The vanishing male

[whatevergirl]

While I agree that men are being marginalized, probably moreso than young boys, in my experience–be very careful that you don’t use that as an excuse or reason if your boys don’t succeed in their endeavors. As much as things need to change in our society from a variety of standpoints, it is dangerous to blame an entire gender for an individual’s lack of success. Very dangerous, and actually enabling.

 

[deepsouthpapist]

deepsouthpapist;5580705:

My kids go to a Catholic College Prep high school. There are many hands on classes in this school, the most recent being an engineering course. It is all hands on. Shop classes are being replaced by engineering classes.

That sounds like a great school! You understand of course you are experiencing the exception to the rule.

My kids’ high school and junior high have many males as teachers. In fact, the numbers are about 50/50 M/F. (their favorite teacher is a 6+ foot guy with tattoos all over!)

Great! My children’s school is 100 percent female teachers. I wish I lived where you lived. Count your blessings.

Yeah, sure. That is why my boys are reading To Kill a Mockingbird, Ovid, and The Odyssey this summer.

Good for them! Three books out of how many? What do they check out at the library on their own? Not To Kill a Mocking Bird I can assure you! That was assigned work. Their choices at the library are likely all squishy touchy feely and girly. Ask them. I’ll betcha a plugged nickel I’m right.

I am a woman…I doubt I could sit for 10 hours without caffienne either!

In that environment most girls are far more successful and this can’t be denied. You may be uncomfortable but your male counterpart is plain miserable and can’t cope. Therefore at test time, who achieves?

SO back to my original point. Where did this all begin? IMO with the commercialization of the pill, which by the way was first used in Nazi Germany. Women now had the “choice” of leaving the home, not having babaies and going to work. The cycle began.



You would feel this way as you are a stay at home mom! You are also Anglican that means birth control to you is no big deal. Not so with Catholics.

So why can’t he?? I don’t understand why you don’t feel boys can achieve as well as girls. In MY experience with boys, my boys are achieving just fine!

Your boys are doing fine because you live in a fantasy world with Male teacher, good role models where there mother stays at home! You have proven my point exactly! Thank you. Serisouly.
IMO opinion men are hard wired to be leaders, guiders and fixers. Only society has stripped them of all ability to be any of of the three. They are stuck now being secondary women with bigger muscles required at every bend and turn to cow tow to women, all thanks in large part to ABC. Whatever! My boys are all leaders, and have been recognized as such with various leadership awards at school. Just because some girls are leaders too in no way makes the boys any less able to be leaders!
/quote]

Frankly boys make BETTER leaders in a lot of ways. They just aren’t being given the chance to do so. Your fantasy world where all the children are above average not withstanding.

 

[utunumsint]

many of not most of those working mothers who are not home raising their children full time have to work because the father of their children has dropped the ball

This does not agree with my experience.

Many women go back to work because they don’t want to be baby making machines for the rest of their child bearing years. After a couple of kids, they want to reclaim their identity because raising kids in this society is lonely isolating work that is looked down upon, demeaned, ridiculed. Mothers who have three or more kids are looked upon as irresponsible and their opinion is confirmed every time a mom of any more than three or four kids asks for help (help that is dearly needed at times).

But to raise another point, often times women have to work because they have demanded to keep up with the Joneses, wanting a house they cannot afford, a second car, vacations in the Caribean, all the best clothing, fine wines, etc… leaving the husband so deep in debt that the only thing that can be done is for the woman to go back to work in order to sustain this lifestyle. A lifestyle that is anything but child friendly. You can sum it up as selfish materialism.

The fact is that when there is a single income, there is a massive disparity in lifestyle compared to those who have a dual income. This is hard for women to accept, especially those who tend to define themselves based on their material possessions. Social pressures makes things worse. Unless you are surrounded by a supportive network of family and or friends, you are also hobbled from the get go.

Look. Birthcontrol is a massive temptation in this society. Even good practicing catholics are tempted by its lure. Less kids means less work, less stress, more personal income, better jobs, etc… Having multiple children is an excercise in generosity and selfless charity.

