young mom's

Fortunately for me, I do know the difference between an explanation and justification... but why should we hold men blameless, as according to your first post? I know I keep repeating myself, but I'd really like to know the answer, because it could mean EVERYTHING to this whole arguement.

If you said that "you can't blame the fathers" in sarcasm, then I have no quarrel with you, whereas if you were quite serious about holding the fathers blameless and offered an explanation, that is where my problem lies. You can't offer an explanation and claim you do not support male abandonment, if you're telling me to hold father's blameless: There's an inconsistancy in what you're telling me. So, PLEASE explain why I'm supposed to hold these men blameless. It doesn't make sense.

Why should we dismiss the idea? Selfishness and status overruled people's priorities in the 1980's, meaning that the "family values" we hear so much about fell to the wayside. It was merely a worsening of morals that began to crack and waver in all people circa. the late 60's.

Yes, what I'm saying is that the revolution of the 60's did not only appeal to women. That means both sexes were involved in the social revolution. At least we can agree here.

Could it not be argued that a woman's freedom can be related to equality? It was about being free to exercise our rights as any man was able to... This only proves that women were slightly less free than men, and perhaps more in need of this revolution than anyone could have realized.

I think that these two values can be equated with each other. I don't think you can have freedom without equality, although you can have equality without freedom. Everyone could be opressed, but what good is that? And how can we truly be free if there are people who are slightly more free than us?

We can agree here, for obvious reasons. I still fail to see why we're holding daddies blameless though. The woman is at fault, too, but the men shouldn't be blameless, though it is admittedly desirable to forget about something that's not attached to your body and was made possible by some woman that might for all intensive purposes be a serious bitch. I'm not saying I don't understand WHY men don't always stick around, there's a whole lot of reasons WHY. But for all those reasons for why they don't, there are more reasons why they should.

Nope, I would like to share the blame though, instead of having the attitude be: "Well, you can hardly blame the fathers!" Sharing fault is one thing, but holding either gender completely blameless is entirely another.

LOL! OSF, you and Shane agree with one another, and that's fine, but where are all of these other people who agree with you? And I never said that the sexual revolution had no effect on women, it affected all participants in the society of the day. It is vital that you recognize that this was never said, I only offered another hypothesis as to why men tend to split when children become involved.

I'm confused. Why does this have to be the case if you accept either premise? Maybe I missed something. Perhaps you could explain to me more clearly as to why you believe this?

The idea that any gender can survive independent from the other is ludicrous in and of itself... It could only survive for one generation! Both genders are necessary if the human species is to continue. So I would like to agree with the idea that the sexual revolution wanted women and men to get along together, but I'm going to toss that hypothesis that feminism was to ensure that women could survive apart from men. Feminism ensured greater personal satisfaction for women. It offered them a life working in peaceful accord with their mates. This isn't what most feminists approve of as feminism, but that is what the basic purpose was designed for. The idea is not supposed to be seperatist, but more communal.

This paragraph decides that it is women's responsibility to govern modesty. This whole "responsibility" seems to be a misconception about women, because women are only human and have the same wants and desires as men. Do you think women have some superhuman abilities? (This is just a joke, but think about it for a minute...) Women are just as succeptable to being tripped up by natural desire as men. It seems a bit harsh to only delegate responsibility to the women to govern their sexual desires. Delegating responsibility to only one gender, under any circumstance, no matter which gender is doing it, seems less than just.

So, in other words, you feel that there is always a separation between men and women, due to gender differences, and under no circumstance are human beings simply human? If that's not what you're saying, forgive me, but that's what it sounds like. Of course, women will always be women, and men will always be men! But isn't there a hope that, though building bridges, men and women will come to realize that we have more in common than we realize? Certain characteristics that differentiate men and women will always be there (other than the crudely obvious ones ), that's why both are necessary for parenting, because it's supposed to show a balanced and cooperative relationship, a basis for modeling children's future relations with others.

My weekend was really awesome, the river was warm and perfect, and the fishing was really excellent! I can't complain a bit... I hope yours went well also. Thanks for asking!

Like I said in my last post, the only qualm I have with you is that you held men blameless in your first post. If you meant that in a sarcastic tone to help open up the stage for your theory, I have no qualms with you whatsoever.

However, if you really think that men should be held unaccountable for the reason you listed, that really doesn't sit well with me. We have to at least recognize fault on both ends for there to be any suitable resolution to this arguement. Now, what say you??

