Introduction

Through the early part of her pregnancy, my wife and I both had a minor assumption that we were having a girl. When we got the NIPT^[1] results back and found out we were having a boy, we both experienced some kind of disappointment. I think the initial reaction was shock at having made the wrong assumption. I knew I didn’t really have a preference for the sex of our child and I’d be happy either way, but something felt wrong. After the initial shock passed, I understood what I was feeling was not disappointment, but apprehension.

When I thought I was having a daughter I had one picture of what my role as a father would be. I had ideas for how to raise a daughter to be a strong, independent woman who believes in herself, advocates for herself, and expects to be treated with respect. With a son, my role is different. Of course I need to raise a boy to be strong and independent, but that’s not a push against outside influences. That’s what our society expects boys to be. But, we see so many teenage boys and adult men drawn, primarily through algorithmic recommendation online, into the far-right pipeline that epitomizes toxic masculinity and fosters misogyny and white supremacy. Most of these people do not start out sexist or racist; those ideas are reinforced by a massive echo chamber. The most important part of raising a son in the United States today, in my opinion, is raising a young man who rejects that pipeline and refuses to fall for the false promises of the manosphere.

The goal is simple to state but leaves me with so many unanswered questions. How do I raise a son to be a good man? What does it even mean to be a good man, when you strip out the idea of “traditional” gender roles, gender norms and stereotypes, and even the gender binary? How do I raise a boy who chooses to reject toxic masculinity, not because I or his mother told him to, but because he sees for himself that it is wrong. What can I do to raise a kind and caring son who loves himself and others? I want to prepare him to see the world as it is and reject patriarchal structures, reject a narrow definition of masculinity, embrace the beautiful diversity in humanity, and protect the natural world. I suspect I am not alone. What can we as a generation of fathers do, to raise our sons better?

I’ve noticed a lack of resources by dads that focus on embracing fatherhood in this way. On Instagram I’ve consistently had parenting videos show up in my feed for years now, but they’ve almost always been by women. Hearing from mothers what fathers can do better is great, but it would be better for dads to hear it from other dads. This blog is where I’m going to write about my own experience and hopefully connect with other dads who want to be better role models and help our kids grow up with a healthier view of the world. I’m coming at this completely blind and want to emphasize that I am nothing anywhere close to a parenting expert. I am a first time dad with lofty goals and very little idea how to achieve them. This is a place for me to document the process of figuring that out. Right now my ideas about what I’ll write about are open-ended. I want to share what I’m thinking conceptually about fatherhood, strategies I’ve tried, what’s working and what isn’t, what I’m doing to help myself grow, and anything else that comes to mind. Some posts may be about specific events or scenarios in my family’s life, others may be more philosophical as I try to organize my thoughts. I may even review kids media and share how I feel that fits into my parenting strategy. No matter what the specifics of the posts are, I will always tie back to the central goal of raising sons to be the best they can be.

For now this will be just my own work, but in the longer term I want to try to build a community of dads (and grandfathers, non-binary parents, and anyone else who identifies with the concept of fatherhood) to support each other and learn together. We have a critically important job and we can’t do it alone. I hope starting this blog is the first step in a good direction.