Parenting: The Last Laugh

I think most of you know that while I take parenting pretty seriously, the one thing that I DON'T take seriously is myself. 

I mention this because it seems that many of today's parenting discussions have become very serious and somber.  You can't joke or make fun of ANYTHING anymore!  In fact, I read recently that adopted children no longer wish to be called "adoptees" anymore.  Can you believe that?  They all got together and decided that they now wish to be referred to as Asians! 

Now, somewhere out there, there's an adoptive parent getting ready to shoot me an angry e-mail. And I want you to listen to me...walk away from the computer, it was a joke.  A bad joke.  Let it go. It was just a comment on how pathetically neurotic we've all become over our own little pieces of turf.

Anyway, I bring this up because I've found that nowhere are the humorless more rampant than on today's parenting message boards. 

As I mentioned before, when the Peanut was first born, I used to hang out over on the UrbanBaby message boards.  At first, I went there seeking advice but after seeing so many judgmental people criticizing other people's parenting choices, I decided it would be fun to start messing with them and their self-righteous attitudes. 

Like pretending to be a woman and starting a thread asking whether it was ok for me to stop breastfeeding my 16-year-old.

Or the time when I read that all these mothers were planning to attend the "Million Mom March" and I wrote a comment saying, ""hey ladies, while you’re all up, can you get me a beer?"

Pretty funny, right? 

Not to some people.  Apparently, parenthood makes some people completely lose their sense of humor!  Man, I got flamed off that board so quickly, my head is still spinning!

How did we get to this point in contemporary America?  When did we become so damn serious about parenting that we stopped seeing the forest for the trees?  C'mon, folks.  Parenting is supposed to be fun.  Sure, it's stressful but that doesn't mean that we can't make light of it, does it? 

If I had more free time, I'd spend my entire day going onto these parenting forums and inciting them.  Unfortunately, I'm too busy leaving my child in front of the television with a set of steak knives while I drink scotch and watch baseball all day. 

Thankfully, I have my buddy Mark.

Although Mark is childless, he and I share the same sense of humor.  He also generally agrees with my assessment that most people have lost perspective on their lives and don't realize that their "BIG ISSUES" are really just the privileged whines of people with too much time or money on their hands (or, as my buddy James calls them, "high class problems.")

Anyway, whenever Mark has free time, he loves going on the Washington Post message boards and messing with all the indignant and self-righteous parents who take EVERYTHING so seriously.  I have to admit.  Reading his comments always leaves me giggling like a little school girl. 

Want to read some of his most recent work?  Check it out... 

On a discussion about the whole Club Libby Lu "controversy," Mark wrote:

"I am taking my 10 year old twin girls to a shooting range so they can take NRA courses on gun handling. Personally I think this type of activity counters the tween marketing hype and the Club Libby Lu phenomenon. Also, on the drive home, we talk about strategies for shooting and target ID at laser tag and, when they are older, paint ball events. I put my foot down when both girls asked that instead of donating their Barbies and Bratz dolls to charity can they use them for target practice...I said no.

I wonder if I am countering all the good I am doing by allowing them to wear lip gloss on the range."

Another time, there was a ridiculously heated parenting discussion about when a child should get a cell phone.  Here's Mark's comment:

"Here in TriChester (Tribeca: The new Westchester) we try to make sure both the moms pushing their $800 strollers and the child have matching phones and the child knows how to text message.

At PS 234, part of the reading and writing classes for third graders are BlackBerry techniques. The school, located in one of the wealthiest zip codes on earth, wants parents to donate their old BlackBerry's so no child is left behind other entitled children.

It is never too soon to begin to use those thumbs."

Proving that when it comes to parenting, the aggressively childless (aka "the anti-breeders") can be just as humorless, Mark found a forum of childless people complaining how they have to constantly pick up the slack at work for their co-worker parents. Again, here's his comment. 

"I am sorry but it is HARD being a working parent and if you are not a parent you should help to pick up the slack for the parents of the world. That’s your role to serve those of us who breed.

