Most parents have read The Rainbow Fish, by Marcus Pfister. The story of a  fish with irridescent scales who refuses to share with the other children. Well, that's what the PR folks at the publishing company want you to believe. I'm going to give you a new perspective that will show you the real lesson of the book and it probably isn't something you want taught to your kids!

As parents, we are responsible for the morals and traditions handed down to our children. We have a duty to review what they read, what they watch, and what they hear to ensure it has a message we are open to sharing with our kids. With that in mind, imagine the following scenario:

Your child is about seven years old and has made you proud. She is polite, intelligent, beautiful, and a role model for other children. You have given her an heirloom that is passed down through the generations to all children in the family. Its a beautiful heirloom that most kids would love to have themselves. But it is unique to your family. A mark of your lineage, so to speak, and it has been entrusted to your daughter.

Now imagine that despite the amazing qualities of your daughter, she is having trouble finding friends at a new school. For some reason, it just isn't working out yet. The other children are asking your daugther for the heirloom you gave to her. They want it for themselves. At first, your daughter says she can't part with it. It was a gift from her parents and she is responsible for it. They other children get mad and still won't be her friend. In an act of desperation, your daugther goes to the principal and asks for advice. The principal says, "friends are important and you want to be cool. If you have to bribe the kids to be your friend, that's okay. Being popular is important." So she goes back out to the playground and starts handing out pieces of your family heirloom as a way to make friends.

When your daughter comes home, you -the parent- have learned the following things:

1. Your daughter loved the day at school!
2. Her principal isn't fit to lead a parade, let alone children.
3. Your family heirloom was bartered on a playground.
4. Your daughter still doesn't have any real friends.
5. You need to start looking for a new school.
6. Oh, and she also traded her home made sandwich for cavity-causing candy.

The next time you think about reading "The Rainbow Fish" to your kids, remember its real lesson: Being popular is more important than your family and you should do anything to be one of the cool kids.

The debates normally surrounding dolls usually include no more than two topics: how slutty are they and/or should you let boys play with them? Well that topic list just grew by one!

"bebe Gloton" is a new product that allows young girls to simulate breastfeeding. It will pretend to be hungry and can only be calmed by the act of breastfeeding. Of course, since the doll is intended for very young girls it doesn't actually require breast milk. (Thank goodness!)

This is such a strange concept that even now, weeks after the initial public relations nightmare began for the doll and its manufacturer (Spanish toymaker Berjuan), I still find it difficult to formulate my own opinions succinctly. And in total honesty, it took weeks to even decide if this was a bloggable topic for us. Breastfeeding is and should be a Mom-dominated topic.

When parents are deciding whether or not to breastfeed their children, of course that should be a discussion between Mom and Dad with input from their doctor. But teaching a daughter to breastfeed or explaining the act of breastfeeding is really a girl thing. No issue here. But then it dawned on me that this is about more than just breastfeeding. This is about a toy, its symbolism and psychological message to a young girl, and how it might help craft her thoughts on motherhood, family, and children.

So where does that leave Dad? Quite plainly: right in the middle of the discussion. As Dads, we should make sure we are giving our children -boys or girls- the toys we believe appropriate. Children are influenced by everything they encounter and toys such as this are dealing with issues far beyond the reasoning and thought maturity of a 7-year-old girl. She has no idea what it means to really be a Mother, but this doll is strongly pushing her to desire a child. Could it be an element in a decision to have teenage sex? Unprotected teenage sex? Unprotected teenage sex with the sole goal of having a baby? Unprotected teenage sex with the sole goal of having a baby just to relive that fun experience of breastfeeding? Perhaps not such a straight line from doll to Mommyhood, but mix this doll with a few Bratz (whore look-alike "action" figures, in every sense of the word) might help promote a whole lot of promiscuous behavior.

But I'm just one Dad with one opinion and as my wife and I discovered last night over dinner, I'm an old fuddy duddy: I used the phrase "I'm the bomb" followed up by "rad".