 

[whatevergirl]

*deepsouthpaptist…

I don’t know if you realize it or not, but I sense some disdain for women in your posts. We need to have balance when discussing these issues with our own boys. It’s important that they don’t grow up resenting women, etc.*

 

[deepsouthpapist]

While I agree that men are being marginalized, probably moreso than young boys, in my experience–be very careful that you don’t use that as an excuse or reason if your boys don’t succeed in their endeavors. As much as things need to change in our society from a variety of standpoints, it is dangerous to blame an entire gender for an individual’s lack of success. Very dangerous, and actually enabling.

Good post and great advice! I was using the women have too much power phrase to incite a reaction and get people thinking and posting comments. It isn’t gender specific and in a lot of ways the problem has been created due to a serious lack of inclusion with women and girls 30 years ago and beyond. The solution however has created another problem which is the marginlization of boys of all ages.

 

[whatevergirl]

Good post and great advice! I was using the women have too much power phrase to incite a reaction and get people thinking and posting comments. It isn’t gender specific and in a lot of ways the problem has been created due to a serious lack of inclusion with women and girls 30 years ago and beyond. The solution however has created another problem which is the marginlization of boys of all ages.

Whew, I am happy to see your response here. I agree…that, the pendulum has swung in the complete opposite direction. Maybe it’s our society that seems to never be able to find a happy medium!!

 

[Catholic90]

Originally Posted by deepsouthpapist forums.catholic-questions.org/images/buttons_khaki/viewpost.gif
My kids go to a Catholic College Prep high school. There are many hands on classes in this school, the most recent being an engineering course. It is all hands on. Shop classes are being replaced by engineering classes.

That sounds like a great school! You understand of course you are experiencing the exception to the rule.

Not in my end of the world. It is pretty standard here.
*
My kids’ high school and junior high have many males as teachers. In fact, the numbers are about 50/50 M/F. (their favorite teacher is a 6+ foot guy with tattoos all over!)*

Great! My children’s school is 100 percent female teachers. I wish I lived where you lived. Count your blessings.

*So move! *
*

Yeah, sure. That is why my boys are reading To Kill a Mockingbird, Ovid, and The Odyssey* this summer.

Good for them! Three books out of how many? What do they check out at the library on their own? Not To Kill a Mocking Bird I can assure you! That was assigned work. Their choices at the library are likely all squishy touchy feely and girly. Ask them. I’ll betcha a plugged nickel I’m right.

*Well, you would be WRONG. There choices at the library…well. let’s see…this summer my 16 year old is reading up on financing and the stock market. He is actively involved in online stock trading and boasts a 40% return thus far. My 17 year old is reading true crime books…forensics and such. My 14 year old is actually writing his own novel. He is about 300 pages into his own fantasy novel set in medieval times. (he is also in Honors English and Literature classes this year). *

I am a woman…I doubt I could sit for 10 hours without caffienne either!

In that environment most girls are far more successful and this can’t be denied. You may be uncomfortable but your male counterpart is plain miserable and can’t cope. Therefore at test time, who achieves?

Stop making excuses. Poooooor me.
*
SO back to my original point. Where did this all begin? IMO with the commercialization of the pill, which by the way was first used in Nazi Germany. Women now had the “choice” of leaving the home, not having babaies and going to work. The cycle began.



You would feel this way as you are a stay at home mom! You are also Anglican that means birth control to you is no big deal. Not so with Catholics.*

Where do you get your information? I am CATHOLIC. I am also a working mom. I work in a school. Birth control is a big deal.
*

So why can’t he?? I don’t understand why you don’t feel boys can achieve as well as girls. In MY experience with boys, my boys are achieving just fine!*

Your boys are doing fine because you live in a fantasy world with Male teacher, good role models where there mother stays at home! You have proven my point exactly! Thank you. Serisouly.