My wife is lucky she is allowed to work from home and raise our twin daughters. She is a senior girl with an escort service and is on outcall three days a week. I have a full time job but my boss understands. So when my wife has an outcall during the day, my boss lets me work from home. It is a blessing to be able to have conference calls and watch Barbie and Trixie play and feed them. And usually the outcall is only for a couple hours so when my wife comes home, we can both parent. And her boss lets her do phone chats and online video work from home as well. We are so lucky.

You may ask why my boss and co-workers are supportive. Well my wife throws my boss a freebie now and then, but it totally makes my working and parenting so much better. The girls have full time parenting!

So you childless adults shut up and help us all raise the next generation right."

See why we're friends?  And don't you agree with me that he really needs to start his own blog?  I think he should call it "The Caustic Caucasian" or "The White Shadow."  C'mon, you'd read him, wouldn't you?   

Anyway, is it me or do many of you find that we've turned parenting into such a serious topic that we can no longer joke about ANYTHING?  Because really, parenting is a hard enough job as it is.  A good sense of humor can go a looooong way. 

Gotta run.  My daughter is trying to flush the dog down the toilet!

Comments

[Andres Bonifacio]

http://www.falloutcentral.com/blog/?p=42

We have to act, or our kids will suffer the consequences.

[Jaime]

When my son was first born 7 months ago I used to read the message boards on babycenter.com. I am wondering if you were the person that posted something along the lines of "my six week old is already reading shakespear and doing algebra." I thought that was pretty funny, but the other parents...not so much.

[Charlie]

Mark, START A BLOG, MAN!

[Sasha]

I completely know what you mean. I've felt like a fish-out-of-water many times in Park Slope where someone once mentioned how if you serve your kid YoBaby, you might as well serve them ice cream. Guess what was in my diaper bag?

But I do think that this is all comes from being insecure about what kind of parents we are. And who doesn't worry about it? This is one thing you don't want to screw up. With no manual, and dozens of parenting books that contradict each other, it's extremely hard to figure out what works for you and your kid, and go your own way. It guess it's just easier to judge other people's parenting decisions than make your own.

[Latia]

So I just checked out the UrbanBaby boards and one of the topics was "Name a celebrity who is gay but hasn't come out yet."

Are they serious?
And what does that have to do with Parenting or even "Being Sophisticated" as they call it.

[LeeMarvin]

Hey, MD.

Another great post.

I want to see the blog of all of the *serious parents* when their childern are teenagers or young adults and start to exhibit their behavior before they were parents. Let's see how righteous they are when they look at their pot-smokin, boozin' kids and see themselves! I would pay to see that!

It's all about what's lurking up in the gene pool, baby. And once the hormones kick in, it's a WAR! Toddlers are a piece of cake compared to teenagers.

Yes, sometimes we take ourselves too seriously. Yes, we try to raise them right.
But, there are no guarantees in life.

My teenagers taught me that laughter is the best weapon.
I can't tell you how many things they got away with by making us laugh!

Yes, Mark should have his own blog. I think he would enjoy the hate mail.

[misfithausfrau]

I'm Asian? Keeewwwwwllll. I always wanted to be Asian cause they are wicked smaht.

Seriously, your friend is a riot. He could write for The Onion.

[henri]

Bastards at Parent Hack reject this every week I submit it....

OK so once your wife is pregnant with the last child that you want to have, you...

1) Adopt a 13 year old

2) Have 13 year old help nanny your kids, clean the house and get a part time job.

3) Wait till they're 18

4) Kick them out.

I mean seriously, this is fucking brilliant. Cost of Mcdonalds every day is like 3 bucks for three meals and what 13 doesn't want to eat McDonalds every day? I mean hell I even took out the rickshaw me to work thing and they still rejected it.

[creative-type dad]

Man, you are so right. More parents need to lighten up and save the angry face when it's needed.

[whit]

Is this a result of someone having some angry comments directed at his post on another site?

I've lived with one motto for the majority of my life, and that is "fuck 'em if they can't take a joke."

Feel free to adopt it has your own.

[FENICLE]

You know what's wrong with people today? I'll tell ya....they take themselves WAY TOO SERIOUSLY!!!

We all need to learn to laugh.

