... is that still something we do?
How long do you think it will continue, this archaic convention?
Wikipedia explains the history of Father's Day in the United States:
Father's Day was inaugurated in the United States in the early 20th century to complement Mother's Day in celebrating fathers, fathering, and fatherhood.
Father's Day was founded in Spokane, Washington, at the YMCA in 1910 by Sonora Smart Dodd.... Her father, the Civil War veteran William Jackson Smart, was a single parent who raised his six children there. After hearing a sermon about Anna Jarvis's Mother's Day at Central Methodist Episcopal Church in 1909, she told her pastor that fathers should have a similar holiday honoring them....
Americans resisted the holiday at first, perceiving it as just an attempt by merchants to replicate the commercial success of Mother's Day, and newspapers frequently featured cynical and sarcastic attacks and jokes. But the trade groups did not give up: they kept promoting it and even incorporated the jokes into their adverts, and they eventually succeeded....
In 1916, President Woodrow Wilson went to Spokane to speak at a Father's Day celebration and wanted to make it official, but Congress resisted, fearing that it would become commercialized.... In 1957, Maine Senator Margaret Chase Smith wrote a proposal accusing Congress of ignoring fathers for 40 years while honoring mothers, thus "[singling] out just one of our two parents". In 1966, President Lyndon B. Johnson issued the first presidential proclamation honoring fathers, designating the third Sunday in June as Father's Day. Six years later, the day was made a permanent national holiday when President Richard Nixon signed it into law in 1972....
Nixon!
You know, we don't need Father's Day just because we have Mother's Day. I note that we have Women's History Month but not Men's History Month. Male dominance has been the norm, historically. "Men's history" is just history. By the same reasoning, "Father's Day" is just day.
And, now we have Juneteenth, a national holiday, falling on the same weekend, and Father's Day seems to drag attention away from all the many the new celebrations and festivities. Wouldn't it be more noble for the fathers to stand back and let Juneteenth dominate?
Moreover, June is Pride Month too, so there are those festivities and celebrations, and they are reminding us to rise above the stereotypes of binary gender. How can — why should? — Father's Day stay afloat in all of that? What if the sperm donor to your existence is a nonbinary or trans person? What if your father is a domestic abuser or a rapist or an absentee and you're condemned to feel bad every year as this subject of fathers is thrust in your face?
I'm not arguing for the abolition of Father's Day, merely observing its senescence.
Posts
114 comments:
I can define Father's Day. Pride month and Juneteenth are mysteries to me.
It seem that Ann’s competing with the Babylon Bee now!
How long do you think it will continue, this archaic convention?
Althouse is trolling her readership again, I see.
As if putting all these other festivities around Father's Day wasn't subconsciously on purpose.
South African philosopher David Benatar points out this very thing in The Second Sexism: Discrimination Against Men and Boys (2012). Yes, Western civilization has been actively trying to diminish and denigrate the role fathers play in the family and men play in society since before 1960.
If you can't see this you're blind. If you can see this and accept it, you're evil.
I just baked a pan of brownies for my son's first Father's Day. His father abandoned him and his sister physically, emotionally and financially when he was five. He will be a very different sort of father and for that he gets brownies.
How long do you think it will continue, this archaic convention?
As long as there are sons and daughters who respect and appreciate the roles their fathers played or are still playing in their development.
As a proud yet very imperfect father, I would gladly yield today to whomever in the Juneteenth and/or Pride factions that want to take it over. I will gladly pop a beer and cheer on both groups in their fight for dominance.
Just let me take a nap (or wash the car or walk the dogs or watch the golf) and, please, GTF off my lawn.
Men are used to not being appreciated. Women seem to like it, so men go along with it.
"What if the sperm donor to your existence is a nonbinary or trans person? What if your father is a domestic abuser or a rapist or an absentee and you're condemned to feel bad every year as this subject of fathers is thrust in your face?"
What if your father struggled and sacrificed during your entire life to give you everything he could manage? Apparently, you'd disparage that because some men somewhere were bad people.
I'm sorry for the harsh reaction, but this post really rubbed me the wrong way.
I have three daughters within a typical, suburban boring nuclear family. We celebrate Father’s Day and enjoy it. Sorry, my Woke friends.
re: "senescence"
Well there's a word I had to look up, good one! I suspect Fathers' Day will stick around as long as it is profitable in some way or another, like Mothers' Day, Valentine's Day, Halloween, etc. If it didn't motivate people to go out and buy shit, I think many of these "special days" would just dry up and blow away.
I have no problem with Juneteenth. A fentanyl junkie stealing a banana with a fake sawbuck gave everyone an extra paid day off. Why would I complain. The 19th of June is a day we should all take a knee and remember to thank Saint Floyd for his martyrdom.
Not only do we (Americans) celebrate Father's Day; I just returned last week from the UK, and Father's Day items were for sale just about everywhere you looked.
Last week you suggested on Flag Day that we could just celebrate any ol' flag we wanted to. Let me modify that notion and say let's just celebrate the holidays that we identify with. So...
If you have a father, celebrate Father's Day.
If you are particularly proud of some aspect about yourself, then celebrate Pride Month.
