Dan Quayle now Bill O’Reilly? The Great Debate!

And as a man, O'Reilly has voiced his concerns about Aniston's single motherhood comments. Besides calling it "destructive", O'Reilly accused Aniston of "diminishing the role of the dad." He went on saying that she "can hire a battery of people to help her, but she cannot hire a dad... Dads bring a psychology to children that is in this society, I believe, under-emphasized." http://www.aceshowbiz.com/news/view/00034664.html

I always wondered what makes a man have to stand up and defend fatherhood. Are they over compensating for their own inadequacies? My mom never got "up in arms" and had to justify herself as a good mother or insist on her relevance in today's society when "Mr. Mom" came out. Real fathers, real dads go on with their daily lives being the best parent that they can be and probably hold little regard to what the rest of the world thinks about the importance of a father in a child’s life. They know their importance and feel no need to defend it and they are compassionate to the plight of the single parent. Parenting is the hardest job that I pray to have the honor of having but does that mean I am single handedly diminishing the role of fathers in today society? Haven’t men already done that to themselves? I might not have the exact numbers but I would venture to say that the majority of single mothers don’t come from women who used Artificial Insemination. I going to go as far as to say over 95% of the single moms are a product of male abandonment. Now if anyone has stats to the contrary please let me know the exact numbers. As I said, I am venturing my guess.

His statement: “she cannot hire a dad” brings about the immediate response: just because you have a biological father doesn’t guarantee you a dad either. My friend’s stepfather (who was a wonderful dad) said one time “I think men are around to raise other men’s children”. Father figures come in many loving forms that biology may or may not have a hand in.

"It doesn't help matters," Quayle complained, when Brown, "a character who supposedly epitomizes today's intelligent, highly paid professional woman" is portrayed as "mocking the importance of fathers, by bearing a child alone, and calling it just another 'life-style choice.' "

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,975627,00.html#ixzz0x4ttasy0

Then there comes the assumption that this is a choice. Well, it’s not really a choice, because if it was a choice, there would be options, choose one:

❒Meet the man of your dreams, get married, have children and live happily ever after

❒Accidentally get pregnant, marry the man and divorce 5 years later

❒Accidentally get pregnant and raise the child alone

❒Get pregnant through ART and raise the child alone

In the great daddy debate I am sure that all single moms if truly given the choice would go with what's behind door #1. In absence of the 1st choice actually being a reality than I would choose (which I did) the 4th option but then again it isn’t really a choice because the other options weren't available. Murphy Brown went with option 3 but once again it was due to the fact that 1, 2 and 4 were not options at the time. So is it a choice? No, it is decision based on being out of options. It’s not like I said “Oh, yes, when I grow up I dream of getting pregnant through IVF and raising my children alone” no, I dreamed of meeting the man of my dreams, getting married, having children and living happily ever after and although painfully difficult I have released the dream of option 1 but my heart, my soul could not give up my dream of becoming a mother. Should a woman give up her dreams of motherhood in order to make sure that she is not mocking the importance of fathers? I wonder if Bill O’Reilly or Dan Quayle would tell their daughters to give up on their dreams?

So, my question is, do shows like Murphy Brown and the movie The Switch glamorize single motherhood and diminish the importance of fathers? Or are they a reflection of what is going on in today’s society? Is art imitating life or will it cause (as the Bill O’Reillys of this world fear) life to imitate art?