Publius, please accept this as an article submission.
In honor of Father's day......
I would like to take this opportunity to look at two aspects of Father's Day. First our Town Father's; our board of selectmen...
This blog has been roundly criticized among the elected officials in town for casting the light of public scrutiny upon their actions. And with measured success. This blog has served as a forum for public discussion that because of the documented actions of some of our public officials, can not take place in public. This and other sites like the Atkinson Taxpayers.org site, with their repository of public documents, has been invaluable in showing th people of Atkinson just how corrupt our town government was. For all of our predjudice against builders and developers, it has been town employees and their willing accomplices serving as elected officials who have given this town it's problems.
And what about our current board? It is my observation that Mr. Sullivan's heart is in the right place, he is evidently an honorable man trying to do the right thing, while not inconveniencing the execution of town government. Mr. Friel, to my observation, has been reasonable, well informed, eminently prepared, and has not been one to make a hasty decision, without the appropriate research. All in all, in my humble opinion he has tried to do the right thing, and has largely succeeded. He has been a welcome change in a board that has had more than it's share of problems in recent years.
And my second issue;
Have you ever noticed how father's are portrayed in the media?
The last HONORABLE TV Dad, was Bill Cosby! Most Dad's are portrayed as incompetent, ineffectual, invisible, or just plain not in the picture. This does a disservice to the Men that choose to be Dad's.
Anyone can be a Father, that can happen by accident, but it takes effort to be a Dad! You can not be an accidental Dad. A Dad is far more important than a Father. And it is a position of honor, that the media, by ans large, does not recognize. It is my opinion that these popular images of Father's rather than Dads harm society as a whole.
Dads, you perform a societally necessary job. Keep doing it, and keep doing it superlatively. Happy Father's Day!
couldn't help but notice that you made no comment about Mr.Childs. you also come across as an unhappy "dad". sorry that you feel that way...happy fathers day
ReplyDeleteAnd Happy Father's Day to you,
ReplyDeleteNo Not unhappy, I just feel that society gives "Dads" the shaft. We as a group are deserving of the same respect bestowed upon Mothers on Mother's Day.
There is a reason the media downplays or ignores the importance of fathers. Doing so requires going against the feminist orthodoxy that women do not need men and the single mothers are just as good a mother and a father.
ReplyDeleteMassachusetts family courts tree fathers as just a check book.
my father was completely screwed up in the head about the fatherhood. Because he had no father, he grew up believing everything would be perfect if he just had a father. He was very good at appearances. And he had a fit any time something happened that forced him to see that all was not perfect. He wanted all jocks and all straight A's from his kids. Instead, he got me. Athletically I excelled at humiliating him. Likewise academically. Perfection had to be attainable. After we "had a father."
As a father now, I do my best not to repeat the mistakes of my father, and also accept that my father was not all bad.
My father died on the eve of father's day in 1997. Surrounded by his children.
I spent the next day in emergency room with my wife who popped a 103.5 fever.
Today, nobody died and nobody went to the ER. It was a good father's day.