An anti-encomium published in the Washington Post was titled “Memories of a father and his flaws on Father’s Day.” The father in question died last October, and the writer”€”would you have guessed that it was a female?”€”aired her resentment at his relatively fresh cadaver. She claims her animus is based upon learning late in her dad’s life that he’d cheated on her mother, and this passage suggests she took a somewhat sadistic thrill at her father’s mental decline:

His dementia didn’t erase all his memory but, almost worse, it erased his ability to speak. Cruel rewards for a man who took such pride in his words.

The London Free Press reminded us men “are human” and “fail.” It also noted that “No Hallmark card can erase memories and ease emotional pain.”

This isn”€™t to suggest that the world isn”€™t crammed with horrible, irresponsible, and loathsome fathers. It is. But it is also teeming with cold, cruel, and sadistic mothers who use their kids as props and their sperm donors as ATMs. There are countless mothers who are verbally and physically abusive to everyone within striking distance. There are also innumerable children who suck the lifeblood out of both parents and drive them to early graves.

What we want to know is: Why do we only hear negative stories about fathers and never about mothers and children?

It’s hard to think of a more thankless job these days than being a father. So on this Father’s Day, if you”€™re able to dig deep in your memory banks and remember anything positive that your father did for you, we suggest that you thank him for it. It will cost you far less than it cost him to raise you.