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Comment by cheald | Hacker News Reader

Speaking as a dad, I hate taking my boys to the playground for the same reason. Moms see "man unaccompanied by woman, must be a predator" - I make a big show out of interacting with my boys and obviously being their father, but it's really grating that it's even necessary at all.

As to the culture of fear, I blame local news. It's wall-to-wall with alternating RAPISTS EVERYWHERE and LOOKIT THE CUTE PUPPIES, because those are the only stories that can compete with other news media. Telling people that they should be terrified (your neighbor is probably a child molester! Full story at 10!) is an extremely powerful tool, and people eat it up.

As a parent, I can understand those moms' reactions, even if I don't condone them. My kids are the most precious thing in the world to me, and I would rather err on the side of caution than ever let something truly traumatic happen to them. But, I think there's a line between being vigilant and being paralyzed in fear because someone with a penis is within 200 yards of your kid.

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> I make a big show out of interacting with my boys and obviously being their father, but it's really grating that it's even necessary at all.

I wanted to disagree with you, but when I read that, I realized that I do the same thing. And as much as I want to play with my boys, I'm also consciously doing it for the reasons you mentioned.

I also realize that my interaction with other children is tempered by the realities that I'm a guy. And those thoughts are always lurking there.

I take my boys to the playground most days when I pick them up after work: my wife works later than I do, and it gives us something entertaining to burn the time until she gets home. I usually have my DSLR out with some sort of "stalker" lens (e.g. a 70-200mm[0]). If my boys want to play with me, I play--if they don't, I wander around and keep an eye from a distance. If someone else's kid needs pushed on a swing and I'm not busy, I give pushes. If someone else's kid needs help off the monkey bars, I help them down. I've never once felt like I'm under a microscope or anyone thinks "man unaccompanied by woman, must be a predator."

1. The feeling you have could be illusory. It's very possible that moms really aren't thinking that, and you're just a little paranoid. I know the feeling you have, because I had it at first as well, but I think it's seriously overblown and largely unjustified. Until someone actually tells me to get away from their kid--I'd be happy to oblige, of course--I'm reject those feelings for lack of supporting evidence.

2. I live in California--maybe that makes a difference.

3. I consistently go to the same park at around the same time. My wife once took the boys to the park on a day I needed to stay late at work and people came up to her and said, "I recognize your boys, but I don't think I've seen you with them before, you must be their mom." I don't know a single parent there by name, but they know my face and they see me parenting my boys on a regular basis.

The point I'm making is that you should try not hate taking your boys to the playground, and the best way to become comfortable with it is to take them more often and involve yourself in the ad hoc community that forms at the playground. You have nothing to worry about, and the more you go, the more you'll see that your concerns are unwarranted.

[0] Obligatory pictures of my awesome boys: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jemfinch/sets/72157634058745609...

"Hate taking them" was the wrong phrasing. I should have better said "I hate that I have to dread running into someone new when I take them, because then I have to do the I-actually-have-a-legit-reason-to-be-here-dance". The area that I live in isn't very communal (mostly due to weather!), and I don't tend to run into the same people frequently. Seeing new faces is common.

Being recognized alleviates the concerns, absolutely. Once you're known, it's fine. My issue is that the default assumption many moms seem to have about men is that they are dangers until proven otherwise. I think if you took your kids and camera to another park where you weren't known, and were taking pictures without playing Obviously Engaged Dad, it might be quite different. Being Visibly Dad "proves otherwise". No such expectation applies to my wife.

(Your boys are adorable, btw!)

this doesn't happen in non feminist countries (ie usually 3rd world).

There are a lot of societal differences between first and third world countries and they exist for a lot of reasons. I really don't see why you would pin this particular one, if it even exists, on feminism.

i know, feminism is a sacred cow.

the truth is that men tend to be highly valued in the 3rd world. by comparison in the west they tend to kill themselves as they get older: http://www.prb.org/Articles/2006/ElderlyWhiteMenAfflictedbyH...

are you aware we've blocked right wing research out of academia, so these issues never get researched properly?

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/08/science/08tier.html?_r=0

and that margaret mead was basically a fraud? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coming_of_Age_in_Samoa https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Freeman

(margaret mead is an early feminist)

Yes, men do tend to be highly valued in some countries. And women in such countries tend to be treated as property. What does that have to do with suicide rates of men in the US? And what does any of it have to do with your original point about feminism somehow causing media scare stories?