If your great-great-great grandparents were freed from slavery in Galveston, TX in June 1865, then celebrate Juneteenth Day.
Just celebrate what you can relate to.
Consistent with these Untruth Times, Fathers Day will be eliminated within 20 years. Pick the reason.
i know, that they've replaced "mothers" with "birthing parent"..
But, i'm pretty comfortable saying; that dads are NOT going to be called "non birthing parents"
You know why? (you KNOW why!)
fathers have dicks.. THIS MEANS, that They are Actual Human Beings; unlike front hole things.
front hole things serve ONE purpose, and ONE purpose ONLY.
For things to cum into their front holes, and then for things to come out of their front holes.
They are NOT Actual Humans, they are baby factories.
Don't get it wrong, women are humans, and Have civil rights.. As Long As, They are Chix With Dicks
ps. do NOT come down on gilbar for this.. These aren't HIS ideas, they are Accepted Gospel.
"Male dominance has been the norm, historically." The feminist argument.
"Wouldn't it be more noble for the fathers to stand back and let Juneteenth dominate?" Shaming language.
"...sperm donor...domestic abuser...rapist...absentee..." Reduction.
"I'm not arguing for the abolition of Father's Day, merely..." pointing out the general uselessness and worthlessness of men in general.
Moreover, June is Pride Month too, so there are those festivities and celebrations, and they are reminding us to rise above the stereotypes of binary gender.
Fathers still exist, binary gender considerations notwithstanding.
How can — why should? — Father's Day stay afloat in all of that? What if the sperm donor to your existence is a nonbinary or trans person?
Still your father. Everyone has a father.
What if your father is a domestic abuser or a rapist or an absentee and you're condemned to feel bad every year as this subject of fathers is thrust in your face?
That's a tough hop, but most fathers are none of the above - my dad was a great guy who loved his children and most everyone I know had a similar experience with their fathers.
Beyond that, what if your mother beat you, or was a prostitute or drug addict, or all of the above? You don't get to choose the circumstances of your birth, but you have life because of your mother and father. You can change your gender if you wish or pursue whatever else matters in your life, but you do not exist unless you have a mother and father. If a person doesn't want to honor that father, it's none of my concern. My father has been gone for over 30 years, but he is always with me in all the ways that matter.
A society that regards fatherhood as less worthy of celebration than transgenderism, homosexuality, membership in an ethnic group, motherhood, and womanhood is a society headed toward extinction.
More to the point, why do we put up with all of these government approved propaganda months and days? Do we have such a low opinion of our capacity to think for ourselves? It seems we do.
Propaganda is everywhere. I have to put up with it to use my computer. Let's make December into Punish the Propagandists month, in which the media and government publicize all of the efforts by government, big business, and the educational systems to slyly seduce the American people into foolish beliefs.
A long, long time.
Anthropologically, Women are the most important, that is why society is structured around supporting them. Because the are the only way to sustain the continuation, and growth of any society. (Ask China for an explanation.)
I'm not interested in examples where you thing females are not supported, the only reason you can notice them, is because we all agree those things are wrong, and not to become the norm. USA social problems come from the govt "helping" (handing out free money) single mom's. Driving away males from their offspring, in order to maximize "help"
We aren't doing anything different from any other Sunday. Church, breakfast, home, lunch, then some maintenance sex.
"Daddy’s in the alley
He’s lookin’ for the fuse"
How many Juneteenf cards does Hallmark sell, compared to Father's Day cards?
Wouldn't it be more noble for the fathers to stand back and let Juneteenth dominate?
LOL. Good one! You sure can come up with some wonderful sarcasm on occasion.
??????
You were being sarcastic I hope? Sometimes it's hard to tell from Internet posts, but I can't imagine it to be anything else.
I see you did the NYT crossword puzzle today. Nice word.
I see you did the NYT crossword puzzle today. Nice word.
Look, Prof… I just came off a string of events- wife’s b-day, anniversary, Mother’s Day, among other “mandatory” celebrations related to school for my kid- and I’m due. Something. Today is that day!
That said, other than my wife doing the breakfast routine for our son (which was her running to a little stand down the street for breakfast tacos’s), I have bulk trash to gather and take down to the curb, grocery shopping, a little bit of kitchen clean up, some light repairs to both vehicles (blinker bulb on hers, headlight on mine) and a few other honey do’s to knock out before I can settle in for round 4 of the US Open Golf tourney, likely tape delayed for me, plus a bonus viewing of a 5:04 CST SpaceX launch.
So I’ll take the celebration any way I can get it and salute all the other Dad’s that probably have very similar parameters as I. They can easily co-exist with Pride, Juneteenth, etc. Pretty sure those groups encompass a few Dad’s, too!
If America does not celebrate the norms, then there will be no norms in the future. Society is held together by norms. Other countries celebrate the future they aspire to. Apparently you aspire to a culture without norms and an untethered society.
