June 12th, 2005
DADS MATTER, NOW
MORE THAN EVER
We've done a great job in America for the past 30 years to demean, diminish, demoralize and denigrate the role of, and importance of, men and dads.
Oh sure, I know it's easy to accuse me of being an oversensitive white man who's afraid and upset that my dominating role in our culture has been minimized to it's rightful position of equality. Fine, if that makes you feel better, argue that point all you want. Doing so just illustrates that we've also become very skilled at attacking the messenger rather than the message in this culture. Regardless of what you perceive to be my personal shortcomings, arguing the facts of what we've done to men and dads in our society is near impossible if you're using logic and reason.
The problem with most "movements" is that they go too far, which is exactly what's happened with the women's movement. 30 years ago women had every right to fight for equality. That movement was legitimate. It later morphed into the always dangerous mentality that the way to achieve equality is to tear down your "opponent," rather than raise your performance. Sure enough, long after we all realized that women are fully capable of running companies, balancing checkbooks and flying airplanes, we are still practicing the politics of personal destruction by trying our hardest to bring men down. The theory behind the argument is simple; we men have controlled the world, quite literally, forever and enough is enough. More over, men still hold women in a sexual, subservient role so it's only right that society demean men the best it can and tear them down in an attempt to force equality on the world as we know it. The argument may make sense, but that doesn't make it right.
If you look and listen around, you will still see and hear countless examples of men being made the fool. TV shows constantly portray the man as the hapless oaf who is lost without the woman in his life. Radio commercials compare husbands to Chewbacca. Movies make Angelina Jolie the professional hit woman while Brad Pitt is the klutz who gets lucky killing ¼ the number of marks Jolie has nailed. Hilarious.
Oversensitive? I'd take that if this weren't an epidemic of idiocy which is now affecting our culture. There is no chicken and egg question here, because the answer is obvious. Some would argue that men were oafs first and society is just exploiting that…those people would be wrong. The fact is that we have spent so long telling men how worthless they are that many boys are starting to believe it and thus, they don't even try to become responsible men. The proof is in the present.
Violence amongst teenage girls is at an all-time high. Sexual promiscuity amongst teen girls begins earlier than ever before and is more rampant than most people even think it is. Teen boys' attitudes towards girls is at an all-time low. All of these things are values that are either learned or not from positive male role models in kids' lives. Yet, we have done such a good job of either eliminating or neutralizing the role of men in this world that many kids are never given the chance to see or learn these lessons.
Men matter. Whether they become dads or not, men are a necessary evil to the success of our society and its' future and we must start acknowledging that.
I was blessed with an amazing father who taught by example. While not perfect (who is?) he taught me that certain things matter. Men protect women, men treat women with a certain level of chivalry, men provide for women and when necessary, men die for everyone. All of these lessons are now called chauvinistic. I call them impressive and necessary.
Men are bred to lead. That doesn't mean that a woman can't, it means that there are certain things that most men do better than most women and vice-versa. Men should provide and protect. We would be well served as a people to go back to acknowledging the differences in the sexes that are positive and necessary.
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