Father's role affects how teens approach relationships

CanWest News Service ^ | February 16, 2004 | DOUG FISCHER

[RogerFGay]

ping

[2banana]

Another girl said that before every date, her father would get out his shotgun and cleaning apparatus and sit in the living room silently oiling his gun - in his undershirt - while the poor schmuck waited inside the front door for her to put on her makeup.

Today, this will get you arrested...

[RunningJoke]

"TV has also provided poor role models for fathers themselves. If you buy the argument that TV dads have been the most influential agent of paternal culture over the past 50 years, it's little wonder even more fathers haven't turned out to be ineffective, hapless idiots like the Tim Allen character on Home Improvement or Ray Romano on Everybody Loves Raymond."

The Fred MacMurray character (Steve Douglas) was a pretty good father model. There are bunch more, too. I think the point here is that hack commedians make for terrible TV dads. It's a Hollywood formula that has jumped the shark.

[RogerFGay]

I didn't think Tim Allen and Ray Romano were bad fathers. They are just more "traditional" in that they leave the housework to mom. Many working girl journalists today might not prefer that arrangement, but it doesn't mean that the men are bad.

[rovenstinez]

A very OFTEN neglected POINT, in WHY the flight of Mexican dads to find jobs in the USA is not only bad for Americans, but bad for those who traffic people, and bad for the mothers and children left behind trying to meet the very basic needs in a home. The absence of a dad, is something we will yet reap. The law of Reaping and Sowing.

[Blood of Tyrants]

And without fatherly guidance, girls were more likely to pick creepy boys.

And become loser magnets. I don't know how many young girls (an women) I have seen who claim to want a nice guy and then date one creep after another. Possibly because they never had a father do the screening for them when they were young.

Every father was once a teenage boy with raging hormones and wild ideas.

Lord, ain't that the truth!

[Blood of Tyrants]

Romano's character is an idiot. Tim Allen's character was just dangerous around tools. (It didn't help that his wife was leaning way left.)

[Blood of Tyrants]

And the young Mexican boys are "sowing and reaping" as we speak.

[FITZ]

The absence of a dad, is something we will yet reap.

In Mexico it's becoming extreme --- in Mexico City there are thousands --- some estimate over a million street children. Abandoned women and children in Mexico aren't doing very well.

[Blood of Tyrants]

P.S. I believe that the disproportionate number of males to females in the illegal alien Hispanic community is a leading factor in their disproportionate crime rate.

[RunningJoke]

My point about Ray and Tim was that they are sitcom formulaic humor, if you enjoy that, good for you.

Since, I've only watched both shows less than five episodes each, I have a restricted sampling on their fatherly skills. The jokes are unfunny the plots are transparent. I'd rather read a book.

[martin_fierro]

Another girl said that before every date, her father would get out his shotgun and cleaning apparatus and sit in the living room silently oiling his gun - in his undershirt - while the poor schmuck waited inside the front door for her to put on her makeup.

And the problem with this is...?

<|:)~

[martin_fierro]

The Devolution of Dads

[FITZ]

The crime rate in Mexico is higher though --- much is due to the destruction of their families and values and a lot of that is due to massive migration and abandonment of families.

[Blood of Tyrants]

Fatherhood is more than a paycheck sent back home once a week.

[FITZ]

Yes --- and very often the paycheck quits being sent back --- absence doesn't make the heart grow fonder. Around here it's not hard to see some of these women --- they'll tell you that first they had money being sent back, then they never heard from the father of their kids again, then they packed up, left their kids themselves and headed over the border to become maids and nannies --- taking care of other people's kids --- and their own kids ended up with no parent.

[Capriole]

...a Texas father - a 6-6, 300-pound former pro football lineman - invited every Tom, Dick and Jason over for a family dinner. Later, he took each boy to his den for a Meet the Parents-type grilling where he asked the young man whether he was a virgin, where he was taking his daughter and with whom, about his driving record and condition of his car, the name of his insurance carrier, the church he attended, his Boy Scout rank, his marks in school and, most crucially, what the word "no" meant to him.

Sounds good to me!

Another girl said that before every date, her father would get out his shotgun and cleaning apparatus and sit in the living room silently oiling his gun - in his undershirt - while the poor schmuck waited inside the front door for her to put on her makeup.

This also sounds pretty good. My daughter, alas, does not have an involved father to give a dirty look to potential suitors. However, some friends of ours who feel very protective of her have offered to sit on the front steps of the house when she receives her first caller, cleaning their guns in their undershirts. They have rehearsed little vignettes, to wit:

"Hey, Joe, 'member what we did to the last kid who wanted to date Susie? That was pretty good."

"Aw, Billy, you shouldna oughta done that to that boy. He ain't never gonna be right in the head again."

"Oh, hell, there's more where he came from. Hey, boy, how fast can you run? Think you can run faster'n this bullet?" By this time, of course, the unfortunate young man would, in theory, be completely cowed and would promise devoutly never to lay a finger on Susie's pure self.