Posted on 02. Nov, 2002 by Brian Reid in General
I just finished reading a story in New York magazine — furnished by Mana — about the claws-out conflict between housemoms and working mothers. What struck me, aside from the fact that the magazine read like the author had never heard of the mommy wars before, was how completely absent fathers were. Other than a throwaway line about toned working moms as status symbols and a nice quote from a dad admitting that he couldn’t hack being a home, the very idea of dadhood was missing.
Why?
This is the question that still bugs me, and the one I’m increasingly convinced any book on the topic needs to focus on. Why isn’t it working-parent vs stay-at-home parent, if we have to have conflict? Where the hell are the fathers, even the working ones? Are they really missing in action?