Human Planet Honors Fathers

I meant to have this ready for Fathers' Day and failed miserably, but any day is a good day to honor fathers, so here we go.



Human Planet is a BBC documentary narrated by the legendary David Attenborough. Every documentary of his I've watched is about animals or plants, but this one is different. Here, the BBC shows us how people from vastly different cultures all over the world live. In so doing, the BBC ends up telling compelling stories about the extraordinary things fathers do to support their families. I assume this is inadvertent, but that makes the documentary even better. Here's what I mean.

As I noted earlier, movies that are based on true stories are more likely than fictional movies to honor fathers. That's because in real life, fathers aren't the incompetent, impotent imbeciles commonly portrayed in modern popular culture. Human Planet, because it's a documentary, and because it didn't set out to portray fathers heroically, sets the difference between real life and Hollywood indoctrination in even starker contrast.

Without further ado, I'll start with my favorite story.

Sailau and Berek



Sailau belongs to a Kazakh tribe who traditionally use golden eagles to hunt foxes. His family needs fox furs to stay warm through the brutal winter. Sailau trains his son, Berek, in the art of falconry, beginning with capturing a fledgling female (they're bigger than the males), then training her, then taking her on her first hunt. The best part is when Berek and his eagle make their first kill. Sailau tells his son, "now you are a man of your people".

Stanzin



Stanzin and his family live in a remote Himalayan village. He wants his children to receive an education, but there are no schools in his village, so Stanzin takes his children to a boarding school 90 Km away. It's a treacherous six-day trek over the frozen (but thawing) Zanskar River.

Sam Niang



Sam Niang risks his life every day to feed his family of seven. The roiling rapids of the Mekong River trap migrating fish, but to net them, Sam Niang has to climb wet, mossy cliffs and traverse the Mekong on a makeshift bridge he jury rigged together in the dry season.

Tete



Tete also risks his life for his family, but in his case it's by climbing 130 ft up a tree with no safety gear and suffering dozens of bee stings to score some honey for his wife and children. Tete's wife has some great lines.

Tete is the best. The kids are not afraid for him, just proud. They say, "wow, look at dad!"... My husband has a kind heart. He always brings me honey. 

The narrator, though, gets the best line.

Tete takes time to savor his success. He's done enough to keep his wife sweet, treat his children and earn respect from his tribe. 

Isn't that what all married fathers want?

Hatogo and Sulaiman 



I've observed good men work themselves into an early grave to support their families, but nothing quite like this. In the Indonesian island of Java, men mine sulfur in the Ljen Volcano's crater. The gasses that constantly fill the crater, including Hydrogen Sulfide (H2S), are highly toxic, and even if they don't kill the men right away, they destroy their lungs over time. On top of that, carrying 90 kg (about 200 lb) of sulfur at a time in baskets leaves their shoulders scarred, calloused and deformed. One of them states:

They say this job can shorten your life. I do it to feed my family. No other job pays this well. 

All for $5.00/load.

But that's what dads do. They sacrifice themselves for their families.

Human Planet contains many more stories. Not all of them are about dads, but most are. The documentary is beautifully shot, entertaining and educational, but what I love most about it is the stories of dads from wildly different cultures who are remarkably alike. They all want to provide for their families and earn their peers' respect. That theme is so nearly universal that it's almost as though someone designed it that way.

I shouldn't be surprised anymore when I see God's plan naturally bubble to the top through layer upon layer of human sin, but for some reason I still am. I doubt that any of the men whose stories I highlighted have ever heard the Gospel, but they all bring to my mind passages from the New Testament.

Romans 2:14 Indeed, when Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law. 15 They show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts sometimes accusing them and at other times even defending them.

Having never read the book of Ephesians, these married fathers nevertheless love their wives and children sacrificially. My experience and observation tell me that is the rule, not the exception, among married fathers, and for that we should honor them.

Watch Human Planet on Netflix while you still can.

Movies that Honor Fathers

“Most people catch their presuppositions from their family and surrounding society, the way that a child catches the measles.” ~ Francis A. Schaeffer, How Should We Then Live?: The Rise and Decline of Western Thought and Culture

Culture matters. A lot. And if Francis Schaeffer was right about how most people form their world view, popular culture matters most of all.

The contempt for fathers that generations of children (now adults) absorbed through popular culture is one major reason that families are crumbling in the US and throughout the West. Families are the foundation of civilization. If the foundation crumbles, what happens to the civilization?

Fortunately, there are still movies that portray married fathers as heroes, and Fathers' Day is the perfect time to highlight them. This is a non-exhaustive list, so if you know of others, please feel free leave a comment below.



Cinderella Man



James J. Braddock was a real life Rocky Balboa, an aging, has been, washed up, working class boxer with far more heart than talent who got a shot at the world championship. Unlike Rocky, Braddock was a married, devoted father of three who lived during the Great Depression. He fractured his right hand (his only weapon in the ring) in a fight he lost and was forced to retire from boxing. He lost everything during the Depression - except his family.