It is not a fantasy world. It is their real world…one we sought out and chose through tuition.
*
IMO opinion men are hard wired to be leaders, guiders and fixers. Only society has stripped them of all ability to be any of of the three. They are stuck now being secondary women with bigger muscles required at every bend and turn to cow tow to women, all thanks in large part to ABC. Whatever! My boys are all leaders, and have been recognized as such with various leadership awards at school. Just because some girls are leaders too in no way makes the boys any less able to be leaders! *
/quote]
Catholic90;5580933:

Frankly boys make BETTER leaders in a lot of ways. They just aren’t being given the chance to do so. Your fantasy world where all the children are above average not withstanding.

SOME boys make good leaders. SOME girls make good leaders.

You sound like you are having a pity party because your boys are being overrun by high achieving girls! Kind of like the football player who chose to take the summer easy and not do any real workouts and is then shocked when he is overtaken by the guy who was the slowest on the team last year, because over the summer the formerly slow guy worked his butt off and improved himself!

Work harder! Teach your boys to apply themselves!

 

[whatevergirl]

*I think those are great points, Catholic90.

Very important to not use an entire gender as a scapegoat for one’s own individual lack of success. Everyone has an equal opportunity in the U.S. to make something of themselves. Where I work, men outnumber the women by a long shot in mgmt …so it’s not true, that women are sweeping through, and taking away jobs from men. I believe in the most able person getting the job, not a man getting it who thinks he deserves it because he is a man…or a woman getting it because of her gender. If you are the better candidate, regardless of race, gender, etc…you should get the job. Period.

And this is not Catholic doctrine…women can be educated, and work outside of the home, if that is where God is calling them. There have been many female saints who were doctors, educators, etc…

Just my two cents. *

 

[deepsouthpapist]

*deepsouthpaptist…

I don’t know if you realize it or not, but I sense some disdain for women in your posts. We need to have balance when discussing these issues with our own boys. It’s important that they don’t grow up resenting women, etc.*

I have a disdain for the way I see society treating our boys. I won’t apologize for that. What you are reading is frustration. I consider myself an active father and I am trying to raise my son with some self respect and that’s hard to do in a female dominated squishy, let’s talk it out kinda world. Nope. Won’t apologize.

Little boys need male heroes, ones that are called on to save the day, not only physically but emotionally as well. They need to be taught to be relied upon when the chips are down when they grow up. This happens through dad’s letting boys make mistakes when they are young when consequences are low. By letting the boy ride a bike without five layers of clothes and $60.00 helmet. They need to be taught a type of courage and strength that will allow them to lead their own families one day, most importantly leading them to Christ. They need to have the type of inner core that helps them understand that they may be asked to lay down their own life for their families one day if necessary. They must have the courage to do so without flinching. They need to be able to teach that inner strength to the next generation when they grow up.

You tell me where there is a woman that can teach all that and I’ll put my son on a bus tomorrow. The fact is it can’t and shouldn’t be taught by momma’s or female teachers.

Boys learn physical limits and how to treat a woman through wrestling with their dad and watching how he treats his mother. This ain’t taught through a series of conversations with momma.

Boys learn physical strength by engaging in sports, not video game baby sitters.

Boys learn physical courage by watching their dad’s and uncles and brothers line up and say yes when their country calls, not engaging in conversation with the enemy and hoping diplomacy works eventually.

Boys learn strength by watching their dad defend his family from the garbage on TV, the sexualization of children in magazines and books and shutting off the **** filled internet. He gets it too by his father insisting on respect to his elders - yes m’amm and no sir should be the norm.

He watches his dad insist his family knows Christ and seeks Him out every Sunday in church.

He learns all of this without a single conversation being had with dad by and large and with no further explanation. But he gets it and he grows up and passes it on.

Nope. Won’t apologize.

 

[Catholic90]

By letting the boy ride a bike without five layers of clothes and $60.00 helmet.

Boys learn physical courage by watching their dad’s and uncles and brothers line up and say yes when their country calls, not engaging in conversation with the enemy and hoping diplomacy works eventually.

I agree with some of your points, but I have to discuss to of them.

How is making a child wear a bile helmet making a wimp out of him? I suppose we should not make our boys wear seat belts either. We should not make them put on sun screen either. Or wear a life jacket while in a boat.

