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Ten Things Every Dad Should Tell His Son
Katie Roiphe has written a book titled, “In Praise of Messy Lives.”
Last week Tina Brown, editor of The Daily Beast and Newsweek, dished out her latest “must-reads” for NPR, this time on the subject of “The Modern Woman.” Financial Times writer Katie Roiphe’s article, “Disappearing mothers,” was on Brown’s short list, and after reading it, I concur that it’s a provocative piece worthy of a look!
Roiphe catalogues what she views as a trend on Facebook: well-educated, competent, often professionally successful women posting in their profile pictures not photos of themselves but, rather, their children. The result? A kind of self-effacement of women. Women become only a shadowy, motherly presence behind their son at his first soccer game or their daughter smiling back in leotards at the camera.
Roiphe goes on to propose a link between this disappearance of mothers on Facebook and a contemporary parenting culture that, unlike even thirty years ago, places children and their interests at the center of their parents’ lives (rather than the reverse). Whereas thirty years ago, I was by and large expected to fit into my parents’ routines and learn to entertain myself, rather than be catered to at my every beck and call, today in many contemporary families, the child has become the epicenter of the familial solar system, with parents as mere planets circling around their child’s every need.
Consequently, and maybe not surprisingly, women are the first to disappear in this brave, new parenting universe.
Betty Friedan of The Feminine Mystique would indeed be rolling over in the grave…But I’m curious what you think? Mothers? Fathers? Friends who, like Roiphe, have watched your friends, like me, become mothers? Is this a trend that you notice, too? Do you see it as representative of a more sinister disappearance of women in larger society, at least in this long period of child rearing?
I’m inclined to agree with Roiphe that the trend is problematic; and after reading her article, I’ll be hard-pressed to think of a future time when I’ll be posting my children’s adorable mugs in my profile picture. (If I do, I’ll at least be thinking twice.) I guess you could call it my own little, feminist rebellion of sorts, and I’m calling all other mothers in danger of becoming extinct as women to unite!
posted November 21, 2012 at 10:44 pm
Hi there,
I’m a bit perplexed as to why you read my stuff if you “profoundly disagree with nearly everything I’ve written?”
Please feel free not to come around anymore if what I say seems so disagreeable to you.
Kristina
posted November 20, 2012 at 10:56 am
hey you. take a good look at yourself. you;re projecting. who’s the one being narcissistic? your friend was looking for you to resonate and join her in the richness of her experience as a parent. instead you chose not to, you wanted her to entertain you, to notice you more than her passion for her children. seems to me she’s chosen to live a more meaingnful life than one of meeting the narcsissitic needs of other adults. good for her. i profoundly disagree with nearly everything you’ve written
posted September 17, 2012 at 10:32 pm
Well, I’m a dad and my profile picture is of my daughter. This is a problem? Sounds like something a childless person would say.
posted September 17, 2012 at 1:25 pm
I agree with all the comments here. Even before kids I rarely had a picture of myself front and center. Primarily because I don’t like the idea of random strangers seeing my picture and I am usually the one taking the pictures – not having my picture taken.
I don’t think this is about feminism at all. My husband is a bigger offender than I am. All his pictures and posts are kid related. I am actually rather conservative about posting picture of my kids online unless I feel pretty certain they are secure. However, overall, it’s just about being a proud parent who wants to share information about our every day life with friends and relatives we don’t see that often.
posted September 17, 2012 at 2:17 am
I don’t really care what anyone thinks, I just like posting pics of my kids. They are always cute and most of my pictures look fat and tired! Besides, my kids are the center of my life, I am not sorry that I am not some Betty Draper type who tells my kids to run off and play while I drink wine and smoke cigarettes with the ladies. No, my kids aren’t spoiled and I don’t cater to them but I love them very much!
posted September 16, 2012 at 3:55 am
There is one good reason why Leif is in my profile right now: it’s because I don’t like any pictures that I have of myself. Now the reason I don’t think I look good in any of my recent pictures may very well be related to motherhood but I don’t think it’s indicative that I’m somehow disappearing — in fact the opposite is absolutely true!