Fathers have become second-class citizens

Andrew

Blimey Toby! What a wimp you are!

Putting one toddler into a play pen and dishing up two bowls of cereal leaves you in a muck sweat, totally traumatised and bleating about the unjust position of modern fathers.

What should you be doing on a Saturday exactly? Sleeping in to be awakened with tea and a kiss by your good lady, followed by the full English and a leisurely afternoon reading the paper? All this wwhile presumably she gets on with the domestic chores?

For heavne's sake man, get a grip! If you didn't want to look after kids you shouldn't have had them - either that or buy in paid help. You can surely afford it.

Mike

Sorry, but I think you are in some kind of Dad purgatory for naming your son after a rubbish board-game.

Ever heard of the phrase "Grow a pair"?

The reason why there are no positive male role models is Dad's have become simply followers rather than leaders.

How about you lay the law down to your kids and garner some respect from them first of all?

dave, surrey

Toby, only Oxbridge metropolitan media types have 'dinner parties', you forfeit any claim to experiencing real life existence by admitting as much. As Andrew says, get a grip.

Jaswinder Singh

To Dave, Surrey:

My, we are an inverted snob, aren't we? Are you saying Toby shouldn't have gone to Oxbridge or be metropolitan, or that if he has and is he should deny reality?

C. Pruett

Hmmmm. Society doesn't respect you, your wife doesn't respect you, and your kids will lose their respect for you (in the unlikely event they ever have any to begin with). Worst of all, you don't even respect yourself (the crux of the problem).
You don't need "a bit more courage." You need to grow a pair, stop whining, and man up. While you may be a male, you'll never be a man. Sad waste of a Y chromosome.

Mr Green

I don't think this is so much an issue with your kids, more a relationship issue with your wife.
Sharing the family workload should mean sharing the burden as well as sharing the experience of seeing your children grow.

If you feel you have suddenly become a general fetcher and carrier, whilst the good times are being had by all those around you, then perhaps you need to redress the balance a little.

David Bouvier

dave, surrey

Plenty of dinner party action amongst us Oxbridge country types too. Well actually amongst most of - what shall we say - the upper middle class and upper class families across the land.

Certainly plenty in Surrey I suspect though perhaps your chip puts people off inviting you.

Admittedly experiencing life as Toby Young is widely understood to be pretty odd, his life is precisely as "real" as yours.

anna

Dear Mr Young, anybody who chooses to produce 4 children in 5 years must expect to be overworked. Whatever happened to spacing? As the late, great Simon Raven wrote, "Nobody forced you to get married, and nobody forced you to spawn like a frog."

Jaswinder Singh

To David Bouvier,

Your last paragraph is what I was trying to say but you expressed it more succinctly - JS (Oxbridge, metropolitan,real)

Toby Young

Funnily enough, the reaction of most of the men on this page -- "Grow a pair!" -- is often the reaction of women when a man complains about the diminution of male authority. It always strikes me as odd that anyone would appeal to masculine values in order to attack a person who dares to stick up for them. Given the reaction an article like this is bound to provoke, sounding a note of dissent takes more courage that embracing the status quo. It's not me who has to "man up", but those men who are too frightened by the prospect of appearing unmanly to complain.

David Short

anne's right that TB's predicament is instensfied by having so many young children...but then again my parents had five, each spaced by a year or so - the norm in my backstreet Tyneside world then - and I'm sure my father didn't get 'involved'.

It's the way of the world now, and it has been remarked upon by other writers that, somehow, the position of parent (not just father) and child has been reversed in not much more than a generation, and no one knows why or how.

At least TB can look forward to a time in the not too distant future when the 'kids' will all start looking after themselves or each other. That's the bonus of having so many kids so close together.

Far, far better than having four spaced over, say, ten years. Almost a life sentence of 'care'.

And at least it's earned TB some extra cash from the Spectator writing about it.

