14th-June-2008
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Father's Day: worst thing President Richard Nixon did, Fathers Day a crime says woman | |
Quote: Father's Day - the worst thing American President Richard Nixon did
By Gill Hornby
In the third week of June 1972, Richard Milhous Nixon committed an injustice with which the Western world is still struggling. Yes, two men broke into the Democratic Party headquarters in the Watergate building - but we're no longer bothered about that. What still affects us today - or rather tomorrow - is that the then President that week brought the American nation together by making Father's Day a public holiday. For this high crime and misdemeanour, his name should live on in the annals of infamy.
Now, of course, it's over here. It's just like Hallowe'en - another American import. One year we're marking it with a quick ghost story before bed, the next it's a national drama involving all major shops and food outlets. The American business press has cheerfully predicted that this weekend is "recession proof". $11 billion will be wasted on Father's Day tat. Why wouldn't British retailers want us to do the same?
The economy must stimulate itself somehow. But the most worrying thing is that there is a new generation of impressionable young minds who might somehow get the Days of Fathers and Mothers confused. They may even, given the strength of the commercial message, judge them as equal. It is essential to clarify the differences.
The first is historical. Mother's Day was born out of the sacred rites of the holy church, in the 16th century. It was a day to celebrate the role of the Virgin Mary in the life of Christ, and for women to meet up in their own mother church and re-establish their family bonds. Father's Day was invented by Hallmark, and blessed by Richard Nixon.
And the second is in the rites of the celebration of the day itself. Gifts are exchanged on Mother's Day; of course they are. Flowers are delivered, cards are sent. But those are not the important things. The traditions that really matter are the breakfast in bed, and the lunch being cooked by others for once, and being allowed to read the paper in the afternoon. It is a day away from the domestic coalface. And how quite do we adapt that this Sunday?
Of course, there are single fathers who deserve every treat coming their way this weekend. But although one quarter of all families live with a single parent, only one in 10 of those parents is a father.
In two-parent families, the culture of fatherhood has changed significantly over the past generation. Men are, on the whole, much more involved on a day-to-day basis with their children and noticeably more demonstrative emotionally than their fathers were.
There is sympathy and accommodation in the workplace for them to be actively involved in family life. They attend births and change nappies and drop off at schools. They are great. Give them a soppy card and a copy of the new James Bond book.
But real co-parenting is still a rare and remote ideal. For all the family activities that men do join in, a few still, bizarrely, get overlooked. Nit-combing remains a female preserve. As does the dentist's waiting room, the scrum of the school uniform sale, the toy stall at the fete. But most important, recent research shows that, among couples with children, regardless of who goes out to work, women do a whopping 10 hours more child-generated housework per week. How can men have a day away from the coalface if they never look down the mine?
And then there is the question of taste. Mothering Sunday one associates with a charming church service and a hand-tied posy of violets. This week, the image most employed in the celebrations seems to be that of Homer Simpson.
But now the day is upon us, it would be rude to ignore it. In this household we will be celebrating as in all others. We'll cook him lun… hang on, we always do. He can read the pap… nope, he always does. Put his feet… they're always up. It'll just have to be the Bond.
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~ A man needs a woman like a lion needs a stove. ~
~ Women deserve only equal opportunity, not equal outcomes. ~
~ Men are not collectively "guilty" of anything. ~
~ Never needing to be pregnant is a blessing. ~
~ Feminist ideology “men have to respect women, but women have no reason to respect men” ~
~ Everybody makes choices, and nobody should be entitled to special treatment because of those choices.
Equal results based on unequal treatment amounts to no kind of equality at all. ~
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