He's right. It's tough and getting tougher for a man to be your traditional family man these days. I'm like a unicorn...

Mike Rowe has always seemed to be an honest and sensible guy. He is right, boys, and girls, need the difference that comes with each gender.Boys learn how to treat women from dads and girls learn how they should be treated from dads. The women's movement has made women think men are disposable, they are not. They have made women act with disrespect toward men, just for existing, that is stupid. That is not to say boys should not learn equally about the realms from the female perspective. Girls can learn about how men think and feel from dad, and become more able to deal in the business environment successfully. And the cown is when parents work together to model how a marriage should work (which did not happen in our home. Each gender brings something important to the business or supper tabl, and to leave dads out of the equation is disasterous and unfair to the child.

My old man (now deceased) was very strong. He exercised and kept himself in shape. He taught me to fight (including a few techniques with the fist). Still, I was not usually afraid of him (except in cases of a dispute, where I had a specific reason to think he might hit me--which he sometimes did). When I was about 5 years old, and we lived on a blacktop, I heard the neighbors' yelling at them with an edge in his voice (unlike my father's voice, which was generally high-pitched, but without the edge). It scared the h*** out of me. If I was there, and he came home from work, I would run home. And there was a young guy (perhaps a relative or friend of their family) who had the youngest boy in a sort of bear hug; I got the idea he was hurting the boy (probably he was not). That showed me; men were mean and dangerous. I was scared of men for a long time--maybe about two or three weeks. One evening, my father and I were in the yard, and he was cutting grass, as I recall, and I thought, even though I was scared of men, Daddy was a man, and I wasn't scared of him. So I though of saying, "You're a man, aren't you?", though I may not have said it out loud. But even so, it was enough. I saw that I did not have to be scared of men; just that neighbor. (Later I learned that the neighbor was not all that bad, either, but it took time). But suppose my father had been an abuser. Or maybe not an abuser, but somebody who was never home, and thought all he had to do was make the money and fork it over, and his job as a father was done? Or somebody who had deserted us? It was very different. But one good father can outweigh millions of brutal, evil men.
I don't know, I do think boys need a role model, but maybe a good father is even more important for a girl.

I always thought Mike Rowe seemed to be a decent guy. After watching this video he has high marks in my appraisal. His article is spot on. Sometimes there is a reason that a father may not be in someone's life, then the extended family and friends may have to step in to help out but positive role models are still important.
I drive a school bus now that I am semi-retired. there were many problems on the bus with the kids while I tried to use the approved socialist guidelines of the school the get the kids to behave. I finally threw out their system and one morning at the school while the kids were still on the bus I got on the PA and told the kids we were not going to write tickets anymore and try to get the principal to cooperate with me. If anyone misbehaved, hurt others, used bad language they would be immediately removed from the bus by me and would not be able to return until I told them they could. I had to remove a couple of them before they realized I meant business. One teenager would not remain in his seat so I pulled the bus over on the highway and took him by the shirt collar, brought him to the front of the bus and told him that was where he would now sit or he could start walking (I heard him later inform another kid, that's Mr. Chad, when he says sit down he means it!). One kid used some foul language and I told he couldn't return until his mother met me at the bus stop and repeated to me what he had said, that way I would know he had told his mother the truth. Within a few days the bus settled down, the kids waited in lines at the bus stop instead of chasing the bus. Instead of shoving each other to get off the bus they unload one row at a time politely waiting for others. My worst kid, who has no father at home, started taking karate lessons so I would show up at his lessons to watch him. You could see that he was proud that a man was taking interest in him.
As the other kids behaved well I made it a point to thank them and treat them with Grandpa' Chad chocolate chip cookies and tell them how well they are doing. Instead of calling me names they call me Mr. Chad. I respect them and tell them I expect the same from them and tell them they don't have to like me but they do have to be nice. The kids who were the biggest problems are now my bus safety officers who ensure kids are seated properly. I also train them in emergency procedures in case something happens they know they are expected to help others and be the last ones off the bus in an emergency. They respond to kindness and responsibility and understand that there is also firmness in what is expected from them.
Still the best thing in a home are both parents being role models of what it means to be of different genders.

I agree with the tenor of this article, but I think it's a mistake to focus on gender roles. We need the "fatherly" behaviors in kids lives. Someone who's father is dead or absent for other reasons can have other people fill that role. Just being a parent whose present and male does not guarantee he will fill that role. Trying to push people into the roles based on their sex is a separate problem that appears to be decreasing.

I think the crisis is even worse than Rowe describes because I think we have an epidemic of what I call Momism. That's where one parent, usually the mother, obsessively focuses on shielding kids from all aspects of the adult world and autonomy. If there's a parent, usually the father, who wants to help the children grow stronger on the path to being an independent adult, people dismiss him as too risk prone.

The first line is Parents "have put their own happiness above the best interests of their kids.".
I do too. My kids will never have to think "Dad probably hated taking me to those ice skating events" or whatever it is. I don't do them unless I want to. I'm putting my happiness first. One thing that makes me happy is seeing my kids learn to recognize what makes them happy, put that happiness first, and take action to get what they want.