This is a story about the lengths to which a father will go to support his wife and children. If you haven't watched it, do so. Better yet, read the book.

We Were Soldiers




Hal Moore is one of the great American combat commanders of the Vietnam War. He commanded the 1st Battalion of the 7th Cavalry Regiment at the Battle of Ia Drang in 1965. He is also a married (now widowed) father of five (now grandfather of 12). The first act of the movie focuses on the Soldiers and families of the 1-7 as they prepare for the deployment. I posted one of my favorite scenes above, in which then-LTC Moore mentors one of his young LTs on balancing soldiering with fatherhood.

Watch the movie and read the book!

American Sniper



I reviewed this movie previously, so I won't write much about it here. Chris Kyle was not only a heroic Navy SEAL sniper, he was a devoted married father of two. Read the book!

The Impossible




If you have kids, this movie will scare you more than any horror movie ever could. It's based on a true story (are you starting to see a trend?) about Enrique Álvarez, María Belón and their three sons Lucas, Simón and Tomás Álvarez, who were on vacation in Thailand during the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami. The movie changes the names and nationality of the characters from Spanish to English, but the main theme remains intact - the lengths to which a father will go to reunite his family after a natural disaster tears them apart.

Soul Surfer 



When, in real life, a shark bit Bethany Hamilton's left arm off just below the shoulder, it was her dad who trained her to surf again. Since then, she's placed first in six international surfing competitions and competed in many more.


Apocalypto



This one really surprised me. Though set in a completely alien (now extinct) culture, the primary subject matter is entirely familiar. It's a story of the lengths to which a father will go to protect his family. Whether intentionally or not, this movie makes the point that marriage is God's idea, and therefore transcends culture and time. Jaguar Paw and his wife, Seven, obviously weren't married in a church, nor do they hold a marriage license, yet we recognize them as husband and wife.

Act of Valor 




A fictional story portrayed by real-life Navy SEALS, it begins and ends with a letter written by one of the SEALS to his battle buddy's son. Yes, I know that's an Army term that the SEALS don't use. Sue me.


Avengers: Age of Ultron




When the Avengers need a place to recuperate after a mission goes disastrously wrong, they take refuge at Hawkeye's house, the only member of their team who is a married father.

Man of Steel



Though flawed, Man of Steel portrays Superman's natural father (Jor El) and his adoptive father (Jonathan Kent) as honorable men doing what they believe is best for their families and their people.

That's all I have for now. Surely there are more. My tastes obviously gravitate towards action, adventure and war movies, and I haven't watched all of those, much less every other genre. If you're a dad, I hope you had a happy Fathers' Day. Enjoy a good movie with your kids!

Doing Good vs. Feeling Good

Dead tortoise (not) walking.

That tortoise is dead, dude, and it probably died slowly, painfully and in terror. Drowning is no joke. The (apparently) young man who thought he was rescuing a confused, wayward turtle, obviously felt really good about himself until someone informed him that the testudo he tossed in the water can't swim. Tortoises are exclusively terrestrial. They sink like rocks.

The photo above is a perfect metaphor of "liberal" "thought". As Denis Prager explains below, "liberals" don't care what actions or policies accomplish good things in the real world, they only care about what actions or policies make them feel good about themselves.



Mr. Prager provides two very good examples in his video, the minimum wage and pacifism. But there may be an even better example: the welfare state. The American welfare system purports to help the poor, but instead creates perverse incentives that lock people into poverty for generations, and the people most negatively affected are poor blacks, the very people "liberals" claim to help most.

The results of welfare policies discouraging marriage and family were dramatic, as out-of-wedlock birthrates skyrocketed among all demographic groups in the U.S., but most notably African Americans. In the mid-1960s, the out-of-wedlock birth rate was scarcely 3% for whites, 7.7% for Americans overall, and 24.5% among blacks. By 1976, those figures had risen to nearly 10% for whites, 24.7% for Americans as a whole, and 50.3% for blacks specifically. And today, the numbers stand at 29% for whites, 41% for the nation overall, and 73% for blacks. In other words, the entire country is moving rapidly in the wrong direction, but blacks in particular have reached a point of veritable catastrophe.  

The devastating societal consequences of family breakdown cannot be overstated. Father-absent families—black and white alike—generally occupy the bottom rung of America's economic ladder. Regardless of race or ethnicity, the poverty rate for single parents with children is several times higher than the corresponding rate for married couples with children. According to Robert Rector, senior research fellow with the Heritage Foundation, “the absence of marriage increases the frequency of child poverty 700 percent” and thus constitutes the single most reliable predictor of a self-perpetuating underclass. Articulating a similar theme many years ago, Martin Luther King, Jr. said, “Nothing is so much needed as a secure family life for a people to pull themselves out of poverty.”  

