Prompted by a single letter of complaint a commercial that had been airing for months with no complaints suddenly got the negative attention treatment by Glenn Sacks host of his radio show His Side. Associated Press's David Crary decided to do a piece on it. The story was picked up on Nov 9th and was given wide coverage by the media that week, hitting about 200 dailies for a week long news cycle.

About 3 weeks after the news cycle had ended on the negative publicity, Verizon finally caved in to the one-article week long media assault and pulled pulled the ad last week. It's questionable weather the commercial was nearing the end of it's it's cycle anyhow, but I don't think they will be volunteering that info.

When I first watched the commercial I could see how it would strike a nerve...if you were a dad. It did bother me a little at first when the smarty pants mom says to dad "Tom leave her alone" in a dismissive way with the full support of her daughter. A little degrading? Well yea, but doesn't this sometimes happen in real life for moms and dads alike in a "bad moment"? When dads look at the commercial it make then feel stupid, so they naturally don't like it. I showed the verizon commercial to my sister and she loved it, she though it was hilarious,, I said why? she said, "it make the mom look smart!" mmm ok I then called my 12-yr-old son, John into my office and he liked it too, why? It made the kid look smart and he's a kid so he's must be smart too!

OK well then we need equal time, here it is, you might have seen it, the wife tries to trash her husbands Toyota Tacoma over a cliff , but in the end it escapes without a scratch. Watch it here. Now admit it dads wasn't it funny?? Well I made my sister watched it, Guess what she hated it, it made her feel stupid.

It's not that smart looking dads are on TV any less, it's just that they get less attention.. There are ads depicting good fatherhood, too we just aren't paying attention to them Good families simply make boring media copy and it doesn't sell. Case in point the ad below, it a wonderful ad by New York Life showing a loving relationship between father and daughter. You might have seen it but the media isn't about to draw attention to it. .

View New York Life Commercial
(Windows Media Video - 338KB)

One dad "Kevin" at our message board sums up the negative attention of the Verizon ad, " I've seen the commercial - and I think getting one's jockeys in a bunch over it is just taking things a little too seriously - or too personally. I'm think skinned when it comes to that sort of thing, though. I read the article and when I did, all I could see in my head is a scene from 'Overboard' when Kurt Russell says to Goldie Hawn 'Lady, you're so [bleep] bored you gotta invent [bleep] (things) to [bleep] (complain) about!'

You probably noticed I've added a map to my site to make it easier to search around for playgroups. Check it out. Some playgroup updates: Nat Heffeman is rebuilding his Lexington, MA playgroup, he's down to "just 2 members right now; myself and a neighbor. I'm starting a recruitment drive to get some new blood into the group" .- If you live in his area sign up!! e-mail him at.. hefferman@rcn.com . Also welcome Stuart Unger who is starting a second playgroup after moving. You can e-mail him at about his new Louisville At-home Dads (LADS) group.