Posted on 04/01/2013 2:14:38 PM PDT by marcbold
My wife recently chaperoned a dance for junior high schoolers at a Catholic school. She working the door when another of the chaperones, a father of one of the students in attendance, hurried over and asked her what he was supposed to do about an eighth grade girl making out with an 8th grade guy in the middle of the dance floor.
“That’s not ok, is it?” he asked her. “Should we be doing something about this?”
The man truly didn’t know what his responsibilities were. My wife was stunned by the question. She was about to answer when another man came up to her and asked her the same question about the kissing couple. “It’s not O.K.,” she said. “Tell them to stop!”
From what I understand, after a lot of eyerolls from the couple, they stopped mauling each other with their mouths. But here’s the thing - what they were doing was completely expected. Kids do dumb things. What the kids did was something kids have been trying to do since kids were invented. Nothing new there.
What has changed in recent years are parents. Can you imagine just forty years ago two fathers frozen and completely unaware of what to do about two eighth graders kissing passionately on the dance floor? What’s happened to men? What’s happened to Dads?...
(Excerpt) Read more at ncregister.com ...
That situation is easy. Both of those men knew that if the girl’s mother was the wrong type of woman, they could get blasted.
Our society today is very contemptuous of men, and treats most women as a spoiled child. Men have learned not to interfere in such things in order to survive.
A friend of mine married a widow with twin daughters. Around age 13 one of them brought a boy home. Daryl took the young man into his home office where his .44 mag was laying on the desk. He explained that he could shoot the balls off a fly at 30 feet with it and asked the young man to imagine what it could do to him at the same distance.
He told me that his step daughter wasn't real happy with him, but he got over real quick.
Oh dear. My dad would have removed me from the dance and I would have been grounded until I graduated from high school.
When were you a kid? It’s been a slippery slope. It used to be that men were high school teachers and nobody got away with anything. Then the women teachers came and brought the NEA and Feminism with them, etc.
Take the boy out for a “get to know you” session.
At the range.
If nothing else you’ve taught another Leftist about guns.
Ping for later reading!
It had to do with the chemistry between 2 young people and the filter religion and society may put on it.
Remember we are talking about 1963 not now. Feminism was the wet dream of the left which was not making that much headway at that time.
I agree with you. We follow Archbold in the Register - my wife showed this article to me when it first appeared. She pointed out to me that the two dads in the article will likely discover that Archbold thinks they're not manly men, which is an interesting opinion for a guy who's essentially a house husband. I'm not picking on the guy - there's nothing wrong with doing what works best for your family and sometimes the way to be a man is to step back and let your wife do the providing while the husband takes care of the homefront. But his situation got me thinking that Archbold may feel he has something to prove and is finding bad Dads under every rock.
Even if the example doesn't make a case, Archbold's underlying point is certainly true - good dads are few and far between. I suspect decent Dads are missing in the homes of the two kids on the dance floor. I'm also very certain that the two Dads Archbold highlighted would've put a stop to the show immediately if one of their own kids were in it. But other people's kids are tricky. If there's not immediate danger or obvious wrongdoing (and two 14 year olds putting on a kissing show is on the cusp) putting a stop to things can put you on the wrong side of an obnoxious parent.
63 percent of youth suicides.
71 percent of pregnant teenagers.
90 percent of homeless and runaway children.
85 percent of behavioral disorders exhibited by children.
71 percent of high school dropouts, in the United States.
I agree with you ESPECIALLY concerning one parent “correcting” another child. I have the strong feeling that if the Dads saw their child kissing and such... he would intervene. However, I can say without a doubt that what is “right” for your child isn’t necessarily and automatically assumed correct for another. Simple (and relatively stupid) example: I volunteer at my elementary school. I made a “suggestion” to a first grader that tissues were available and it isn’t polite to pick ones nose. Well... I was somewhat scolded by the teacher because nose picking isn’t under the behavior guidelines and I stepped my bounds. Like I said... silly and stupid example but shows that many parents volunteer and aren’t 100% positive what can and can’t go on.
The question was, what happened to Dads? I said, feminism. American men have been effectively castrated.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.