It's unfortunate that politics can have such an influence on science and psychology and sociology are far from the only fields it happens in. But, again, that doesn't somehow prove feminism wrong or your original point correct.

Did you even read that link you provided about Margaret Mead? Freeman was accusing her mostly of incompetence (taking jokes/lies as fact is the main example) and Freeman's attacks on Mead's work have themselves been heavily criticised.

And even if they hadn't... so what? You're going to condemn the entirety of feminism (and the field of sociology, I suppose) because one person early in its history may have lied?

Margaret Mead provided the foundation for feminism to advance by "proving" that culture drove society, not genetics.

Unfortunately that isn't true. Genetics shapes culture. One of the interesting things from Mead's "research" was that Samoan women were having a lot of premarital sex in the 1920's. Yet somehow none got pregnant but that was overlooked.

When you force people too far out of their natural roles, bad things happen. There's a whole lot more to this and its fascinating to see how people don't realise it.

I respect that feminism is the moral case. Genetics is the scientific one, which currently is not respected. There's a balance between the two

And all that would mean something if (a) all of sociology was somehow based on the work of Margaret Mead, (b) Margaret Mead had been proven fraudulent, (c) proof of bad evidence on one side automatically meant the correctness of the opposite, and (d) you provided any evidence of your claims that genetics somehow drives society towards an ideal that coincidentally lines up perfectly with your preferred gender roles.

Since none of those things are true, I'm left to ask again - what the hell does any of this have to do with men getting weird looks in parks?

margaret mead effectively founded "cultural anthropology" which basically means "research which makes people feel good". many people have followed her:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/10/science/10anthropology.htm...

this ties into funny looks for men in parks because men as a gender have been devalued into being potentially dangerous, rather than as a source of strength and value for communities.

challenging feminism is a little like investigations into wall street executives after the financial crisis, it just hasn't happened.

things are starting to turn - we have the internet now so we're much better informed...

either that or the USA economy continues its downward slide.. i really don't care either way.

the truth is that as the left becomes too strong, whether it is socialism, feminism or whatever, the economy gets destroyed. this is likely why rome collapsed, too.

the moral case is very important. so too is the economy.

I condemn the parts of it that are transphobic, and I wonder why nobody mentions it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transphobia#Transphobia_in_femi...

> Radical feminist Janice Raymond's 1979 book, The Transsexual Empire, was and still is controversial due to its unequivocal condemnation of transsexual surgeries. In the book Raymond says, "All transsexuals rape women's bodies by reducing the real female form to an artifact, appropriating this body for themselves .... Transsexuals merely cut off the most obvious means of invading women, so that they seem non-invasive."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feminist_views_on_transgenderis...

> In 1999, the book the whole woman, Germaine Greer published a sequel to The Female Eunuch. One chapter was titled "Pantomime Dames", wherein she states her opposition to accepting transsexuals who were assigned male at birth as women:[3]"Governments that consist of very few women have hurried to recognise as women men who believe that they are women and have had themselves castrated to prove it, because they see women not as another sex but as a non-sex. No so-called sex-change has ever begged for a uterus-and-ovaries transplant; if uterus-and-ovaries transplants were made mandatory for wannabe women they would disappear overnight. The insistence that man-made women be accepted as women is the institutional expression of the mistaken conviction that women are defective males."

and:

> Gloria Steinem has questioned transsexualism. In 1977, she expressed disapproval that the heavily publicized sex-role change of tennis player Renée Richards had been characterized as "a frightening instance of what feminism could lead to" or as "living proof that feminism isn't necessary." Steinem wrote, "At a minimum, it was a diversion from the widespread problems of sexual inequality."

It goes on. And on. And on. And on. And now watch this issue get ignored again, as it usually is, and me be accused of 'derailing' for bringing it up in this context.

>I condemn the parts of it that are transphobic, and I wonder why nobody mentions it

Because it's BS? I know people in politically correct societies wont even consider it (if anything, to avoid being labelled), but mutilating yourself is not exactly, well, alright.

A society has to draw a line at what it considers normal/desired behaviour and what not. Regardless if said behaviour is any harm to others or not.

For example, showing you genitals in a mall doesn't harm anyone, but we still don't consider it kosher. And we wouldn't think twice to say people should not use meth (despite them being able to afford it).