I am sorry, but if ever there were a time to focus on fatherhood and its vital importance, it would be now. Boys in school are a national crisis. College enrollment is about 60-40 female. Etc. As to Juneteenth, fine, celebrate it. But perhaps go look up the central concern about fathers and missing fathers as taken up by Robert Woodson and his 1776 Unites group, Glenn Loury, John McWhorter, the Free Black Thought organization, Kendall and Sheila Qualls' "Take Charge" group and dozens of others who understand that the crisis of fatherhood in poor minority communities is vastly more of a challenge than the residual racism our detached and ignorant elites obsess over.
Seeing as men and fatherhood are under renewed assault in the Woke Hysteria, we should certainly promote Father's Day. Fathers are a critical part of a functioning society. Look at what the rise in single parent households has done to the country and certain subcultures in particular. Note that upper income liberals assault the traditional family while they are more likely to marry before having children and more like to stay married. Do what I do and not what I say. I am looking forward to great zoom call with my son and grandson today.
Juneteenth is an odd holiday.
Are blacks supposed to thank whites for freeing them from slavery from other whites?
Or is it meant to distract from Fathers Day since so many fathers, especially black fathers, aren’t involved in their kids lives?
Let’s not forget Flag Day either.
So the Pride has to share its month with Flag Day, Fathers Day, and Juneteenth.
But Black History has to share its month with Ground Hogs Day, Lincoln’s Birthday, Valentines Day, Washington’s Birthday and Bachelor’s Day/Leap Day (every fourth year).
Not for long, fathers don't matter much anymore, very few Murphy Brown episodes extolling them.
Althouse the Troll
"How long do you think it will continue..."
Not that fathers care, but yes, it will continue as long as there are any happy families out there. And particularly any sons who finally learn what he meant to them.
Wow, this was a terrible take
Or is the professor just observing her senescence? Or just trolling, per usual?
It'll be gone when the fascists declare Year Zero...
So how is the 'hood celebrating Juneteenth? Not even officially here until tomorrow, but 2 shot at a Juneteenth event in Asheville, 20 at one in Chicago.
There's an old - and though realistic likely racist joke- about how Father's Day is the most confusing day in the 'hood.
Now Juneteenth is the same weekend as Father's Day!
Coincidence or not? Just 3 years ago Juneteenth was little known outside Texas, and celebrated nowhere but Texas, which is, in reality, the only state with a reason to celebrate Juneteenth since that's where it took place. In most of the rest of the Confederacy freedom for slaves followed the front lines. A better holiday with more meaning for everyone would be Abolition Day on December 6th since December 6, 1865 is when the 13th amendment was ratified and became the law of the land.
But Father's Day is no ore and no less archaic then Mother's Day. Always more problematical before DNA testing. Mother's were known, Fathers were assumed... I have a half sister running around right now. I wonder if she knows we share the same biological father. Her son DNA tested- my half nephew. So far everyone remotely related to them with family trees on Ancestry have rebuffed my attempts at contact. Took a few years after the DNA match popped up to figure out my half sibling was his mother and not his father.
I do recall from my grade school days = a long time ago now- that Mother's Day was a big thing in school. School was out by Father's Day. Have to wonder- was that by design also?
But while I hope all the Fathers like me raising kids they know are their own have a good and joyful Father's Day, a special shoutout to those who've taken on the task of raising children they know aren't theirs. Those men have stepped up to do something special.
I already had Father's Day texts from all my kids when I got up today. Texting has replaced the traditional phone call.
Let's have Pride month instead. Celebrate how and who people have sex with is so much more important than REAL fathers being in kids lives...
Until recently, Pride Week, oops, I mean Pride Month, had nothing at all to do with "gender nonbinary" and it won't be long before it goes back to having nothing at all to do with gender nonbinary.
>Ann Althouse said...
"You know, we don't need Father's Day just because we have Mother's Day...
Wouldn't it be more noble for the fathers to stand back and let Juneteenth dominate?..."
(and then) "I'm not arguing for the abolition of Father's Day,"<
No, of course not. Anyone can see that.
There have been a lot of them here but this might well be the lamest Althouse perpetually-pissed-off-feminist-in-my-soul post yet. Juneteenth and Pride Month as replacements for Fathers' Day, indeed! We are laughing at that absurd equivalence.
I got phone calls from the ladies today. I always enjoy talking to them. I will see them in a week or so, Happy fathers day to me.
Hope the rest of you dads are having a great day.
Father's Day will continue.
But it could expand to all sorts of groups if it's became Daddy's Day.
Puhlease. If there is one thing this country needs, and seems to have tried hard to abolish, it is actual fathers - caring, diligent, and responsible men who get and stay married and partner in instilling the same sort of character in their children. Many of the men who were freed on Juneteenth were of this sort, and certainly some of the men who celebrate Pride Week. "Baby daddies" are not fathers. Blessed be those who identify as fathers (and Americans) before they identify as black or white or gay or straight. Perhaps, even, if more men strove to be good fathers and Americans, some of these other issues might fade away much faster.
The lustration of the problematic month of June continues.
Sorry, I just had to one up "senescence."
I guess not having a father one can be proud of having had can make this weekend seem like a pointless chore. I had a great one, though, so this take on the day makes me pity those who apparently didn't.
Father's Day will continue.
