Recently, I was in Portland, Oregon and had the opportunity to visit the "Oregon Museum of Science and Industry" - this is a children's science museum with lots of hands on exhibits. I was very happy to see that many if not most of the parents taking their children around to the various stuff were fathers.

Portland seems to be a place where fathers are very engaged in their children's upbringing. One thing disturbed me while in the Pacific Northwest, though. That is that fathers don't seem to be able to bring themselves to bond physically with their children in a similar way to how women do. My own brother's physical interaction with his small child seems to always gravitate toward roughhousing. I think that is typical in this region of the USA.

I think, in general, parents are teaching their children the wrong lessons about touch if children (especially boys) feel that they can only enjoy physical touch with fathers or other children if they are wrestling each other.

In some extreme cases, boys who become very accustomed to this manner of interaction grow up to be those who will wrestle with women when they get to be in college, and then it's called "assault" or "rape."

Futhermore, when mothers become the go-to people for boys to find affection and love, nurture and emotional support, when those kids grow up, they're easy prey for women who know how to manipulate them by playing on this urge of the men.

We men, really need to better develop our own support of eachother, and the emotional bonds between men and children can be where it starts.