Who better on Father's Day than Rudyard Kipling?

If..
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with wornout tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on";

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man my son!

Hey Cornflower

Is the poem for biological fathers or just dads in general?

Anyways, am off to the zoo with my (biological - not that it should matter) daughter. Just as soon as she has finished deciding what to wear.

I agree with her that OLO looks like a women versus men bunfight and I cannot offer her much by way of explanation either. After all (she says) we have Mothers days and Fathers days, what's all the squabbling about?

Out of the mouths of babes Johnny Rotten.

Dear Cornflower,

Women's magazines have covered Father's Day
rather well. From Hugh Jackman's "Father of the
Year," to Sonia Kruger's, "Why She's Smiling
Again," dealing with her father's recent op.
Then there's been all sorts of advice on how
to make "Dad's Day," with plenty of advice,
photos of fathers, and so on.
"The Age," newspaper contained articles like,
"Portrait of my father," ( including
precious snapshots), "Like Father Like Me,"
by Samantha Selinger-Morris.

Even our local magazine, "Melbourne Weekly,"
did a feature article by David Natoli - a
father figure to kids in need.

Good for the much maligned women's mags.

In 2010 we did see Quentin, as in G-G, for Mother's Day as Patron of the Mother’s Day Classic (at Southbank, Brisbane). Very positive and registrations are already being called for the 2011 Classic:

http://mothersdayclassic.com.au/register-online

Maybe men should seek support for a Father's Day Classic for prostate cancer to raise their profile.

Not such a bad idea because it could combine a number of men's health issues with Father's Day. A positive recognition of Father's day with the PM and Premiers saying something and it wouldn't matter if NAPCAN hobby-horsed for the following week.

Our fishing club had a Fathers Day barbecue at the local pub. I'm the treasurer so I went along and cooked some snags, drank some beer and traded fishing yarns. Dads, mums, kids, grandparents and various others all took part, and a very pleasant day it was. We always do something for both Fathers and Mothers Days, and we never schedule fishing outings for those weekends. I think that similar things happen in the neighbouring towns too.

Cornflower - I had that Kipling poem on my bedroom wall as a kid, placed there by my father. He never quite lived up to it, and neither did I, but they are indeed noble sentiments. Mind you, I'm not sure that there's anything essentially paternal about it - they could just as easily be words from a mother to her son.

Why does Fathers Day have to be linked to any issue beyond fatherhood? I like a day when I get appreciated for just being as good a dad as I can be - I imagine most mums feel similarly about Mothers Day.

JR - as pelican said, out of the mouths of babes.