But it could expand to more groups if it became Daddy's Day.
In the novel Infinite Jest, which, written in the '90s was pretty prescient, the United States had a Trump-like figure as POTUS, and to raise money to pay off the national debt, he sold off the naming rights to particular years, so 2024 could be renamed "The Year of the Depends Undergarment," it seemed absurd. but we did have the "International Geophysical Year," so.. I will just shut up before I give them any more ideas.
What if the sperm donor to your existence is a nonbinary or trans person? What if your father is a domestic abuser or a rapist or an absentee and you're condemned to feel bad every year as this subject of fathers is thrust in your face?
This sounds like a race to the bottom to me with bad logic. Because some people aren't good fathers, all fathers must be bad, so let's not celebrate any of them.
How about we just call it "Baby Daddy Day" & do away with fake juneteenth?
I only counted two US flags on houses in my neighborhood on Flag Day this year, and those were on houses that always fly them. Lots of Pride flags, though.
"What if your father struggled and sacrificed during your entire life to give you everything he could manage?"
Then I would count myself very fortunate and show my love for him every day of the year, without prompting from the calenda, and I would not make a public occasion out of exulting in my good fortune, because I wouldn't want to make less lucky people feel envious or depressed.
"Daddy’s in the alley/He’s lookin’ for the fuse"
Meade and I — listening to the version of "Tombstone Blues" on "Shadow Kingdom" — were talking about this line yesterday.
I realized that I'd always thought of the fuse Daddy was looking for as the kind of fuse you blow if you run too many household appliances but that it could also be the fuse on a bomb. Was Daddy just trying to get the electricity running again or was Daddy some kind of terrorist, ready to set off an explosion?
Meade had thought of it the same way I did — the fuse box kind of fuse — but we agreed it was more likely the bomb kind of fuse. It wasn't so much our opinion of this character "Daddy." It was the location in the alley. Not only is it an unlikely place for a fuse box, but "the alley" seems sinister, especially since Bob has spoken elsewhere of the alley — "Look out kid/It’s somethin’ you did/God knows when/But you’re doin’ it again/You better duck down the alley way" (from "Subterranean Homesick Blues" on the album "Bringing It All Back Home," the same album as the original version of "Tombstone Blues"). Also on that album, Bob gets thrown in the alley for pulling down his pants in a bank in "Bob Dylan's 115th Dream."
"without prompting from the calenda..."
should read: without prompting from the calendar
You're just baiting fish here Ann.
Trolling, or just playing law professor with the commentors? Who knows, though probably best not to play the game.
No one says you need to observe it, Professor. How about just not giving a fuck? We should all try not giving a fuck from time to time. It’s better than meditation.
Moreover, June is Pride Month too, so there are those festivities and celebrations, and they are reminding us to rise above the stereotypes of binary gender.
Fathers still exist, binary gender considerations notwithstanding.
How can — why should? — Father's Day stay afloat in all of that? What if the sperm donor to your existence is a nonbinary or trans person?
Still your father. Everyone has a father.
What if your father is a domestic abuser or a rapist or an absentee and you're condemned to feel bad every year as this subject of fathers is thrust in your face?
That's a tough hop, but most fathers are none of the above - my dad was a great guy who loved his children and most everyone I know had a similar experience with their fathers.
Beyond that, what if your mother beat you, or was a prostitute or drug addict, or all of the above? You don't get to choose the circumstances of your birth, but you have life because of your mother and father.
You can change your gender if you wish or pursue whatever else matters in your life, but you do not exist unless you have a mother and father. If a person doesn't want to honor that father, it's none of my concern. My father has been gone for over 30 years, but he is always with me in all the ways that matter. I think having a day to honor him publicly, which I do on social media, and to acknowledge the other fathers similarly feted, is a good thing.
My dad's sperm gave me half my genetic material, but his positive example and his love are his legacy, for me and for my five siblings.
If progressives keep, um, progressing...? Anyway, it won't be long until there is no such concept as mothers or fathers day, because it is just a birthing person and taxpayer providing resources for the commune, and we will celebrate village day.
I think the “fuse in the alley” is both meanings. As is “Daddy”
Also Daddy might be trying to disable the bomb
"The calenda." I assumed Althouse was poking fun at her own remaining mid-Atlantic accent
"Yes, Western civilization has been actively trying to diminish and denigrate "
I get a kick out of commercials where the wife thinks she's so smart, unlike her idiot husband (e.g., Scott's Turf Builder). I mean, yeah, your husband may actually be an idiot, but honey, you're the stupid bitch who married that guy.
"How long do you think it will continue, this archaic convention?'
As long as deplorable conservatives haven't been cleansed altogether. We like archaic. Particularly when the archaism also serves as an FU to progs trying to impose substitutes. The personal is political, after all.
Anyway, in my circles we express love and appreciation year round, and a little bit extra on certain days. And-and. All good.
There is a beautiful NPR Instagram post today celebrating black fatherhood, with pictures of black dads and their children, along with an affirmation of their 'tender Black masculinity.' It made my heart happy to see it. A bit like Juneteenth and Father's Day rolled into one. I'm good with celebrating both days.
