You may remember that for Mother’s Day, I posted this really great video Thank You Mom. So I went looking for something similar for Father’s Day. The results were poor. All of the videos celebrating Father’s Day were not only explicitly Christian, they had a very traditional view of fathers.
Even when I was growing up in the middle ages of the 20th century, I could see that the standard line on “dads” was wrong. Fathers were much more involved in the lives of their children than commonly accepted. They were a hell of a lot more involved than the standard line that says that fathers lead by example. This is the “we aren’t reptiles” theory of fatherhood: we don’t eat our young!
The great diversity and fierce attachment of modern fathers shows that men always wanted to be intimately involved in the rearing of their children. The moment that social mores allowed this, men jumped at it. This is one of the best and most enduring results of the feminist revolution.
And this is the text from the supremely silly card I got my father:
To which I added even more silliness. But that’s private.
Happy Father’s Day!
I thought I’d add a comment about something I saw on an online source (might have been The Huffington Post?) because, it seemed to ‘dove-tail’ nicely with, this post on Father’s Day (generally) and (part) of our conversation on Woody Allen?
Apparently Woody and Mia’s son, Ronan, wrote this on Twitter for Father’s Day: "Happy Father’s Day, or as we like to call it in this house, Happy Son-in-Law’s Day". I guess there’s still some tension?
I know I’m late with this, but I was kinda distracted as of late.
@karl – I don’t know how to take that. I thought it was very funny. Are you sure it’s true? It has that urban-legend-too-good-to-be-true feel to it. But if it is true, I could easily see it indicating that he got the old man’s sense of humor. Or that he hates dad’s guts. Or both!
@frank-well, I’m reasonably certain it’s true. I saw the ‘Twitter feed’ and read Mia Farrow’s ‘re-tweet’. I know what you mean though, it does seem like part of an ‘urban legend’, but I don’t think it is? Anyhow, I think he *was* trying to be funny, and I think he also, kinda-sorta, ‘hates his dad’s guts’. I saw Ronan in an interview, a few years back, and he’s definitely a really smart, very sharp and quick witted guy. even then, I detected that, he had some bitterness towards his dad.
@karl – I can’t blame him. We boys perhaps expect too much from our fathers though.
@frank-yeah, can’t blame him-that’s for sure. it seemed most of his ‘bitterness’ stemmed from a (perceived?) lack of emotional support from his father? his remarks on ‘the controversy’ seemed influenced (along with the bitterness) by being raised and growing up with, his mother? so, it made sense he was sympathetic in that way.
we often *do* expect a lot (much of it unrealistic) from our fathers. but, I think father’s can often be guilty of the same thing?
@karl – Bingo!