Doing it Daddy’s Way

Just as women can bring their own feminine traits to the workplace – with great success – so men can bring their own masculine style to the domain of child-rearing.

When my son was very young, just months old, I told his Mum I wanted to have one day alone with him each week so that we would learn about on another.

She loved the idea, and why not? Not only did Dad get involved with his own child, but it gave Mum a day off.

However, the theory sounded great, the wrinkles revealed themselves more in the practice. The very first Saturday that was declared to be Dad-son time, she hovered around in the background. Actually ‘hover’ makes it sound like she was a humming bird – and at some levels, she was.  But at another level, she was more like a Momma-bear.

I felt intimidated. The stereotype of intimidation generally runs in the other direction, but in this instance, I definitely felt like I was being watched, and judged – and perhaps found wanting. Even though I tend to work at home, and so I was around much of the time with our young son even if she was the one primarily pre-occupied with our first-born. Nonetheless, there was a sense that on this first Dad-son day that this was not my domain.

To add to that, Momma bear wasn’t far away as she was pottering around the house doing other things in other rooms. This could at some level be reassuring, but at another, it threatened to undermine the whole intention of the practice.

Whenever our young son would squawk or wail or burp or grizzle, she would holler her advice from somewhere within the house: “He wants a feed,” “He needs to be put down,” “You need to change his nappy,” etc.

I quickly saw that this was not what I had wanted and just as importantly, was probably not going to work. So I suggested to his mother that for Dad-son day, either Dad and son would leave the house together, or she could leave the house for the day leaving us to work it out for ourselves.

It was hard to establish a rapport with my young son with his Mum playing translator and big boss ma’am. I was fortunate. His mum agreed to this and so I learned heaps about my son from these regular intensive interactions, and maybe he learned some from me too!

Yes, the Mum may have a good deal of expertise in the care of the offspring. However, just as Mum will probably acknowledge herself, all the advice in the world (from her own mother, from her mother-in-law, from other helpful mothers) does not replace the tried and true hands-on method. At some point, the parent – be it Mum or Dad – has to work it for themselves.

Men – like women – need to be supported in this. Parenting is a tough job, and as every child is different, it is impossible to ‘parent by the book’. So it would be great if the community, that is employers, neighbours, mums, all stepped up to support Dad for what he is doing. When he gets involved with the kids at home, he is doing everyone a favour.

Mum in particular can help. It is true that ‘his’ way may not be ‘her’ way – just as ‘her’ way may not be the way of those faithful family members who tell her how to do things. However, she can help by trusting that Dad will learn the same way she did, by trial and error, hands-on practice.

(For more thoughts along the different and important ways in which fathers offer care, see Richard Fletcher's book The Dad Factor and see Bettina Arndt and some of the damage done when Dad is absent)

Man Guilt

There is a guilt that comes with being a man.  Not only do women have a tougher time than me, but I get a strong impression that I’m a member of the gender that is blame for her hardships.

In fairness though, I didn’t ask for it.  It was my parents’ fault.  Actually, it was my Dad's fault.  He gave me his ‘Y’ chromosome rather than his ‘X’ chromosome.

You see! Men are the ones to blame - again.  Women get it tough, and it’s the man’s fault.

Hence, I have this guilt about being luckier than 50% of the Australian population because I am male.  Well actually, that would be guilt about being among the minority gender because there are more women than men!  And the preponderance of women to men grows with age.

Why are there more women than men?

Because women tend to live longer.  About 5 years on average in Australia, but the result is observed widely in the world (see figure).

And so men are the lucky ones again - men get to choose from more potential partners than do women.

Hang on though.  If women are living longer on average than men, does that not count as being luckier than men?

If I was given the choice of living five more years or getting more choice of partners, I think I would go for the five extra years thank you very much.

In fact, I'd choose five more years of life over more chance of a boardroom seat which are typically occupied by men rather than women.