"and I would not make a public occasion out of exulting in my good fortune, because I wouldn't want to make less lucky people feel envious or depressed."
You're thinking necessarily leads to abolishing all the holidays, because somebody, somewhere can't partake. What a dreary society you would build.
"What if the sperm donor to your existence is a nonbinary or trans person? What if your father is a domestic abuser or a rapist or an absentee and you're condemned to feel bad every year as this subject of fathers is thrust in your face?"
"What if the ova donor to your existence is a nonbinary or trans person?
What if your mother pimped you out to her boy friends for drug money?
and you're condemned to feel bad every year as this subject of mothers is thrust in your face?"
??????????? what about THAT ann?
how about..
What if your mother filled YOU full of chemical castration pills and male hormones, then chopped off your breasts, because when you were 5 you said you liked the color blue??
This will come as A REAL SURPRISE... But there have ALWAYS been terrible parents
I'm so glad June teenth was made a holiday. Now, finally, I can celebrate my Jewish, black, gay father, who was descended from slaves.
Of course "Lets Hurrah for Jews" was last month, but now I can save some time.
Then I would count myself very fortunate and show my love for him every day of the year, without prompting from the calenda, and I would not make a public occasion out of exulting in my good fortune, because I wouldn't want to make less lucky people feel envious or depressed.
I take it that mother's day is out the window too? By your logic every day of remembrance should be tossed aside. Any good Christian living the word of God day by day doesn't need to observe Christmas. Washington and Lincoln - outta here. July 4th? What's the deal with pride month? Proud of yourself? Celebrate every day. You need a whole month set aside? Sad.
I get it if your beef is the commercialization. Just get rid of all days of remembrance. You're either appreciative or you're not. No reminders necessary.
BTW, make sure you never speak of your love of your father to anyone or say anything about the good fortune you may have had in life. You might "make less lucky people feel envious or depressed."
How long will it continue? Well.. as long as men can still have babies, I guess.
Check the facts, mam, check the facts.
"South African philosopher David Benatar points out this very thing..."
I read that as "Pat Benatar." A small coincidence too big to not comment on.
Althouse: “Drop Father’s Day for Juneteenth and Pride month.”
Me: Althouse the comedy writer! I don’t care who you are, that’s some funny shit right there!
I wish I could just watch the US Open without all of the "his dad was so great" bits. You know that they cut away from the golf for the personal family stuff to appeal to women viewers. I would rather just watch some golf, to be honest.
“I have three daughters within a typical, suburban boring nuclear family. We celebrate Father’s Day and enjoy it. Sorry, my Woke friends.”
Why do you say sorry to your”Woke friends”? I don’t think you know many people on the left, do you? Do you think “woke” people (the term “woke”, used by the right makes me cringe, you people use this term far more than anyone of my friends and acquaintances on the left and it makes you sound silly) don’t have fathers and husbands and sons that they love and honor? You think all people on the left live in cities, no one lives in the countryside or suburbs? Seriously? The world of the right just seems to be getting smaller and more extreme.
I wasn't going to comment, but after that.
This is my 61st Father's Day, 51st legal holiday Father's day. And the 60th without a father. I don't think he was even home on the first one.
What is annoying is all righteous pontifications of "needing a father in the home". I can show you 5 who didn't. Both me and my siblings and my brothers best friend and his brother.
As an outsider, let me say, fathers are nice, apparently. But they also can be horrible, apparently. So take the day, celebrate the good ones, curse the bad ones, but after six decades, let me just say, leave the orphans alone.
This is a "what if you had to argue" post, so it's an homage to her dad.
We know so little about your father or your relations with him, but we do know he was a Chemical Engineer which means he had worked his ass off to get the degree which afforded you a nice middle class upbringing. We may infer that the feminist identity you assumed was, at minimum, in partial rebellion against this. So go ahead, shit on the whole notion that fathers deserve a modicum of recognition or respect.
"I would not make a public occasion out of exulting in my good fortune, because I wouldn't want to make less lucky people feel envious or depressed."
I've thought about this some more, and I come to the opposite conclusion. And it's not hard for me to put myself in the "less lucky people's" shoes, since my father is no longer with us. There is no way that I would ask other people to forgo their joy because I can't enjoy the same. And it certainly doesn't make me feel envious or depressed. That'd be pretty small of me.
Flat Tire at 11:31 AM posted one of the most beautiful comments I have ever read on the internet.
You must be a beautiful person.
Thank you.
Anne, I think you have lived and worked too long in Ann Arbor. In the real world where I live Father’s Day is still celebrated.
"Celebrating Father's Day..."
Fathers, and mothers create role models for children to observe, and to learn how to live happily!!
Don't demonstrate happiness for fear of disturbing those who are not happy?
Hey, did you ever think You might inspire them!
By your logic (as perceived my me), we should also do away with Pride Month and parades and Juneteenth celebrations to avoid disturbing straight people and white people...
Do away with Father's Day? Let's celebrate Juneteenth instead? Look around you? Is there any great risk that Black people will be put into slavery if we ignore Juneteenth? Is there a risk that Black children will grow up without a Dad? Would doing away without Father's Day help or hurt?
