Melissa over at Shakesville has a biting series called Assvertising, highlighting all the many ways, shapes, and forms advertising insults, degrades, and devalues women. All women, everywhere, not just the ones who are aware of and sensitive to negative message in the media. Not just feminists, all you women out there who “hork, hork” at men’s crude, disgusting, victimizing, sexist “humor” trying to prove that you aren’t like those other bitches, look you’re rollicking good fun, just like one of the boys. News for you, lady, “the boys” know you aren’t one of them and those jokes are about you, too. So shut up and quit enabling them. But I digress.

A common trope is how feminists vilify and hate men. This is pure projection, men have been vilifying and violently oppressing women since the dawn of recorded history (hello, Eve!). I will not disagree that some, maybe many, women have been so scarred from their dealings with men that they do not trust men, maybe even hate them, as a whole. But that’s not what the trope is indicating. The common myth among woman-hating men is that all feminists everywhere hate all men everywhere. This is their raison-d’etre, their excuse, the way they justify their over-arching hatred of all women and everything feminine or woman-positive. The he-man woman-haters club never points to individual feminists to say, “Look this person has said this thing that paints all men, even the pro-woman ones, as evil bastards.” No, they extrapolate and assume, not even researching for themselves, but relying on hand-me-down information and hearsay to vilify all feminists and, therefore, all women.

I have been frequenting Shakesville for some time now, and I have never heard one of the fine feminists-in-residence paint men with such a broad brush. In fact, the only times I have ever read anything there that is anti-men-as-a-whole is from some passing troll. Somebody trotting out the same tired trope to explain away his unreasoning hatred for all things woman. When they (Shakers) point out individual incidences of misogyny it always made very clear that, while these acts are indeed indicative of the larger anti-woman bias that creeps like a noxious miasma through our culture, theses acts are the responsibility of the person or persons who performed them, not that of the entire male gender. Also in fact, many of these out-spoken feminists are, wait for it, men. Even straight ones, who pee standing up.

Men are being painted as brutish, stupid, inept, incompetent, lazy, good-for-nothing, family-abandoning jerks who live only to escape their nightmarish domestic existences with childish pursuits. All men everywhere are being painted in this fashion, but if it’s not the ee-vil feminists who are doing it, then just exactly who is?

Melissa’s latest installment of Assvertising seems to indicate that it is the man-heavy advertising industry that is doing so, in between trying to sell beer and push-up bars by making women feel inadequate. Her example is a commercial for a frozen confection and the low-set bar for a man to receive one of the coveted treats. In order to get one, all he has to do is put a cup in the dishwasher, or not ogle a nubile young woman in front of his wife, or listen to his wife. Excuse me, who is it that hates men, I didn’t quite get that?

Some other incidences of man-hating have come to my attention recently, probably because of the channels we watch during the day. As horrible as the commercials aimed at kids are, the ones aimed at their (usually) mothers are even worse. Right now an insurance company is running commercials for motorcycle insurance stating that if the men had just had this brand of insurance, they wouldn’t be hanging around your nice, clean house right now, bothering you, while the bike is in the shop. The very same commercial can be seen in a different context by the male viewers. You wouldn’t be forced to hang around the house, with that harridan wife of yours, doing chores if you’d only had our insurance. Imagine if you will, o man, hitting the open road, just an old smoothy on the loose, but no, you have to fold laundry or do all the other tasks that are necessary to the smooth running of a household. You know, all those things that women are supposed to do, I mean, the only reason you got married in the first place is so you could out-source your chores!

Wow, that’s a lot of man-hating and woman-hating all wrapped up in one neat little package! So, if you insult most men and most women, exactly who do you think is going to buy the insurance. Because it sure isn’t going to be anyone in this House.

And this little blurb on the cover of my June Parents magazine has me so livid that I won’t be renewing my subscription, “Hop on Pop-Why Dads are The New Moms.” Now I get that Father’s Day is coming up this month, but still.The accompanying article goes on the say just how awesome dads are because they spend more time with their own children than their dads did. Now don’t get excited, the numbers aren’t good.

“Make no mistake — it’s hardly a revolution. The typical dad spends 6.5 hours a week with his children, less than an hour a day, and far less time than the typical mom spends. Still, that’s more than double the 2.6 hours weekly that men devoted to their families 30 years ago.” says Doug Most in “The New Face of Fatherhood.”

The article doesn’t say how they arrived at these figures, did they average the numbers of hours spent by the men surveyed or did they tally how many men fall into each of the measured amounts of time spent. Because my husband spends a lot more time, on an order of magnitude, than 6.5 hours a week with his kids. I understand that this may have to take into account factors like time spent commuting on weekdays, but Hubby can easily spend more than that amount of time in one day on the weekends! Maybe it’s the fault of those guys with motorcycle insurance. And if they are taking into account non-custodial dads, it is not indicated.

I would like to think that a lot of dads are spending a lot more time than 6.5 hours per week with the kiddos but that the average is being lowered by a few absentee fathers. But if the majority of fathers surveyed looked the amounts given and said, “Six and half hours a week? That sounds about right, and they’re lucky I do that much!” then why should we be praising these guys? That’s another very low-set bar. This kind of reporting makes men look bad and it’s not coming from feminists!

