http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1074862,00.html
I thought this would be a good subject to write about since in our last two class periods we have been discussing teenage fathers. The article above was very interesting to me and also mentioned more than one thing our guess speaker spoke about. In the above article, they mentioned that there was a recent study that showed that many young fathers are not only willing but eager to help their partner and offspring. This is rare for us to see this on 16 and Pregnant because we mainly only see the life of the mother and the typical father on the show which is a guy that is distant from the child's mother or does not want to have much to do with the child. I would like to see on 16 and Pregnant what the study shows which is fathers wanting to be active in the child's life. I understand that MTV want to keep their ratings up so they need couples that have drama to catch their audience attention. But, it would be like to see the "reality" of teen pregnancy (including the father) in this present time.
As mentioned at the end of the article, there are very few programs that are designed for teenage fathers. There are many programs that benefit the mothers but why not the fathers? At my high school we had a program once a week for teenage mothers but I never understood why the fathers were not a participant in the program as well. I believe that if there were more programs to benefit the father that there would be less teenage pregnancies. Once a father have a child under the age of 20 it is likely that another pregnancy will occur soon or the father will lack in some other area such a qutting school and/or having a low paying job. The programs for the fathers could potentially help him get on his feet and finish school and help find a nice paying job for his age, lastly teach him how he can be active in his child life since most are unsure on how to help. This would not only benefit his life but the child's life as well. I hope in the near future that the media will give more recognition to the father so that these issue can be resolved.
(Brittney Williams)
This is a great topic this week i love it.
ReplyDeletefathers and mother should defintly both have equal attention when it comes to programes and raising and parenting, i dont know why we assume that just because a lady give birth to a child that automatically means its her responsibility. how did the baby get here in the first place? vaginas dont make babies, sperm does.
I also agree that the Father's of these children should be regarded as important. They are after all a significant part of their child's lives. And I hate the way that all shows displaying the lives of these pregnant mothers, don't include the lives of the fathers. And the personal struggles they endure. We as a society should make the effort to acknowledge them too.
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ReplyDeleteSorry, I was the 2nd post (Jennifer Hall)
ReplyDeleteI thought Jennifer mentioned an interesting point our class about the fathers she interviewed. She said that even the fathers highly involved in their child's life would say, "Oh, I watch him whenever she (the mother) needs me to." Even though the father, and probably the mother as well, consider the father to be very involved, it's interesting that they talk about it in that way. The mother seems to always be the prime caregiver, and the father just "helps out". Maybe some of the new programs being formed to support fathers could teach that a father's role doesn't have to be secondary to the mother's.
ReplyDelete(Brittany Randolph)