The absent black father myth—debunked by CDC
DAILY KOS
Originally posted on SUN MAY 10, 2015 AT 11:15 AM PDT
We've been told, quite frequently and repeatedly that the problems in the black community that we've seen in Ferguson and Baltimore recently are not the fault of biased, paramilitary, paranoid and violent policing (even if the Bureau of Justice Statistics indicates that black people are three times more likely to be subject to law enforcement uses of force). They are not the fault of racist red-lining that created these impoverished neighborhoods in the first place. They are not the fault of bigoted lending and hiring practices that create roadblocks for those attempting to escape those neighborhoods. And the fact that black students are disciplined, suspended and expelled far more easily and quickly for the same or lesser offenses, isn't the problem.
None of that is the problem. Nope. All of that is just too bad. Life is tough all over. Lots of people have got lots of problems. No, instead we've heard that the welfare benefits in Baltimore are "too lucrative," because when you give people nothing they somehow get more, somewhere. That businesses won't invest in these neighborhoods until something is done about those darn teachers unions. That it's because of "too many gay marriages." That ISIS is using Baltimore to recruit blacks. And, of course, when all else fails, blame Obama.
But what we've heard the most, is that the real problem is the Breakdown in the Black Family™. That too many black fathers have abandoned their children, allowing them to be raised by the streets like feral cats. They don't learn morals, and they don't learn values—so naturally police have to shoot them down like rabid, foaming dogs. Even when they're unarmed. Even when they have their backs turned and are simply running away. It's all justtheir own fault really.
If only black fathers would spend as much time and energy on their kids as white fathers do. If only...
Well, someone—the Centers for Disease Control—actually went to trouble of checking just how involved in their lives all fathers are, whether or not they are married to the mother of their children or live with them. What they found was that, in reality, black fathers are actuallymore attentive to their children than other fathers generally are.
Details over the flip.
Some of the relevant highlights from the CDC study as posted atThink Progress.
Considering the fact that “black fatherhood” is a phrase that is almost always accompanied by the word “crisis” in U.S. society, it’s understandable that the CDC’s results seem innovative. But in reality, the new data builds upon years of research that’s concluded that hands-on parenting is similar among dads of all races. There’s plenty of scientific evidence to bust this racially-biased myth. [...]So, of course, parents should be involved in the lives of their children. Of course they should help guide them, give them a sense of morality, goals and direction. But that doesn't require that the father necessarily be married to the mother. People like Donald Trump have certainly made that obvious. The nuclear family myth has long ago been blown into small dust-like bits. Many of us live in extended and blended house-holds within which we've all learned to adapt, and function and even thrive.Although black fathers are more likely to live separately from their children—the statistic that’s usually trotted out to prove the parenting “crisis”—many of them remain just as involved in their kids’ lives. Pew estimates that 67 percent of black dads who don’t live with their kids see them at least once a month, compared to 59 percent of white dads and just 32 percent of Hispanic dads.And there’s compelling evidence that number of black dads living apart from their kids stems from structural systems of inequality and poverty, not the unfounded assumption that African-American men somehow place less value on parenting. Equal numbers of black dads and white dads tend to agree that it’s important to be a father who provides emotional support, discipline, and moral guidance. There’s one area of divergence in the way the two groups approach their parental responsibilities: Black dads are even more likely to think it’s important to financially provide for their children.
Perhaps it's time we stopped flogging the simplistic notion that all that truly plagues the black community is a lack of weddings.
12:03 PM PT: To be fair and complete, as pointed out in the comments, there is a significant difference in the rate of single-parent families across racial lines as this chart from theKidCount Datacenter shows here:
Definitions: Children under age 18 who live with their own single parent either in a family or subfamily.This really a difference in the rate of marriages, so it is isn't really a perfect correlation for those living with, or apart, from their children.
In this definition, single-parent families may include cohabiting couples and do not include children living with married stepparents. Children who live in group quarters (for example, institutions, dormitories, or group homes) are not included in this calculation.
Here's a couple snap shots from the Census Bureau on Children Living with a single or both parents regardless of marriage.
Does this invalidate the CDC analysis? Well, no. There is a lower marriage rate among black people and that does seem to have an effect on how many of them are living with vs living apart from their children. But the level of involvement, of parenting, across racial lines from men in either of those two living situations - is not that significantly different. In fact, more Black fathers who live apart from their children are in most measurements are actually far more involved in their children's lives [in some cases by nearly a 2:1 or 3:1 ratio] which may be a direct result, and/or offset, to the fact that far more of them are in that situation percentage-wise.
5:11 PM PT: Couple more thoughts:
One of the problems with the assumption that a Nuclear Family is the "best" family for raising children is the reality that not all biological parents provide the best guidance, example, or have the best of relationship with each other. Things can turn abusive, violent and sometimes deadly. Quite often the weapons used in this disputes, is a gun.
Firearms were used to kill more than two-thirds of spouse and ex-spouse homicide victims between 1990 and 2005.2So that's one reason why some moms and dads shouldn't live together.
Domestic violence assaults involving a firearm are 12 times more likely to result in death than those involving other weapons or bodily force.3
Abused women are five times more likely to be killed by their abuser if the abuser owns a firearm.4A recent survey of female domestic violence shelter residents in California found that more than one third (36.7%) reported having been threatened or harmed with a firearm.5 In nearly two thirds (64.5%) of the households that contained a firearm, the intimate partner had used the firearm against the victim, usually threatening to shoot or kill the victim.6
Another factor on the "Nuclear Family" ideas is the fact that many of these studies don't take into account the impact of the extended family, grand-parents, uncles, aunts, older siblings and cousins can have on the child-rearing processes. Parenting sometimes takes more than just the actual parents themselves, particular when both of them need to work to make end-meet, and there are other day-care and babysitting issues that need to be addressed. Two out of our last three serving Presidents were raised in single-parent homes with the support of extended family, so clearly - it's not hopeless.
Lastly it strikes me that there can be inherent problems at looking at an internal proportional number, when the external proportion may be at an far larger differential. To wit: there are almost five times as many White people in America as they are Black. So if you were to take the single-parent percentages for each and multiply them against the numbers of actual children involved what you would see is this:
Hispanic Children in Single-Parent Households: 28.6% x 16.3 Million = 4.66 Million
Black Children in Single-Parent Households: 54.7% x 11.2 Million = 6.12 Million.
[Corrected] White Children in Single-Parent Households: 22.1% x 55.9 Million = 12.3 Million.
So even with an almost twice as high internal percentage of single-parent households, the external percentage is that there are still only one third one half as many black children living in that situation as there are white, and when you add this greater quantity of white "at risk" youth to the CDC data it seems that the quality of some of that white parenting may not be quite a strong.
But we don't really hear much about the single-parenting crisis of absent White Fathers, now do we? And we don't see our jails filled to the brim with the failed results of these millions of white single-parent households even with a 3:1 gap in actual numbers, instead we see it filled far more frequently, with black men who afterward can't really be good, attentive Fathers anymore, now can they? Perhaps that is the source for the internal percentage differential in the first place.
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