“Is Father’s Day outdated?” That's what Mary Schmich, a columnist for the Chicago Tribune, asked in 2018. For me, the answer is a resounding “no.” As long as there are men, fathers will be relevant and worth celebrating. And, I don’t just mean “father” as though it were interchangeable with the word “parent.” A parent, in my view, can be of any gender or none at all. If you are willing and capable of taking on the responsibility of parenthood, you can be a parent. A parent’s responsibility is to educate, entertain, guide, protect, provide for and love their child. My success as a parent … [Read more...]
‘How to Raise a Boy’ Takes Reassessment of Teaching, Relationships
Michael Reichert says that just as we no longer believe a girl's destiny is set by her biology, we need to think the same about boys. The old "boys will be boys" notion of masculinity is not inherent in their DNA. That and our understanding of how boys learn are among the many things Reichert, the founding director of the Center for the Study of Boys' and Girls' Lives at the University of Pennsylvania, says people need to change if we are to raise a new generation of men who can form strong relationships without falling into the macho stereotypes and sexist behaviors of the … [Read more...]
‘Raising Empowered Daughters’ Starts with Dads at Home
Best-selling author and OG dad blogger Mike Adamick tells The Modern Dads Podcast he thinks fathers changing the conversation about boys and parenting is a good start to raising girls to be strong and independent. Raising Empowered Daughters: A Dad-to-Dad Guide, to be released in June 2019, is "a fists-up handbook for helping dads dismantle the patriarchy," Adamick's website. On the show, he and host Whit Honea talk about Adamick's efforts to meet dads where they are to discuss equality, representation and feminism. One way, he says, is to start by changing the way we talk about boys and … [Read more...]
Parenting Transgender Child More than ‘Just a Phase’
“Maybe it’s just a phase.” I said it to my wife while we were alone. I knew it was wrong, but I was feeling it so intensely that I had to let it out. I was feeling it because I really, really wanted it to be true. Our middle child had recently come out as transgender. I wasn’t supposed to feel the way I was feeling. I was woke. I mean, I was “hella woke,” as we say here in Nor Cal. I grew up in the San Francisco Bay area so I’ve been around LGBTQ people my entire life. In fact, if my child had said they were gay it would have been easy. I know how to move through that world. While … [Read more...]
One Dad’s Animated Battle Against Gender Stereotypes
If some gender stereotypes seem cartoonish by today's standards, is there a better way to discuss them than in animated video? That exactly what our own Whit Honea, a Los Angeles City Dads Group member, does in a recent piece for The Atlantic online magazine. Honea narrates "Outdated Gender Stereotypes Are ‘Very Much Alive,’" a three-minute essay on his family's experience with the assigning of old-fashioned gender roles in the modern world. The video is part of Home School, an animated series about parenting produced by The Atlantic. Previous episodes tackled issues such as … [Read more...]
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