tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8850578816787718159.post9142144643944902945..comments2024-03-24T12:55:07.300-04:00Comments on grounded design by Thomas Rainer: The New Manliness: Machismo through Dirty Diapers and Gardening?Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805682623764800983noreply@blogger.comBlogger12125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8850578816787718159.post-42507169499894778792010-12-20T16:54:10.544-05:002010-12-20T16:54:10.544-05:00what a thoughtful post! i think being in the garde...what a thoughtful post! i think being in the garden, working in the garden, discovering how we relate with outdoor spaces, helps us tune in with nature, and discover both our feminine and masculine qualities--ie, our humanity!Janinehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06788941000657600217noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8850578816787718159.post-28019860226039358362010-12-20T08:25:48.037-05:002010-12-20T08:25:48.037-05:00Congratulations on your new baby and best wishes t...Congratulations on your new baby and best wishes to you and your wife.<br /><br />Thank you for this post. I am going to get my sons to read it..ages 16 to 25. One of them has already discovered the joy of helping in the home and gardening and growing vegetables since I decided to turn my typical barren backyard into a fruit and vegie wilderness.<br /><br />I look forward to reading your archives. Thank you for sharing.frazzledsugarplummumhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14662292532191196282noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8850578816787718159.post-47964378306431916912010-10-08T19:34:36.219-04:002010-10-08T19:34:36.219-04:00Congratulations on the birth of your son. And, th...Congratulations on the birth of your son. And, thank you for yet another wonderful post.<br /><br />I wish we could all move past the strange construct of man as hunter-provider, and woman as nurturer. <br /><br />Hell, I wish we could move past all the stupid girls versus boys stuff, and just let people be people.Lisahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03932975112078606231noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8850578816787718159.post-85009028112802891212010-10-07T00:06:28.444-04:002010-10-07T00:06:28.444-04:00Hi Thomas,
Great and thoughtful post. Congrats on...Hi Thomas,<br /><br />Great and thoughtful post. Congrats on baby! Your life will stay turned upside down one way or another for, well, the rest of your life. Hope your wife is doing well.<br /><br />It sounds like you have found good balance. My brother has done all the cooking in his family for years: when he goes on an annual hunting party up to a cabin in the north woods, he cooks great meals and reads while the other guys shiver and mostly fail to shoot the wily deer. He considers he has the best of it. My son plays hockey and sings opera. <br /><br />A polemical rant regarding women replacing men in the workplace: I read that Hanna Rosen article and my first reaction was that many women might be the new, docile, easily exploited workforce, “married” to the employer that sets the schedule and doles out barely enough to live on. A responsible single woman with children will do almost anything and put up with a lot to support those children. I’m not at all saying women should not work, but that one should look to deeper reasons why one societal group becomes the preferred employee pool, especially for low wage jobs. <br /><br />It’s so unfortunate that so many men get marginalized, blamed, fed these retro masculine images and pacified with video games. I see aspects of this all the time at the community college where I teach. No one wins.Adrian Ayres Fisherhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11057583835126786240noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8850578816787718159.post-87872916486162340592010-10-05T23:22:05.945-04:002010-10-05T23:22:05.945-04:00Big congrats on your son!
I like the way you fram...Big congrats on your son! <br />I like the way you frame this sociological transition as an opportunity. Let's hope that men get more and more respect and appreciation for playing a prominent role in their children's lives from the very beginning. As we continue to expect society to embrace women in traditionally male roles, we must be willing to open things up for men as well.<br />Enjoy!Kathy Oberghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11453036583832667525noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8850578816787718159.post-16653665567301020632010-10-01T16:41:02.984-04:002010-10-01T16:41:02.984-04:00Thomas, Congratulations on your entry into parenth...Thomas, Congratulations on your entry into parenthood! My research on Blotanical has led me into a larger project on the ways that gardens and gardening was gendered. I had just spent the afternoon reading some sociological work on gardens as an expression of class and gender identities and was looking for a little break before I turned to writing some letters of recommendation, so I turned to your blog and found this post on similar issues. Thanks for raising so many interesting points. <br /><br />As a long-time feminist and a sociologist teaching Women's Studies, I would note that feminism has almost always been more complicated than trying to gain equality for women by opening up traditionally male roles to them. That project is often in tension with another goal of feminism -- increasing the value attached to all those parts of life that have traditionally been assigned to women and devalued. Perhaps we're now in a period where there are similar tensions for men -- between valuing the masculine things that men have always been valued for and claiming some of the newly valued turf that has been traditionally assigned to women.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8850578816787718159.post-53460203601875899112010-09-30T14:57:25.897-04:002010-09-30T14:57:25.897-04:00Congrats on your baby boy!