[meleahrebeccah]

well said. People have lost the ability to make light of anything,anymore especially KIDS. I am a single parent, and if I didnt make jokes about it, I wouldnt have made it this far as a parent! Thanks for saying it OUTLOUD

[Mama Nabi]

Dude, don't be messing with mommy boards - they're mean, cliquey, and serious. They can easily make a grown man, in this case you, cry... beware... they'll get you. Bwahahahah.
Oh, right. I don't think I was cool enough to play on those boards.

[p-man]

I have lost the ability to make light of people making light of people who need making light of which means I have very little of use to offer regarding this post so I am, in fact, merely expressing a disturbing degree of codependency by posting this comment gratuitously. I'd sign up for some kind of CODA-daddy board and discuss my feelings behind a veil of anonymity, but I have a blog for that, and I imagine someone would be messing with them too.

[kerchoo]

Hell, my daughter's name is Trixie and I STILL thought that was a great post. UB is the hands-down best source of completely insane parenting online. I'm not sure that was the "We're Number 1!" that they were aiming for, though.

Anyone who can't appreciate absurdity needs a hobby other than a child.

[Mama Luxe]

Where are all these great commenters who have a sense of humor when *I* joke around. Maybe I'm just not funny.

I think that Mrs. Q is spot on...you have to be secure enough in your choices as a parent to have a sense of humor about the whole thing!

[Linda]

Found you via the Blogger's Choice awards and have spent the whole morning at work reading your archives. This blog is great! I had no idea that there were daddy bloggers out there. Keep up the amazing writing!

[Suburban Turmoil]

Not only do many parents take themselves too seriously, but many bloggers take themselves too seriously. Put the two together and hooo doggy!

BTW, you gave me a great idea for a column with the LibbyLu link. THANKS!! :)

[stebujiji]

Thanks...I read your stuff and I know that I can sit back, laugh and just enjoy these days with my wife and kids. Hell, I just got the request for a popsicle at 6:30 this morning. If I would have read your posting a little earlier today, I probably would have sat down and enjoyed a "Freeze Bomb" with my three year old. I think I'll throw out the normal rules and do that tomorrow morning. Cheers!

[Kim]

OH. My. God. I am an adoptive parent (well, we're working on it anyhow!) and I COMPLETELY and totally agree with you. You should be reading what goes on in some of the adoptive parents forums. Dear, dear. It's all so serious. Now I'm just as devoted to the issues that our adopted children may/may not have when they come home. I don't mean to diminish that AT ALL. It's just the parents take *themselves* so very, very seriously.

I'm with you MD. I do not take myself seriously on any day of the week. I'd much rather dance down the street singing "Raindrops on roses, whiskers on kittens ..." to make my baby laugh while we jump up and down as high as the springs in our feet allow us than be *serious* and *mature*. Shudder.

We're in need of some warm-woollen-mittens down our way in Australia. Anyone got a spare pair?

[Research Mom]

Mark makes me snortle! I'd read him any day.

As for the parents who take themselves too seriously, they scared me into doing a whole bunch of stuff as a new parent that, in hindsight, I really did not need to do. Cost me a lot of lost sleep doing the extras - sterilizing everything 3x, making organic food from scratch every weekend, trying to sleep train. Now, she drinks from cups rinsed out with tap, eats El Pollo Loco, and sleeps in the Valley of Mom & Dad . . .

[Lila]

I'm a little late in the posting here, but I just wanted to say that it's refreshing to see people still have a sense of humor when it comes to parenting. Where I live we have two kinds of parents, the kind who "overparent" and the other kind who don't parent at all and lock their children outside all day. I'm stuck in the middle with my sarcasm and logic, leaving me no local parents (other than my friend who has the same dark humor as myself) to relate to. I don't scrapbook or watch Nascar which makes me incredibly unpopular in the area.

[Lisa (qtpies7)]

Your friend sounds hysterical!
I'd love to hear him pretend to be me, a mom of 7 kids, so I can get some great ideas for all the idiotic remarks I get.

[loula]

why is the only time i can get a laugh out of parenthood is after i have drank a bottle of wine? am i the only one?

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