Thinking about Carl Dean and #IWD2025

Today, March 8, is International Women’s Day.

It’s also the day after Dolly Parton released a new song after losing her husband, Carl Dean.

In my opinion, the two are intertwined because Carl was possibly the ultimate example of supporting a woman behind the scenes.  I was thinking about Carl and how none of us know much about him beyond the fact that they were married for 60 years. He avoided the spotlight to an extreme that this introvert could only marvel at. As popular, loved, and public as Dolly is, Carl was none of those things and never needed to be.

He supported his wife, and her success was enough for him. He didn’t need credit from her fans or public acknowledgement of what a good man he was for supporting her. He only wanted to see her be what she wanted to be.

There are no humble-brag social media posts from Carl; there are no interviews where he talks about what it means to support her; he just quietly does it and goes about his life.

Supporting the women we love- wives, daughters, friends, and family- and the many talented women we work with should look the same. Men, there’s no need to draw attention to our efforts to support the women around us. (He says this while unironically writing a post about it.)

Just get out of the way and let them shine. A woman getting attention for her accomplishments never threatened Carl Dean; why should it threaten us so much?

When we refer to women as “DEI hires,” what we are really saying is that we aren’t secure enough in our own accomplishments to let someone else shine. I imagine Carl would be embarrassed of us. I suppose the idea that we must diminish any woman’s achievements would be utterly unacceptable to the man who spent 60 years married to one of the most famous women in the world without ever feeling the need to grab the spotlight for himself.

We need examples like that. Carl Dean was one.

RIP

Follow these topics: Personal