Hey, maybe the boardroom is the problem?  Maybe while members of the board might be winners in the money and social status stakes, they lose out on the life stakes. 

Seems dubious given that most men - just like most women - never make it to the boardroom.  That is, what happens in the distant stratosphere of the corporate world is unlikely to explain what is happening at the population level.

However, it certainly is true that where you work can kill you.  Every year, a number of people die while working.  

But get this, those unfortunates who die working, 95% of them are men!  This result is true of most nations, not just Australia.

Maybe men make poor work choices.  I mean, it is their choice to work in dangerous professions, right? 

But wait, if men make choices to work in dangerous professions, and women want the right to make the same choices as men, why are they not lining up to take up a 50% share of the jobs that are downright dangerous? 

I obviously do not want anyone to die, but if there have to be jobs that lead to deaths, should we not have equal representation in those jobs so that women share an equal burden with men?

Hmm, maybe it’s not so clear cut.  I live a shorter life than she does, and I get a higher chance of dying on the job than she does.

However, as a man, I may have a better chance of gaining a coveted seat in the boardroom.  A rather miniscule better chance it must be admitted as those boardroom seats are downright scarce altogether.

In review then, the picture is unclear.  I am doubtful about whether I am luckier than women in an overall sense.  I am pretty sure I am not to blame.  But I am certain that I have more guilt about my gender than she does!

Exercising Rights : Bombs vs Blame

Anders - Bombing Rights

“Behind every great man, there’s a great woman” so it is said. 

So what is behind every monumentally failed man?  A monumentally failed women? 

One Friday night in late July, Anders Behring Breivik exploded a car bomb in the city of Oslo killing eight people.  A couple of hours later, he went to a summer camp on the island of Utøya.  There, he calmly and indiscriminately shot 69 people.

Why everyone asks?  How about this for an explanation?  I think that Ander’s mother has a lot to answer for.  Let me explain why I think this:

Anders Behring Breivik refuses to plead guilty, but recognises he is responsible for the attacks that killed 77 Norwegians. He shirks real responsibility. Breivik’s refusal to plead guilty beggars belief.

But Anders Breivik is not the only one to shirk responsibility. His mother, Wenche Behring has remained strangely silent throughout this affair. I wonder whether she was so silent when she abandoned both Anders and his father to marry another man? I wonder whether she considered her son’s peace of mind when she thought it best to move to Oslo and then to deny his father’s application for custody? Anders was only one year old at the time his parents separated with his mother treating him like some kind of football. Such traumatic events in a child’s life so early on can have life-long effects.

Even though most divorced children do not go on to become killers, his mother is made conspicuous by her silence.  What is she thinking?  What was he thinking?  Well maybe he did not have a father when he was growing up to teach him the difference between right and wrong. What I want to know is why his mother is not feeling any sense of remorse for having failed her son.

Wenche Behring is not a bad person. Anders Breivik is. But his mother’s lack of reaction to this event is disappointing, and demonstrates a lack of humanity that should be there.

Okay, okay.  Keep your knickers on.  Extremism merely engenders extremism.

The point is this.  If anyone tries to publish a story vilifying a mother, public (and notably women’s) interest groups would cry ‘Foul.’ The writer would be hunted, haunted and hated. 

I do not really think that Anders’ mother can be held to blame for this event.  I admit (with pride) that the above story is not mine.  Shamefully, it is essentially the story of one Katharine Birbalsingh a columnist for the Daily Telegraph.

Katharine like any good Freudian-wannabe quickly identifies the parents of Anders as the causal factor.  Well, I say parents, but that is not entirely correct.  She places the entire burden of blame for the episode on one parent, the killer’s father, Jens Breivik. 

Katharine - Blaming Rights

The story above is nearly verbatim copy of Katharine’s story – except that my version implicates Ander’s mother instead of his father.

Katharine can write this stuff about the father, but no-one – and almost certainly no man – can write equivalent drivel about the mother.  To do so would be considered unremittingly sexist.