In this sense, this "transphobia" thing is a little too much to take. What's next? Respect for self-amputees-for-fashion?

Slippery slope is a terrible argument.

If folks want to change their gender, then let them. Much like someone being black or gay, it's quite litetally none of my, or nyone elses, business. If people want to chop off their leg for fashion, who cares?

Anyone who says anything else is a bigot.

>Slippery slope is a terrible argument.

Fortunately it wasn't the only argument.

And I'd say, slippery slope is not a terrible argument by itself, just because there are "fallacy" list saying so. It is quite appropriate as an argument in an awful lot of situations. Matter of fact, the "broken window theory" is an example of the slippery slope: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows_theory "Overton Window" is another: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overton_window

>If folks want to change their gender, then let them.

I did not say "don't let them".

I said labelling those that are not Ok with this "phobics" is taking it too far. Are those not OK with people doing meth, meth-thobics? Are those not OK with women content to be in an abusive relationship abuse-phobics?

>Much like someone being black or gay, it's quite litetally none of my, or anyone elses, business.

Waiving our genitals in public is, by all means and with the same reasoning, none of yours or anyone else's business. And yet, we do (and perhaps you too) frown upon it.

Thing is, we don't base a society only on "whatever rock's one's boat", but also on general principles. That's why it's a society, and not a jungle.

>If people want to chop off their leg for fashion, who cares?

I care. And "who cares" is not an attitude to base a society on. An egotistical dystopia, maybe.

> and that margaret mead was basically a fraud? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coming_of_Age_in_Samoa https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Freeman

Did you even read your own linked articles?

Generally, Freeman's critique has not been accepted in the anthropological community. Several Samoan scholars who had been discontent with Mead's depiction of them as happy and sexually liberated thought that Freeman erred in the opposite direction [1]

Much like Mead's work, Freeman's account has been challenged as being ideologically driven to support his own theoretical viewpoint [2]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derek_Freeman [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coming_of_Age_in_Samoa

I don't claim that Margaret Mead was necessarily right. I'm not an anthropologist. But your own sources contradict what you're saying.

you can see my link above to the NYtimes and the lack of research for the right in academia. there will be 10,000 papers supporting the left position to every 1 paper supporting the right position. they're just forced out of academia. this is a huge blind spot for society and is a little like how wall street wasn't prosecuted after the financial crisis.

that derek freeman was successful in what he did (and he was, mead was dropped from anthropology) was a minor miracle. if you want to learn more, watch this movie:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lyOD-qNaiL0

Okay, it's pretty clear you didn't even read the articles you linked to.

of course i did. the point is that academia doesn't research the opposing viewpoint virtually at all.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/08/science/08tier.html?_r=0

"He polled his audience at the San Antonio Convention Center, starting by asking how many considered themselves politically liberal. A sea of hands appeared, and Dr. Haidt estimated that liberals made up 80 percent of the 1,000 psychologists in the ballroom. When he asked for centrists and libertarians, he spotted fewer than three dozen hands. And then, when he asked for conservatives, he counted a grand total of three.

“This is a statistically impossible lack of diversity,” Dr. Haidt concluded, noting polls showing that 40 percent of Americans are conservative and 20 percent are liberal. In his speech and in an interview, Dr. Haidt argued that social psychologists are a “tribal-moral community” united by “sacred values” that hinder research and damage their credibility — and blind them to the hostile climate they’ve created for non-liberals."

Well, as far as anyone can tell the idea that women are naturally better parents than men was originally e feminist one, and for the most part feminists are so attached to the idea they never even seem to really question it - after all, it's about doing what's best for the child, and why would you want to get in the way of that? (That's an actual, widely used argument mainstream feminists justify their support for the status quo with.)

I've also seen, for example, feminist mums argue that their kids' stay-at-home-dad is unfairly dumping work on them because they have to organise playdates and other social events, when that's almost certainly the result of sexist bias against dads - apparently mums are uncomfortable letting dads get involved in this, it's a common complaint of single dads. They don't even think about whether there may be gender-based reasons why their partner doesn't have access to the social circles they do.

In other words, in countries where men make all the rules and run the show nobody dares look askance at a man in a public setting?

Go figure.

by your statement you'd almost think people like margaret thatcher, Dilma Rousseff and benazir bhutto never existed.