 

Very nice! That reminds me that you never answered my question.

If you can hold up your end of responsibility for your children, isn't it fair that it be expected of all men? You have decent enough morals and values to actually stand by your children. Don't you think that it is vital for other men to make the same choice you did?

This is a reminder that I very much respect you for your choice to stand by your kids. I really do! I just want to know why you'd want to justify men who are not as morally sound as you are getting away with neglect.

That is all I asked of you, and all you can do is attempt to insult me...
(By the way, it doesn't work. It's hard to insult someone who doesn't particularly care what your personal opinions of her are. No offense. )

So please answer my question, or if you choose not to, that's fine too.
But but if you don't, then who is the brick wall? Just a thought!

 

I'll say this one more time and then i'm done w/this thread.

No one is justifing the actions of deadbeat dads, just trying to find a valid cause of a rising social phenomena(sp).

This one makes the most sence to me.

 

Then be done, if you wish, my dear. The person I was speaking to in regards to justification was OSF. You decided to jump in and defend this statement below. Very admirable, but here is where the problem lies:

To which I replied that he is a creep for saying such a thing. He then chastized me for calling him a creep, by offering some defense which does not excuse shifting the blame off of men. You supported him by saying:

You wanted to defend this particular little quip? This is what I was commenting on! This is where all of the trouble began! Perhaps you should pay more attention when replying to people's posts, and know what they are responding to. By supporting the idea that fathers are not to blame you are justifying the actions. Sorry, maybe you didn't understand the implications of what you were saying... Just thought I'd clear this up!

 

I hate to do this as it is nitpicking to the extreme, but hippielngstckng, the definition of the word hardly is " 1. Barely; just. 2. To almost no degree; almost not: I could hardly hear the speaker. 3. Probably or almost surely not: "Easily was a man made an infidel, but hardly might he be converted to another faith" (T.E. Lawerence). 4. With severity; harshly. 5. With great difficulty; painfully.

I never said you can’t blame the fathers. I said you can hardly blame the fathers. I did intend to use the word hardly as it is defined. I meant it to leave some room for blame on the fathers. I put the great majority of the blame on feminism.

I hope that clears a few things up. In this post I will do my best to illustrate the role males played in the reconstruction of our sex.

I think I have cleared this up enough. I am not asking you to hold males blameless, I am asking you to ‘barely’ blame males and strongly blame feminism.

What I meant to convey is the dismissal of the ME generation as a cause of the ambiguity of the father. I wholeheartedly agree that they did nothing to stop the tides of change, but they were not at the cause of them.

I don’t know if freedom and equality are necessarily contingent upon each other. Off the top of my head I would hesitate to say so. You ask if [a woman’s] freedom could be related to equality. I would argue that it is the other way around. That [the silly notion of and the human need to fight for] equality is a result of our lack of real freedom. Equality is only necessary in our world because we aren’t free. My views on freedom are neither here nor there right now.



There is no denying that when a fight in the name of one is being fought, the other isn’t far behind. This thread, though, is dedicated to the cause of the change of the role of males in the family. The changing of female status in society and the admittance to human rights were the goals, unfortunately they were not the only effects. As I have mentioned, it seems females took their newfound status and ran with it, and ran, and ran, and ran, until they were the only ones in the race. We praise independent women today. We award rights to women instead of a growing child for the first nine months of that child’s life in which she can do whatever she wills. The father can not have say during those nine months. I suppose they can have a say, but only if the woman allows him to. These are the rights that women have fought for, and won.

It may not sound like a whole lot to you, but imagine for one second if a man had the say in whether the child in your womb lived or died. This is possibly the best proof that the fight for female rights has forced the role of the father into confusion, frustration, and ambiguity.

I want to make it clear now that males should take their small portion of the blame. We have sat idly by and watched the abortion debate end without saying a thing. We have watched our role as fathers fall deeply into obscurity. But again I have to stress the hardly in my blame. The literature is out there. There are many male critical intellectuals out there who understand what is happening to the role of the male and have written many books on it. Where do you think I get these ideas and hypotheses?

It is one thing to note the availability of literature on the subject and an entirely other thing to convince young street kids to read it. Even if we could convince kids to read it, how do justify that the responsibility [that Warren Farrell preaches in his book "Women can’t hear what men don’t say: Destroying myths, creating love"] of fatherhood [burden or no] should be accepted over the alternative? You can’t even make these kids see that being in a gang is bad for them, or doing well in school is beneficial to them. These are the kids who grow up in violence and carry guns for protection. These are the kids who will never know what the inside of a university looks like.

