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April 28, 2021 - Dennis Prager Show
08:10
Male / Female Hour: Encouraging Marriage
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So here's the topic of the day.
If you didn't push and encourage marriage with regard to raising your daughter, do you, in retrospect, wish you had?
Now, obviously, I think a lot of people made a big boo-boo.
In this regard.
But I'm not forcing any answers.
If you're happy with the way you raised your daughter.
By the way, I think boys should be encouraged to marriage as well.
But the price paid by a woman is greater.
There's no ticking clock, biological clock in a male with regard to pregnancy.
And it's just easier.
Because of the way things are in the world, not because of sexism, just because the way things are.
It's easier for a 40-year-old man to find a 30-year-old woman than a 40-year-old woman to find a 30-year-old man.
By the way, or want a 30-year-old man, for that matter.
All right, let's see here.
Brian in Scottsdale, Arizona.
Hello.
Hello, Dennis.
It's an honor to be with you.
Thank you.
So, I have a daughter, and I emphasize that she grew up to be married and be a great wife.
Because what I see is that behind every great man is a woman, and I want my daughter to be that woman for a great man one day.
How old is your daughter?
She's young, so she's five, and I have two boys, one that's eight and one that's ten.
So this is how you are raising her?
Yes.
So obviously you can't tell us the results, but I agree with you.
Are you a religious home?
Yes, certainly.
Well, this is reason number 826, why the religious tend to produce healthier people.
I also happen to be a retired professional athlete, so I see the hollow victory of a successful athletic career.
Wow.
Let me guess.
Let me guess.
You sound to me...
I'm narrowing it down to baseball and football.
I'll say baseball.
Well, I grew up thinking I was going to be a baseball player, but it ended up being football.
Well, I was really guessing what you grew up thinking you would be.
That's right.
What did you play?
What was your position?
I played for the 49ers.
I was a special teams long snapper.
You know, this is going to sound like a joke.
It is not meant to be.
I never met a long snapper.
You're the first.
You guys don't get injured, isn't that correct?
Well, yeah, you play like 12 or 14 plays a game, and you try to not get killed by the defensive linemen when they hit you in the back with all their might.
Uh-huh.
That's right.
As Sean just said, and you only get noticed if you make a mistake.
Yeah, that's right.
So I managed to not get killed or fired for 13 years in a row.
No, bless you.
That's great.
But did you know the limitations of a professional sports career?
Well, I knew at one point my income was going to drop to zero, and my skills weren't going to transfer.
So, yes, is the short answer.
So you didn't spend all your money?
No, and I wanted to...
I think it would be, like, if you have a chance to play pro sports in your 20s, you'd do it.
Of course.
Of course.
But you don't turn it down.
No, I totally agree with you.
Especially the long snapper for the 49ers.
Great deal.
And then the thing was amazing, I got to see exceptional people and the way their lives operate.
And I was raised in the 80s that boys and girls were the same and like profession was important.
Like I needed a job.
And then I met all the most successful people that had the most money in the world and they did what they loved and they were in relationship with great people and they focused on relationships and contribution and money showed up.
So did you meet your wife while you were a player?
Yes.
Was she waiting for you outside the locker room?
No, we met.
I outkicked my coverage.
She was introduced to me through a mutual friend, a teammate at the time.
And she is a better athlete.
She's an attorney.
She's a beautiful model beauty.
And she happened to take a fondness to me.
Which I found, you know, kind of surprising.
But yeah, we were friends.
You know what?
You've got a lot of charm.
I think your charm, wit, professional athlete, let me tell you something.
You're a desirable hunk.
Well, thank you.
And I would also just agree that guys have an easier time finding a spouse in their 40s.
You know, so I've had, like, my wife has friends in their late 30s that it's an emergency that they get married and have kids.
And I see there's a lot of suffering there for women that grew up building a career, and they're looking at the next 40 years of their life being alone.
And it's scary.
Well, thank you for your call.
That's exactly my theme.
A long snapper for the 49ers.
This is one of the joys of my work.
You know, never thought I'd talk to one.
I love it.
I really do.
So this is the question, my friends.
Are you raising your daughter?
Did you raise your daughter?
If you were a daughter, were you raised with too little emphasis on getting married?
That's the question.
All right, Mary, Albany, New York.
Getting a lot of calls from Albany.
Hi.
Hi, how are you today?
I'm well.
Good.
First, I have to say, when I first started listening to you, I envisioned a salt-and-pepper-haired gentleman.
Right.
It wasn't until I saw a couple of your PragerU videos that I realized it's not salt-and-pepper.
It's all salt.
This is like the Dead Sea.
Exactly.
At least you're not going Himalayan pink.
No, not now.
No, I went through that stage.
Actually, I didn't, but it's very funny.
To be honest, I feel very blessed with all my hair.
I got it from my mother.
She had gorgeous, full white hair until 1989 when she passed away.
Yeah, that's how my family is.
I've got Sicilian in me.
Right.
Alright, so what's on your mind?
But to answer your question, no, I didn't push marriage on either of my kids.
My biggest thing was I've been on my own since I was 17, and a lot of the adventures that I went on, tire gliding, whitewater rafting, I would have never been able to do if I had a kid.
So I placed rules on my kids that they had to do 10 things in their life.
It doesn't matter what those 10 things were, but they had to do 10 things in their life, and they couldn't do it.
All right, hold on with me.
I'm very curious to know.
How they grew up.
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