Neutrino wrote:daddy1gringo wrote:Note that this girl, whose children have no father, also has no father. Dan Quayle was right. Fatherlessness leads to more fatherlessness and poverty. This girl is starved for a man’s affection so she searches for it in the only way she knows. The men of her community need to load their shotguns and track down the perro sinverguensa that got her pregnant and ran off, and supervise his taking up his responsibilities.
That's quite a generalization. I grew up
sans father and never really felt the need for one.
You’re absolutely right, it was a generalization, and I apologize if you were offended by it. That said, let me say that one characteristic of generalizations is that they can admit to exceptions and still be true, and I still believe it to be a
true generalization.
Since I don’t really know you, I have to assume that you are correct and that you really did come through the experience of growing up without a father well-adjusted and unscarred, and that it is not just that you do not know what you are missing. If that is the case, then I am extremely glad for you. I hope you know that I say this not in sarcasm, but in all sincerity. It also says a lot for the strength of character of your mother, and probably yours as well. I say that because you have beaten the odds; you are part of a small minority.
I’d have to re-locate the actual numbers, but statistically, children who grow up without one parent, which is usually the father, are many times more prone to every kind of social ill: delinquency, early pregnancy, drug abuse, alcoholism, suicide, broken relationships, becoming abusive or absentee fathers themselves, among others.
My wife grew up w/o a father from the age of 7 and it left scars that we have spent our 18 and a half years of marriage healing.
Also, since what I said specifically applies to girls, I wouldn’t expect you to feel exactly the same way.
Neutrino wrote:What is it about being in constant immediate proximity to someone who watches football constantly and occasionally plays catch with you (steriotypical father figure) that discourages early teen sex?
Heh, good point. What we’re talking about in general is a
good father figure. With girls the key is affection and affirmation, like snowpepsi said. I don’t know if it could be proven, but I’d wager that as long as he’s not abusive in any sense, even a not-so-good father is better than none at all. Even the worst workaholic or couch potato has got to give his little girl a hug and tell her she’s cute occasionally. If he
never does, check for a pulse.
The right answer to the wrong question is still the wrong answer to the real question.