re: A conversation about the role of men in societies with a lack of fathers, past and present

Thoughts are this. Too many men having children and then not raising them. Is it my responsibility to raise them? Hell no its not.

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What are you, 16?

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Suspended adolescence is the new rage.

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We started talking about post World War Europe and the Orient. And how many fathers never came home to their sons but, seemingly, the men in that society managed to deal with that lack of natural fathers, and how important that is in those situations especially.

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The word 'seemingly' is doing a lot of work here. You know that the question of how societies dealt with fatherlessness is a question you could begin to answer, right? Firstly, you don't know how they dealt with it, but just assume they did, which is a nonsensical premise. There has been plenty written about this with respect to both inter-war and post-war Europe. In fact, it was so well-known a phenomena that one of DW Griffith's films was an adaptation of a play about French orphans post-French Revolution, Truffaut's directorial debut, The 400 Blows, featured its main character who had a stepfather but felt like an orphan, as well as Melville's film Les Enfants terribles, based on Cocteau's novel of the same name. It might even be considered a trope in French cinema, as the medium adapted to the realities of the banlieues.

The most direct answer is that those societies didn't deal with it. I'm more interested in why you think they did.

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I think I heard Thomas Sowell say this once but like 2/3 of black kids are in single parent homes and like 1/44 Koreans are in single parent homes.

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Go to my post on the first page and see how those stats agree with his statement. The single parent household is almost non- existent in Asian households. The rate of black unwed mothers in the U.S. is 72%.

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The rate of black unwed mothers in the U.S. is 72%

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Yep. Dysfunction all the way around.

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They can fix their problems easily. But they won’t.

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Two parent, working household would fix most problems in that community.

Kids need positive role models.

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Why is that a problem?

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No father in the home. No positive role model in the home, just more examples of irresponsible sperm donors.

Scary that you even had to ask.

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Now as far as mentoring fatherless children in your community, such as coaching or big brother/big buddy-type role, or being an involved uncle or role model to kids who don’t live with you - we definitely could use all the help we can get in our communities.

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I think about this a lot.

My husband is the quintessential "man's man". Strong, well-rounded, handy. Was an Eagle Scout. Knows everything there is to know about hunting, fishing and cooking, and if he can't fix it, it isn't broke. But also educated, successful, Godly and loving/protective of his family (and those he considers family).

It's a genuine regret of mine that I didn't get to see him parent a son. I think it would have been beautiful to watch. We have two daughters. Lots of nieces. The only boys in our life are our daughter's friends, her classmates at her (private, Christian) school, and kids at church. They all have fathers.

We've discussed that he needs to go to where the fatherless boys are, that they're not going to show up in his life to teach/mentor. He's concerned that if he shows up at an organization (Boy Scouts, for instance, as I had suggested given that he was an Eagle Scout) looking to build relationships with fatherless boys, he'll be seen as some child molester/predator looking for a victim to groom.

How does a man willing to mentor the fatherless go about doing so when there aren't fatherless boys in his orbit? Have to expand the orbit, naturally, but how does one actually go about that?

My daughter can skin a deer with the best of them, and that's great, but there's a lot my husband has to offer that some boys out there could really use. Hope he finds a path someday to sharing it.

In your Scenario, the communal raising of children without fathers was the result of a civil strife that affected the entirety of that community, in your example, war. In our society today, we have fatherless children that simply resulted from generations of fatherless children, largely in acts of pure selfishness (my thought).

So you're asking should we, who have not experienced a group traumatic event, accept responsibility for the selfish acts of others?

I know what the good book would say, but I also know in my own selfishness I could not do it. A father is a lifelong prospect, and not a role I think I could appropriately provide to someone not of my own loins.

But then again what do I know, I'm posting on the internet while sitting on the toilet.