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men who change diapers change the world


Sunday, 22 February 2009
Dads shut out of parenting bill because "only women can be nurturers"
Topic: Media

On my hot seat today is Rep. Cynthia Davis, (R-O'Fallon),  and not just because she bought herself a truck for personal use with state money a bunch of years back, or what I think are questionable parenting techniques

According to KMOU of Columbia, Missouri, Davis is trying to push a bill through the house to pay at-home moms $600 each year they care for children under the age of 16. A nice gesture, but dads need not apply. Davis informed the  NBC affiliate reporter Sarah Hollenbeck "only women can be nurturers" and has intentionally left dads out of the bill. 

Let's send send a bunch of emails to NBC reporter Sarah at mailto:sjh4h5@mizzou.edu,%20athomedad@aol.com.  The more emails the better....  I don't think it will take too much pressure and a followup article from more dads to get her to re-think her misguided position.

There's an auto cc.to  me athomedad@aol.com if you click her email above. I'll keep you posted.

- Pete


Posted by athomedad at 9:13 PM EST
Updated: Friday, 27 February 2009 10:36 AM EST
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Wednesday, 10 December 2008
Dave Sez to at-home dad.. be a man and go back to work
Topic: Media

Syndicated columnist Dave Ramsey may be a good financial advisor, but when it comes to family advice you may want to stay away.

Here's the Q&A I came across today that should piss off 3 month old babies everywhere.

 

Q, I bring home $2,800 a month, and my husband stays home with our two daughters – one 3, the other 3 months. He’s healthy and able, but he won’t work because he thinks he can’t make enough money to cover the cost of daycare. Our rent is $1,000 a month, and our other bills add up to about $2,000 a month. What do you think about this, and when is it OK to avoid daycare expenses by not working? 

A. I’m an old-school guy, a crusty old dinosaur about some things. I grew up in a generation where a guy who did this kind of thing was called a wuss, or worse; not because he’s staying home with the kids, but because he’s staying at home while you guys can’t pay the bills!

I’m all about family togetherness, and with spending as much time with your children as possible, and I don’t have a problem with guys being stay-at-home dads as long as the family is in agreement and can afford to do that kind of thing. But if you’re just scraping by, or can’t meet your financial obligations, which seems to be true with you guys, that’s a different story.

This guy needs to get off his butt, fulfill his responsibilities as a man and a husband, and find a way to start taking care of his family!    — Dave



   Come on Dave, you havent been checking your math. Daycare alone for two kids one being a 3 month old comes pretty close to a weeks salary.  In fact at-home dad David Chapa of Downers Grove, ILL did all the dirty work on this topic and came up with these figures that I used in my book.

"Put together a simple spreadsheet. Daycare for two kids, nine hours a day at, what, $10 an hour?  That’s $450 a week, times, say 50 weeks in a work year. That amounted to  $22,500. OK, now you need a more dependable car for work. $350 a month, plus additional insurance, plus the extra gas (not even getting into wear and tear depreciation). That ends up to be about $5k a year. Dress business clothes?  Another $1,000 a year. Lunch at work?  Even if you only spend $3 a day extra, that’s $750 a year. According to my calculations, that’s about $29,000. Not to mention additional medical expenses, sick days, and all of the other "throw your kids in daycare" costs. But wait, there’s more!  If you’re spending $29,000, just to go to work, you need to make another $11k, just to pay the federal, state, and local taxes to bring home $29,000. ($40,000 per year, taxed at .28% = $28,800 take home). So, it costs around $40,000 in pre-tax dollars, just to break even, when sending two kids into childcare, just so you can "go to work." As always, your mileage may vary. Then, add in the social expense of having your children raised by strangers.

I feel sorry for this mom, I just hope she or her husband knows how to add before taking this advice.  I'll send this post to him and see if he could pass on some more reasonable advice.

As a disclaimer David Ramsey Says on his websiteOur mission statement isn’t just lip service; it’s our mantra:
The Lampo Group, Inc. is providing Biblically based, common sense education and empowerment which gives HOPE to everyone from the financially secure to the financially distressed.

Enough said..

[ref: Man Up!]