There is a time for fighting, and I have the utmost respect for our military. I admire what they do and the sacrafices they and their families make. However, there is also a time for diplomacy and talking! (this may be before or after the fighting, but there IS a time and place for it!) It’s not an “all or nothing” matter!

 

[whatevergirl]

*You might have to “apologize” however, to him if you create him to grow up resenting women, because you have caused him to use women as a scapegoat for his own lack of success. If he ends up not getting a job he applies for someday. Raising boys into men is not an easy task. I have a 16 yr old son, and it takes balance between his dad and me, to raise him to respect women and their roles, while becoming a strong responsible man. I don’t want my son hearing out of my dh’s and my mouth…well, son, you probably didn’t get that job because I bet a woman took it from ya. Not saying you are doing this, but it seems to be something that you feel to a degree, as seen in your posts.

I know you are frustrated, but continue to raise your son in the way you believe will make him a strong male in this society, and I don’t see you going wrong with that.

My husband is the tough one on our son, I’m the softer one. I believe boys need a balance. If boys only needed moms or dads, why would God have created marriage? Boys to become strong men, need both genders, and a strong male role model at home. I think you are shifting some of the blame onto women…when men do a fair amount of walking out on their families in our country. MOST male inmates, this is a stat, had no male role model growing up…dad walked out on their mothers, and they have no idea how to be a real man in today’s society. The ills of society are here due to the irresponsibility of both men and women*…

 

[chevalier]

So here is my opinion - It’s not going to be popular but read through it - Women have too much power.

Schools are run nearly 90 percent by women. As such, they teach to little girls. They stick boys in chairs for eight hours a day and require them to be still. They pop pills in their mouth if they squirm, wiggle or disrupt. Then they kick them out when they are older. 20 Years ago schools had physical education/recess an average of 1.5 hours per day which boys need! Today, my son get 30 minutes on some days and none on others with a weekly average of around 15 minutes per day. You say it didn’t happen 20 years ago and women ran the schools then! True enough but there has been a concerted effort to teach to little girls in the past 20 years to the detriment of little boys. I am not saying we need to teach to girls less don’t get me wrong. However, we need to teach to boys MORE!!

Boys now grow up, disrupt, get frustrated and don’t attend college where women now outnumber men almost 2 to 1. Those educated women then enter the work force and have dibs on all the good jobs, have better success in government as well as business. Men are entering trades at a rate non seen in 25 years. Those are the only jobs they are qualified to do!

My father, a criminal defense attorney, has told me for years that he believes terrible life circumstances usually start with a single bad decision. Usually that decision is drugs or alcohol but there are plenty of other bad decisions that could make the point.

So to the above problem I believe it started with a single bad decision - ARTIFICIAL BIRTH CONTROL!

That’s my premise…Any takers?

Firstly, I experienced some of the pro-female bias in school that you talk about when I was a kid. Girls were good, boys were bad, girls were the more advanced stage of the evolution, boys were comparably lesser beings. Begone with that, I say.

Furthermore, there aren’t enough manly things to do at school, while schools are too tolerant of the bad kind a manly thing to do, i.e. plain thuggery. On the one hand, boys are clearly not the types to decorate their pink copybooks with flowers or whatever else some schools come up with. And I do believe teachers who ingrain the aforementioned women superiority ideas in children, especially in boys, should be made to stop. It makes boys reject their identity and that way, they can either rebel and burst into aggression (e.g. becoming thugs or turning that aggression against themselves), or become less of men.

Heck, these days, real men seem to be dying out. Even as I look at myself, I can’t escape noticing I’m not quite fully the man I’d like to be. But in no event should shortcuts be taken and masculinity achieved by coarseness, negation of sensitivity, art and so on.

