A few years ago, when we only had three kids, my husband took them out on some errand with the goal of giving me a very much-appreciated break. He came home beaming: when he left the grocery store, someone had left a note on the windshield, along with a $50 bill, telling him they saw him with the kids and how he was such a great dad. The letter-writer told him to enjoy a night out with the money they had enclosed. I didn’t think much of it at the moment besides being excited about having a date night, but I did notice the paradox. I took all three of them out to run errands all the time. It’s part of my regular schedule: to the grocery store, to therapy, to doctor’s appointments (both theirs and mine), everywhere. I get rude comments. My husband gets money. What’s up with that?
Since then, we’ve added a fourth child to our family, and we’ve had the same experience over and over and over again. I get the raised eyebrows and people questioning me about whether or not I’m done yet, or if I know what causes that. My husband gets heaps of praise. If he takes the four of them to a therapy appointment, for example, the next time I’m there, the staff will be just gushing over what a good, hands-on dad he is. And let’s be clear: my husband is a wonderful father. He absolutely is the best man I could have chosen to raise our kids. He is always willing to help change diapers or feed them. He is happy to take them — all of them — out of my hair so I can get a break. I appreciate everything he does… and I should. I’m his wife. I should be proud of and thankful for him. But why is it that, as a society, people go crazy applauding dads when all they’re doing is their jobs?
Think about how dads are treated, versus how moms are. Moms are subject to never-ending scrutiny. Breastfeeding vs. formula feeding, working vs. staying at home, attachment parenting vs. free-range parenting… every decision a mother makes is picked apart, criticized, and never, ever good enough. If a mom goes out in public with her kids and is struggling in any way — you know, a crying baby, a toddler having a temper tantrum — then she gets annoyed huffs, snarky comments, or intrusive and inappropriate questions. Moms have every single parenting decision they make questioned and attacked. The term “mommy wars” didn’t come out of nowhere, after all. Meanwhile, if a dad goes out in public dealing with a crying baby or a toddler having a meltdown, everyone praises him for his wonderful parenting. They don’t have to worry about constant criticism because everything dads do, no matter how minor, is apparently worthy of praise and adulation. Why is this, exactly? It shouldn’t matter which parent is doing the parenting. Taking your children to the park or the grocery store isn’t worthy of applause, whether it’s dad or mom. (It’s also not worthy of scorn, for what it’s worth.) There’s no extraordinary parenting happening just because a dad happens to take his kids to a doctor’s appointment. Fathers play incredibly important roles in their children’s lives, but they shouldn’t be getting pats on the back for doing routine parenting tasks.
And while people may defend the idea of congratulating dads every time they do something with their kids without the aid of their wife, consider this: it’s massively insulting to fathers. When a mom gets a night out, and someone remarks that dad is “babysitting,” that’s insulting to the dad. When people act shocked that fathers are actually doing their jobs as fathers — that they’re parenting — the insinuation is that they otherwise can’t or don’t do that job. Applauding dads because they’re being dads isn’t just unfair, to both moms and dads alike, it’s saying that the bar of what is expected out of dads is extremely low. Why? Well, it could be the “idiot dad” trope that we see so often… well, everywhere. TV, movies, even commercials overwhelmingly feature a dad who is often a bumbling doofus, who can barely dress himself and whose hygiene appears to be questionable at best, who can barely manage to take care of his kids and creates messes everywhere he goes. And meanwhile, the wife is meticulously put-together, can juggle anything, solves problems in mere seconds, and handles her husband with nothing more than a chagrined smile. Dads are frequently the butt of parenting jokes, which is ridiculous. Fathers are, with extremely rare exceptions, hands-on, capable, loving parents. Treating them as idiots who deserve applause for the simplest parenting tasks undermines their abilities as equal parents, as well as subverts the important role fathers play in their children’s lives.
So yes, please keep applauding dads, but applaud them for the things that matter. Don’t give them high-fives because they managed to change a diaper or survive a trip to the park. Dads are better than that. It’s about time we treated them that way, starting with destroying the low expectations and “bad dad” stereotypes.
There’s ta few ways to view a Dad alone with his kid(s) – he could be a single father, like my son; he could be a divorced Dad having visitation time (in which case, he surely should have his kid(s) with him since it’s his time with them); OR – he could be an everyday Dad who’s giving Mom a break or just having a good time with his kids. In all those cases, the Dad is doing what a PARENT should be doing, spending time with their kids. This is just one more stereotype we need to destroy (the hands-off Dad vs the involved Dad) and a paradigm shift society must be ready to make – PARENTS care for their children, no gender necessary.
Couldn’t agree more on the ‘Bad Dad’ stereotypes. It goes the same for pandering to minorities of all the protected classes, which is primarily due to low expecations. No one needs the pity or the low expectations. They’re better than the low bar that some in society set for them. Leave ’em alone. The struggle is worth it. Take it from Frederick Douglass, a man who knew…https://fee.org/articles/frederick-douglass-tax-rebel/
Thanks Cassy for sharing this and great timing with the holiday vacation when moms can really use a ‘break’. I’m so frustrated when people tell me how lucky I am that my little one’s dad changes a diaper because their husbands never changed a diaper. As a mom of two boys, I’m very sensitive about what they are being taught (by example). We can’t change the the world overnight, but I do have an influence over my two little boys.