A few years ago, I asked one of my closest friends an interesting question. Why would anyone think I wasn’t essential for the proper rearing of my children? Many often assume that after a divorce, the mother gets the children, and the father leaves and pays child support. The dad visits his kids every other weekend, and life goes on. 

That idea never seemed right to me. Maybe it was because I grew up in a two-parent home, my parents never got divorced, and I loved both of my parents equally. If my parents were to split up, why would I only want to see my dad every other weekend when I was used to seeing him every day when they were together? 

While I was in the process of getting divorced from my wife back in 2008, I felt the same about my kids. Why would anyone think I shouldn’t see my kids half the time after we finished our divorce proceedings? Isn’t that obvious?

Apparently not.

Our culture in the United States, since the 1970s, is supportive of maternal superiority. Mothers are seen as the primary parent and fathers the secondary. I started to question why so many feel this way. When I began thinking things through, my objection to the cultural zeitgeist started in earnest. 

Instead of wondering why mothers were invaluable, I asked what fathers bring to childrearing that mothers generally don’t. What is it about fathers that makes us different than mothers? Those questions were challenging to answer for some strange reason.

After years of research, I uncovered so much information, and I’ve decided to spend the rest of my life dismantling the misconceptions and myths about men, fathers, and masculinity that have been infiltrating our culture.

Here are just a few reasons today’s fathers tend to make distinctive contributions to their children’s lives:

1. Fathers play differently: One of the best ways for fathers to bond with their children is through rough and tumble play. There are definite differences in the ways fathers and mothers interact with their children. You’ll observe this at any playground where fathers are with their kids. Fathers generally use a more physical play style that benefits children in various ways, including enhanced cognitive ability. Roughhousing with fathers helps children quickly learn that biting, kicking, and other extreme physical violence forms are unacceptable. 
2. Fathers provide emotional stability: When fathers are involved in the day-to-day rearing of their children, a strong, trusting relationship is formed over the years. Children generally don’t fear abandonment. Fathers that listen and support their children when they experience joy, sadness, fear, and frustration raise children who have higher self-esteem than children whose fathers are less involved. 
3. Fathers encourage risk-taking: Children need a balance of protection and reasonable risk-taking. Encouraging kids to swing or climb just a little higher, ride their bike slightly a little faster, throw slightly a little harder, or get up immediately after falling to the ground, is all part of the management of peril. Fathers encourage their children to push the limits of any experience while simultaneously reassuring them; they will be protected with a return to a safe place.
4. Fathers promote a healthy gender identity: Men and women are biologically different. Fathers can help their children, especially boys, develop a healthy sense of what it means to be male. We eat differently. We dress differently. We deal with life’s challenges differently than women. Boys and girls benefit from having healthy role models of both sexes. Daughters who have secure relationships with their fathers are significantly better placed to succeed academically, have high quality and stable romantic relationships, and have positive psychological outcomes. They are also empowered to avoid negative peer pressure and refuse unwanted sexual advances and emotional coercion in their future relationships.
5. Fathers communicate differently: Mothers tend to find themselves generally in a more nurturing role. Father’s talk tends to be more brief, direct, and to the point. Fathers also make greater use of subtle body language. Mothers tend to be more descriptive, personal, and verbally encouraging. Children who don’t experience both conversation styles as they grow may be at a disadvantage because they may not have experienced it as a child.
6. Fathers discipline differently: Fathers stress justice, fairness, and duty (based on rules), while mothers stress sympathy, care, and help (based on relationships). Fathers tend to systematically and sternly observe and enforce rules, teaching children the consequences of right and wrong. Mothers tend toward grace and sympathy, providing a sense of hopefulness. Active fathers play an essential role in teaching their children proper behavior by setting and enforcing limits. This creates a healthy and appropriate balance with the discipline style of the mother.
7. Fathers provide children with more significant financial resources. Families with an active father in the home are often better off financially. Two incomes are always better than one. Children raised with fathers are more likely to have direct access to resources that support healthy development, such as food, clothing, shelter, and quality medical care. The unfortunate reality is that income in homes with single mothers is, on average, less than half of that of married couples with children. Father-absent children are more likely to live below the poverty line than children in homes with both parents.
8. Fathers provide physical protection: Fathers provide a visible source of security and strength. Fathers protect against harm. Children will learn to trust the safety of a father’s presence because males are generally physically bigger and stronger than mothers.

Fathers are far more than just ‘second adults’ in the home. Involved fathers – especially biological fathers – bring positive benefits to their children that no other person is likely to bring. Children with highly involved fathers tend to be more cognitively and socially competent, less inclined toward gender stereotyping, more empathetic, and psychologically better adjusted.

Fathers are essential to the lives of children. It is baffling why people still feel that fathers are not necessary. We now know that fathers are vastly important in their children’s lives, in ways that both scholars and parenting experts have often overlooked.

Clayton Craddock is an independent thinker, father of two beautiful children in New York City. He is the drummer of the hit broadway musical Ain’t Too Proud. He earned a Bachelor of Business Administration from Howard University’s School of Business and is a 28 year veteran of the fast-paced New York City music scene. He has played drums in several hit broadway and off-broadway musicals, including “Tick, tick…BOOM!, Altar Boyz, Memphis The Musical, and Lady Day At Emerson’s Bar and Grill. Also, Clayton has worked on: Footloose, Motown, The Color Purple, Rent, Little Shop of Horrors, Spongebob Squarepants The Musical, Evita, Cats, and Avenue Q.

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