These kids can’t be taught. It isn’t for a lack of trying.

Read this: http://www.eonline.com/News/Items/0,1,14618,00.html

Even Bill Cosby is trying. If names like Warren Farrell or Lionel Tiger or Christina Sommers don’t get attention, than maybe names like Cosby and Puff Daddy will.

So why don’t I blame the education system as the cause of the ambiguous father? Same reason I can’t blame the ME generation.








n.b. I have to continue my post in pt.2 as this forum won't let me post it all in one.

 

I didn’t expect there to be one person on this Internet forum that would understand. Not a single one. I was wrong. Read on for more clarification on my counter to your argument.

What I meant to say is that your premise, the sexual revolution is the reason ..., seems to disregard the historical fact of the feminist revolution. Since you chose not to mention it as a cause or reason it must be that you see no plausible connection between the effect feminism had on women and your conclusion. But there is a plausible connection between feminism and the ambiguity of the father. Since there are strong arguments for just that, we would expect [as it is absolutely necessary] you to disregard these theories. But you haven’t so for us to accept your premise [your reasons] we have to admit that feminism had no effect on women.

It is because of this assumption inherent [whether you meant to leave it out or not] in your argument that we can see that you would base the family on the role of the father and say nothing about the role of the mother. [Yes I am reaching here, so disregard this jump if you want. I am willing to also.]

Does that help any? I hope so.

I said survive independently from men, not procreate independently. You should understand that I am not talking about prolonging the species. I am talking about women accepting the idea that they don’t need a man in their lives to be a mother, to be a family, to make money, etc. Basically, that women could live out their time here on earth without a man.

With that clarified, do you still want to disregard the idea that feminism wanted to ensure that women didn’t need men to survive?

It is only the responsibility of the individual to govern themselves. My use of the word themselves here means to include any vice or virtue in the human. If modesty is the female virtue that allows the delicate cooperation necessary for the family than the female has to be held responsible when modesty is lost. That is what happened! Just or not, doesn’t matter. If only I had a time machine ...

Don’t get me wrong here. I understand full well that it was lost, or given up, in the name of equality. I can’t fault the feminist leaders for their conviction. They did what they thought was right. They didn’t see what the effects would be.

What I will not say is that men and women changed their role or suppressed a necessary virtue at the same time. The social reconstruction brought under feminism changed women. The change in the women tipped the scales of family in definite favour of the woman and altered the delicate balance that both nature and society up until that point had worked so very hard to perfect. The change in the balance in the family left the father on his own. A father on his own is no longer a father. Just a man.

I do think that there are differences between the sexes. I do not think that the rights awarded to us by our governments should differ because of those differences, perhaps except in parenting. But I don’t think much of any ‘right’ that is ‘awarded’ me by someone else in the first place. It can’t be the case that men and women are just human beings. Any two human beings can not rear a child. It must be a male and a female. It is in parenting that all the fickle ideas of equality and rights that our society has made up should be disregarded as they are merely words that will inevitably rip apart the natural ties that bond.

I am a male. I will never know what it is like to be a mother. Nature doesn’t afford me that option. The government can’t give me the option. Nothing ever can.

I don’t have a qualm with you. Only discussion.

I am glad your weekend went well.

 

OSF, I still wanna know if you agree with Shane's statement that abortion rights should nullify child support.

 

My opinion is that both parents should have to agree to have an abortion when birth defects and danger to the mother are not an issue. If both vote for an abortion, then it goes through, if not then it doesn't. If the dad is nowhere to be found, then it is up to the mother. I think a man should have a say in the life of his baby.

I also think that absentee parents, both mothers and fathers, should have to pay child support for the child they helped create. That means if a mother runs off and leaves dad or her parents with the kids and the bills, she should have to pay just like a father who does the same thing.

 

I can't believe you people!



Only a man that has NEVER BEEN pregnant would think they should be able to force someone to go through a pregnancy that they don't want


men suck

 

Only a selfish woman who has no heart could kill a real man's baby without consulting him just because pregnancy isn't easy enough for her.

How would you like it if a man forced you to abort a baby you wanted to have because he didn't want to suport the kid? Well, that's how many men would feel about you aborting their baby because you didn't want to go through pregnancy.

