How to Be a Cold, Distant Father

Tips to stop coddling your children

Parents are too involved these days, leading to weak children with lots of fears and anxieties. Children need to be left to themselves to learn independence and social skills. That’s why I advocate a traditional approach to parenting, i.e., being a cold, distant father. If you want your kids to grow up right, you can’t be their play friend as familiarity breeds contempt. Instead, you need to be a mysterious object of fear to your kids. And I have the tips to help you achieve that!

Tips on Being a Cold, Distant Father

• Have generalized terms to refer to your children. Whenever my kids come up to me, I say things like, “What is it, small child?” That way I don’t have to bother with names. Knowing your kids’ names is sort of a mother’s job.

• Never emote (except for the occasional outburst of terrible anger). Emotions are feminine and make you look weak. Your children will never respect you if they ever see you tear up because you’re so proud of them. The only allowable emotion for a father is anger — which should be infrequent but memorable.

• Focus on business travel. Familiarity breeds contempt, so it helps if you’re just not around a lot. A great way for that is lots of business travel. Children should only catch occasional, late-night glimpses of you as you arrive home on a red-eye, making you almost a mythical figure.

• Have a forbidden room they’re never allowed in. What if you work from home, though, which is quite common these days? Your kids could end up seeing you all the time, undermining your distant, legendary status. To counteract that, have a room in your house — the forbidden room — which is always locked, and the kids are forbidden even to look inside. This is the room where you will spend most of your day.

• Sometimes disappear in there for days. It’s not enough to spend most of the day there; if you emerge every day, it will still make you feel accessible and undermine your power. So disappear in that room for days. What could he be doing in there? Why is he in there so long?

• It’s been a week now. Where is he? I know father never said to go in there, but he’s never before disappeared in there this long. Mother says not to disturb him, though, but she looks scared. What could be going on in his forbidden room?

• I need to check inside. I know father told us to never — never — even look inside his room, but there’s been no peep from him for nine days now. Could he be hurt? Mother changes the subject whenever we bring it up. I’ll wait until night fall when everyone else is asleep. Huh? The door is unlocked…