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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

#101

Post by kelipso »

krapp wrote: post #82
compiler-guy wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

But when leftists says things like community support, it doesn't bring up images of traditional villages and extended families. It brings up images of communists saying things like abolish the family. Naturally, due to their history.

It's not like leftists are known for their traditional family values now or then, so why should it be taken that way?

Re: American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

#102

Post by senordevnyc »

gib444 wrote: post #23

I feel there is a trend of not fully appreciating what fathers who spend less time with kids actually do. I think that's unfair, frankly. Many of them do things that contribute to the family in other ways. What was my Dad busy doing? Focusing on his career in order to provide for his family. Doing hobbies that increased his skill set. Fixing the house to ensure we all had a nice safe place to live. Tending to the gar…

Strongly agree. I know so many men who are the sole provider for their families and their wives are unhappy about how things like childcare and household chores aren’t split more fairly, but they seem to have zero appreciation for the crushing burden of financially supporting a family for decades. It’s hard, stressful, and wears you down. Almost all of the stay at home moms I know get more sleep, more exercise, and more social time than their husbands do, once the kids are old enough for school.

I’ve also now watched many friends divorce, and I have to say, the wives who stayed at home seem to struggle a LOT more with the transition of now having to parent AND have a job, and the husbands mostly seem to be fine. And that’s despite them now paying a big chunk of their ex’s bills!

Re: American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

#103

Post by kelipso »

david-gpu wrote: post #94
mc3301 wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

I found that /r/daddit was full of pictures of dads with infants. On the other hand, /r/parenting was full of moms desperate because their partners didn't to their part. It really paints a picture, if you think about it.

It's like how /r/steak is just dudes posting steak pictures, and there is some new cooking sub where it's just women posting food pictures and complaining about their significant others. Women be complaining.

Re: American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

#104

Post by mitthrowaway2 »

david-gpu wrote: post #94
mc3301 wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

I found that /r/daddit was full of pictures of dads with infants. On the other hand, /r/parenting was full of moms desperate because their partners didn't to their part. It really paints a picture, if you think about it.

It seems like a safe guess that very few of the moms complaining about their partners on r/parenting are also married to the dads who are posting on r/daddit.

Re: American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

#105

Post by giantg2 »

hackable_sand wrote: post #97
giantg2 wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

That is your bias talking.

The reseach says otherwise. https://couplestherapyinc.com/why-women-complain-and-why-men...

Re: American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

#106

Post by Ancapistani »

Not directly relevant to the article, but I'm curious if anyone else has connected the fact that fathers are spending more time being close with their children at the same time average global testosterone levels have dropped without a solid explanation?

To be clear, I'm not trying to point a causal arrow here, or even say it's good or bad. I read a study the other day that asserted that fathers who spent more time parenting have measurably lower testosterone levels, and that the delta correlates to the amount of time spent.

Re: American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

#107

Post by Ancapistani »

ryandrake wrote: post #92
rhubarbtree wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Millennials seem to have their shit together more than any generation since the silent generation, at least in the UK.

I'm GenX, but had kids a little late, so most of my kid's friends either 1. have Millennial parents or 2. are raised by their Boomer grandparents (parents not much in the picture). The differences in how these two sets of caretakers behave is astounding. Take a typical visit from the friend to my house to play with my kid: The friends who are with their grandparents show up. Grandpa parks his car in my driveway, and…

I'm a Millennial, and I do something much like this intentionally. I make it a point to explicitly put my kids into situations where they are responsible for themselves and are uncomfortable because of it.

The transition to adulthood was rough for me for several reasons, and looking back I think that was one of them - my parents always did things for me, but never expected me to do things on my own.

I almost certainly go overboard with this, but that's the nature of things.

Re: American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

#108

Post by Ancapistani »

nradov wrote: post #60
purplerabbit wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And guess why trad household structures are (still) popular in some circles

Those household structures aren't popular , they're just common when women have no other options. I have nothing against those structures, they work great for some families. But the reality is that they often force the wife into becoming an unpaid caregiver for her in-laws (who constantly criticize how she runs the household).

It's 2026. Barring severe manipulation/abuse, why would you choose to get married and have children if you're a woman who doesn't want to raise them?

Re: American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

#109

Post by gracefulliberty »

Ancapistani wrote: post #106

Not directly relevant to the article, but I'm curious if anyone else has connected the fact that fathers are spending more time being close with their children at the same time average global testosterone levels have dropped without a solid explanation? To be clear, I'm not trying to point a causal arrow here, or even say it's good or bad. I read a study the other day that asserted that fathers who spent more time pa…

If that's the case, that's not a bad thing. Maybe men who aren't properly bonded with their kids have higher than normal testosterone for some reason?

Re: American Dads Became the Parents Their Fathers Never Were

#110

Post by krapp »

kelipso wrote: post #101
krapp wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

But when leftists says things like community support, it doesn't bring up images of traditional villages and extended families. It brings up images of communists saying things like abolish the family. Naturally, due to their history. It's not like leftists are known for their traditional family values now or then, so why should it be taken that way?

Yes, when you intentionally take what leftists say in bad faith and stereotype them negatively, then the bad faith interpretation and negative stereotypes make sense. But normal people don't hear "communism" when leftists say "community support."

Also given how many people espousing "traditional family values" among the right turn out to be abusers, pedophiles, rapists, deadbeats, etc, what you might consider "traditional" values don't actually mapped to the left-right political axis at all.

And I assume you didn't bother reading my comment or this thread very hard and just wanted to dunk on the left, but the American nuclear family isn't "traditional family values" to begin with.

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