Plus, I don’t see women as taking jobs away from men - or rather it doesn’t seem so disproportionate when you consider that each sex is more or less half the populace. I don’t think men skip college merely because there are so many women there, either. Besides, I suppose in older times, fewer people went to college anyway (these days, where I live it seems half the people have a Bachelor’s degree, whereas not so long ago, 40% ever finished highschool. At some point they closed the old vocational schools here and then one’d ask if everyone in a trade were supposed to be a diploma-ed technician…

Finally, while birth control is indeed an awful thing and has brought about many evil things, your final thought came to me as a real surprise because it doesn’t seem to follow logically from the education thing. I woud definitely agree, however, that all the relaxation of morality which has led to men growing up without fathers has been and is depriving us of real men at an astounding rate.

Can’t deny women overwhelming men in certain areas of life. It’s hard to avoid the unpleasant consequences of that to men for sure. Think of parish activities and the like. Often the same goes for clerks with the authorities (where I live most judges and most court staff are female, along with most administrative authority clerks, though I guess it’s easier for them than for men to resist the bigger money from corporate jobs (e.g. most law firm partners are firmly male and the same goes for top-exec levels in business).

By the way, it’s nost just men that are affected. The same difference as between grandfather and grandson also exists between grandmother and granddaughter. Guess we shouldn’t expect the same hardiness from today’s kids as from the post-WW2 generation (or the generation that remembered both wars).

 

[Cat]

I think there are some unpleasant and just plain wrong stereotypes in this thread that need to be addressed.

Not ALL males are hyper and require lots of physical activity to function.

Growing up, my husband was one of those geeky little boys who preferred to fiddle with electronic projects, model rocket engines, chemistry sets, and when he was older, computers. He read everything he could get his hands on about science. Even now, he will relax in bed with one of his computer journals, and when we were dating, he read mathematical problems and solved them for FUN.

He is also rather artistic, and when he was younger, enjoyed singing in the chorus and acting in school plays.

He HATED P.E. He dreaded it. He was miserable in gym shorts and tank tops. He wasn’t athletic at all, at least when it came to team sports like basketball and soccer. He was OK in track and field in middle distance running, but not at a competitive level. Thankfully the other boys didn’t make fun of him because they liked him–he was lots of fun with his model rockets and chemistry experiments, his homemade radios and computer programs and fun plots to take over the world bwoo ha ha! But HE felt inadequate compared to other boys. To this day, he is rather soft and round, and has a hard time seeing himself as a true athlete. (He’s working on his ice dancing tests.)

He wasn’t fat or out of shape. He enjoyed hiking and rock climbing with his father, and twirled trick ropes with his father and grandfather. He also liked to ski and ice skate.

But he wasn’t athletic and he really would have preferred to skip P.E. entirely and stay inside taking apart the school’s programmable calculator to find out how it worked, or practicing with the music teacher on a special ensemble piece.

I know LOTS of boys who are the the same way–they truly hate P.E. and prefer to stay inside and keep working. Many of them are theatrical boys, into music, drama, or other forms of arts. Others are science nerds–God knows we need more of them in the U.S.!!

A lot of boys like this prefer solitary workouts, like running, skating, weightraining, swimming, etc. Some like to dance.

Although running is a possibility, and a lot of schools have pools, most schools (other than Michigan) don’t have ice rinks, and only performing arts schools offer dance. These are activities that the child must pursue outside of school.

And IMO, that’s what’s wrong with PE–it cuts all the kids out of the same cookie cutter. The curricula generally revolves around the competitive team sports, or around games (yuck), or competitive individual sports, and this is NOT something that appeals to all boys (or girls).

In fact, now that I have experienced multiple physical problems due to my flat feet, I am convinced that many boys and girls are actually HARMED by participation in sports that they are NOT physically suited for! No wonder I never liked to run when I was in school–my feet, given to me by God, are not SUITED for running. Too bad none of the P.E. teachers figured that out back then.

I would be in favor of school P.E. IF it were optional, and boys were allowed and encouraged to stay indoors and work on other projects if they prefer.

But basically, I’m NOT in favor of physical education offered through schools, except as electives to those children and teens who want to pursue more advanced knowledge in this field.

When I was in 8th grade, I did an analysis of our school’s P.E. classes and published it in the school newspaper.

