I am a Black Woman who grew up without my father I knew him more in my earlier childhood, as I grew into my teens our relationship suffered and ended. I have suffered greatly for this. I have known him to take care of a close relatives child and ignore me. This hurt me greatly and I still hurt from it today. My relationships with men are null and void, I have no trust in Black. It has taken me some time and serious soul searching within myself to realize I miss my father who died last December leaving me with more unanswered questions and hurt. I need and want male love in my life but am still dealing with the distrust of Black Men. This is because I have been looking for that father love in my personal relationships with men and its not fair to them nor me.

Sent by Linda Kimble-Williams | 7:58 PM ET | 10-24-2007

I think fatherhood is very important to all people involved in the parent-child relationship. For the mother, having an active and responsible father alleviates some of the stress of raising a child. For the child, the benefits of having an active and responsible father are huge because of the male influence in his or her life. Finally, and I believe most often ignored are the benefits of fatherhood to the father himself. If a man rises to the occasion and decides to play the role of the active father, he often grows as an individual and becomes a better man than he was before.

I experienced this when I became a father. While my wife's pregnancy was unplanned and prior to our marriage, I felt it my duty to accept my responsibility for the pregnancy and be a father to my child. The trials of fatherhood have changed me from a boy who was more into partying and drinking and shunned responsibility most days to a man who most days is focused on working hard to make life better for himself and his family. Fatherhood motivated me to be a better person, and I think if more people accepted the challenge of fatherhood, they'd become better people also.

Looking back, had it not been for my father and his active role in my life, I may have chosen a different path and not ever become the man and father that I chose to become.

Sent by Daniel Holloway | 12:06 PM ET | 10-25-2007

I watched a special on the Moyninhan Report years ago. What always has stuck out in my mind about that particular broadcast was the young brother that was featured in one of the stories. He was hanging out on the streets and talking about his babies. How important they were to him. But this brother was by no means active in his children's lives. In fact, one of the two mother's gave birth to her second child with him during the taping. He was banging on his chest and bragging about the son he had made. But this brother was just a baby maker in my mind. I remember having discussions with others who saw that special. We were all upset over his behavior towards the mother's and his children. But now that I look back on him, I have to say that he had no real clue what a man transforms into when he becomes a father. It was not popular to side with the Moyninhan Report back then. But I have always felt he nailed the situation.
Having actively engaged father's in our families is important. I am a firm believer in that. I also believe that we have got to be a lot more persistent in breaking the cycle of single parents. Not just by advocating birth control as a means of preventing pregnancies and one parent families. We need to put a lot more emphasis on relationships and expectations. I have sons and it has surprised many people when I have pushed them to be responsible parents. They have had to file to pay for child support-and give up the money. They also have to be there for their children. Which they have done. They have had a two parent to one parent situation growing up. Their dad did not always do the right thing by them. I did all that I could. By God's grace my father, male relatives, and friends helped out in a major way.

Sent by D.L.White | 3:07 PM ET | 10-27-2007

"Fatherless" America???

Twenty-five percent of America's presidents; a majority in America's first fifty years. Many of America's top jurists. And some of the world's greatest others.

