Looks like the Wall Street Journal – always a conservative rag anyway – is starting to show its Murdoch underbelly. For Father’s Day, the WSJ’s Sue Shellenbarger brings us an article telling us all about why men make better parents than women. In fact, she proves with science (science!) that men are simply better people than women! Peep this quote:
“Under stress, men’s brains are wired to … leap into action. Women are more likely to withdraw or shut down.”
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| via the WSJ |
The article goes on to gush about how fathers’ disinterest in their children helps kids to grow up awesome, while mothers’ damn mothering turns kids into whinging, weakly brats. There’s even a cheesy full-color illustrations in which men are shown heroically sweeping in to save the day while mothers, offscreen, according to the unattributed cutlines, withdraw, shut down or otherwise over- or misreact, turning the unsuspecting children into balls of exposed nerves. The author throws a bone to the ladies by stating, repeatedly, that moms are darn good at teaching their squalling brats to “express their feelings” and “talk through their emotions.”
But wait! There’s more: “Because fathers have had to learn to manage their own impulses to strike out or react physically to frustration, they may be better equipped than mothers to help children manage their own urges to behave badly.”
Oh right. Because women never learned to manage their own impulses to strike out or react physically to frustration – we’re just born meek and feminine of course! The last little bit of conservative trope? Why, it’s that single mothers are ruining everything:
“Another reason involved fathers help kids, of course, is that families often function better when two parents are working as a team to give children what they need, supporting each other’s efforts.” Oh of course! How could we forget? Although it’s hard to see the logic in this conclusion, since the article’s assumptions are really building up to the conclusion that fathers should do all the parenting themselves, since they’re so great – actually, it would be best if all children were raised in two-father households, not one-father, one-mother households. But then we’d have to support gay marriage, wouldn’t we? Oh dear. Now we’re just confused!
If you want to read the whole Father’s Day Wall Street Journal piece, feel free.
What a terrible article. This looks like an instance of the WSJ writer thinking up the narrative for the article first, then digging around for some Science to throw in there. The article is about her narrative, not about what data say about fathers and child behavior outcomes.Here's what's really telling:"The average behavioral differences between large samples of moms and dads are small, in statistical terms. Also, their roles overlap a lot. For example, both parents spend a large share of their time with children in play—35% for fathers, and 29% for mothers, based on a University of Illinois analysis."This is the important part, and she just throws it in there in the middle with no explanation. She goes on to include a bunch of quotes from father-lovers about how much better fathers are, but then, shouldn't the story should be trying to explain why these people's stories differ from the research? She just threw it in there without acknowledging that this info contradicts her article's argument. uggg.
Lies, damn lies, and stastistics, as they say. I hate stuff like this on so many levels – one being that this kinda crap makes people hate journalists. Grump grump grump!
Listen. If you want to get published, write a memoir about how great your father was. If he ever wrote a book or did anything of note, your chances of getting published are 100%. Oh, and be sure to throw your mother and other females under the bus, while you are at it.When I look around me, I can tell you who is spending time doing the dreck work with kids! And it is not dear old dad. My kids revere their father and tolerate me, which is about standard. He was way more fun, when he was around.
shame on you. here is an article that speaks of behavioural differences among men and women and the role that these behaviours play in the development of a child, and you are simply bashing it for no good reason.what are addressed is how fathers are likely to play and interact with their children and how this affects the child's personality. i do not know where you got the impression that the article is suggesting that one style is superior to the other. the focus is on the father's likely parenting technique because its father's day and the article is address the father's role in the upbringing of the child. it is not saying that this method used by the fathers is superior to the method used by mothers. according to the article, fathers tend to require the child to provide physical response to emotions and thoughts as opposed to non verbal. what this means is that most fathers help develop the physical expression of emotions whereas most mothers help develop the non-verbal/physical indicators of emotion. are they different aspects of the development of a child? yes. is one aspect more important than the other? no.
Hattie: Thankfully that's not a temptation because my dear old dad has not written a book or anything of the sort. A very good blog I have been reading that talks in depth about the drek work mothers are unfairly burdened with is blue milk: bluemilk.wordpress.com.