Obviously the existence of a handful of women leaders means sexism is dead, men and women are completely equal, and feminism has warped into an evil movement bent on making men social pariahs.

Does that mean women are setting the rules in America?

No, the inference from karmajunkie's post is that in America men don't make all the rules.

Where the heck did that come from? For example, China is arguably a very matriarchal society, and guys take their kids out all the time.

Are you talking about the Mosou? Because they're only about 40,000 strong in a country of 1.34 billion, and aren't even a true matriarchy, as political power tends to be in the hands of men.[0]

If you're talking about the rest of China, the absence of modern women leaders has been a concern.[1] I don't see any way you could call China "very matriarchal".

[0]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosuo

[1]: http://behindthewall.nbcnews.com/_news/2011/03/07/6206108-ch...

Leaders of the country are male. Leaders of the family are female.

Your point?

Dude, do you even hear what you are saying? Women being required/pressured to stay home and look after the family while men gather political power and control the flow of resources is one of the hallmarks of a patriarchal society.

For example, Western societies in the past, and, to a lesser extent now, were like china in this regard, and are almost universally considered more patriarchal as we go further into the past. If you consider china matriarchal, you mean it in a different sense than almost anyone talking about gender politics ever.

> Women being required/pressured to stay home and look after the family

You obviously have no idea what you are talking about! Most (95%) women work here, there are no such things as stay at home moms (maybe stay at home grandparents...). Women make up around 60% of the small business owners here, possibly more, they are highly represented in most every field with a few hold outs (e.g. security guards and taxi drivers).

Obviously it is different in politics, but I have no experience there at any rate, just in the home lives that you seem to know more about than me for some reason. The concept of feminism is foreign here not because the men are macho, but because the women hold much of the family and economic power already.

67% according to http://www.tradingeconomics.com/china/labor-participation-ra.... And that's without even discussing the quality of jobs people are getting, or the gender pay gap within particular jobs (30% in china, woo, matriarchy!). I find it hard to believe your statistic that women make up the majority of small business owners when they participate in the workforce lower rates than men, but perhaps you have a citation?

I really don't know how you can defend china as an egalitarian society, much less a matriarchal one, considering their problems with sex selective abortion and infanticide among female babies, to say nothing of the labor issues I just presented. I guess you must have just chosen a position and you are going to ignore or twist whatever inconvenient facts contradict it.

Is that official or does it also include gray market numbers? Also, remember women retire at 55 in China, compared to men at 60.

I told my wife what you said, she had a good laugh about it.

Oh, I'm glad your anecdote had a good laugh at my data. We should also query your anecdote what she thinks about medicine and call her answer science. That would totally be an effective way to arrive at true results.

I'm sure you are a wonderfully published scientist then. Best to you.

In other words, men are not shamed in those countries for being men.

This doesn't happen here in Norway either. It might have something to do with the (more or less) mandatory 14 week paternity leave.

I'm not quite so sure that this is a 1st world thing necessarily. It think it's more of an American thing. During our last vacation in Europe, I was surprised by how people, even at random rest stops along the autobahn were interacting with my kids and did not feel threatened or run off with their kids b/c I was the one taking the kids to the play area. (Albeit, I wasn't the only father/male there)

All things being equal, I think it may just be our media. I noticed other parents were playing peek-a-boo with my 2 year old, whereas in the US, I face the same kind of treatment at parks as the author of the article and people in general aren't quite as friendly to kids they don't know(possibly due to similar sentiments).

happens in europe, here's an example: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10401416

It does happen in European countries. A few years ago, there was a big pedophilia case involving a male day care worker who had made over 80 victims over the year. Ever since then, male day care workers get confronted with suspicion and distrust from parents - especially homosexual male day care workers - and have major trouble getting a job. A lot quit the job. Men working with children are being increasingly distrusted every time a new case like that pops up. It's blatant sexism, but understandable to a degree.

The patriarchy affects all of us negatively. The sexism here is in favor of keeping women in the home and the men anywhere else (preferably in positions of power). Any person not falling into their respective gender role prescribed by these rules will be punished.

Speaking as a dad, I hate taking my boys to the playground for the same reason.

As a single dad, I never experienced that weirdness.

It might be a type thing. Kids, dogs, and moms love me. (But not ex-wives.)

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