TB should just make sure he puts a knot in it now.

Nick Constable

Toby's overarching point is a good one, which is that men generally have been emasculated over the last two decades, and it's no wonder that strong male role models are thin on the ground at the domestic level, at any rate - 'society' (or the liberal left) has succeeded in almost completely feminising us men. we do need to 'grow a pair' if nothing else because we've had 'em metaphorically chopped off. How many male primary schoolteachers are there? Count the number of TV ads aimed at women that effectively denigrate 'useless' men. I could go on We are cowed, brow-beaten and made to feel like neanderthals if we stand up for male values...

Laura

"Charlie, our one-year-old, was crying and it was my turn to get up."

It sounds to me like the burden is being shared here, and he thinks it's wrong that it's not all dumped on his wife.

I wonder how long the newspapers that Toby evidently never gets a chance to read would sit around if Caroline didn't throw them away. I wonder if she ran across Saturday's stained newspaper later on Sunday and wondered why she was having to throw it away a second time.

And I wonder about the complaints about vasectomies - which are NOT castration, btw - these men clearly don't want the kids they have, why do they complain about not having more?

jenny

In fact, Mr Young is doing what women have always done. Imagine if a mother had written this article, complaining about being "put upon" by her family? The reason that fathers are more "hands on" in this day and age, is because women work to bring in the bacon too, so they shoulder their share of the husband's traditional role. And really, you could have stopped after one, or even two... did you think four children wouldn't change your life in any way!?

Alan scott

Come on chaps! This worthy gent is raising children who in due course will - if there is any work to be had - contribute by their taxes to support all you dreary fellas who criticise Toby.
Give the little b*****s a beer, Toby, or at least chips.

Riccardo

Toby, you'll get no thanks from your woman for this, and no respect from anyone else.

Elementary fact about women: they don't say what they mean. When they say they want you to take an equal share, they mean they want you to take some of the decisions and some of the responsibility, and to be assertive. If you don't decide what's going on with the kids, you're just a serf. Your wife goes from running the family to running your life too. At this stage she also despises you and yearns for a real man to philander with while you're at work.

Answer: be decisive and assertive in your relationship. Pick a fight with her when she least expects it. Flirt with other women as often as possible.

With 4 kids under five it's going to be tough. But that soon passes, and your job is to make sure you're still a man at the end of it, rather than a one-man chain gang.

Adrian

Toby,

I'm not fussed about your domestic worries - you must have known what you were getting into. Your choice. But you're totally right about the issue around education of teenage boys.

I've spent several years working with prolific young offenders who have been let down by our feminised and politically correct education system. What annoys me is when someone points out how the inequalities in education are harming young men the feminists point to the inequality that still exists at the most senior levels within different organisations. What they willfully ignore every time is that the people at the top today began their careers in the 1970s and 1980s, and were educated in the 1960s and 1970s when things were very different. The feminists don't want equality, they want payback. When that plays out in your home that's your problem, but when it effects teenage boys who then drift into crime and violent behaviour it's everyone's problem.

james

Excellent piece Toby.

Ignore the comments of the ignorant males above who cannot see what is being done by our feminist-dominated government to fathers.

Rupert Fotherington-Smythe

From a broader perspective, it's my observation that the English middle class male is pussywhipped. English middle class females take the piss out of English m/c males summat rotten. This is just emblematic of it. Feminism has neutered the English m/c male. I see evidence of it everywhere I look.

Andrew

"It always strikes me as odd that anyone would appeal to masculine values in order to attack a person who dares to stick up for them. - Toby Young

You're haveing a laugh aren't you?

You aren't "sticking up for male values" you are whinging like a baby because your quality time is being disrupted by parental duties. No harm in that. I am sure we've all done it, but trying to inflate being pissed off and hassled into a plea for the status of men - pull the other one Toby!

The main problem men of this generation have is a desire to shirk responsibility and never grow up. That is what drives the ridiculous phenomena of "lad" culture.