But is it not also sexist that our society allows someone like Katharine to write this sort of thing about men even while no-one, least of all men, can write this sort of thing about women?  Actually men could write something like this against the mother.  But stoning would be too good for them in the views of many – both male and female.

If we are to condemn sexism, then whether it targets a man or a woman should be irrelevant. 

Ironically, another writer for the Guardian  argues that Breivik’s manifesto is anti-feminist.  Breivik’s manifesto actually rails against a number of broad cultural segments.  Feminism is one of them, but cultural Marxism (whatever he means by that) is another, and Islam is yet another. 

So apparently rants against feminism are not allowed.  But rants against anti-feminists are.  Katharine of the Daily Telegraph can write a story about the culpability of the father of Anders Breivik based more on her apparent prejudices against men while Breivik can be roundly condemned for his writings criticising feminism.

Actually, perhaps we begin to see a similarity between both Katharine and Anders.  They are both assassins.  Admittedly she merely assassinated a man (Anders’ father) in print.  However, both took their beliefs, and extended on them by acting on people. 

Now we have crossed a line.

I am all for free speech.  I may disapprove of what Katharine says, but I will defend her right to say it – in echo of the statement often attributed to Voltaire.  Just as I will defend Breivik’s right to criticise ‘cultural marxism’ and feminism in his manifesto.

But when their beliefs flows to intolerance and more significantly, to actions affecting others – be it by bombs, bullets or blaming – then I draw a line.  Both are to be condemned for thinking that their beliefs accorded them rights over others not sharing their beliefs.  That is prejudice – the root of sexism and racism and discrimination.  Our beliefs do not give us rights. 

I would be tempted to put Anders and Katty B in a room together to sort it out.  The outcome would likely be unpleasant.  And neither victim nor victor would have right on their side, no matter how strong their beliefs, no matter who wins.

The stage is set for a scene

Consider the following scenario.

Kim is a single parent of two, a 7-year old boy and a 3-year old girl, and also the director of marketing for a small to medium-sized electronics firm. Today, Kim is scheduled to present key results from the quarterly sales report to the Board of Trustees but arrives for the meeting 15 minutes late due to having to drop the older boy at school, and the younger girl at daycare. In addition to disheveled hair, there is a noticeable stain down the left side of Kim's suit, the result of the young girl vomiting at the end of her car trip after a hurried breakfast.

Why do you think Kim is late for this meeting? Is Kim a good parent? A good employee?

More importantly, which sex have you assumed Kim to be as you answer these questions? Did you think that Kim was a man or a woman? In research I conducted, I simply asked these initial questions to encourage people to reveal their assumptions about the sex of Kim.

Daddy deception – ‘Who’s your daddy?’

You're cuckoo if you think it is yours!

"It's a wise child that knows their own father."

Who's your daddy? Who knows? And you maybe cuckoo to think it's yours!

The potential for a man to conceive without his knowledge is so complete as to defy counting.

So what's the big deal? This has been going on for millennia. Some men even find the idea of being a father without responsibilities appealing.

It certainly must be admitted that 'sowing your oats' is a strategy that is only available to men.

Nature is like that sometimes. Just as Nature gives women an 'advantage' over men by dominating the in-utero and post-partum experience, nature gives men an advantage over women on minimizing the time and energy they have to put into the offspring.

However, not satisfied with allowing Nature to run without constraint, human culture has generally imposed a number of rules or guidelines or norms on how the two sexes play together in the reproduction game – and in particular, how child-care will be managed. In most human cultures, men are expected to be responsible for their offspring. And women can demand that be the case – sanctioned and reinforced by law in many countries.

Differing views of sex differences

For better or for worse, there are two sexes of humans.

That the sexes look different is plain to see. Even a five year old can confirm this and are generally keen to do this early. That males and females act and behave differently is self-evident also. Certainly the characteristic behaviors of the other sex make up much of the conversation of same-sex individuals in TV sitcoms and real-life.