I analyzed how much time was spent in changing into our gymsuits, lining up in squads, attendance, instructions, choosing side, actual activity, showers, changing back into our school clothes.

The results were that we spent about 8 minutes on actual physical activity. The rest of the time was prep time.

My conclusion back then was that school P.E. was a waste of time. (As you can imagine, the teachers were not amused.)

I think that much of school P.E. is very much like it was when I was in school. Waste of time. More prep than actual movement. And just plain painful for kids with flat feet or other physical limitations.

I think it would be better if schools did NOT offer P.E., but if instead, parents took charge of their children’s physical education by allowing them to try out a variety of sports and other physical activities (dance), and then as they get older, allowing them to settle into the sport or activity that most suits them, is in keeping with their physique and any limitations, and that the family can best afford.

I think this would save us taxpayers a ton of money, money that we could use to pay for our kids to figure skate, dance, hike through woods, twirl ropes, etc.

And I think we would be a more active nation if kids were allowed to do the sport or activity that they like best, instead of being forced in P.E. classes to learn how to play soccer and other games and activities that we dislike.

 

[deepsouthpapist]

I agree with some of your points, but I have to discuss to of them.

How is making a child wear a bile helmet making a wimp out of him? I suppose we should not make our boys wear seat belts either. We should not make them put on sun screen either. Or wear a life jacket while in a boat.

There is a time for fighting, and I have the utmost respect for our military. I admire what they do and the sacrafices they and their families make. However, there is also a time for diplomacy and talking! (this may be before or after the fighting, but there IS a time and place for it!) It’s not an “all or nothing” matter!

Reagan brought down the Soviet Union and never fired a shot. He did it through a position of abundant strength and with very little talking. In contrast, our military today is under funded and stretched thin. We are seen as a weak an incapable enemy. And we end up fighting a lot! Your point though is duly noted, there is a place for diplomacy, just not as much of it.

Bike helmets are an example - no they don’t need them. I grew up in a neighborhood of all boys and two brothers. We all survived riding bikes just fine! Seat belts are another story as they should be required. The point I am making is we don’t need to over protect our boys. They need to play rough, get dirty and make mistakes when the consequences are low. That way when they are older, they know how to avoid mistakes and what hurts and what doesn’t.

 

[chevalier]

I tend to agree with you on P.E. My P.E. has been misery. I had doctor’s leave whenever possible. In elementary school, I played chess with the teacher or was allowed to leave earlier or come later. Once, I wrote a paper to raise my grade from C to A (would’ve cost me “colours”). Later, they were understanding and made me sweat the generous B the rare years I wouldn’t have doctor’s leave. In highschool, life wasn’t normally so easy and doctor’s leave didn’t exempt one from chores like preparing the field or carrying stuff around, but at least there was no grade in the end.

I had asthma and a bad spine, but initially many doctor’s leaves were for an ingrowing toenail. Initially, I was frankly rather fat, but a spine therapy gymnastics routine took away over 30 pounds in 6 weeks (one of which I was immobilised by another nail incident, so it was really 5) . Plus, it’s true I wasn’t the little Ronaldo, but I was more reclusive and geekish (wanting to read instead) and didn’t have a good rapport with my peers (interaction tended to hurt me because kids could be mean, they didn’t normally care so much for learning as I did and they frankly did some stupid things I felt to smart to join in. And it wasn’t out of arrogance (that came later). Then, I had poor coordination for various reasons not in my control and not all corrigible simply by more effort on my part. Later, I was clumsy, not that reactive, did enjoy games when able to play, didn’t enjoy tedious repetitive workout or such, which you needed to have the fitness for games to enjoy them.

Now I regret skipping P.E. all the time from the point of view of my health, but I also remember the dread associated with it and the stigma against those who weren’t into athletics (even if you were physically capable of beating them up if need be). I wish someone would simply have found something for me I could do and shown me something I could appreciate, without dragging me through all that **** for my poor coordination or bad breath span.

I’m all for sports in school, but the situation with obligatory exercises and the grading needs addressing.