So what's your opinion?

According to this study by Common Sense Media, parents still aren't getting the message about keeping tabs on their child's online behavior. Especially when you read a statistic like: "13% of teens said they posted naked or semi-naked photos or videos of themselves. Only 2% of parents said their kids have done that." Wake up folks. That's more than 1 out of 10 kids. If your child has more than 9 friends, someone in that group is the culprit. Is it your kid?

Here's a sample of the new report's findings:

• 37% of teens said they used social networks to make fun of other students, but only 18% of parents believe their own angels do so.
• 13% of teens said they posted naked or semi-naked photos or videos of themselves. Only 2% of parents said their kids have done that.
• 24% of teens said they signed on to someone else's account without permission, while only 4% of parents said their kids have done that.
• 28% of teens posted personal information that they normally would not have revealed in public, but 16% of parents said their kids did that.
• 23% of teens downloaded or shared files illegally, while only 10% of parents believed their child was a thief
• 18% of teens pretended to be an adult while on a social networking site, but only 8% of parents thought their kids were imposters.

(Updated December 5, 2010. See below)
I may as well begin with a disclaimer. I am not now, nor have I ever been, fashionable. I couldn't care less what is making its way down the runways of New York, in the windows of Barneys, or even what my peers really want as the latest and greatest look. I like what I like. In fact, this came to glaring light recently as I attempted to purchase a new suit.

I like double-breasted suits. The fashion world has a major disagreement with me as they decided not to make them anymore. After visiting three different retailers and receiving the same answer, I came to the conclusion that designers no longer find double-breasted suits to be suitable for a man.

Okay, that was a bit of a tangent. Sorry. But it was slightly important as I attempt to make a point. While I may not be fashionable, I'm curious about the Dads who are and are willing to wear pink shirts (or ties or whatever) just because they are back in fashion. If you are one of those Dads, I'm willing to bet that you weren't wearing pink shirts in the late '90s, especially if you were going for some venture capital. You wore blacks, blues, greys, maybe even a green or red. But pink? Heavens no! Now, I'm seeing more and more guys wearing pink shirts and it irks me.

We're living in an age when men are becoming women and women are becoming men. For the last 30 years, men have been told that we need to "get in touch with your feminine side". Women have been encouraged to be more dominant, take power from the men, and "even the playing field". Are we now at the point where children are growing up in an androgenous society where gender identity is a complicated or even taboo exercise and the distinctions between men and women are fast fading?

My current boss is the only woman I've seen in the last 5 years to wear a skirt to work. She is no shrinking violet by any means. She runs her company and has a successful history. But she seems to understand femininity and isn't afraid to wear a skirt. She doesn't have to look like a man to get respect. So while guys are running around in pink shirts and washing their manhood away with each shade of mauve (or fuscia or whatever), most women are grabbing the nearest set of suit pants and voting as a New York Senator.

As Dads, we have a question to ask ourselves: what does this mean for our children? Will your daughters grow up to become dominant feminists who emmasculate the men in their lives? Will your sons develop into gardening knitters who love cats and obey the orders of every woman they meet? Is there, perhaps, a happy medium?

I have a cousin who, along with her husband, made the choice to raise their son in a "gender neutral" environment. In spite of the nine months that I've been hearing that term, I'm still a bit lost about its full definition. We've heard that they won't push trucks or blue or baseball on him. Okay, you're the parents. But will you be pushing dolls and pink and fairies on him? I suppose my biggest conundrum is this: without direction, what is he supposed to learn? I believe the job of a parent is to teach their child how to be the best person possible. I'm more than just a guardian. I'm an instructor. I'm an example. I'm a guide. If no teaching is occurring, I'm just a bubble and my child has no role model for decision-making.

There is a venomous debate occurring in psychological and sociological circles right now about gender identity. Its playing out as another element of the "nature vs. nurture" debate. I tend to fall somewhere near the center of that argument as I believe both elements have a role to play in the development of a child. Genetics and conditions in the womb are probably the largest factors in the development of an infant's brain. But beyond that, they learn from the adults that care for them. Whether it is Mom & Dad, Grandma & Grandpa, or another family member, children are learning every moment of their young lives. That is how we become adults.

