I have an idea for a new reality series. It’s called “Labor Of Love.” It will chronicle the lives of men who want to “have it all.”
This show will follow men in their thirties who fight and scrape their way to corporate success and have a great time on the New York City dating scene. The problem is they don’t find suitable women who they feel they can marry and settle down with. They use dating apps to meet all kinds of women. They sometimes find it even easier to just hang out and meet women face to face at bars, nightclubs and out in the general public. They are confident, mature, interesting, well-read, bright, thoughtful, adventurous men but can’t seem to meet “the one!”
Well, what do they do? They feel that since they aren’t getting any younger, they decide to stay single. The twist is that they want to raise a child on their own. They look for women who will either be the one who will give birth to ther child, through insemination, or they will adopt a beautiful baby on their own.
These men will finally be able to raise a family. They will also continue to date from time to time if they choose to – just for the fun of it! They don’t see the need to get married or have anyone move in with them. They got this! They feel empowered knowing there is support for single parents, especially these single dads.
It seems as if our society has noticed how men’s dreams have evolved over time from the one-time ideal of having a good job, a big house, a nice relationship and then kids. Often having a family is part of this dream, but for more and more men, it’s a good job, the big house and not the other two. Settling down and having kids used to be the natural progression, but for those who have completed the first two of the four-step dream, maybe it’s just some fun on the side and raising kids on their own. Maybe this is the path for the modern man!
This show will explore this phenomenon deeper and see what life is like for men who want to “have it all.”
Sounds interesting doesn’t it? Or does it sound alarming?
Well, what if it were a show with the exact opposite?
Choosing single parenthood isn’t in the best interests of children. I feel it is selfish and not the ideal way to raise our offspring. Growing up without a father does serious and lasting damage to both boys and girls.
– Children in father-absent homes are almost four times more likely to be poor. In 2011, 12 percent of children in married-couple families were living in poverty, compared to 44 percent of children in mother-only families.
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Children’s Living Arrangements and Characteristics: March 2011, Table C8. Washington D.C.: 2011.
– The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services states, “Fatherless children are at a dramatically greater risk of drug and alcohol abuse.”
Source: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. National Center for Health Statistics. Survey on Child Health. Washington, DC, 1993.
– A study of 1,977 children age 3 and older living with a residential father or father figure found that children living with married biological parents had significantly fewer externalizing and internalizing behavioral problems than children living with at least one non-biological parent.
Source: Hofferth, S. L. (2006). Residential father family type and child well-being: investment versus selection. Demography, 43, 53-78.
Don’t take my word for it, these are the words of former President Barack Obama that he spoke in 2008:
“We know the statistics – that children who grow up without a father are five times more likely to live in poverty and commit crime; nine times more likely to drop out of schools and twenty times more likely to end up in prison. They are more likely to have behavioral problems, or run away from home, or become teenage parents themselves. And the foundations of our community are weaker because of it.”
“Yes, we need more cops on the street. Yes, we need fewer guns in the hands of people who shouldn’t have them. Yes, we need more money for our schools, and more outstanding teachers in the classroom, and more afterschool programs for our children. Yes, we need more jobs and more job training and more opportunity in our communities.”
“But we also need families to raise our children. We need fathers to realize that responsibility does not end at conception. We need them to realize that what makes you a man is not the ability to have a child – it’s the courage to raise one.”
“We need to help all the mothers out there who are raising these kids by themselves; the mothers who drop them off at school, go to work, pick up them up in the afternoon, work another shift, get dinner, make lunches, pay the bills, fix the house, and all the other things it takes both parents to do. So many of these women are doing a heroic job, but they need support. They need another parent. Their children need another parent. That’s what keeps their foundation strong. It’s what keeps the foundation of our country strong.”
There is a world of information about fatherless children. Why would anyone find a show about choosing single parenthood worthy of rewarding?
Well, there is one. it’s called Labor Of love and its about women making this really ill-informed choice. I wanted to see what people’s reaction to a man choosing this path as a opposed to a woman. It always seems great when women do it but eyebrows are raised if a man were to choose the same path.
Maybe it’s time to re-think the choice of single parenthood and actually producing more garbage like THIS: