Fatherhood and Manhood
Newsweek has an article below on the absence of black fathers from the home. Before commenting, because the very word manhood has come to be synonymous with male chauvinism and/or misogyny I want to share some thoughts on what manhood is and what it is not
A real man is one that honors his wife, provides for and educates his children (boys and girls), pays off his debts, is considerate, compassionate, helps around the house, has self-dignity, and is engaged and feels a sense of responsibility for his community.
Manhood does NOT mean brash sexuality and promiscuity, selfishness, physically or emotionally abusing women, recklessness, sophomoric immaturity, ‘honor killings’, and being uncomfortable with women being educated. It is not about a man beating his chest and saying that ‘he is a man’. Real manhood is in doing what men do, not crude talk about being a man. Real men do not confuse manhood with misogyny and adolescent misbehavior.
Unfortunately, people immediately think of the cartoonish distortions of what manhood is not when someone mentions that word. So the baby has been thrown out with the bathwater and now the black community - in particular - is lacking in real men, the entire community is suffering. Hence the article below:
Ta-Nehisi Coates grew up in the type of family unit that causes census takers to develop stomach ulcers. His father, Paul, was a bit of a free spirit, which is how it came to be that he fathered Coates and his six siblings with four different women. Despite this peculiar scenario, Paul was an active, present father in all his kids’ lives. Coates certainly had his share of issues growing up in a tumultuous corner of Baltimore, but as he writes in his new memoir, “The Beautiful Struggle,” his father was a source of security and stability in a neighborhood subject to rampant, random violence. “I don’t know if there’s an environmental explanation for why my father was the way he was,” says Coates, 33. “For some reason, he just took being a father really seriously.”
The engaged black father is an elusive character in popular culture. The percentage of black children living in fatherless homes
Filed under: Changing World
Spot on Tariq. There are so many misconceptions about that makes a father and a man in our communities.
As salamu ‘alaikum,
I plan to write something on this issue on our blog Insha Allah. I would argue that there is more to the picture than most of these articles will show. Although two of the main factors were mentioned. Namely:
“…roughly 50 percent
[...] Post: Fatherhood and Manhood Inspired by a recent Newsweek article, Tariq Nelson wrote a timely piece on manhood in the Black community. A real man is one that honors his wife, [...]
I thought
Tariq,
While I will agree with most of what you stated I think your only painting half the picture. I know personally of men who are all those things. They were told that every woman is a prize and should be respected. Well the truth of the matter is Tariq while many men aspire to those ideals. The other half of the picture is that the choices they have in real women are few. You and I both know personally of brothers who are paying their child support yet there is no accountability on the woman. The woman can smoke up all the money, spend it on her boyfriends, or support her weave habit. I’m not saying that we should let bad man or bad women define who we are but I am saying you can’t give the real man treatment to anything less than a real woman. Another problem is we are putting all the accountablity on the men but we are not empowering them. Empowerment and accountability go together. So what we have today is women who are being empowered yet more accountability is placed upon the men this is an imbalance. Every decent man wants to support his children but no man wants to participate in a system that gives usurps his money and leaves him with no rights. I agree with your ideals but let’s paint a full and acurate picture.
A video is worth a thousand words
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5eXNClwV5AM&hl=en&rel=0]There are two Black Americas. One that is upwardly mobile, hard working, have two parent families, well educated and prosperous and another that is drug ridden, violence is commonplace, education is rejected and is falling further and further into poverty.
Reggie,
That’s an excellent point the advice Brother Tariq is giving to upwardly mobile Black American is great. But I’m sorry if a brother is living in the drug ridden ghetto where the only women you see are trying to get into your pockets and play you, you will be eaten alive.
http://rasheedmoore.com/cgi/wp/?p=6
Salaam alaikum Rasheed,
Can you point out exactly what was wrong with brother Tariq said? Where did all this talk about weave and smoking stuff come from? And can you provide some empirical evidence that the majority of mothers who receive child support misappropriate those funds?
What you contributed is definitely not a full and accurate picture. I know many single mothers who are not receiving child support. I know some cases of men who quit their stable jobs, take money under the table, and float between jobs in order to skip out on their responsibility to pay child support.
If the mothers of your friends’ children are so unfit, smoking up the money, getting elaborate weaves, and seeing all types of men, why don’t they sue for custody? My brother, for example, took custody of his daughter. My niece’s mother was pretty trifling and unfit. And, no, she wasn’t a Black woman. She was white. One of my cousins did the same thing. Once again, another non-Black woman left all her kids with the man and left the state. The woman tried to pass one baby off like he was my cousin’s until it was clear that he had no resemblance to my cousin. My cousin even manned up and took the boy that wasn’t even his. So, my cousin has a 100% white son who has his last name and all. He’s not treated any differently in my family than the other kids. To me, both cases says a lot about Black manhood. And no, I’m not going to generalize about white women and their child rearing based upon my anecdotal stories. I’m just saying, we can take positive steps to ensure the well being of our children, as opposed to whining about some sense of victimhood.