I don't think the minute you have a kid you need to buy a beige pullover and a pair of slippers, but acting like an adult might be nice.

I am constantly amazed to see guys in their 30s and 40s who expect to behave towards their wives and partners like small boys - only with beer and sex thrown in. Meanhwile, they treat their kids as playmates and get niggled when the youngsters need a bit more than a man acting like an oversized 10 year old - like, say, a parent perhaps.

It might work in a sitcom, but real life requires real men, not characters from Men Behaving Badly.

Philipa

Toby Young - you're not sticking up for masculine values, you're just whining.

If you long to live in a misogynist society then divorce the wife you made promises to, ratting on your promises in doing so, leave the children you chose to have, and go live in one. Otherwise please stop whining in print about the responsibilities you chose. Your family will respect you all the more for that.

Oh, and an abundance of male teachers never ever stopped a proportion of the male population being whining wimps.

Ian Walker

Somebody call a waaaaaahbulance!

Four under fives isn't easy - I've beeen there. The fact is that Dads aren't really cut out for the toddlers - we can muddle through and learn the ropes, but it's not really enjoyable. In a few years time you'll have a bunch of demanding, bright, inquisitive little people and you'll re-read this article and laugh at yourself.

My advice: if the Sunday paper's so important to you, rather than get it delivered, get up early and walk to the shops. If the kids are up, take them with you - you can teach them the value of exercise and road safety and use the time to really connect with them. And when you get back you'll have really earned that sit down with the paper.

Respect as a father, husband or anything else, is something you earn - always has been, always will be.

randy

Western men die some five years earlier than women. They suffer more from nearly every medical disease and ailment that there is. And yet, far more money is spent by governments on women's health than on men's health. Men are also nowadays educationally disadvantaged significantly compared to women; with the curriculum, the teaching methods and the resources being designed to cater far more for women and girls than for men and boys. Men make up 80% of the homeless. There are more of them in social service care-homes as boys. They are many times more likely to be wrongfully arrested, wrongfully imprisoned, mugged, assaulted or murdered. They are 5 times more likely to lose their children when families break down, 4 times more likely to lose their homes, 4 times more likely to commit suicide, 20 times more likely to be killed or injured at work, 20 times more likely to be imprisoned, and, probably, more than 100 times more likely to be demeaned, denigrated and ridiculed by the mainstream media. Men also pay much more in taxes than women but receive far less in benefits from the government.

In other words, when compared to women, men are significantly disadvantaged when it comes to their health, their lifespans, their homes, their children, their education, their families, the tax burden, the law, the benefit system, and even when it comes to their own personal safety.

They are nowadays also being heavily discriminated against in the work place.

James

Good God Toby you really are pathetic. How on earth are you standing up for "masculine values"? 'Masculine values' involve taking control and being in charge. Note that I said TAKING control, not ASKING or WHINING for it. Just TAKE it.

You say in the article "I had to ...". What a retard you are. Don't you realise you don't HAVE to do anything - you are a man which means you only do what you WANT to do. Nobody can FORCE you to do what you don't want. So be a man and stand up for what you want and start issuing the ORDERS in the family.

The problem is that - as you admit - you are a coward. You are right that television denigrates men - so simply switch the TV off and do NOT allow your wife and children to watch any programme you deem unsuitable. As I said before: take CONTROL and start issuing ORDERS to the whole family - especially your wife.

Your problem is that you are a brainwashed liberal wimp. You are NOT typical of men - leastways, not the men I know. Why should we feel sorry for you if you are not prepared to stand up for yourself?

Whiskey

Reality check: Women in particular don't respect or value fathers. Toby's wife nor does Lewis's wife respect him. Fatherhood is not valued.

So Fathers should not do it. Don't get married. Spread your seed. If you do get married, foolishly, don't do anything like Lewis or Toby. Flirt with other women. Be "sexy." Let your wife know you can leave in a heartbeat for another woman, then she'll value you.