Children in single-parent households are burdened not only with economic, but also profound social and psychological, disadvantages. For example, youngsters raised by single parents, as compared to those who grow up in intact married homes, are more likely to be physically abused; to display emotional disorders; to smoke, drink, and use drugs; to perform poorly in school; to be suspended or expelled from school; to drop out of high school; to behave aggressively and violently; to be arrested for a juvenile crime; to serve jail time before age 30; and to go on to experience poverty as adults. According to the National Fatherhood Initiative, 60% of rapists, 72% of adolescent murderers, and 70% of long-term prison inmates are men who grew up in fatherless homes. With regard to girls in particular, those raised by single mothers are more than twice as likely to give birth out-of-wedlock, thereby perpetuating the cycle of poverty for yet another generation.

Obviously, "liberals" can't blame their pet policies for this catastrophe. After all, their hearts - and therefore their intentions - are pure, unlike those mean, heartless conservatives. "Liberals" therefore invent all kinds of excuses, like racism and "white privilege", as though 21st century America could possibly be more racist than Jim Crow America.

Kathryn Edin writes:

After several years of interviewing, observing, and living among these fathers, I’ve learned that not caring about their children is not the problem. Our 2013 book, Doing the Best I Can: Fatherhood in the Inner City, reveals that these men desperately want to be good fathers, and they are often quite intensively involved in the early years of their children’s lives. Yet they usually fail to stay closely connected as their kids grow older.
...
If they want to stop the father-go-round, moms will have to do what they can to keep the biological dad involved with his child and not push him aside. It’s up to them, because currently, mothers have most of the power de facto, if not de jure. Almost always, an unmarried mother has presumed custody, even if the dad willingly signs documents to establish legal paternity.
...
So here is my message to the single moms I’ve come to know and admire over the years, the ones who do so much of the nurturing and caring—those who often struggle mightily just to keep a roof over their kids’ heads: You can’t easily substitute someone else for your kid’s dad.

Unfortunately, Ms. Edin doesn't make the connection that custody law is not the only factor that gives  mothers the power, and that fathers aren't just being replaced by other men, but by government itself. As Daniel Mitchell points out, depending on her state of residence, a single mother might need to make $69,000/year before getting off welfare makes economic sense.

That also means that the father needs to make $69,000/year before marrying him and getting off welfare makes economic sense. The probability that a young man who grew up poor in the inner city can clear that bar is minuscule. That means that governments give mothers incentives to kick fathers out of the home rather than marrying them, even if both together can make that much. From the Front Page Magazine article quoted above:

The marriage penalties that are embedded in welfare programs can be particularly severe if a woman on public assistance weds a man who is employed in a low-paying job. As a FamilyScholars.org report puts it: “When a couple's income nears the limits prescribed by Medicaid, a few extra dollars in income cause thousands of dollars in benefits to be lost. What all of this means is that the two most important routes out of poverty—marriage and work—are heavily taxed under the current U.S. system.” 

William Galston, who served in the '90s as Deputy Assistant to the President for Domestic Affairs, estimated that the welfare system, with its economic disincentives to marriage, was responsible for at least 15% to 20% of the family disintegration in the United States. Libertarian scholar Charles Murray has placed the figure at somewhere around 50%. By Murray's reckoning, the growth and increased liberalization of the “welfare complex” have eroded the traditional ethos of working-class communities that once held people who worked at low-wage jobs, and men who married the mothers of their children, in much higher esteem than unwed parents who became wards of the state.

People tend to respond predictably to incentives. Obviously, these perverse incentives affect everyone who partakes of the welfare state, not just blacks, but blacks are most likely to partake, and are therefore most negatively affected.



Note that blacks make up 15.1% of the under-18 population, but 30.5% of TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families) recipients, which makes them the demographic most likely to use welfare. Hispanics are next, followed by whites, followed by Asians. Note that, as noted above, blacks are most likely to grow up in fatherless homes, followed by Hispanics, then whites, then Asians. That's a strong correlation, and although it's true that correlation does not necessarily prove causation, when strong correlation exists alongside strong financial incentives, causation becomes rather obvious.

As Walter E. Williams stated:

The welfare state has done to black Americans what slavery couldn't do, what Jim Crow couldn't do, what the harshest racism couldn't do, and that is to destroy the black family.

I've presented this evidence to my "liberal" friends and they simply don't care. It doesn't matter to them that in reality the welfare state they support has destroyed the most vulnerable American families, causing untold, unnecessary misery. It doesn't matter to them that the murder rate in Chicago and Baltimore, the incarceration rate of young black men, the poverty rate, unemployment rate and rate of drug use among blacks can all be traced back to fatherless homes, which can be traced back to the welfare state. It's not about race. The same is true for poor Hispanics in the migrant farmer communities where I grew up and poor whites in Appalachia.

None of that matters. Like the ignoramus who tossed the non-swimming, terrestrial tortoise in the water without so much as a Google search on his smart phone, facts don't matter to "liberals". All that matters to them is the feeling of righteousness they derive from supporting policies that Democrat politicians insist are compassionate. But there's nothing compassionate about perpetuating generational cycles of dependency, poverty and criminality.

It's not just economically stupid. It's immoral. It's unconscionable. It's an atrocity. It's downright evil.


Further reading:

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