Relationship Cluelessness Celebration Day

What’s wrong with this picture? Or maybe I should ask how many different things are wrong with it?

I read about Spouse 2.0 day in the New York Times. No, it’s not a joke. The Times says:

To celebrate, founders are asked to buy their significant others a gift, then post to their blogs or Twitter streams about it, using the “Spouse 2.0″ tag. The stories will be collected on the project’s Website.

And it gets even better … the piece quotes one of the founders saying:

… leaving the blackberry outside the bedroom is an option on Spouse 2.0 Day.

Is it just me, or is this hilarious? Show her you really love her by putting it into a 140-character text on Twitter. So does a blog post mean more love than a tweet on Twitter? And don’t forget to tag your post with the Spouse 2.0 tag. And maybe even — just an option — turn off the BlackBerry. What a great idea!

And, of course, in this imaginary world of startup geeks, all spouses are wives (look at the font and color), and the wives run the “other” startup, which is presumably the real world, like home and children. No stereotypes here, right? No women running startups, nor husbands running homes and children of course, and no working couples sharing the work and the children. It boggles the mind.

And speaking of stereotypes, where does it say that all Web 2.0 startup people are clueless about everything else? I didn’t get that email. It was probably spam.

I knew an emergency room doctor who told me he once treated a man injured on Valentine’s Day by having been bashed over the head by his wife with the vacuum cleaner he’d given her as a present. And I once heard a supposed parenting expert advise parents to turn the television sound lower during family dinner. What those two anecdotes have in common with Spouse 2.0 day is called CDD: clue deficit disorder.

If you’re tempted even for a split second to take Spouse 2.0 day seriously, then you’re suffering from CDD. Wake up.