American Fathers 4Change with a mission of helping to bring awareness that by increasing the proportion of children growing up with involved, responsible, and committed fathers it will improve the well being of children.
"The man as he converses is the lover; silent, he is the husband." ~ Honore de Balzac
Where Fathers, Mothers, GRANDparents and Children from all 50 states will be uniting at their State Capitols to demand a change in Family law. This is an EQUAL RIGHTS issue and OUR Children need, want and deserve to have BOTH fit parents as active participants in their lives. Those states participating are as follows: Alabama Alaska Arizona Arkansas California Colorado Connecticut Delaware Florida Georgia Hawaii Idaho Illinois Indiana Iowa Kansas Kentucky Louisiana Maine Maryland Massachusetts Michigan Minnesota Mississippi Missouri Montana Nebraska Nevada New Hampshire New Jersey New Mexico New York North Carolina North Dakota Ohio Oklahoma Oregon Pennsylvania Rhode Island South Carolina South Dakota Tennessee Texas Utah Vermont Virginia Washington West Virginia Wisconsin Wyoming
America leads the industrialized world in fatherlessness.
Right now, around 41 percent of children are born to single mothers.
For women under 30, who bear two-thirds of all children, that rate is 53 percent.
Many unmarried women are cohabiting with partners at the outset of their children’s births, but those couplings disintegrate at twice the rate of marriages.
In total, about one-third of all children are raised in father-absent homes. By some estimates, this means more kids are growing up with televisions in their bedroom than with both of their biological parents. Boys are especially affected by this trend. Without positive and consistent male role models, society misses out on much of their constructive potential. It’s no coincidence 70 percent of male inmates did not grow up with both parents, for example.
Even for those with fathers, the average school-age boy spends just half an hour per week in one-on-one conversation with his father, according to David Walsh, founder of Mind Positive Parenting.
“That compares with 44 hours a week in front of a television, video game screen, [and] Internet screen,” he says. “I think that we are neglecting our boys tremendously. The result of that is our boys aren’t spending time with mentors, with elders, who can really show them the path, show them the way of how it is that we’re supposed to behave as healthy men.”
Across the board, children with intact families have more advantages than their fatherless peers. A report published byThe Center for Disease Control and Preventionsays children of married biological parents or adoptive parents are healthier, have fewer definite or severe emotional or behavioral difficulties and are less likely to grow up in poverty. They also have more friends. When Gen-Y children were surveyed in elementary school, those who were living with their fathers scored better on 21 of 27 social competence measures.
The US Is Leading The Way In Fatherlessness And It's Hurting Our Kids
On average, a little over 3 million children in the US receive welfare benefits, known as Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) or State Supplemental Program (SSP), each month during the fiscal year. A recent report from Pew Research indicated 18 percent of American adults have received assistance from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), or “food stamps,” at some point in their lives, and Democrats were twice as likely as Republicans to have used food stamps. Women were about twice as likely as men, and black people were twice as likely as white people to have received food stamps.
Paramount Pictures
People over 65 years old were the least likely age group to say they had received food stamps, while people with less education – a high school diploma or lower – were three times more likely than college graduates to have received those benefits. Women who marry or maintain a home with the biological father of their children can face the reduction or loss of their benefits, according to the US Department of Health and Human Services:
“Our main finding is that if a male has financial resources, TANF provides the greatest disincentive to form and/or maintain a biological family, and the least disincentive, if not an incentive, to form an unrelated cohabitor family. In a biological family, where the male is the father of all the children, he must be included in the unit and his resources counted. In an unrelated cohabitor family, where he is father of none of the children, he is not included and his resources are not counted. In addition, most states disregard unrelated cohabitor vendor and cash payments to the TANF recipient and her children.”
In other words, the current structure of TANF actually promotes having nearly any man but the biological father heading the house. Women are also about six times likelier to get sole custody of their children after separating from their fathers. In some cases, men even go to jail for falling behind on child support payments. In South Carolina, for example, about one out of seven inmates are imprisoned for this very reason, and 75 percent of them were unemployed or having trouble finding work. How sending them to jail will help them, their families, or taxpayers is a mystery. And. again, for children with fathers, dads are missing out on crucial bonding time. Children who had frequent and positive interactions with their fathers, such as the father paying attention to the child’s interests, offering encouragement and smiling, during the first year of their lives were calmer and better behaved than other children at age two. This was especially true for boys. Involved dads also reduce the chances of their infants experiencing cognitive delays, and fathers themselves feel more confident about their job skills, parenting skills and social relationships. The US is an oddity among Western nations in not granting statutory paid maternity or paternity leave or providing childcare at a reasonable cost. This creates a situation where women are forced to choose between work and family (to “lean in” or “lean out”), while men have no option but to “lean in” or just opt out altogether.
These trends paint a very disconnected picture, but that can change. The government can step up by commissioning a White House Council on Boys and Men. There is currently a White House Council on Girls and Women, but they have yet to support a similar platform for men, even though it has been proposed and endorsed by a number of experts. Creating policies that support a father’s right to be present in his children’s lives during divorce and custody battle situations, eliminating perverse welfare incentives for parents to live apart, offering men paternity leave equal to maternity leave, providing childcare for both mothers and fathers and encouraging family members to visit inmates would also be steps in the right direction. Sponsoring a nationwide male mentorship program to bring more positive male figures into children’s lives would also help reverse these trends.