Bottom line, women take men and particularly fathers for granted so men should not take on that role. Women will only respect men and fathers when men who take on that role are rare, the exception, and important. Lesson: women are so hard-wired for dominance not domesticity that no man should ever take it on; hire a nanny if you must and flirt with her, it will make your wife uneasy and thus more attracted to you as a man. Ugly, but a true portrait of women's hardwired nature.

Ian

Sounds like you and your other half thoroughly deserve each other. You've both fully subscribed to the politically correct/feminist claptrap that has made Western society the complete dogs breakfast it is in today so stop moaning and enjoy. The only surprise is that you were able to sire any children at all.

A. MacAulay

Isn't the point that a "real" man can afford to have a wife who stays at home and looks after the home and children?

The sordid truth is that a double income is a prerequisite for a middle class existence. Our society would be only half as rich if women didn't work, pay taxes and consume on credit. The joke is that women, blinded by feminism, think of this, which is what we men used to call the rat race, as a kind of freedom. And of course it is the children, not the fathers, who pay the price.

I suggest Toby Young should step up 3-5 income groups and he will find that his wife is quite content to manage the home, the nanny, learn flower arranging and work in an honourary capacity for a charity.

damozel

Yup - men have been conned. When I walk around Hampstead and see the hapless men with babies slung around their necks like breastless women I feel sorry for them. My father and husband spent their weekends resting and relaxing from their arduous working week - not being unpaid nannies to small children (who, love them as you do, are still intellectual pygmies with a boring factor of 60) and, from what I see, their own intellects suffer accordingly and their children end up despising them instead of being lordly creatures who are only rarely seen and therefore revered and respected!

Richard

Toby, Caroline, Sasha, Freddie, Charlie - just about says it all really. P.S. Nice one, Ian.

Dave

Is the irony of typing an angry comment about "being a man" and whatnot, with virutal anonymity and no chance of meeting the person you're berrating lost on everyone? (I'm happy to include myself also...)

A. MacAulay

If you make yourself into a target, Dave, don't cry when you get hit. Perhaps one of the first lessons in becoming a man.

Shan Morgain

Toby my heartfelt sympathy. Fatherhood is tough.
But first - why are you putting your kids and yourself through such a horrific number of weekend activities? Neither you nor they need this. Cut out 80% of the rushing around to classes and visits and you'll have a happier, and lazier time.

Second, I note you did say that you had to get up early because it was your "turn." Nor did you anywhere mention that your wife was lolling around while you do all the parental work. Therefore I conclude your wife is clearly sharing the load, doing her share.

So if you do less, as you would naturally rather do, who would do it for you?
Your wife? Why should she do more than you?
Who else is there? You could look at recruiting other relatives, or pay for minders. But failing these, they are simply YOUR kids.

Yes I too sometimes think longingly of bygone days. I understand that once upon a time I might have had just one job as a woman: looking after my family. Or maube one and a half, a 'little part time job' which didn't carry much responsibility, coming second to my real work of running the family.
As it is in these modern days I am breadwinner, childcare manager, husband supporter, house manager. Ah me! I remember my mother doing the housework then putting her feet up in the afternoon with the newspaper!

But these fantasies are unrealistic. If I were a 50s wife I'd be cut off from any financial independence. I'd have no access to finance (loans, mortgage) in my own name. I'd have no control over my fertility (contraception, abortion). I'd be paid pocket money if I was employed. Domestic violence would be about the same (epidemic, 80% on female victims) and my world would make most women invisible, certainly very few women in politics or business. So no thanks.

For you it would be a bleak world, shut out of family life, your main purpose being to bring home MONEY. That would be your life, to make money. Cold, hard cash. You'd be nagged to death by a frustrated powerless wife you couldn't possibly understand, because her life would be so different. Your children would not know you except as a distant figure not to be disturbed. On retirement your useful function would be over and you'd fade into a lonely pathetic old man.
In return you'd get your meals cooked, a cleanish house, and some passively submitted sex. Cold, practical services.

