Men need to grow up

It is with great shock, sadness and disappointment that I have watched the burning debate around the cost of parenting. Too often we hear the term baby mama drama and after all the comments I have seen, I think I am now going to call it ‘asshole daddy drama.’

 

Too many men think that the mothers of their children just want them back. This is a complete lie that men have told themselves in order to dodge responsibility. It’s sad that men have to reach that low down just because they don’t want to be held accountable for unprotected sex.

 

I want to clarify something to men: most of your baby mamas don’t want you back; they are frustrated that you left them with the load. No amount of bad mouthing the mother of your child will take away the fact that you have failed as a parent. If you do not know what your child had for dinner last night then you are in no position to bad the parent who is present.

 

Brothers, there is a lot more to parenting than paying child support. Child support is the bare minimum, because even in failed relationships we don’t hear you screaming for joint custody. Your child is not a pay cheque at the end of the month, your child is a human being that needs you physically, mentally and spiritually. You have left women with crying children asking where you are. The greatest disappointment is not that you’re an absent father, it is the moment that mothers have to explain your disappearance to your children.

 

I don’t know what level of inhumanity our men have reached, where they have children that they don’t even see.

Men love the excuse that women are keeping them from seeing their children. Sies what a lie. When you were having sex with her you knew exactly where she lived, are you telling me that you can’t pitch up to go see your child after work? Sies man. What kind of man is my generation dealing with?

 

When I read stories on ancient Africa and African values, women were sacred and revered BECAUSE they gave birth. Men in another time respected the role of women and the greatness of giving birth. Our men went into the world with the sole purpose of feeding the family. We Africans...our values are based on the family unity. Africa is broken because the family unit is broken. There was a time when the birth of a child joined two families making the clan bigger and more powerful. Look at us now with broken families, we are so disunited we can’t even fight battles like racism or capitalism. We are too broken inside to protect our assets. Our family units are broken.

 

It takes so much more than money to raise a healthy child. Men think they are being amazing just by providing money. When raising a child one needs love, compassion, discipline and so many other characteristics, that men have not developed because they have run away from the experience that nature has designed to groom them. We are dealing with partners who are assholes probably because they have run away from parenting and engaging their emotional sides.

 

When women ‘overprice’ child support it is because they cannot put a price tag on staying up all night with a sick baby, washing a child every morning, feeding the child, being responsible for another soul outside yourself. Energy is much more than money. Being the parent who is physically there for the child automatically qualifies you as the better parent.

 

Some men even have the dirty habit of sleeping with the mother of the child/children and then disappearing again and then claiming ‘she wants you back.’ My brothers your romantic relationship with the mother has nothing to do with parenting. Parenting is something you choose when you have unprotected sex. The problem here is that you have chosen to be at the chesa nyama and soccer while women are at home raising your children. 

 

If it were up to me, absent fathers would get arrested because there is no logical explanation why we should need to explain to grown men that having a child is equal to being a parent.

And it is disgusting that you parents have now exposed children to such a ugly conversation where they are no more than just a cost to you.

 

This is that toxic masculinity we are talking about. Our men need to grow up. This conversation has certainly separated the boy from the men.