Posted by athomedad at 12:05 PM EST
Updated: Wednesday, 10 December 2008 3:23 PM EST
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Saturday, 18 August 2007
6 ways this new dad killed his baby daughter
Topic: Media

 

Parenting Magazine accepted this book excerpt as fit to print in their next (Sept) issue. It's from Not that You Asked by Steve Almond. If the title below was say, 6 ways this new mom killed her baby daughter, would they have still approved it?  Is it me?  Or is this really a cute dad piece?  I've already handed this off to the  proper authorities.

                  -- and --

    (and so on with Death 5 and 6)


Posted by athomedad at 7:18 PM EDT
Updated: Saturday, 18 August 2007 11:21 PM EDT
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Monday, 26 March 2007
Linda Hirshman's Food Fight with Rebel Dad
Topic: Media

Forget the mommy/daddy wars - Yesterday Linda Hirshman has launched this high brow food fight  with Rebel Dad (Brian Reid) at the TPM Cafe. Brian's crime?  He  spent under three years at home with one baby.....Once the second baby came Rebel took his rebellious self right into full time work in public relations, leaving his former lawyer wife with a newborn and a kindergartener.

Although this fight has history,  Hirshman's latest comments lead you to believe he practically abandoned his kids, when in my opinion he ranks pretty high on my involved-father-o-meter.  

After she was done bruising up Brian she spotted Daddy Dialectic's Jeremy Smith on the other end of the playground and started poking him with her stick:  Dialectical Smith didn’t even stay home a year, but lived exactly the life the mommy activists dream of. He posts: “You know, my wife and I tried [both working part time] (she . . . is fortunate to have a unionized part-time teaching job that provides full health care) and I must say that it was extremely difficult to maintain . . . I'm interviewing for jobs. For our family, it might better for one of us to work full-time while the other stays home . . . I'm sort of thinking that maybe it's my wife's turn to stay home.” A few hours later: “Well, for us the issue is resolved: yesterday I accepted a full-time job . . . Poof! I'm no longer a stay at home dad and now it's my wife's turn to stay home -- actually, she's still thinking about whether she wants to go back to work. I hope she doesn't; I want her to have time with the boy.” Poof. I’d hate to be the woman with the desk next to Dialectical Dad, taking family leave while he minds the workplace. 

Geez Linda! Brian and Jeremy have both presented  fair arguments, regarding your basic creed of choice feminism and you have to get into a verbal fist fight.  Now I have been home for the last 14 years, with 2 boys while my wife works as a school teacher... does that make me a better father or am I being more fair to my wife than Brian or Jeramy? Well for my family I am, and for their families yes,  we all have a parent at home, which is the best family balance you can have. 

It's important that when couples decide who's staying home to do diapers,  they make the best choice for them and their kids, not for any social agenda or statistical conclusions that's created. Yes it is taking a long time to achieve the equality that you are reaching for. And if we get there great,  but lets concentrate on getting at least one parent to stay at home first, not which sex stays home.

Posted by athomedad at 11:11 AM EDT
Updated: Tuesday, 1 May 2007 10:43 PM EDT
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Monday, 5 March 2007
An inside look at the production of the Stephen Colbert SAHD Report
Topic: Media

 

Eamon Stookesberry,  the Texas at-home dad featured (see video on right) on the Colbert Report last week agreed to clear up a few questions the readers had on the planning and filming of the SAHD piece.  Eamon says Colbert Report producer, Aaron Cohen originally thought of doing the piece at the At-Home Dad Convention last November but felt he needed something with a more personal feel. When he saw a local CBS affiliate story (left video) done on the Austin Stay At Home Dads  group they tracked Eamon down and asked if they could film "a day in the life"...

 

I'll let Eamon share with us the rest of the story......

That was a hard sell to the boss (also known as my lovely and gracious wife Tracie/Tasty!) but she agreed and the producer and asst. producer arrived at my door step at 6:30 in the morning to capture the morning routine. They followed me around all day with a camera crew in tow. They interviewed a bunch of the dads at the park and tried to get every one of us to say: "My name is ------ and I am SAHD  :-(        They had me do multiple takes folding laundry, vaccuummmiiinnnggg... and I think I cleaned the kitchen counter about 8 times and used a Wet Swiffer(c) (which does ROCK!!!) for about 6 passes. That floor was CLEAN!!!! 

They taped us waiting for Lord Tracie/Tasty to arrive home and then had her sit on the couch and drink a beer while they interviewed her. I was waiting for them to ask her to scratch her balls and burp, but they didn't. One of the funniest lines from her was when they asked her about how she felt about making me do all this house work and how I do not get paid. She said "he does get paid! He has a roof over his head, he is obviously well fed. He's my Bitch!!!!"  I was surprised that that did not get in there instead of saying" Sometimes I feel like I have a wife". " He's my Bitch!!" would have been way funnier.