I'd favor making Father's Day mandatory for fathers.
Obviously a troll post which Ms. Althouse does from time to time. Can’t believe some bought into it
Come on, Ann. The fathers become more and more useless as grandchildren leave the nest too. But the kids should send us a message acknowledging the 20+ years we gave them the best childhoods we could. And they do. We don’t have that many more years left on earth. Time to say thanks for all we did while we are here.
If your father hated you and wanted you to disappear, that’s different. Its the Good Father’s Day.
I say we combine all three holidays into one, as was done with Lincoln & Washington on Presidents Day. June Fathers Prideteenth will be a great federal holiday, even if cultural appropriation occurs and it becomes known as simply Gay Free Baby Daddy Day.
It may merely be that I'm getting to the age where many of my peers no longer have a living father to honor but I must say that today I sensed an air of comaradery that extended across generations this Father's Day. Men whose fathers have passed honoring the day by honoring those young men joining our brotherhood, the not so young men who are still caring for their children, and those of us with adult children acknowledging our peers. Maybe it was spending ten hours totting Thomas the Tank Engine and many families up and down our tourist line. I saw a lot of Father's Day t-shirts in the crowd.
So you, like Scrooge, can keep the day as you see fit but there will always be a day to honor fathers. I'm willing to bet Juneteenth passes into the semi-obscurity of President's Day, MLK Day, and Columbus Day as the odd days when banks are closed and no mail gets delivered before Father's Day is no longer noticed.
For some reason, I thought today was Monday.
We went to Mass on Friday( the Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus) &it threw me off. As an aside- we prayed the Litany to the Sacred Heart in reparation for the blasphemous LA show put on by a different order of sisters… a “disorder“, even.
So- we woke up, made coffee, did chores &I never wished my husband a Happy Father’s Day.
Got to the house &a friend had texted to wish my husband a Day… I felt like a heel. Then, I couldn’t find the card I’d bought- only ordered a gift yesterday and wrote a sorry explanation of love &appreciation on a quirky, blank card and marched back to the barn to apologize for forgetting.
And yes- I cried when I wished him a Happy Father’s Day- he took me on w/2 very small children in tow. He’s allowed me the life I’ve always wanted to live(allowed as in: supported &partnered) &he loves me(a tiring job, lately!)
One day/yr…
In return for a lifetime.
I am blessed.
I am thankful everyday. I honor our troops every day. We have MLK drive and King county. Washington and Lincoln are on my money. Let's just abolish all celebrations of everything. I don't need a stupid holiday to honor anything that I already honor on my own. We should all just privately honor that which we want to honor and forget about national honoring. Except donuts. We should keep national Donut day.
"I'm not arguing for the abolition of Father's Day, merely observing its senescence."
Now do Mother's Day.
It will take a concerted effort of white suburban women with degrees to erase Father's Day, but it looks like that's what's inn the cards.
Deprecating human life for the sake of political congruence ("="). All's fair in lust and abortion.
"How long do you think it will continue, this archaic convention?"
Not as long as baby mommas demanding child support payments.
Re: Gospace:
A better holiday with more meaning for everyone would be Abolition Day on December 6th since December 6, 1865 is when the 13th amendment was ratified and became the law of the land.
Absolutely, given that slavery remained active and legal in Delaware and Kentucky right up to December 1865. But December 6 comes right after Thanksgiving and shortly before Christmas, so it would only cause the holidays to get further bunched up in that period.
That's some first-class trolling there. Or a horrible take. That's our Ann.
Do you support all the single mothers who go on social media insisting that THEY be recognized on Father's Day because they assume both roles?
Why, did you not love your father? Or is it just men you hate?
MarcusB. THEOLDMAN
"...you're condemned to feel bad every year as this subject of fathers is thrust in your face?"
C'mon man.
I must have missed the Father's flags, the parades, the public lewdity - can't be a father without that wang, show 'em proudly boys, the call for reparations for Dads, the cry that all non-fathers are evil, the raw LOOK AT MEEEEEEE! I'm a Father events.
Yep, sure it's Father's day that is thrust in our faces... feh.
For the past few years, I've gotten emails from various companies giving me the chance to opt out of Mother's Day and Father's Day promotional emails.
It's the only holiday I get those for. No asking me if I want to opt out of Pride, or Juneteenth, or Women's history promotions.
Its so odd.
farmgirl said...
For some reason, I thought today was Monday.
We went to Mass on Friday( the Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus) &it threw me off. As an aside- we prayed the Litany to the Sacred Heart in reparation for the blasphemous LA show put on by a different order of sisters… a “disorder“, even.
Yes, very good, but did you celebrate mass in Latin as my son and his family do? And my wife, who's currently staying with them helping out. You know, those evil right wing anti-government Latin Mass types with groups that government agents are trying to infiltrate. He and his wife are both former military intelligence- so they've warned other Latin Mass societies about the attempted infiltration of their group and gave them the signs to look for.
