Imagine Watching “Mr. Mom” In Reverse …

Posted on 25. Aug, 2010 by Brian Reid.

… and you’d get something similar to what is apparently one of next Julie Roberts vehicles. Last month came the news that the guy behind Glee is at work on a romantic comedy that goes down like this:

In the romantic comedy, Julia will play a working woman married to a stay-at-home husband. She loses her job, their roles are reversed, and she has to adjust to motherhood.

I honestly have no idea how this works as a concept. I’ve long argued that the reason that fish-out-of-water plotlines about dads suddenly thrust into a caregiver role have gotten more and more stale since “Mr. Mom” came out in 1983 is because clueless dads are less and less plausible in an era where at-home dads are being called ho-hum part of the social fabric.

So as cool as a reverse “Mr. Mom” is on some level, I’m not sure a movie about a clueless mom is going to work all that well. In fact, it begs for a first act in which Julia is set up as a completely out-of-touch working mom, which is not a stereotype I’m a big fan of, either.

But if this moves forward, it should prompt some interesting social commentary. This will be well worth tracking.

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If You Read One At-Home Dad Piece This Year …

Posted on 24. Aug, 2010 by Brian Reid.

… read Salon’s “The shocking new normalcy of the stay-at-home dad,” by Aaron Traister.

Traister’s thesis is pretty simple: based on his experience in a blue-collar, old-school Philly neighborhood, at-home dads don’t shock or interest much of anyone. The lead anecdote is about a charming interaction with a representative character: a wizened old woman with a nasty racist streak who nonetheless had come to celebrate the new reality of the involved father.

Everywhere Traister looks, people are nonplussed about his at-home dadness. The other dads in his circle don’t feel isolated. His right-wing Texan in-laws are big fans. He says that “Ninety percent of the men’s rooms I visit have a changing table (the other 10 percent are usually in adult bookstores).” He celebrates the Swagger Wagon commercial, the commercial where a dad eats an Oreo over a webcam with his kid and the spooky Earl Woods Nike ads are all proof that active fatherhood is hip. (All of those examples are a bit of a stretch, but I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt on that.)

Here’s the thing: though Traister’s experiences match mine — I’ve never received the cold shoulder on the playground — I’m not sure I buy the argument. We’re not there yet. I still don’t see universal changing tables. I still meet dads who feel isolated. My new PTO has about two dozen officers and committee chairs, and only a single one is a guy (he is on the “safety committee”).

But the fact that Traister can make a compelling case for the fact that primary caretaker dads are ho-hum means that we are getting closer to gender equity. It’s good news for dads, like Traister, who are confident in what they’re doing: they’re going to be accepted almost anywhere. (One of the unexplored ideas in Traister’s story — which matches research findings by Texas’ Aaron Rochlen — is that dads who are comfortable with the at-home thing tend not to be isolated or negative about their position.)

So go read the piece. It might not reflect reality for most of us, but the fact that it’s not total fantasy is a huge step forward.

[NOTE: I should note that I'm saying these nice things despite the fact that Traister takes a good-natured dig at me and my obession, earlier this year, with diaper marketing. He may have a point.]

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The 14 Things Moms Should Know About At-Home Dads

Posted on 21. Aug, 2010 by Brian Reid.

You’ve all seen this kick-ass post from Chicago Pop over at Daddy Dialectic, right? Jeff nailed down 14 funny and true things that moms need to know to bust through whatever bizarre stereotypes might exist. So if you haven’t seen it yet, you really need to click over …

Here’s a sampling:

The Fourteen Points

#1. I don’t want to sleep with you. So can we please just chill about that.

…

#8. Every time your kid sees a SAHD with a stroller in the park, packing his kid’s lunch, handling visits to the doctor, picking him up from preschool, or hanging with their own mom on a playdate, she’s that much less likely to grow up believing that these things must always be women’s work.

#9. If I never see your husband doing any of the above-listed things on weekends, days-off, or after work, I start to think you’ve got a bum deal and maybe think they really are women’s work.

…

#14. I also really enjoy, and maybe even prefer, talking about things that have little to do with parenting.

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