http://www.thelizlibrary.org/fatherless/research-fatherless-children.html

Alexander Hamilton - President Gen. George Washington - President Thomas Jefferson - President James Monroe - President Andrew Jackson - President Andrew Johnson - President Rutherford B. Hayes - President Herbert Hoover - President Grover Cleveland - President Gerald Ford - President William Jefferson Clinton - U.S. Supreme Court Justice James Wilson - U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Rutledge - U.S. Supreme Court Justice Stephen Johnson Field - U.S. Supreme Court Justice Thomas Todd - U.S. Supreme Court Justice David Davis - U.S. Supreme Court Justice John McKinley - U.S. Supreme Court Ch. Justice (and U.S. Treasury Secretary) Salmon P. Chase - U.S. Supreme Court Justice Melville Fuller - U.S. Supreme Court Ch. Justice Edward D. White - U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Marshall Harlan - U.S. Supreme Court Justice Benjamin N. Cardozo - U.S. Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas - U.S. Supreme Court Justice James F. Byrnes - U.S. Supreme Court Justice Arthur J. Goldberg - U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas - Frederick Douglas - Gen. Robert E. Lee - Gen. John Rawlins - Booker T. Washington - Benjamin Rush - George Mason - Fr. Gen. Marquis de Lafayette - Henry Clay - Meriwether Lewis - Eleanor Roosevelt - Jackie Robinson - Mark Twain - George Washington Carver - Nathanial Hawthorne - Eli Whitney - Linus Carl Pauling - Aristotle - Nicolas Copernicus - Sir Isaac Newton - Mahatma Gandhi - Leonardo da Vinci - Confucius - Queen Elizabeth I - Jean-Jacques Rousseau - William Blackstone - Alexander Fleming - Nelson Mandela - Catherine the Great of Russia - Alexandre Dumas - Gen. Alexander Haig - Alabama Governor Bibb Graves - New York Governor Al Smith - Tennessee Governor Sam Houston - Indiana Supreme Court Justice William Allen Woods - U.S. Senator Al Sharpton - U.S. Senator Bella Abzug - U.S. Senator Barack Obama - U.S. Senator William Warren "Bill" Bradley - Queen Victoria of Britain - Alan Greenspan - Alessandro Volta - Ada Lovelace - Jane Austen - George Eastman - Roy Wilson Howard - Johann Sebastian Bach - Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz - John Lennon - Hans Christian Andersen - Edward Jenner - Giacomo Puccini - Joseph John ("J.J.") Thomson - Bertrand Russell - Hermann Rorschach - Herman Melville - John Keats - Marian Anderson - Garry Kasparov - Leo Tolstoy - Peyton Rous - Benjamin Carson - Raphael - David Hume - Hannah Arendt - Ralph Waldo Emerson - Stephen Crane - Friedrich Nietzsche - Agatha Christie - William Wordsworth - Max Weber - Cleopatra - Audie Murphy - Gustav Theodor Fechner - Edgar Allen Poe - Emile Zola - William Smith - Gerald Bull - Willa Cather - Daniel Dennett - Cass Gilbert - Mary Leakey - Charlie Chaplin - Nelly Bly - Max Born - Sarah Breedlove - Steve Allen - Warren Hastings - Allan Pinkerton - Billie Holiday - Hank Williams - Malcolm X - Carol Burnett - Thomas Green Clemson - John Irving - J.R.R. Tolkien - Charles Bronson - Gene Hackman - Robert Hooke - Halle Berry - Eddie Murphy - Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg - Deborah Sampson - Ralph Ellison - California Supreme Court Justice Rose Bird - Eamon de Valera - William Reddington Hewlett - Mother Angelica - Deval Laurdine Patrick - F. Whitten Peters - Henry Talbot - Arthur C. Clarke - Jim Rogan - Frederick W. Alt - Emil J. Freireich - Charlotte Perkins Gilman - Bessie Coleman - Bertrand Russell - Dorothy Andersen - Chiang Kai-shek - Coco Chanel - Anderson Hayes Cooper - Hunter "Patch" Adams - Jack Nicholson - Roald Dahl - Douglas Fairbanks - David Harker - Irving Berlin - Loretta Young - Barbara Stanwick - Steve McQueen - Cher - Wayne Dyer - Sophia Loren - Stephen King - Whoopi Goldberg - Fatty Arbuckle - Dorothea Lange - Gloria Steinem - Gloria Gaynor - Jon Stewart - Bette Davis - Tom Cruise - Bill Cosby - Barry White - Jodie Foster - Ed Bradley - Rickey Henderson....

The term "fatherless" is used in this series as it is in current research and policy rhetoric by the U.S. federal government, DHHS and the National Fatherhood Initiative, most U.S. states in connection with child custody law and policy, and various family values and fatherhood interest policy and lobbying groups.

Sent by thelizlibrary | 10:26 PM ET | 12-18-2007