A boy who does not have a father figure to teach him the things that only a man can goes into the world as an adult sometimes ill-equipped to deal with the issues males encounter. How do I build this? How do I fish? How do I hunt? How do I find appropriate work? How do I view and treat women? How do I choose a wife? How do I become a good husband and father? Where does religion fit in my life? There are a whole range of questions that boys need to find answers to. Children generally do better with a father present in the home in almost all activities that can be measured — mental wellness, happiness, educational achievement, attitude to sex, avoidance of teenage parenthood, decreased criminal behavior. They have been denied a meaningful contact with their biological fathers, and thus have been denied experience of traditional fatherhood. The children of single mothers tend to not perform as well in society as those with both parents.
Some will argue that almost every social ill faced by children is related to fatherlessness.
Poverty
Fatherless families are 44% more likely to raise children in poverty. [1]
90% of all homeless and runaway children are fatherless.
Substance Abuse
Is greater among fatherless children.
- 71% of all substance abusers come from a fatherless home. [1]
Even the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services states:
“Fatherless children are at a dramatically greater risk of drug and alcohol abuse.”
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. National Center for Health Statistics. Survey on Child Health. Washington, DC, 1993.
There is significantly more drug use among children who do not live with their mother and father.
Hoffmann, John P. “The Community Context of Family Structure and Adolescent Drug Use.” Journal of Marriage and Family 64 (May 2002): 314-330.
Educational Achievement
Best-selling author Alan Blankstein writes that the growing number of fatherless children in this country poses one of the the most serious problems in education today.
A U.S. Department of Education study that found 39 percent of students, first through twelfth grade, are fatherless.
Seventy-one percent of high school dropouts come from fatherless homes. [2] Children born outside of the traditional family structure are simply more likely to drop out of school.
The truth is, there is a successful conspiracy aimed at reducing and ultimately destroying fatherhood. Those that currently hold the microphone (feminists) simply deny that there is a problem. Although, the microphone is now being transferred to the LGBT crowd. The micriphone is covering up the effects of fatherlessness, and claims there is no need for a traditional father, and that any “family” arrangement will suffice. In an article titled: “Deconstructing the Essential Father,” from 1999, researchers (((Louise Silverstein))) and Carl Auerbach made a direct, full-on attack. They asserted that fathers are obsolete with claims that “a wide variety of family structures can support positive child outcomes” (American Psychologist, June 1999).
Silverstein and Auerbach persuaded that:
“Neither the sex of the adult(s), nor the biological relationship to the child has emerged as a significant variable in predicting positive development. One, none, or both of those adults could be a father (or mother).”
“Deconstructing the Essential Father,” from 1999, researchers (((Louise Silverstein))) and Carl Auerbach.
However, the article had a political bias as they stated:
“We acknowledge that our reading of the scientific literature supports our political agenda. Our goal is to generate public policy initiatives that support men in their fathering role, without discriminating against women and same-sex couples. We are also interested in encouraging public policy that supports the legitimacy of diverse family structures, rather than policy that privileges the two-parent, heterosexual, married family.”
They were making an assult on the traditional Christian family.
“[W]e do not believe that the data support the conclusion that fathers are essential to child well-being, and that heterosexual marriage is the only social context in which responsible fathering is most likely to occur.”
Silverstein and Auerbach wrote
“The social policy emerging out of the neoconservative framework is of grave concern to us because it discriminates against cohabiting couples, single mothers, and gay and lesbian parents.”
In 2000, Silverstein and Auerbach were awarded the ‘Distinguished Publication Award’ for their article: “Deconstructing the Essential Father.” by the Association of Women in Psychology. And why would there be a ‘Women in Psychology’ association if there were no ‘Men in Psychology’ association. One might assume that males were barred from an association! Anyway, they were lauded for destroying fathers.
Sexual Behaviour
- 70% of teen pregnancies occur in fatherless homes. [1]
- African-American girls are 42 percent less likely to have sexual intercourse before age 18 if their biological father is present at home. [3]
- Adolescents who live without their father are more likely to engage in greater and earlier sexual activity, are more likely to become pregnant as a teenager, and are more likely to have a child outside of marriage.
