patriarchy), etc.

I've heard this from many moms, "My husband does so little in terms of housework, childcare, play and mental load, that it is actually easier when he is out of the house; when he is home, I essentially have to take care of an additional child." I even know some moms that organize playdates for their husband, as in ONLY the husbands, so that that the husbands are out of the house.

On the other hand, I know of two separate marriages that fell apart because the husband worked, did all the child care and housework, while the mom stayed home and doomscrolled. After a few years of no improvement, divorce. Of course many things could be at play here... screen addiction, post-partum depression, etc.

Raising kids is complex, time-consuming, hard, and amazing. It takes a lot of energy, people, and love. I always try to assume people are doing their best, though sometimes even that's tough.

Re: American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

#88

Post by giantg2 »

david-gpu wrote: post #72
giantg2 wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The number of mums who say their partner is not involved really at all in their child's care is so sad." While that can be true, I wonder how much of it is true. It's pretty common in therapy to hear partners saying the other one doesn't contribute, but further investigation can often turn up observation biases.

Without proper statistics we can't know. But I do wonder why is it that if you spend any time on parenting websites you find lots of mothers complaining about deadbeat husbands, and so few fathers complaining about deadbeat wives. Purely anecdotal, but it is very lopsided, and it has made me wonder why is it. I am a dad, FWIW.

Being a deadbeat is defined as not paying. It's not about caregiving. These roles may not be equally distributed by gender, but then why is there not as much complaining by men about women not being equal partners financially? It's has to do with bias.

You can also find that much of the research about household duties is biased against the type of work that men have traditionally done (eg excluding yard work, maintenance, etc).

Re: American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

#89

Post by mc3301 »

brewdad wrote: post #83
david-gpu wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Without proper statistics we can't know. But I do wonder why is it that if you spend any time on parenting websites you find lots of mothers complaining about deadbeat husbands, and so few fathers complaining about deadbeat wives. Purely anecdotal, but it is very lopsided, and it has made me wonder why is it. I am a dad, FWIW.

It depends on the site but when I was a SAHD, I found many of those parenting sites were not welcoming to dads, even dads doing the exact same work as the moms. Moms there wanted a place to vent about their husbands and men who were pulling their fair share or were handling most of the parent duties simply weren't allowed.

one of the better places I found found was Daddit on reddit, though I haven't been in a while.

Re: American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

#90

Post by IcyWindows »

compiler-guy wrote: post #59
sjhatfield wrote: post #18

I think this only applies to certain segments of society. My child has type 1 so I'm active on Facebook groups for parents. The number of mums who say their partner is not involved really at all in their child's care is so sad. The child's own father can't supervise their child solo because they can't manage the care. And then the divorced parents. Oh boy...

That's the thing about trends in aggregate data. It tells very little about the details of any particular situation. There are almost certainly a wide variety of subgroups where this particular trend doesn't hold, and others where the changes are even more dramatic. But the aggregate trend is quite clear.

Isn't the point that there is no way to get reliable data on this?

How would aggregation of unreliable data help?

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