Today Show/Marie Claire on Trophy Husbands
Posted on 15. Aug, 2010 by Brian Reid.
Let’s start with the good news: when the media talk about at-home parents, they often act as if there is no other parent in the household. Pieces about “opt-out” women jumping out of the workforce rarely not the partners still logging in hours at the office, and article about at-home dads usually note in passing that there is a mom out there doing the breadwinning.
So the Marie Claire piece on at-home dads and breadwinning moms (arrestingly MSNBC subtitle: “Is this the new status symbol for alpha women?”) gets props for at least framing at non-traditional family roles through the eyes of the woman, for a change. Except that the piece, once it gets going, doesn’t actually look at that hard at those alpha women, instead choosing to focus on what — to modern magazine editors — the great irony of an at-home dad.
It’s almost not worth summarizing the piece, which fails to look at all closely on what the impact of at-home dads are on the women in their lives. There are all kind of important questions that can be asked of those women, but I didn’t see that any of them actually got asked. (In fact, a better take on this was done, um, 8 years ago, when Fortune put “The New Trophy Husband” on its cover.)
(I also want to give props to the Today Show — which based a segment on the Marie Claire article — for featuring all-around good-guy at-home dad Jason Sperber in their piece — the video is below — even if the show failed to really unearth anything new. I’ve lost count, but I think this might be the fourth Today Show piece on at-home dads this year, and, taken together, they show a real inability to do much other than repeatedly scratch the same surface, again and again.)
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Modern Media Man Lineup
Posted on 13. Aug, 2010 by Brian Reid.
Man, it seems like conference week around here, with my At-Home Dad Convention post earlier and my aimed-at-BlogHer-marketers post over the weekend, so I should note that the Modern Media Man (M3) conference now has their agenda online.
It’s got one heck of a lineup of marketing gurus, especially online marketing gurus, if that’s your thing. There are some real luminaries of the blog world. And I’d be remiss in not noting that Cal Ripken will be there (as well as Roland Warren of the National Fatherhood Initiative).
The list of sponsors is growing, too. Should be an interesting confab, and though I won’t be there, I will be curious about the goings on. Twitter hashtag is #M3Summit, for those who want to track by Twitter.
[Registration runs $225, extra if you want to hang with Cal. It's happening Sept. 9-11 in Atlanta.]
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At-Home Dad Convention: Act Fast to Get Your Discount
Posted on 11. Aug, 2010 by Brian Reid.
Just a reminder: the early bird discount for the At-Home Dad Convention ends this weekend. Act now, and it’s 50 clams. The price jumps to $65 next week. (For some perspective, the early bird AHD rate is *10 times less* than the BlogHer blogger conference that just wrapped.)
If you’ve been before, you don’t need me to sell you on it. If you haven’t, it’s one hell of an inspirational weekend, and the guys are super. And I’ll be there, in the unlikely event that sways your decision.
Heck, I’ll do you one better: I’ll offer a money-back guarantee: if you show up and *don’t* have a good time, I’ll reimburse you for the registration fee. All you need to do is write a guest post for me on why you weren’t moved by the experience, and I’ll cut you a check.
[UPDATE: As a couple of commenters have noted, I failed to include a link or other information about the event. It's athomedadconvention.com, and it's being held in Omaha on Oct. 2.]