It’s not unusual for the commemoration of Father’s Day to pale in comparison with the hype and excitement that Mother’s Day brings. This unbalance doesn’t mean fathers are less loved or unappreciated than mothers, but is indicative of the continuous, growing matriarchal pattern of modern society.
Years ago, Edith Clarke, a sociologist in Jamaica, wrote a very relevant book entitled “My Mother Who Fathered Me,” highlighting the significance of the role of mothers in Jamaican society. Many of these women served as fathers and mothers to their children. Sadly, that situation has not changed over the years, but if anything has increased, as numerous men go about irresponsibly impregnating women, then just walk away from their responsibility. This has given rise to a growing breed of “sperm donors,” not fathers.
Innumerable pages have been written about the irresponsibility of some fathers towards their children. Courts in this and other countries are overcrowded with cases of mothers filing lawsuits against absentee, irresponsible fathers for child support. Yet, despite some harsh penalties meted out to these “deadbeat” fathers, the practice of fathers not supporting their children continues.
But children need more than financial support from their fathers. A child, especially a male child, needs the emotional bonding that a father should be giving. Children need that loving, nurturing figure in their lives whom they affectionally call “Daddy.” An uncaring absentee father isn’t a daddy, and shouldn’t expect to be called as such by his child or children.
Several sociologists have determined a primary reason for the preponderance of crimes in most countries is the absence of a father figure in the home. It’s often difficult for mothers forced to work away from home, to be able to provide the required emotional support plus enforce discipline over their children. The male child, in particular, as he grows older, in the absence of that father figure, seeks to bond with his peers, spend more time on the street, graduating into gangs and serious anti-social activities. It is much easier for the child to succumb to peer pressure when there is no father figure around.
Some female children, devoid of a father figure at home, seek such a figure in men outside the home, risking ending up in emotionally damaging relationships, and even unwarranted pregnancies.
In this technologically advanced age, there’s no reason for a man to not try to make regular contact with his child/children by phone, e-mail, or text. Often fathers are separated from their children because of a breakdown in the relationship with the children’s mother, but this isn’t an excuse for fathers to ignore their children. A group of teenagers interviewed on a recent Cable-TV program said they would have loved to be able to at least speak with their fathers once in a while, getting their opinion and advice on certain aspects of the teenager’s lives. One young lady spoke of the pain she feels of having a father living in the same town as she does but not ever hearing from him.
Fathers, although pained by the broken relationship with their children’s mothers, should nonetheless remain interested in the welfare of their children. Children must never be treated badly or ignored because of a broken relationship. Neither should mothers try to spite the children’s father by not allowing him to have access to his children, either directly or indirectly.
Of course, all fathers are not irresponsible fathers. There are good fathers, dedicated fathers who make valiant efforts to provide emotional and material support for their children. This is manifested in the growing trend where fathers are the ones acting as stay-at-home parents while the mother goes out to work.
There are fathers within the South Florida community, and in the Caribbean, who work several jobs for long tiring hours to be able to provide for their women and children. There are men who through love, act like fierce lions in protecting their children from unwarranted circumstances. But nonetheless, the selfishness and irresponsibility of some fathers have often overshadowed the responsible fathers.
In this real world, incidences of men fathering children will not decrease. However, what must decrease is the blatant irresponsibility of men who simply walk away once they learn their female partner is pregnant, or ignore providing for the child as it grows and its needs increase. This is a sociological problem that still needs to be firmly addressed.
There would be real progress if some fathers would seriously stop and consider that it takes two to responsibly raise a child, just as it takes two to create that child.
