The first incident that caught my attention was on a bus ride in India, in the bus in front of us was an Indian family, young couple and a toddler, maybe under two years. The father was very caring and attentive to the toddler, and mother was kind of disinterested. When in mothers hands the toddler would cry quickly, and the father would immediately get the baby. I said to my husband: this dad is like your brother Carlos, he is all over the baby!

I didn't pay much attention to that until our next move in India. We were in the train, in sleeper wagon. In the same bed was a young couple and two toddlers, not sure if twins. The father was all over the toddlers, feeding them, changing dippers, holding them often two at the time. If one would cry in moms hands the dad would immediately take the baby. I was astonished. He was a very young dad, and just could not come to terms of how dedicated, patient and effective, knowledgeable he was.

I just saw a trend, and rewind life tape to compare fathers and mothers: - and to my surprise I concluded that ALL fathers I know we're better than mothers: 3 Mexican families, 4 Serbian, 1 USA, one Serbian - Japanese, and now the 2 Indian.

So I would boldly say today that fathers are better than mothers. Not to say that the moms are not good, but very different, they do the necessary, loose patience quickly, and are more strict, not to say that it's not good, but more that it is not recognised by the society the roll of a dad at all, I just surfed the web and could find nothing on this topic, but the negative or very stereotypical portrayal of dads. This often affects the legal system, and judges are more in favour of moms, themselves being mostly woman. And I saw one French show on how much dads are discriminated in divorce cases.

I read and studied feminism a lot, but since the masculinity studies are not very developed, there are not articles of that nature, at least not easily accessible to me.

Is it that in USA, I live in Brooklyn, were the " new " fathers are, but the rest of country is 50's style dads, so the USA social research is not picking up a new international trend? I don't know.

I definitely think that there is an important shift in parenting totally neglected by the public, not even to mention film, which is my profession, which is bastion of conservatism and stereotyping.

Also it may be interesting to investigate ourselves, and recall how was our childhood. And ask family members what were our parents like when we were babies. The social stigma of uninterested dads is so wide spread that it is bilind us and confusing is. It took me long time to "rehabilitate" my dad, to see that actually he was a very good father.

How do you see fathers in the cultures you live in?