Teen Suicide
Children growing up without a father are more than twice as likely to commit suicide. [7]
Behaviour and Crime
- Children who live without their fathers are less likely to be able to delay gratification, have poor impulse control over anger and sexual gratification, and have a weaker sense of right and wrong. [4]
- 70% of children in juvenile correction facilities were brought up in a fatherless home. [1]
- 60% of rapists were brought were brought up in a fatherless home. [1]
- Compared to peers in intact families, adolescents in single-parent families and step-families were more likely to engage in delinquency. This relationship appeared to be operating through differences in family processes—parental involvement, supervision, monitoring, and parent-child closeness—between intact and non-intact families. [5]
The numbers have been increasing as shown in this graph:
Father Suicide
The following graph illustrate the rapid rise in suicide levels in males since the introduction of the Child Support that puts onerous burdens on males to support children they often don’t see. There is a big increase in suicide for males in the divorce age bracket:
Alby Schultz, Australian MP for Hume writes:
“This anti-male culture is contributing to the destruction of careers, mental health problems and it would appear to national male suicide rates. The system is not fair, not just and certainly not equitable between men and women. It is demonstrably wrong to have a system in place under which in some instances a man must pay $2100 a month for his three children plus support himself and his new partner.
”As if the loss of all things materialistic and his children was not enough he is now being prevented from embarking on a new life because of these unrealistic expectations from the Child Support Agency. … The CSA must be dismantled and reconstructed. The system as it is being administered is not fair, it is unjust and it is inequitable.
It is obvious there is discrimination and a mindset against men, to the point where it is really disturbing.”
Physical and Emotional Health
A study of 1,977 children age 3 and older living with a residential father or father figure found that children living with married biological parents had significantly fewer externalizing and internalizing behavioral problems than children living with at least one non-biological parent. [fathers.com] [6]
Data from three waves of the Fragile Families Study (N= 2,111) was used to examine the prevalence and effects of mothers’ relationship changes between birth and age 3 on their children’s well being. Children born to single mothers show higher levels of aggressive behavior than children born to married mothers. Living in a single-mother household is equivalent to experiencing 5.25 partnership transitions. [8]
Links
The Consequences of Fatherlessness http://fathers.com/statistics-and-research/the-consequences-of-fatherlessness/
[1] National Centre for Fathering. http://fathers.com/wp39/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/fatherlessInfographic.pdf
[2] National Institute of Justice and the Executive Office for Weed and Seed, “What Can the Federal Government Do To Decrease Crime and Revitalize Communities?” National Institute of Justice Research Forum (1998). Available at https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles/172210.pdf. Accessed 3 October 2014.
[3] Robert Day, “The Transition to First Intercourse among Racially and Culturally Diverse Youth,” Journal of Marriage and Family 54 (1992): 749-762. 4 Sharon C. Risch, Kathleen M. Jodl,
[4] Sarah Allen and Kerry Daly, “The Effects of Father Involvement: An Updated Research Summary of the Evidence,” Father Involvement Research Alliance (2007): 9.
[5] Stephen Demuth and Susan L. Brown, “Family Structure, Family Processes, and Adolescent Delinquency: The Significance of Parental Absence Versus Parental Gender,” Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency 41, No. 1 (February 2004): 58-81.http://familyfacts.org/briefs/26/marriage-and-family-as-deterrents-from-delinquency-violence-and-crime
[6] Hofferth, S. L. (2006). Residential father family type and child well-being: investment versus selection. Demography, 43, 53-78.
[7] The Lancet, Jan. 25, 2003 • Gunilla Ringbäck Weitoft, MD, Centre for Epidemiology, the National Board of Health and Welfare, Stockholm, Sweden • Irwin Sandler, PhD, professor of psychology and director of the Prevention Research Center, Arizona State University, Tempe • Douglas G. Jacobs, MD, associate clinical professor of psychiatry, Harvard Medical School; and founder and director, The National Depression Screening Program • Madelyn Gould, PhD, MPH, professor of child psychiatry and public health, College of Physicians and Surgeons, Columbia University; and research scientist, New York State Psychiatric Institute.
http://www.webmd.com/baby/news/20030123/absent-parent-doubles-child-suicide-risk
[8] Osborne, C., & McLanahan, S. (2007). Partnership instability and child well-being. Journal of Marriage and Family, 69, 1065-1083.