I didn't mention my dad earlier. Parents divorced at the end of my fifth grade year, and that was the end of his active participation in my life, not that there was much before then. But he did serve as a role model of sorts. He was with his third wife when he died. I've been married 45 years now. We have 5 successful adult children, 4 males, one female. So how did he serve as a role model? Well, pretty much, as an adult, and a married man and a father, whenever I wasn't certain of the path I should take, I looked at what my father did or would have done, and then did something different. Note- not the opposite, because lots of times there are other options beside 180° out, but something different. It seems to have worked. And my mother was an alcoholic...
But anyhow, I survived my childhood and became a successful adult. As successful as I could have been? But- if I had been- I wouldn't have followed the path that allowed me to meet my wife, and we were seemingly meant for each other. Met in JAN, married in AUG.
SO my father wasn't perfect. But- I think he did the best he could, and I suspect his father wasn't the best example of a father either. I know my paternal grandfather's father wasn't the best example- 34 years old with a pregnant 15 year old paramour- who he married, having my grandfather, their only child, at age 16. ( Said he as 28, birth year listed in the US is 6 years after his actual birthdate in England. Not that being 28 vice 34 makes it much better...) Something I've noted in my family tree research- (>22,000 people on my tree) family dysfunction, or extreme success, both seem to last 3 generations before reverting to norm. So 3 generations, then mine.
I'm certain I'm not the best father hat could have been- but my children do actually assure me I did a great job. But for a quick aside- I worked in the prison industrial complex for several years. Was forced to have an inmate assistant who followed me around and carried my toolbox. Had one was telling me one day, around father's day, what a great father he was. He had 10, count them, 10 different children. By 10 different women. In his 50s, about my age at the time. Had been in prison half his adult life, 1 or 2 years at a time. 4 of his adult male children were currently guests of the prison system. And all his female children were unmarried, with children, on welfare. BUT- he was a great father. As another lesson liberals should learn- people aren't in prison because they have low self esteem. He was, in his eyes, a great father. Lot's of positive self esteem.
Inga said...
“the term 'woke', used by the right makes me cringe, you people use this term far more than any one of my friends and acquaintances on the left and it makes you sound silly"
Those righties are so divisive. They just need to put down their assault weapons, and come together to support common sense legislation and pay their fair share of taxes.
My father died as at a younger age than I am now - 57 - but then he was rode hard and put away wet , as they say
My Dad was a complex man. He was raised by a single mother in late 50’s rural WA. When he became too much for his mom to handle, she sent him to live with his father, who was a WA state patrol officer.
He met my mom and she was pregnant by 17, and married.
And here I am. Was he a perfect father? God, no. He was abusive, and alcoholic, and appalling, even in his dying age when he was so weak and frail, and so unlike the tough guy I knew so well. He didn’t understand children, nor how to talk to them.
But he was a master craftsman - he could take any substance - wood, leather, metal - and he could make something beautiful or useful out of it.
He was uncannily brave - at least, based on my understanding of his VN medals. And he always tried to show us an appreciation for hard work, excellence, and nobility.
“the term 'woke', used by the right makes me cringe, you people use this term far more than any one of my friends and acquaintances on the left"
That only makes sense. Conservatives use words to communicate their ideas with others, progressives use words to disguise their ideas from others.
Gospace said...
"I worked in the prison industrial complex for several years. Was forced to have an inmate assistant who followed me around and carried my toolbox. Had one was telling me one day, around father's day, what a great father he was. He had 10, count them, 10 different children. By 10 different women..."
My nephew has a friend - an acquaintance really - who had ten children by eight different women. Said acquaintance must have found true love, because he eventually married the mother of #9 and #10. She was already a single mother of six before they met, of which she had custody of four.
"...In his 50s, about my age at the time. Had been in prison half his adult life, 1 or 2 years at a time. 4 of his adult male children were currently guests of the prison system. And all his female children were unmarried, with children, on welfare..."
Nice to see that he's passing on the family trade.
"As another lesson liberals should learn - people aren't in prison because they have low self esteem. He was, in his eyes, a great father. Lots of positive self esteem."
Quoted for truth.
My dad did something that I've always thought extraordinary: he married my mother when she was a young widow with three sons. Instant family! He and my mother then went and had 4 more boys in less than 4 years! So I'm the youngest of seven sons and the youngest of Irish quads.
My dad. I miss him; his decency, his courage and his commitment.
I have two daughters 11 and 13. I decline any thoughts of gifts or going out to eat. I do let them make my favorite French toast for breakfast. I've always thought of Father's Day as my day to reflect on what a blessing it is to have my girls.
But nobedy asked," What is it to be a father?"
http://www.truenorthreports.com/roper-the-legislature-just-decided-to-start-automatically-deducting-5-of-vermonters-paychecks
No need to pay: Liberals automatically deduct!!!
AI pickpockets!
Be best.
America 1st.
“No one says you need to observe it, Professor. How about just not giving a fuck? We should all try not giving a fuck from time to time. It’s better than meditation.”