They then went with me to one of our monthly DNO's (Dads Night Out) to film us there. They had the bar/restaurant put the home shopping network on the big screen TVs and had a bunch of Shirley temples dressed with the fruitiest frilliest crap possible delivered to our table and asked us to sip at them like women do. I revolted and got my team, when it was our turn to drink them on camera, to pound them in a race. I guess it was too manly, it did not make the cut. Hehehehehehe

They said that the original idea was to do a piece about how pissed off Colbert is to find out that there is a sub-class of workers in the US that are being exploited. Here is a copy of the original description from the producer about what angle they might possibly take:

Our angle is more or less the following:

Stephen is astonished to learn about the existence of stay-at-home-dads. He believes that they are  economically oppressed, exploited workers. They rise early, clean, cook, perform child-care and household-management duties -- all for no money!  He wonders whether they should be paid a decent wage.

(And by the way, for Stephen, women who stay at home don?t need to get paid because they innately know to do this work, and they enjoy it to boot.)

Here are some sample questions for Tracy :

what reactions do you get from people when you explain that your husband stays at home?

-did you ever have second thoughts about your decision?

-is it sometimes a relief to head out the door in the morning, off to a relaxing office?

-is there a working-wives-of-stay-at-home-dads group in your area?

-are you planning to give Eamon a Christmas bonus this year?

They had NO interest in the acronym that I came up with which is DADMAN (Dad All Day - Man All Night) or the shirts that I had made (see below). They very much wanted us to play up the fact that we were sad/SAHD.

 

https://www.angelfire.com/zine2/athomedad/colbert1.jpg

https://www.angelfire.com/zine2/athomedad/colbert2.jpg

 

Even though it was different than what had originally been planned, it was still funny as hell and we have had very positive feed back from just about everybody from members of the group, family and friends and even a teacher at my sons school approached me today and said she saw us on TV and thought it was great.

Well I have to go clean the kitchen with my Rockin' Wet Swiffer (c) and then get dinner started.

Thanks Eamon!!! 

The biggest question bought up was a near shocking, but hilarious scene where  Colbert appeared to be  hugging and groping  Eamon's wife Tracie in the mirror. Was he?  Eamon assured me it wasn't his wife.  Several people were shocked that  "Tasty" would let Stephen grope her ass, but it was not her. My guess is it was one of his interns or something.  (Stephen did not come out for the actual filming.) 

Personally I though the piece was hilarious, and a quick  look at the dad message boards show that most that viewed the piece agreed.  Had this been a "serious report" the outcry would have been deafening but only Stephen Colbert and writers could pull off a parody like this and get such a positive response.

Posted by athomedad at 8:07 AM EST
Updated: Wednesday, 2 May 2007 8:51 AM EDT
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Friday, 12 January 2007
A homecoming for Matt Lauer?
Topic: Media
At New Page 1

In this weeks Time Magazine, Matt Lauer hinted that he could join the at-home dad ranks.. He was asked where he sees himself in 10 years. His reply? Probably on some baseball field coaching my son's Little League.  At some point I'll take early retirement to be a stay-at-home dad, Mr Mom. Too bad he had to clarify what an at-home dad was by throwing in the M word. Check back here in in 10 years, I'll keep you posted. 

Posted by athomedad at 10:27 AM EST
Updated: Saturday, 10 February 2007 4:23 PM EST
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Tuesday, 16 May 2006
Seattle Playgroup Video from the Today Show
Topic: Media
At New Page 1

Here's the Video for the The Seattle At-Home Dads Group that was on the Today Show this Monday morning.  Chris Nelson of the group was featured.  We had a fun night in New York and didn't get into the Survivor Finale, but we did spot past survivor winner Ethan who also ended up interviewing my wife for a CBS promo (in picture). The next morning we had fun with the Today show where I huddled with other nervous book authors in the green room for 30 minutes before they smothered us with make up for our interview with Ann Curry, (it's right after the Seattle playgroup video).  We were in and out of there in 4 minutes, then flown back to New England just in time to pump out our flooded basement in our North Andover, MA home.

Posted by athomedad at 12:45 AM EDT
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