Something Opportune for Father's Day

Dalrock: Only if he finds a better woman than his mother and grandmother

Something to supplement this post about Inside Out.

Novaseeker has some good observations:

I’ve seen this with my own son. He has no issues listening to me and getting along with me as a father. He does what I ask (maybe not that very second, but he does it in the next period of time), and we don’t really have fights or friction. But with his mother, it’s a totally different story, because she tries to parent him like he’s still a small child – lots of control, lots of micromanagement, lots of lecturing. This doesn’t work at all with a teenage boy – at least not in most cases. You need to set the tone and set the expectations, and have accountability if they are not met, but you can’t micromanage, and, as a woman at least, you can’t bully. They will make mistakes, and they will suffer the consequences of those mistakes – that is a part of the process of growing up. Many women seem very hard-pressed to deal with teenage boys who are more masculine (boisterous, pushy, pushing boundaries, etc.), as compared with the more compliant feminine type of boy. I don’t think they realize very well that their ability to parent differs when the kid is 16 from when the kid is 6. You can’t just “take stuff away” as a punishment and expect the same results you got when they were 6. It’s like there’s only one tool in the parenting toolbox or something.

I’ve seen this with my own son. He has no issues listening to me and getting along with me as a father. He does what I ask (maybe not that very second, but he does it in the next period of time), and we don’t really have fights or friction. But with his mother, it’s a totally different story, because she tries to parent him like he’s still a small child – lots of control, lots of micromanagement, lots of lecturing. This doesn’t work at all with a teenage boy – at least not in most cases. You need to set the tone and set the expectations, and have accountability if they are not met, but you can’t micromanage, and, as a woman at least, you can’t bully. They will make mistakes, and they will suffer the consequences of those mistakes – that is a part of the process of growing up. Many women seem very hard-pressed to deal with teenage boys who are more masculine (boisterous, pushy, pushing boundaries, etc.), as compared with the more compliant feminine type of boy. I don’t think they realize very well that their ability to parent differs when the kid is 16 from when the kid is 6. You can’t just “take stuff away” as a punishment and expect the same results you got when they were 6. It’s like there’s only one tool in the parenting toolbox or something.

Related: New book by F. Roger Devlin