The problem is upwardly mobile black men already have these values they are not the intended target. The target is getting our brothers who are not upwardly mobile out of the traps of the ghetto. To do so you have to be smart, wise, and not fall into the traps. If you are not already upwardly mobile but a young male living in the ghetto your choices in women will zero next to none. No upwardly mobile woman is going to want to deal with you. That narrows these brothers choices down to hood rats and chicken heads. Hood rats and chicken heads have one hustle. It’s called the baby daddy hustle they try to get pregnant so they can sit on their lazy trifflin’ behinds and get a check. So here’s what happens lets say a brother like that reads this article and says I yes I am going to be this great provider of a man and wife up these hood rats. Man that brother will never make it out the ghetto because those hood rats will suck the life force out of him. Tariq in my humble opinion what the brothers who are not upwardly mobile need to hear is stack your money, up your standards when it comes to women and don’t fall for the traps now that’s real practical advice.
Sister Margari,
The examples of unfit mothers and their stories are too many to name. I know a Brother who is a police officer and his child is getting beat by another man and the courts won’t give him back his kids. Plus your missing one important point in order to sue you have to have money. Do you really think a Brother who is living in the hood giving half his check to a baby mama has the money to sue for custody? There is nothing wrong with what Brother Tariq said. I agree this is the IDEAL that every man should live up to. My point is in REAL life not every woman deserves that treatment. Ma Sha Allah for your cousin wallahi I always love to hear the children winning. As far as white or black this is not the point trifflin is trifflin, hood is hood, low class is low class.
Nobody is whining sister what we are doing is debating how brothers can elevate out of their circumstances and make better choices in women.
Jazakumullah Khayran for your 2 cents or lack thereof
In conclusion I think the best thing for our sisters who have mastered the art of being a lady and who are happily married with husbands to do is to educate these young hood rats and chicken heads and teach them there are other ways to earn a living besides the baby daddy hustle.
Those sisters who are not married should stop hating on the ones that are by saying childish things like. We are being abandoned and why are all the Arab women stealing our men. Maybe the sisters need to go sit down with those Arab women and figure out what they are doing right instead of hating….
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Rasheed Moore, it seems to me that you are just trying to be offensive and have no desire for serious dialogue using terms like “chicken heads” and “hood rats”. I’ll submit that I have heard some black women complain about white and Latin women, but I have not heard them complain about Arab women stealing their men. You must live in such a microscopically small world that it is probably insignificant to even discuss.
I live in Atlanta and there are upscale Black suburbs here just as there are in other cities. These neighborhoods are stable and have intact families.
In all fairness the initial post was about manhood. While we can’t completely seperate the male/female issues - drawing attention to specific aspects of the issue is fair.
Rasheed I agree there are other factors that come into play even in seemingly normal relationships or at least where the factors seem normal from the outside. However, since the initial post was about fatherhood/manhood we might start here and not branch too far.
As stated in my initial post I think that the general attitude towards ‘males’ is that of being disposable, dispensable and simply utility. There is also the attitude that he is inherently irresponsible and therefor he warrants no trust and is incapable of responsibility. He is generally considered lowly/beastly in his behavior and immature. Hence, he has to manipulated, molded and shaped into the ‘man’ he needs to be.
The most sensitive and critical area in this regard is that mans position as a leader in the household. I think this is where social breakdown occurs on both sides. But in this analysis what I mention above seems to be the attitude ‘towards’ men. I’m not addressing his attitude towards himself or towards women.
I would add, since this seems to be how we [AfAm & Muslims] are socialized in regards to relationships (generally speaking) when these ideas and attitudes breakdown in the course of a relationship then the relationship falters and takes massive hits. I will emphasize here, again, in the area of leadership. That is: Who leads explicitly/implicitly? who is qualified to lead? Can trust, integrity and loyalty be established?
I’m saying these things as a male looking outward trying to gain perspective on issues I’ve experienced first hand and discuss with other brothers.
Thoughts?