 

[Em_in_FL]

Yikes… I agree with Cat - way too many generalizations in this thread.
Yes, there are some valid points… but the generalizations make it difficult to sift through.

As a WORKING, MOTHER of 3, who’s income is necessary to send our children to CATHOLIC school, and who prayerfully uses NFP, and would LOVE more children when God opens that door for us… I don’t appreciate the generalizations.

 

[deepsouthpapist]

*You might have to “apologize” however, to him if you create him to grow up resenting women, because you have caused him to use women as a scapegoat for his own lack of success. If he ends up not getting a job he applies for someday. Raising boys into men is not an easy task. I have a 16 yr old son, and it takes balance between his dad and me, to raise him to respect women and their roles, while becoming a strong responsible man. I don’t want my son hearing out of my dh’s and my mouth…well, son, you probably didn’t get that job because I bet a woman took it from ya. Not saying you are doing this, but it seems to be something that you feel to a degree, as seen in your posts.

I know you are frustrated, but continue to raise your son in the way you believe will make him a strong male in this society, and I don’t see you going wrong with that.

My husband is the tough one on our son, I’m the softer one. I believe boys need a balance. If boys only needed moms or dads, why would God have created marriage? Boys to become strong men, need both genders, and a strong male role model at home. I think you are shifting some of the blame onto women…when men do a fair amount of walking out on their families in our country. MOST male inmates, this is a stat, had no male role model growing up…dad walked out on their mothers, and they have no idea how to be a real man in today’s society. The ills of society are here due to the irresponsibility of both men and women*…

Spot on! No questions with your post. You are right. It takes both of you, you are correct their too. This is a call for men to be men not mothers to be men, which is what has happened. Don’t misinterpret what I am suggesting here. Women do a great job and like our military, they are stretched thin and are having to do double and triple duty to make up for lost fathers. My son is doing great and well positioned to compete with anyone, male or female. There is a lot that a mom simply can’t teach. Period. Dad needs to step it up. Find a boy with a strong, capable dad and you’ll find a strong an capable man one day! mom certainly plays a role but she needs to play mom and not mom and dad!

 

[deepsouthpapist]

Yikes… I agree with Cat - way too many generalizations in this thread.
Yes, there are some valid points… but the generalizations make it difficult to sift through.

As a WORKING, MOTHER of 3, who’s income is necessary to send our children to CATHOLIC school, and who prayerfully uses NFP, and would LOVE more children when God opens that door for us… I don’t appreciate the generalizations.

Thanks for the post! I am sure you are doing a great job with your children and you should be proud. Generalizations are made for society as a whole, not you in particular. Where have all the men gone? Why do they leave their families high and dry? Why are our prisons full of dysfunctional boys? Cause dad has been vacated from his position through a societal paradigm shift. I believe that the shift was originally brought on by the use of ABC. You’re doing great and should be commended for it. Go get your husband and put him on the line! I want to hear from him how he is “manning” up those boys!

 

[ac_claire]

Yikes… I agree with Cat - way too many generalizations in this thread.
Yes, there are some valid points… but the generalizations make it difficult to sift through.

As a WORKING, MOTHER of 3, who’s income is necessary to send our children to CATHOLIC school, and who prayerfully uses NFP, and would LOVE more children when God opens that door for us… I don’t appreciate the generalizations.

I agree…the OP is speaking very generally and that’s frustrating. To have a conversation about specifics when it’s starting out as a general convo is like comparing apples and oranges.

So…if I look at the OP’s theory just as a very general statement, I agree with it 100%. Dietrich and Alice von Hildebrandhe and the late Dr. William Marra spoke and wrote a lot about this subject, and all the little side-issues that stem out of it.

(BTW you can download many of their talks at keepthefaith.org/, or just see what a google search brings up. )

 

[deepsouthpapist]

When I was in 8th grade, I did an analysis of our school’s P.E. classes and published it in the school newspaper.

8th grade…I’m sure your study was well funded and randomized, double blind and placebo controlled! Paleeeze!