My husband is a very i...Congrats on your baby boy!<br /><br />My husband is a very involved papa...both to our human child and our plant children. He also cooks. :)<br /><br />My greatest wish is that my son can pursue whatever interests him...whether it's being a car mechanic, poet, chef, biologist or nurse...without feeling he's not "manly" enough.katyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02503125514920954129noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8850578816787718159.post-53291462093752599092010-09-30T12:21:42.736-04:002010-09-30T12:21:42.736-04:00Congratulations on becoming a father. My children,...Congratulations on becoming a father. My children, two daughters now in their thirties, are my greatest accomplishment in life. My wish for you is that your offspring make you just as proud as I feel.<br /><br />Your post, well crafted, all encompassing yet very precise, leaves so little to be added to the dialogue that I will focus on two aspects only.<br /><br />I suspect that Caucasian men of Northern European heritage are probably the only male group in the known world whose familiarity with domestic matters such as cooking and infant care is limited to the past 40 years. Based solely on my observations of the behavior of men from other cultures,it appears to me that men in other parts of the world have been comfortable in the kitchen and the nursery for centuries. <br /><br />Also, young boys in North American schools might feel more comfortable in their own skins, and perhaps less threatened by feminist behavior, if there were more male teachers to act as role models in their lives. For most of their waking hours young men are in the company of women who don't understand what it means to be a boy.allanbecker-gardenguruhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00249183285802762125noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8850578816787718159.post-48348323192145869642010-09-30T12:10:38.496-04:002010-09-30T12:10:38.496-04:00Thomas, I just love you! Congratulations on this w...Thomas, I just love you! Congratulations on this wonderful article and your new little one too. <br />Excellent!ArtZenFlowers Color and Designhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08334171389389257463noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8850578816787718159.post-84927904798161186332010-09-30T10:23:37.514-04:002010-09-30T10:23:37.514-04:00Wasn't gardening largely a man's professio...Wasn't gardening largely a man's profession until the end of the 19th century? Don't sweat jerk college guy.Susan in the Pink Hathttp://inkandpenstemon.tumblr.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8850578816787718159.post-73210453067419799982010-09-30T10:02:29.874-04:002010-09-30T10:02:29.874-04:00Thanks for a really thoughtful post, Thomas, and c...Thanks for a really thoughtful post, Thomas, and congratulations to you and your wife! I've been thinking about humans as three-dimensional beings this past summer, and have come to the conclusion that turning off the screens (computer, TV, phone) and turning toward the real world -- engaging with it with all our senses, whether we are indoors or out, brings us back to our humanity. It's not possible (is it?) to abandon our contemporary electronic tools, but being aware of our need to live in our bodies and in our full environment makes it easier, at least for me, to balance the digital and the analog worlds.Debhttp://www.takingplace.netnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8850578816787718159.post-62933689476472116762010-09-30T06:20:00.120-04:002010-09-30T06:20:00.120-04:00Thomas,
Thanks for a fascinating post and congra...Thomas, <br /><br />Thanks for a fascinating post and congratulations on the birth of your son. My oldest son, now 24, has called me "garden boy" for many years. I also got a similar reaction to my gardening from a good friend from professional school. <br /><br />There seems to be less rigid gender roles in England. Monty Don's last book, The Ivington Diaries, has a chapter called Sex where he explores gender roles in the garden which I found very interesting. He says, "Neither pure femininity or masculinity make good gardens or gardeners.You need a balance of both. The truth is that they are usually mingled within all of us to a greater or lesser degree, But I think it no accident that men who are most comfortable with femininity and woman with their masculinity tend to make better gardeners than those who are locked into gender roles." I think that is probably very true. I am thinking of doing a post in the future exploring what makes a garden masculine or feminine.<br /><br />Good luck balancing diapers and your garden spade in the next few years!Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14771120380247636617noreply@blogger.com