Why is the dialogue not serious because I am using the terms “chicken heads” and “hood rats” they are a reality they do exist. Fatherhood, Manhood, these concepts exist already in upper middle class enviornments black or otherwise. Ma Sha Allah that is great that you live in a neighborhood that is full of stable and intact families. The point that I am making is this, the brothers who do not come from stable and intact families are the ones that are suffering and if we don’t give them practical advice that is going to cause their elevation then everyone looses. When we tell these men all women are prizes and that every woman should be respected. That’s a lie, we are afraid to speak what is real because it would offend some of the women. My point is this the things Tariq is saying brothers will laugh you out the hood if you come at them like that. They know that just being a “good man” is not going to solve the problem. It’s part of the solution but not the whole, the other part of the solution is avoiding bad women. Let’s be real sisters there are things such as “hoes” “chicken heads” “hood rats” “trifflin women” so if your suggesting that these types of women are not in existence in the plethora in lower income neighborhoods then it is you my dear respected sister that is living in your suburban bubble. Can I get a Brother to wiegh in here please?
I have offered many Muslimah friends of mine to have their husbands come over to my house and to study and take notes about “fatherhood” from my husband.
I seriously have, you can ask any of them.
He rocks as a Dad and sometimes I think he is a better parent than I am. Thank God I didn’t end up with a man who never has time to even read a book to his own kids! I would be long gone if I had to deal with a man like that!
Abu Hunain,
You make some excellent points here part of the problem is that the welfare system as well as the child support system made men disposible. This is attested to by even some black female authors such as Dr. Pearl Jr. author of “Black Women Need Love Too”. So when women became financialy independent there was no need to keep him around there is no incentive. The man was looked at as a play thing and a paycheck. Cash one man in and use another man for your physical needs. I have a female cousin who stated this very thing. She stated “I think there is one man for breeding and another man to take care of the kids.” So when we talk about the concept of Fatherhood and Manhood we can’t help but bring the subject of women into the topic because without women there is no Fatherhood.
Who here said that all women are “prizes”. Is not every human being deserving of mutual respect? Are there no bad men in your world? Why is it that in your world only women are bad?
My point here is not to blame the women or the men to say this one is bad and that one is not. There is plenty of blame to go around as my mother always said it takes two to tango. My point is this and this is directed to my brothers we need to stop worrying about hurting women’s feelings, or being politically correct, or sugar coating the truth, or trying to earn brownie points by being “the good man”. My point is let’s help our brothers by giving them sound practical advice that is going to help them. My advice to the younger brothers in the hood is this. Leave the hood rats alone, avoid them like the plague, get an education, stack your money, up your standards when it comes to women, if you have to go outside your race to get a good one do that, do whatever you have to do to become one of those upwardly mobile brothers, whoever doesn’t like it let them talk because people are going to talk about you regardless.
What an wonderful tariq, its shame the comments section is being flooded with such vile from rasheed moore who obviously is a misogynyst, take your emotionally charged rants else where please.
Beautiful… Insha Allah you’ll have more influence on my brothers than the music / videos and institutional racism do.
I suggest
Tough Guise: http://www.mediaed.org/videos/MediaGenderAndDiversity/ToughGuise
Ooooh god! I’am so sick and tired of Maury Povich. His show should be banned from the face of the earth! Call me crazy, but when he put his focus on his guests, they have to have to have a stereotypical appearance: Thugged out looking people being obnoxiously loud.
Anyways, back on the subject matter. Amen to this post! When it comes to the definition of a good family, some people just don’t get the message of what it means.There were many times( until now) where I disagreed with my mother about this issue. There were times where she would tell me that ” Your dad is taking care of you”. The reason that I didn’t agree with her statement is because she was referring to the child support that she was getting from him. Even with that he only did it because it was the law. Even then, he acted as he didn’t want to do that.
There is a difference between being a father and being a daddy. I haven’t had a daddy since the age of 14. My mom, eldest brother, late maternal grandmother and some members of my neighborhood were the people that took was my ” daddy”. Taking care of family is not just about money, it about being there in their children’s good and bad times. There was a mention about Chris Gardner in this post. I just loved reading his autobiography because he exemplified the meaning of being a dad. For a while he was broke and homeless, but he cared for his son at all costs. If people just think that he was speaking for his son, they just don’t know. His son ( along with Chris) was interviewed on the Oprah Winfrey a couple of years ago. He didn’t condemn his dad. He had the highest regard for Chris for being there for him.
A good father will be there for his children at all costs. When a person uses money to define one, they are sending the wrong signals to society. If child support is supposed to be
” taking care” of families then you will find a lot of happy people. While it’s good to pay it, in it’s own right it’s a form of indirect appeasement. You actually have some who really base fatherhood on it. They do not have to ever lay eyes on their kids and they expect for it to take place of them. This is why I disagree with anyone who say that it is. It’s no more than the father saying ” I don’t have to be there for my kids. I’ll just give them some chomp change and I’ll win the father of the year award”
Assalam alaykum.. I just had to congratulate you on this wonderful post. mashallah brother. I have to say that all my life I grew up around “men” who only talked the talked but did no walk. They would boast about their manhood and what It means to be a man. My father was one of them. alhamdulilah my mother was the one that got us through and now she has a great career..
