Fatherhood

 

“And Uh, to all the ladies having babies on they own

I know it’s kind of rough and you’re feelin all alone

Daddy’s long gone and he left you by ya lonesome

Thank the Lord for my kids even if nobody else want ‘em”

 

I was listening to 2Pac’s Keep Ya Head the other day. While he did rap misogynistic lyrics at some point –definitely not cool– he also touched upon some of the hard realities of life in the hood. The topics imbued in his songs (gang and gun violence, drug addictions, racism, unemployment, and poverty) resonated with a lot of people. The son of Black Panther activists, his songs were conscious of the social inequalities and institutional violence that plague black and brown communities. His mom raised him on her own, and the subject of absentee fathers come up again and again in his lyrics and writings.

From The Rose that Grew From Concrete by Tupac Shakur:

Tears of a Teenage Mother

He’s bragging about his new Jordans

the Baby just ran out of milk

He’s buying gold every 2 weeks

the Baby just ran out of Pampers

He’s buying clothes for his new girl

& the Baby just ran out of medicine

u ask for money for the Baby

the Daddy just ran out the Door

 

2Pac touches upon a very real issue in the hood, and really anywhere else, where fathers often evade the responsibilities of raising a child after they have taken part in making one. Too often, the responsibility of having (or not having) a child falls solely on women. These responsibilities begin even before a child is actualized. Plenty of birth control options are available for women–patches, the pill, injections, diaphragm, female condom, vaginal rings– while condoms are men’s most viable option.

 

The fact that birth control, pregnancy, and child rearing often falls on women as their responsibility (since they are the ones with the uterus) allows men to feel less responsible. Statistics, which I must contend are not representative of an entire population, grant that this lack of male responsibility is particularly skewed among fathers of color, something 2Pac alluded to.

 

Gender roles can also get in the way of parenting and being a father. Men, when they are fathers, are often seen as the providers and mothers lend emotional support. As Brent Taylor and Andrew Behnke explain in the academic article, “Fathering across the Border: Latino Fathers in Mexico and the U.S.”, fathers appear absent from their children’s lives because they are too busy providing for the family by working, which is an important role of being a father and a man.

 

The film “The Black Fatherhood Project”, which came out in 2013, stated that close to 70 percent of black households are steered by single females. Some people said their dad’s were either in jail, dead or absent.

However, it is easy to get caught up in statistics and tales about careless fathers and limited fatherhood. There exist fathers out there who are taking active and positive roles in their children’s lives. They seem to be disregarded as an exception, but their portrayal is necessary if men are to realize that they can and should take responsibility in the creation and formation of their children.

Angry Man-Hating Lesbians

This week I bring up the practice and ideology of feminism and the face of feminists.

To explore feminism, I use Bell Hooks‘ book, “Feminism Is For Everybody”. Feminism has in a general definition been defined as the unity of all and any genders against patriarchy. Patriarchy embodies a male-dominated society that seeks the subordination of females. Patriarchy thrives in a foundation of sexism to the extent where women are simply objects as opposed to subjects in control of their bodies and lives. Women just as well as men can participate in sexism and the oppression of women. In a patriarchal society, heterosexual men hold most, if not all,  power in the social, economic and political spheres. Men are seen as the head of the household which is legitimized in the higher wages they earn. The number of men dominates the number of women in political office. A simple example is the fact that all of the U.S. presidents have been men.

Often, feminists are illustrated as sensitive, angry man-hating lesbians. There is a limited knowledge in the popular imagination of what feminism stands for and who a feminist is.

Feminism is a movement and one at has progressed over the decades. Three waves characterize the movement. The first wave of feminism was pioneered by white women who demanded equal rights, particularly the right to vote. Women of color challenged the first wave which did not examine class or racial oppression; this is considered by feminist scholars to be second-wave feminism. Second wave feminism considered that women also exploited other women exemplified in the demand for domestic servants who were often women of color by white women. Feminism recognizes the intersectionalities of oppression: gender, race, and class etc.