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Dads on the Front Line
The Fight Against Sexism By Kelly Burgess
Looking at the media, the question begs to be asked: Have we come a long way, Baby? Buxom twins sell beer. Teen Talk Barbie proclaims, "Math is hard!" A man, charged with dressing the kids while his wife is sick upstairs, allows them to go to school in summer clothes on a snowy winter day. The implications are 1) sex sells, 2) girls aren't "math people" and 3) men are incompetent.
While women's groups have traditionally been the watchdog of these types of mixed messages, more and more men's organizations are joining in the fight against sexism in society. Many of them are fathers of daughters who want their children fully accepted in our culture because of who they are and what they can accomplish. Others are fathers of sons who want them to have mature, fully-developed relationships with the woman in their lives.
"It makes me sick to my stomach that in what we think of as this 'enlightened' age, we are still using that type of sexual advertising to sell a product," says Kelly. "What I always ask people to do is to imagine it's your daughter's face in the picture or up on the billboard. How would that make you feel? At that point, it really goes beyond politics."
Kelly, 48, is a founding member of Dads & Daughters, a nonprofit, national advocacy group for fathers and daughters. Their mission is to "inspire fathers to actively and deeply engage in the lives of their daughters and galvanize fathers and others to transform the pervasive cultural messages that devalue girls and women."
It can seem like an uphill battle. Media seems to be ever more youth centered, even though television viewership is aging as baby boomers age. Media is also driven by advertising, not by programming, and much advertising still relies on stereotypes and alienation to try to attract customers.
"There is an awful lot in this culture that is undermining family value systems because they want your child to identify with something that takes no moral stance," says Kelly. "There are multi-billion dollar forces out there who care only about making more money and they're willing to do so by objectifying girls and stimulating their insecurity."