Fatherlessness is a growing crisis in America, one that underlies many of the challenges that families are facing. When dads aren't around, young people are more likely to drop out of school, use drugs, be involved in the criminal justice system, and become young parents themselves.
President Obama grew up without his dad, and has said that being a father is the most important job he has. That's why the President is joining dads from across the nation in a fatherhood pledge — a pledge that we'll do everything we can to be there for our children and for young people whose fathers are not around.
Published on Jul 28, 2015
A teenager tells his dad, “You don’t do anything for me.” As a father of four, Carey Casey, author and CEO of the National Center for Fathering, knows that's just not true. Here he is on Today's Father.
Visit http://www.fathers.com for ideas, advice and inspiration for being the best dad you can be to your children.
Carey Casey, author and CEO of the National Center for Fathering and father of four, shares some insight on custody battles that may be difficult to hear on Today's Father. Visit http://www.fathers.com for ideas, advice and inspiration for being the best dad you can be to your children.
WANTED ~ Pitch us your investigations on disparities in State Courts. Dec. 10 Deadline
Reveal from The Center for Investigative Reporting is launching a new reporting initiative to examine how the poor and minorities fare in state courts around the country.
Impressive work – uncovering system-wide disparities and issues related to court fines, bail, jury selection and sentencing – already is being done. But what problems aren’t being identified? What stories aren’t being told?
We are looking for reporting proposals that dive deeply into a region or reach broadly across the country, particularly those with potential for radio. (If you have radio skills, that’s a plus.) We plan to establish reporting partnerships in some cases, award freelance contracts in others. This initiative will continue into 2017, so ambitious ideas are welcome.
Send us a one-page pitch that also addresses these basic questions:
Will this uncover a hidden problem and/or tell our audience something new? Who is being harmed and how? Can you quantify the problem? Who is responsible, and can you prove it? If you already have begun reporting on this topic or it builds on past work, include this information as well:
Who are some primary characters for the story? Tell us about any tape you already have gathered. If other outlets already have covered some of your story, please include links and a brief explanation of how your story will be different.
Email your pitches to me, Amy Pyle, Managing Editor, at apyle@cironline.org, using “State Courts Pitch” in the subject line. Deadline: Dec. 10.
Parents forcefully blocked from seeing kids could be abuse STOPPING parents from seeing their children could fall under the definition of child abuse if George Christensen gets his way. The Federal Member for Dawson said he would lobby with Victorian independent Senator John Madigan to have the definition of child abuse widened to include parental alienation.
Progress! Finally, there is mention in the media of concerns about Family Courts. Way to go New Jersey. Way to go NJ4Kids/NJ4ParentalEquality.The rest of us can kick it up too. Be seen where your at.
Posted by Disgusted Dads on Thursday, October 15, 2015
We at Single Fathers Association call on the Minister of National Security, Attorney General , Chief Justice, Chief...
Posted by Children's Rights on Monday, November 30, 2015
Bring your kids to our Father & Kids Experience! It’s an afternoon you’ll never forget!
Posted by All Pro Dad on Monday, October 12, 2015
"Every word of it makes me sick, why you ask because it's the truth!!! No one cares when it's not their child!!! I hate...
Posted by Children's Rights on Tuesday, August 18, 2015
PARENTAL ALIENATION SYNDROME. HEARD IT ON THE STREET moves away today from reporting the hubbub of political conspiracies and controversies to present an issue that affects a lot of people every day, but seldom generates the attention it deserves. Parental Alienation Syndrome is not a communicable or terminal disease. It is a man made tribulation that strikes usually without warning in a relationship between a man and a woman, whom at one point professed to love each other “till death do them part”, but suddenly developed a deep seated mutual loathing to the point that they are willing to go to any length to deny each other the bundle (s) of joy that their union created and which can never, nor should be separated from both of them; children. This is the story of Debo Adejobi, a father of two fighting tooth and nail for the right to spend some quality time with his children, but faces a legal brick wall and often times, underhanded obstacles erected by the mother of his children.
Posted by Ade Adegbenro on Saturday, September 26, 2015
There's a Fatherless Epidemic
There are 20 million children in the United States living in fatherless homes. Help NCF tell the story of how important dads are. Help us enrich the lives of children through dads. Support our mission today. www.fathers.com/donateLearn more about fatherlessness at www.fathers.com/fatherless
Posted by National Center for Fathering on Thursday, July 16, 2015
"So live your life that the fear of death can never enter your heart. Trouble no one about their religion; respect others in their view, and demand that they respect yours. Love your life, perfect your life, beautify all things in your life. Seek to make your life long and its purpose in the service of your people. Prepare a noble death song for the day when you go over the great divide. Always give a word or a sign of salute when meeting or passing a friend, even a stranger, when in a lonely place. Show respect to all people and grovel to none. When you arise in the morning give thanks for the food and for the joy of living. If you see no reason for giving thanks, the fault lies only in yourself. Abuse no one and no thing, for abuse turns the wise ones to fools and robs the spirit of its vision. When it comes your time to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with fear of death, so that when their time comes they weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way. Sing your death song and die like a hero going home." (Tecumseh).
American Fathers Liberation: ALL Men’s Rights are Human Rights. ’nuff said http://bit.ly/1JgMgEm
