No, don’t bother to check your calendar for the date of Parent’s Day. It is not an official holiday (yet). However, one Maryland pre-school has decided to spay and neuter Mother’s and Father’s Days into one jolly Parent’s Day for fear of offending families with Two Mommies and Two Daddies. (Or should I say "Two Parents"?)
"A pre-school in Maryland has lost at least one customer after a student’s father working on the school’s newsletter was told he must change a ‘Happy Mother’s Day’ greeting in the publication to ‘Happy Parent’s Day.’
[…]
"The trouble began when [David] Becker [the student’s father], while typing the newsletter, changed a hand-written greeting from ‘Happy Parent’s Day!’ to ‘Happy Mother’s Day!’ After submitting the final draft, a teacher contacted Becker and said the greeting would have to be changed back to ‘Happy Parent’s Day!’
[…]
"Becker then asked the administrator: ‘Who would we be offending on Mother’s Day?’
"The response: ‘What about families with two fathers?’
"Becker then asked about Father’s Day. He says he was told: ‘You can’t say ‘Father’s Day’ either.’"
One wonders how Mother’s and Father’s Days slipped beneath the radar of the the More-Sensitive-Than-Thou crowd for so long. Next on the chopping block will undoubtedly be Arbor Day for its outrageous preference for trees to the exclusion of flowers and grass. But wait! There is already the More Sensitive Option of Earth Day.
And so it goes in our society’s continuing ever-spiraling decline into irrelevance.
Where’s a rolling eyes smiley when you need it?
this is a sad time in personstory (“his”story is offensive).
One more way to glorify mediocrity.
“spay and castrate” or “neuter” mother and father’s day… neuter refers to either. I assume you know this, but I work at a vet. office, and you would not believe the things some people say! So for anyone reading this, there ya go!
Gee,
I must not remember my biology lessons correctly. I thought everyone had a mother and a father. Thanks for straightening me out.
Holy criminey, man! Abject silliness, if’n you ask me.
The silliest part, as James points out above, is that there are actually folks out there who believe 2 daddies or 2 mommies are just as good as a Mom & a Dad. Um . . . sorry, no. No, it’s not, really. There’s a difference between the 2. (Well, apparently, it’s news to some!) That’s why there were 2 diffenent days to begin with!
Ai, carumba. I need a nap.
Doesn’t “Parents’ day” discriminate against orphans?
Gad! You’re right! How could we have been so insensitive?
Don’t you know parents’ day discriminates against child-less people?
And worse, against the child-free ones.
(I’m childless myself, but the child-free ones will assure you that they have it much worse than me.)
Geeze. Ok, so you don’t have a mother. That’s fine. Don’t celebrate the date. Why do they act as though the words “happy mother’s day” or “merry christmas” have power over people to force them to feel a certain way? They act like you’re SUPPOSED to be unhappy because other people have a day to celebrate. It’s like all the “sore losers” on valentines day whining about how it’s a cruel holiday (though, even when I was single, I used it as a day to show affection for my sibilings and shower them with chocolates and teddy bears)–I guess what I’m saying is… it’s not the fricking end of the world. Celebrate something you DO celebrate. Should I get upset when I see Happy Haunika or ramadan or whatever?? I figure hey–that’s nice for the people who celebrate that. Or thanks for including me, even though I don’t “belong.”
What I’m trying to say is…
GET OVER IT.
Isn’t Earth Day offensive, too. It discriminates against Mars, Venus, Jupiter, etc. Ans what about the asteroids, meteors, comets, moons, stars, and black holes? How can we leave them out? ;-\
After my father died when I was 7, I made stuff for my godfather (an uncle-by-marriage) when the other kids were doing Father’s Day projects in school. I did feel a little weird, but having people make a big deal about it probably would have made me feel a lot more weird. And I know all kids don’t have a handy substitute like a godfather, but it’s best to learn to cope with reality as a child while people still have some tolerance for your struggles with it, isn’t it?