Barack Obama delivered a Father’s Day speech at a church in Chicago, IL. His speech has been praised in some camps and criticized in others including Drs. Joe Feagin (Distinguished Professor of Sociology at Texas A&M University) and Boyce Watkins (Assistant Professor at Syracuse University). You can read their critiques below. In Obama’s speech, he urged Black fathers to step-up and engage their kids. Obama states, "They have abandoned their responsibilities, acting like boys instead of men. And the foundations of our families are weaker because of it." Please read the full article and segment of the speech below. It is important to place these comments into context. Nevertheless, Obama has been criticized for downplaying the institutional effects of discrimination and racism on the life chances of Black males in America. Others assert that Obama’s address on race clearly showed that he does not downplay how race influences life chances and social interactions.
http://www.barackobama.com/2008/06/16/in_fathers_day_sermon_reminds.php
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25176204/
Senator Obama’s Critique of Black Fathers: Playing to the White Frame?
http://www.racismreview.com/blog/?p=326
Obama Attacks Black Fathers: Open Letter
http://drboycespeaks.blogspot.com/2008/06/open-letter-to-senator-barack-obama.html
Despite the critiques, it should be noted that Obama often speaks about the importance of parental involvement. He has sponsored legislation to increase the rate of child support payments by offering tax credits for fathers who pay child support, establishing more efficient and effective means to collect child support payments, and increasing the penalties for fathers who do not pay child support. While there is a lot that can be said about this topic, and Drs. Feagin and Watkins and the discussions that are occurring on their websites has engaged this conversation, EngageDiversity chooses to discuss a different issue regarding the role fathers play in the household and how we can deal with these issues candidly.
What Obama is addressing in his Father’s Day speech is absentee and reactionless fathers. Absentee fathers are men who are absent from the home. Reactionless fathers are men who may live in the home with their children, but the children do not feel that the father sufficiently fulfills the care giver, house worker, and/or provider roles. I had an absentee father. I have never seen my biological father before. However, I was blessed to have a mother, along with the help of many including my grandparents, aunt, and other extended family and friends, who fulfilled all of the family roles for me. Some individuals I know have reactionless fathers. Their fathers may have been in the household with them, but they did not positively influence their lives in anyway.
In my forthcoming article in the International Journal of Sociology of the Family, Special Issue on Intersectionality, entitled “The Professional Allowance: How Socioeconomic Status Characteristics Allow Some Men To Fulfill Family Role Expectations Better Than Other Men,” I was part of a research team that sampled 46 Black, white, and Mexican-American families across the United States. I find that 93% of the sample said a family member positively affected their life. 56% said this individual is a female immediate family member whereas only 29% said this individual is a male immediate family member. In most cases (about 75%), the positive male immediate family member was identified as the father of the respondents. But in other cases, these men were uncles, brothers, or other extended family. Some families where the father is the positive influence in the home are due to unconventional circumstances. For example, in two families (one white family and one Black family) the mother died while the children were young. The fathers in these families fulfilled not only the provider role but the house worker and caregiver roles as well. Still, this was a rare occurrence. 48% of the sample said a family member has negatively affected their life. 56% said this individual is a male immediate family member, while only 25% said this individual is a female immediate family member.
So what does this mean? Well, these data suggest that fathers are not fulfilling family role expectations sufficiently. More specifically, I find that fulfilling family role expectations carry different meanings from the perspective of fathers, mothers, and children. Men believe they are supposed to provide economically for the family, while women and children want men to also be caregivers as well as spend quality time with the family. Some men are afforded a professional allowance to fulfill the family role expectations of women and children better than other men. Men with professional jobs have the flexibility to bring their children to work with them when necessary, leave early, or arrive to work early so they are available for important family obligations. Conversely, working class jobs normally have set work hours and are so physically taxing that working class men do not have the energy or time to fulfill the caregiver role desired by women and children. As a result, men with working class jobs are often blocked from socioeconomic status characteristics which are important to fulfilling the family role expectations of women and children.
Through various interactions with family members, some men learn over the life course what it means to fulfill family role expectations. Many men have an “empathetic resentment” towards their fathers’ role in the family. The resentment component entails yearning for their fathers to have a deeper, more substantial relationship with them. As these men get older, the empathy component involves a unique understanding of the perceived familial and societal pressures for men to provide for the family. Later in life, men reflect on their role in the family and wish they could have spent more time with their children. This life course process often leads to men striving for a closer relationship with their grandchildren to compensate for time lost with their own children. Still, men, when comparing themselves to their fathers, believe they are better parents and husbands. Thus, they are prone to justify that their role in the family is sufficient.
So what are the broader implications of this research? Well, most individuals view their fathers as Gods. Gods are the perceived rulers of the universe, perfect and without flaws. The level of expectation that comes along with being of “God status” is unattainable. Therefore, fathers who are viewed in this light are unable to fulfill the family role expectations of their children. Instead, we should view our fathers as Super Heroes. Super Heroes often do much good, but they normally have a fatal flaw. For Superman it is kryptonite and for Batman it is the desire to live a normal life. Everyone has fatal flaws and fathers are no different. This perspective is not to take up for fathers who do not “do their job.” However, this is to help those of us like myself who struggle emotionally with the fact that our fathers are not in our lives up to the standards that we set for them. Viewing our fathers in this manner allows us to cope with these issues and it allows us to make changes in our lives to not repeat what our fathers have done to us.