We celebrate Father’s Day, but don’t celebrate Juneteenth, and piss on Pride Month. Why should anyone rational celebrate sexual deviancy, and for the T part, mental problems? For a whole friggen month? And we already have MLK’s Day. Pick one or the other. My ancestors did their part, advocating for emancipation in the 1850s, voting for Lincoln in 1860, and fighting in the Civil War on the Union side. GG Grandfather lived for 70 years with his war wounds. Why should we, as goof Republicans who voted against LBJ, be responsible for his subsidization of single Black parenthood, which is one of the primary causes of the plight today of the Black community? Democrats (200 years now of being the Racist Party) condemned Blacks to perpetual poverty, crime, and dysfunctional lives, with their Slavery, Jim Crow, KKK, and Great Society, and pay them off with two holidays.
For the women out there, if you want to keep Mothers Day, you had better make sure that we keep Fathers Day. Quid pro Quo. Step daughter started trying to call me at 7 am. Her brother called at maybe 9 am. My partner called him back shortly thereafter. He really is a very good father. My own daughter called me almost at dinner time. Turns out, she had been camping, out of cell range.
Denigration of Fatherhood is directly related to, and likely a primary cause, of many of the ills in our country. Put simply, fathers civilize boys and teach daughters femininity and self worth. Few women can do either very well, and was probably why, in past times, fathers were given control over their children, instead of mothers, after maybe 10-12 years of age. Statistically, children raised by their fathers do almost as well as if they had been raised by both parents, and much better than if they had been raised by just their mothers. And we see this most vividly in lower income Black communities, where fatherless child rearing is at the highest. The boys run in juvenile gangs, killing each other, and terrorizing their community, until they end up dead or in prison (except in Dem controlled big cities, with Soros funded DAs, where they are left on the streets to continue their depredations), and the girls fight for these boys to have their kids, out of wedlock, perpetuating the dysfunctional cycle. Thank you Democrats.
Fathers, and mothers, are an anachronistic reactionary tale. Today, there are womb banks and sperm donors to normalize social progress. And, with forward-looking human deficits, there is immigration reform to import carbon-based resources to sustain a viable society.
Juneteenth celebrates white privilege and reactionaries to progressive slavery and diversity. It's the history of whites emancipating blacks from their historical burden in black democratic/dictatorial societies.
Pride month celebrates the polyamorous love of lions, lionesses, and their unPlanned cubs playing in gay parade on the African savanna, but probably not on the Isle of Lesbos.
The rainbow in nature is beautiful. It's rare couplet doubly so. The Rainbow in human context is a celebration of albinophobia in rabidly diversitist societies a la performance of human rites for social, redistributive, clinical, political, criminal, and fair weather progress.
Althouse says: "What if the sperm donor to your existence is a nonbinary or trans person? What if your father is a domestic abuser or a rapist or an absentee and you're condemned to feel bad every year as this subject of fathers is thrust in your face?"
This kind of rhetoric leaves me unmoved, and it's not the first time I've heard it. Why shouldn't people who have a normal experience of family as it should be give up celebrating it because others have experienced family as it shouldn't be? It's like a sports team not celebrating a win because one of the players got injured.
Sorry (really) if that sounds insensitive, but just about any celebration will make someone feel sad because of who they are, where they came from, or what happened to them. Sympathy, yes. Giving up a celebration, no.
Too bad Ann did not like her father. Mine was an alcoholic who left me on my own at age 18. Still, I have some pleasant memories of him when I was a child.
Pretty sure I've said this here before.
I raised my daughter as a single father from 2yr to 19yr alone with no help. By no help, I mean family or other in the take off of the feminist "all men bad" messaging. Two for instances: although she blew through paying half a year's bills, my family believed her that I did it and when I was despondent and called Parents Without Partners, the bitch who answered the line told me "You can't have any problems. You're a man. [click]" That is a precise quote.
Her mother was a shrieking harpy who ran off with a Joe Trittico (already a criminal) and together robbed warehouses. As soon as she disappeared I filed in absentia and got full custody and all assets. Both of them wound up in jail.
The hardest thing I've ever done in my life was to not bad-mouth her mother in front of her and to let the woman hang herself with undelivered promises and alcohol laden, dress-pissed visits which eventually ended with my daughter deciding and asking if she could tell her mother she never wanted to see her again. The woman died five or so years ago of liver cirrhosis. My daughter's reaction was basically "Figures."
Explain to me again why my day of recognition should be considered deteriorated with age and not hers.
Bill Owens - Thanks for sharing. Nice story about your dad. He was a good man.
My father and his sister were dumped in an orphanage (actually a workhouse) by their father when their mother was dying of tb. His father went on to have another family; my father started life from infancy living in a barn in Rochester and only was returned to his family when his father's second wife insisted, a year before he joined the Navy.
My father had many reasons, including abandonment and later theft of his college savings, to have no reason to visit his father on Father's Day. But the fact that he did, and never spoke badly of him, taught me and my brothers extraordinary lessons of character, forgiveness, resilience, and family obligation. I miss him every day.
It is awful, I know, from inside my own glass house, to be trapped in bitterness. Life is hard enough without it. But even if sentimentality give you the hives, you can work at being grateful.
I refuse to look up 'senescence'. The definition should include 'pretentious'.
You never know who is gaslighting you anymore. If Ann is in earnest here, I am disappointed.
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