So going backwards doesn't help. Nor does overdoing the present. So take a hard look at where you can cut out some of your frantic activities. Just stay home with the kids, or go to the park. They'll enjoy it just as much.
Don't try to ignore them either. They sense that and will try harder to destroy whatever you want to do (read the paper). Instead give them intense attention, more than they want! They'kk soon push you away and you can win some free time.

Be comforted it does get easier. When the youngest is 3, and even more at youngest at 5, they all get a lot more independent. Hang in there!

Finally, analysing this as a gender war - she or he ought to do it differently - is highly political. It's very much what suits the powers that be for us to do. While we do that, we 're not looking at THEM.

Women have been pushed out to work, a childcare pressure put on men, not in the main due to feminism, but because of unregulated banks. That's right - the banks.

You see the banks could once only lend a maximum amount to the highest earner in a household. A mortgage was set so one income could cover it and still pay the bills as well.
Once that limit was lifted in the 80s under the Tories mortgages got bigger and bigger and bigger. Property prices went up and up as capacity to pay rose. New Labour eagerly continued the project.

As a result we're all shafted. We all have to work twice as hard, at home and at work - can't afford to lose the crummy job with huge debt burden to pay. As we all know the banks ran the engine into the ground so now the economy is in a crash as well.

So don't blame women, and we'll try not to blame you either. But do cut out most of all that unnecessary dashing about.
To keep up couples found they BOTH had to work. Very very few families can now afford not to be a double employee home.

Ulysses Elias

Oh dear. What a poorly researched, argued and written article. What faulty reasoning to assert that a small percentage of male teachers techaing in primary schools necessarily means that men (sic) enrolled in primary schools are being treated as second class citizens. I think if the author had any appreciation for research, logical argument and scientific thinking, he would have discovered that that 'overrepresentation' of female teachers in primary school goes hand in hand with the overrepresentation of low salaries for primary school teachers. The same applies to techers in early childhood institutions. I would have expected a much higher standard of thought and writing from the Spectator. How does such a poor piece get through the 'gate-keepers' I wonder?

aileen Stein

Toby, Toby, Toby. I understand I'm answering this late but I'll post my thoughts anyway.

You have little kids and they suck the life out of you, yes, I get that. Sometimes you want to flee, yes I get that too. But what I don't get is you framing it as a castration/de-manning of men.

Here's a question - What would you like to change? Would you like your wife to do everything all the time, whilst you read the paper with a leisurely coffee? Is that what would make you feel manly, servitude?

I've read your books and your wife sounds quite sensible, I'm sure she's not watching TV and eating bonbons while she's barking out orders to you. I'm sure she's just as frazzled and in need of personal space as you are.

Here's what we did when our kids were little - We would each block off a space of time on the weekends. So it might be a movie or going to the driving range or going for a run, but each parent got a few uninterrupted hours of personal space. It works wonders for the psyche.

As another poster said, cancel all that kid crap on the weekend, especially since they're really little and won't know the difference. When you get an invite express extreme distress at already having other plans. Give a lovely gift. Keep a closet of age-appropriate gifts that can be grabbed and wrapped at a moment's notice.

Another thing I would strongly suggest is HELP. Get a cleaning person once or twice a week, get a sitter for a few hours a week, get out and do non-kid activities before you lose your mind.

You will get through this but in the meantime stop whining about being emasculated and being a victim, it's terribly unbecoming.

Monkey Munch, LA

You were all so busy being real men and insulting each other that you missed the major howler...

Elizabeth Ross in the Stepford Wives...?

Katharine, surely.

betty

Fathers lose in custody battles? But this guy just said he longs for the good ol days when fathers were not involved with their children? Could someone explain?