AsSalaamu Alaikum,
May Allah bestow His Mercy and Blessings on those who seek Truth and Guidance.
JazakAllahu Khairun akhi Tariq for post such a blog.
To comment on such a post, I would say that Black men, our in a struggle to reclaim “righteous identity” In urban communities such as the Marcy Projects in Brooklyn,NY, the drug and thug mentality and lifestyle runs our black youth in circles, so even if they wanted to do better, generations of the same ole thing hold them back from knowing what that better truly is. Many times their salvation or inspiration to do better comes from movies such as the Pursuit of Happiness. While many can somewhat relate to the poverty aspect, they respect the father character played by Will Smith, however now they must wage an internal war between taking care of one’s responsibilities and still upholding the “I’m that new ni**a mentality” of the streets, which holds the father character, at times to seem like a chump.
There is hope, though I believe building a strong family structure and in turn a strong community can be achieved by attacking several obstacles at once or by the people who can. First, as men of these communities the upward mobile thought must be thrushed into their vision, both by action and word. This occurs but sometimes to disastrous and perilous results because jealousy and envy of seeing upward mobile members of a ” not suppose to be” , for lack of a better phrase, community stifles the message from reaching home and making an inspirational change. To combat this, families with the “right” thinking and action must unite within the community, uplifting and supporting each others families, holding community events or just gathering discussing how to make their place of living better and safer for them, without of course, excluding the rest of the community, but just establishing a road on which, when ready the rest of the community can adopt and be part of. An example of this can be as small as organizing community outings where families in the community, neighbors, take trips to Museums for the children in the community, or organize a “walking the children to school” group where,adults within the community walk the children of the community to school, pick them up and drop them off at their apartments or houses to Organizing a community fund to establish a garden within the community where children can learn about agriculture first hand.
These small things change the face of a community over time and the struggle, inshaAllah, instills patience and perserverance in a community. it also opens up the door for good Da’wah inshaAllah.
Allahu Allum.
I’m just thinking of some solutions to our community problems.
AsSalaamu Alaikum
Abdul,
I agree.
Tariq,
I think this discussion about manhood it is a discussion we men need to have amongst ourselves. The women really are in no mood to hear about it they just want to see results and I can unstand this. As far as the Misogynyst label being thrown around this is just plain labelism at it’s best I don’t think anything I said indicated I hated women. On the contrary I have a Mother, a Daughter, and a Sister, and I love all of them and want what is best for them. I understand for the sisters this is an emotional subject and your emotions get the best of you but if we are going to have an adult conversation it’s best to try to keep those emotions in check. And to be honest no man wants a woman telling him how he is supposed to be a man. I think what is needed is honest self evaluation on both sides but ultimately it is going to be up to the brothers to step up our game and retake our rightful place.
Interesting discussion. I think that Rasheed needs to calm down because the discussion is about taking care of your kids. If you love your kid, you will find a way to love the kid’s mother. And that means putting a roof over their head and food in their mouth whether you live with them or not. If the lady needs to get her hair done that is not your business because you are paying her to raise your kid and you don’t want your kid to be seen with an unkempt woman. She is working 24 hours a day, losing sleep and most of all taking total responsibility. Are you paying her $20/hour with benefits? A mother doesn’t have to do anything to “earn” her child support except be home and love the child and make sure they are fine. If she is sitting on her behind that’s not your business as long as the kids are clean and fed.
Actually Maria if you knew the details of my particular case you wouldn’t be so quick to judge. The problem is much deeper than people imagine I suggest anyone on lookig at the issue seriously read the following book.
http://www.amazon.com/Taken-into-Custody-Fatherhood-Marriage/dp/1581825943
In fact my case is mild compaired to the plight of many father’s out there. There are men who’s children are being beaten by other men, men who have been falsely accused of molesting and abusing their own children. This is a fact aknowledged by both men and women. This is not an issue of men vs. women this is an issue of the state vs. the family. It sounds from most of the comments that the people commenting have not been through the joke they call the family courts. I am curious to hear feedback from men who have actually been through family court.
Another good book on the subject is one co-authored by Dr. Cornel West and Sylvia Ann Hewlett. The War Against Parents.
http://www.amazon.com/War-Against-Parents-Cornel-West/dp/0395957974