The generality is that daughters idolize their fathers, Liz. I think that there's less pressure(obviously) for daughters to be like their fathers. That's a general-ization and may even be true. I have two older sisters. One of them usually said, "Sure, Dad!," no matter how stupid he was being. She was obviously his favorite, because he couldn't tolerate anyone disagreeing with him. My other sister challenged him on just about everything and they fought like cats and dogs. I was Professor Challenger, myself, so I was definitely not a favorite son. I also had the audacity to be myself rather than a younger version of my Father (although I started this thread to honor the goodness in my Father that I came to see as I grew older, and now see some of him in me.)

The irony is that my Mother, my "good" sister and I can comfortably talk about my Father, warts and all and have a good laugh voer the dumb ( and often hurtful things he did.) My other sister, who almost ran away from home after one of her rants with my father, now refuses to let anyone say anything bad about him, and gets quite upset if my Mother my "good" sister and I are cracking each other up remembering something my father did that was really stupid.

My sons are equally split about their mother, who became and increasingly very destructive, emotionally ill woman in motherhood. In that case, the "good" song can laugh about the cruel things his Mother did, while the one who stood up to her finds it very difficult to even talk about her. Maybe being "good" works. I wouldn't know. As far as me and my parents were concerned, I wasn't "good."

Jerry