The Myth of the Missing Black Father

"I put this on my list because there is a huge shadow over the African American population that says black men don’t stick around to raise their children. Sociologists looking at this issue in the 1960s vastly overstated it. Anybody who works with the black inner-city population of kids will hear them say, ‘I know who my dad is. My mother hates him, he’s in and out of jail but he slips me $20 if he has it and he keeps me from getting my ass kicked, so I know who he is.’ The census bureau and society may not count him as a father. He’s not residential but he’s not missing. That is a critical distinction for an awful lot of kids, who feel connected to their dads even though they don’t live with them. So to keep this myth going simply perpetuates the inefficacy of black fathers and gives women another reason to have yet another generation of fatherless families. Support Five Books Five Books interviews are expensive to produce. If you're enjoying this interview, please support us by donating a small amount . The way that we as a society have bought into the myth of the black father is highly destructive to children, to women and to men. We need to fix it in this generation, because there are an awful lot of fathers who with a little help could find their way back into their children’s lives in constructive ways. We know, for example, that when men in prison participate in fathering programs they all say, ‘The only reason for me to change my ways is because I’m a father, and I don’t want my kid to wind up across the cell block from me.’ But the fathering support stops when he gets out of prison, can’t get a job, his housing sucks and he’s back in trouble in six weeks. If we were able to seriously support the transition from prison and help these men reconnect with their kids, we could have very different outcomes. Help, and the potential for a really useful lifelong partnership. Children grow up, just like puppies. Their needs change profoundly. Children have a hunger in them. If you choose to raise a child without the father in their life, some day that child is going to come to you for an explanation and you better be prepared for it. The absence of the paternal figure is going to be a powerful psychological entity in the life of that child. It could turn out to be a time bomb, or it could turn out to be a little firecracker. Women can’t be all things to all children. It’s not that women can’t do a wonderful job, be incredibly loving, willing to make all the sacrifices necessary and have kids who turn out fine. They can. Women come to me and say: I want to have this child and I’ve never had a man in my life that I trusted, what do I do? Although I don’t give advice on how people ought to live their lives, I can say that if you want to avoid the negative outcomes of unrequited father hunger, including the idealisation of the guy whose sperm you have used, then get men in your life that you do value close to the child, keep them there, and let the child understand what the fathering experience feels like from people you trust. But it’s a myth that one person can do it all. You can’t. This interview was published in July, 2012."