Sure, some guys are losers who don't give a shit, you can usually tell who they are because they're the guys who don't give a shit. Try not to fuck those guys.

Some of us, though, would cry for the rest of our lives if you killed our baby. We have emotions too you know, we love, we get angry, we get sad and depresed, and we love our kids more than anything else in the world. We are real people too, so don't treat us like we are all a bunch of sub-human shits just because you have had to scrape a lousy example of us off your shoe.

It's called equality. Are you for equality? Or only for equality when it benifits you?

 

whatever....I've been pregnant 5 times so I feel the way I do

no man should have the right to make me do that if I don't want

 

Use protection or don't have sex.

Abortion isn't birth-control.

 

If some girl had an abortion and killed my kid, giving birth compared to what I would do to her before I burned her alive would seem like an orgasm

 

I'm trying to be patient with you


and for your fucking information I don't believe in abortion

 

Not that everything else you said isn't absolutely facinating, and I promise that I'm not being sarcastic, but this is where my problem is with your whole arguement. Like I said, if you're willing to share the blame equally between the genders, then I can agree with that. But you're trying to shift most of the blame off of the men and onto the women, as Shane said, it takes two to tango. Women acted as they saw fit, men reacted to the women's actions, and now if seems that you think that it's entirely a woman's responsibility to raise children, and you can only sort of blame dads for not being there. As for your whole "hardly" vs. "can't" arguement, you can't play semantics, because your sentiment was loud and clear. Most of the blame falls on the women. I don't agree with that.

So, every other thing you've said, while very insightful and intelligent - I have to give you credit, loses some credibility because it comes from a biased source. Your whole arguement is based on the idea that it's a woman's responsibility to either keep her legs closed (modesty), or to have sucked up her mistreatment before women's lib, and submit to the selfish whims of men. Either way, it becomes an arguement of whose opinion is right, and everyone knows that opinions aren't right or wrong. And like you said previously, one shouldn't argue just for the sake of arguement.

I wish I had time for more, but I'm really behind at work, and it's the 31st...
I've got people to pay, before they wring my neck!
Perhaps another time, OSF.... Take care!

 

how can you not believe in it. Its existance is well documented. I dont like it, but I do believe in a womans right to choose. Late term abortion I disagree with entirely. If the child could be saved were the mother in an automobile accident, then that is much too late to consider the child a "health issue".

 

Just a note to everyone who seems to think that abortion is a walk in the park, my experience with it changed my life. I don't believe in abortion for myself anymore... Although I can't impose on another's rights.

Believe me, anyone who hasn't had one has NO IDEA. You know it's wrong while they are doing it, your whole body contorts with the pain, because it's not a natural thing to do. It feels like they're trying to rip your womb out. Whoever goes through with an abortion has got a good reason, or they are going to find out how much better off they'll be to use birth control in the first place.

Those girls who do use abortion in lieu of the pill or the shot will get theirs... Doctors are beginning to believe that may cause other serious health related issues later on.
http://www.obgyn.net/newsheadlines/womens_health-Abortion-20030220-0.asp

Also, a woman's risk of death during an abortion is higher than risk of death during childbirth anyways...
http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a39666eaf2591.htm

 

Seeing how bad my ex dealt with hers/ours was the first thing that made me realize that I had just contributed to the murder of what I believed was to be my firstborn.

 

I'm kinda beginning to regret that I made this thread.. be nice to eachother damnit!


Basically everyone here feels the same somehow..

1) If you caused something, you have to take the responsibility for it
2) Idealy children should be able to know both their biological parents
3) no one here condons (sp?) a parent who abandons their kid (see 1 and 2)
4) male and female are not the same (biologically different) but within those difference there should be equality (some take this further than others)

When it comes to 4. there's an interesting topic as to what the consequences are of the mothers complete authority on her unborn child. If the father has no say in this, then there's a good argument for setting him free of any obligations when the child is born as well. And vice versa, if he wants to raise the kid alone, then the question is if there should be a way to force the mom to carry his child untill the child is born. Interesting.. yeay for ethics!

Anyways.. try to keep the discussions clear in here, 'cause I've got the feeling that there are several topics going on at the same time.. and ironically none of them has to do with my original posts, because all I was wondering was if there were any young, single dads in here.. *note to self: explain yourself better in posts*

 

Yes! Thats my opinion.

I know i said i wouldn't post in this thread any longer, but it's so damn interesting...

Equality in reproductive rights.