I realize that hearth and home, and children, have long been considered the purview of women. And even in families where the mothers work outside the home, that is still the case. Who is it that does the childcare-scramble when things fall through? Usually it’s the mom. But I have noticed more and more dads doing the everyday things with their kids. Lots of fathers dropped off their kids at Monkey’s school. And since families come in all shapes and sizes, lots of grandparents do the everyday things, too. But still.

I’m sorry, no matter how much time a dad spends playing with his kids per week, he is not the new mom. Some dads have do the work of two parents, but for the most part, men rest safely assured in the knowledge that wife will handle most of the kid-stuff, whether she’s a SAHM or works outside the home. I guess I am peeved at the praise heaped on men for finally “pitching in” and doing all the things that women have been doing forever with little praise or recognition. You know, my husband doesn’t “pitch in”, he doesn’t “babysit” his own children, he parents, and does it well. And he is suitably rewarded, not with a frozen confection, but with the love and appreciation of his wife and children.

I am sick and tired of this media portrayal of men, and by extension, the women in their lives. Why is the portrayal of home and family life so unattractive? To be fair to Mr. Most, the article does showcase the changing (and improving) nature of the American family. I guess, in the end, what I am most upset about, is the editors’ decision to use such inflammatory (to me, anyway) titles and headlines. Here again I can’t imagine who they are trying to appeal to, moms are just going to be thinking, “New moms, eh? Well, when was the last time a dad got cracked nipples or got in trouble at work for pumping?” And fathers making real contributions to their families (like my husband) are going to be appalled at that paltry 6.5 hours and the praise it is garnering. I can’t remember the exact quote, but Hubby said something like, “Six and half hours a week? How is that possible?” I was so furious at the title on the cover that I nearly burned the damn thing without reading it!

And you know what? None of this came from teh ee-vil feminists! And they say that we hate men?!

I have a couple of things that are too short for or not worthy of a post of their own, so thanks to Christina for pointing me the way!

1. We didn’t lose power in this latest round of storms; nor did we lose many branches. Mostly because we didn’t have many branches to lose due to December’s “ice pruning.”

2. Somehow I have to find my childhood vaccination records for Nursing School.

3. I turn 40 on Saturday.

4. My hair is becoming quite salt-and-pepper grey and I have decided to grow it out a little. I was afraid my very short hair was starting to resemble George Clooney’s hair.

5. Procrastination- I’m doing this instead of working on my book of short stories.

6. I hope to go see the SATC movie on my birthday, sans children.

7. Follow me on Twitter, when it works. http://twitter.com/burningprairie

8. A couple of months of ago Pumpkin broke Monkey’s train table by jumping up and down on it. This week, she tore some of the sticker-decorations off her play kitchen, then she broke Monkey’s play tool bench, and sometime yesterday she broke the DVD player. Oh yeah, a while back she ruined Monkey’s Nintendo DSLite, by smearing it with yogurt. This kid is getting expensive.

9. I’m about done with children who won’t use utensils and insist on shoving Spaghetti-O’s in their mouths with their little fists. (I’m talking to you, little missy.)

10. The Incredible Hulk is Lou Ferrigno, thank you very much.

O.K., I have two shows to review today, both fall into the inexplicable category for me, but the kids seem to like them.

Caillou-I despise this show, no, that’s not a strong enough word. I hate this show with the heat of a thousand suns, the fiery quality of my utter loathing and active hatred of this show is powerful enough to melt the paint off the walls. The star of the animated show is an extraordinarily whiny, melon-headed little punk. He’s supposed to be four years old, but exhibits a maturity level far lower than that of his barely-verbal baby sister, Rosie. Caillou’s mother and father are so preternaturally patient and kind and loving and mealy-mouthed that their resemblance to real parents is cursory at best. There’s a cat and some stuffed animals that have their own puppet show thing between the excruciating animated segments. The theme song is terrible, the parents seem like they are on tranquilizers, those grandparents are the most boring grandparents on the planet, there’s a creepy next-door neighbor with a gold tooth and no visible means of support, and did I mention the whining? Caillou is a terrible influence on children, at least on mine. One half-hour of Caillou leads, hop-skip-and-jump, to a week of emulating his atrocious whiny-toned voice. I think the kid gets away with being so whiny all the time because those cartoon parents of his are zonked out on Quaaludes all the time. I find no redeeming qualities in this show except that the kids seem to like it, thank heavens it’s not one of the favorites.

Then there is Yo Gabba Gabba, a children’s show/rave that boasts some very cool guests and artists. Guests like Elijah Woods and Biz Markie and Mark Mothersbaugh. This show is a cross between The Banana Splits, Sigmund and the Sea Monsters, and Dee Lite. And can I just say that I am utterly confused by DJ Lancerock’s hat? During my sophomore year of high school, before we got the new band uniforms, that hats we had to wear were these white, itchy towers of fake fur. DJ Lancerock’s hat looks just like those except in orange. To me, Yo Gabba Gabba just seems like a bunch of hipper-than-thou parents or wanna-bes got together and decided to make a “cool” children’s program. I can’t fault them for this, as much children’s programming is absolute garbage. But sometimes it comes off as self-congratulatory and pretentious in its efforts to not be Barney. 

When I get tired of modern children’s programming I just turn the T.V. over to Boomerang, watch Yogi Bear, and relive the innocent T.V.-viewing of my childhood. And, seriously, children’s-programming-people, why work so hard at being “cool” when we can just turn over to The Jetsons or Scooby Do, Where Are You?