If children watch the men in their lives adopt the identifiers of women and the women in their lives adopt the identifiers of men, what are they learning? Are the mannerisms so stark that they can't be explained simply?

Men and women are and should be treated equally. But they are also different and if those differences fade, so do the opportunities for gender identity education.

(Update - December 5, 2010)
One of our Twitter followers (@getdaddysomegin) sent a tweet yesterday about his "15 minutes of fame", during which he was interviewed by the Calgary Herald for being a dad blogger. The article had this to say about his blog: "and as a father he has a lot of opinions to share in the blogosphere about things such as cloth diapers, labour contractions, man bags (get one, fellas!) Crocs (throw them away!), tucked-in golf shirts (fatherhood fashion faux pas; don't get him started!), and, yes, gin." The mention of fatherhood fashion got me thinking about the above post and I realized I owed all of you an update.

I bought something pink. And I've worn it. More than once. As the Marketing Director for an automotive dealership group, part of my job is to integrate community relations with our regular advertising efforts. My employer is a big believer in community support. This October, we kicked off an annual event I dubbed "Walking and Wearing Pink" in which all of our employees wore pink ribbons throughout the month and on the last Friday before the local Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure, we all had to wear a pink item of clothing. As stated above, I owned nothing pink. So I bought a really nice looking Jerry Garcia tie with strong pink elements. Not a totally pink tie, but it definitely fit the bill! And despite its pinkness, I really liked it. I've worn it two additional times in the last two months.

But its not a pink shirt. Its an accessory. And its an accessory designed by a guy, for a guy, that also includes gray, blue, and green.

Enough of my self-defense. I felt it necessary to update you on a related blog. Don't hate me.

What does "never again" mean to you?

My wife and I saw "The Boy in the Striped Pajamas".  I heard about the power of the film, but didn't know the subject until I saw the poster. That made me want to view it even more. Watching movies such as this with my wife, who is not Jewish, is a strange experience. The same film undoubtedly means very different things to us. But this time, we had one very strong commonality to tie things together: a child.

The movie is about a concentration camp commandant's son who makes friends with a boy on the other side of the fence. In other words, he makes friends with a Jew. There is an incredible quote at the beginning of the film: "Childhood is measured out by sounds and smells and sights, before the dark hour of reason grows." -John Betjemen

That quote and the story of the movie had me seriously contemplating the lessons I teach my son, and the lessons that parents of the world teach their children. I recognize that parents can not teach all the lessons of this world, nor can children be expected to mature as clones of their parents, but I believe it to be our primary responsibility as parents to teach and exemplify those lessons that matter most.

The movie made a very powerful effort to show how hatred was a matter of required indoctrination for German children. Jews were "not really people at all". If you could find a nice Jew, "you would be the greatest explorer in the world". These were the lessons taught to German children. As I watched these scenes and the scenes of the concentration camp (never referred to as Auschwitz, but that is the camp it was intended to portray), I felt myself becoming more and more angry. "How could this happen? How did it get so far? What would I be willing to do to prevent my son from entering a camp like that?"

At the end of World War II and the Holocaust, all Jews and most of the Western world said, "never again". Never again would something like that be allowed to happen. Never again could we institutionalize hatred. Never again could we stand by while others committed genocide. But we do. We (the world at large) continue to do all of these things. More than 2 million people have been slaughtered in Darfur. The killing fields of Cambodia also slew millions. It took the death of hundreds of thousands in Yugoslavia for the world to intervene (like Germany in WWII). China continues its government policy of destroying the people of Tibet.

The words "never again" rang through my head over, and over, and over, and over again. I hope for and simultaneously fear the experiences my son will have in battling hatred. I want him to reject its ugliness and ignorance and I hope he encourages others to do the same.