#RolandMartinUnfiltered - #RMU: The Critically Important Relationship Between Black Fathers And Their Daughters

Episode Date: June 16, 2019

Father's Day is today and it's a good time to talk about how important Father's are in their children's lives. We always talk about sons and Fathers but we don't hear enough about how important the relationship is between Fathers and daughters. Clinical Psychologist, Dr. Nic Alford spoke with Roland Martin and the #RolandMartinUnfiltered panel (Dr. Greg Carr, Chair, Department of Afro-American Studies at Howard University and Michael Brown, Former Vice Chair of the DNC Finance Committee) about the special roll Black fathers play in their daughters' lives. - #RolandMartinUnfiltered partner: 420 Real Estate, LLC To invest in 420 Real Estate’s legal Hemp-CBD Crowdfunding Campaign go to http://marijuanastock.org - ✅ NOW AVAILABLE: #RolandMartinUnfiltered Merch - https://bit.ly/2VYdQok ✅ Subscribe to the #RolandMartin YouTube channel https://t.co/uzqJjYOukP ✅ Join the #RolandMartinUnfiltered #BringTheFunk Fan Club to support fact-based independent journalism http://ow.ly/VRyC30nKjpY ✅ Watch #RolandMartinUnfiltered daily at 6PM EST on YouTube https://t.co/uzqJjYOukP ✅ Join the Roland Martin and #RolandMartinUnfiltered mailing list http://ow.ly/LCvI30nKjuj The Roland S. Martin YouTube channel is a news reporting site covered under Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use. No copyright infringement intended. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. by going to RolandMartinUnfiltered.com. Our goal is to get 20,000 of our fans contributing 50 bucks each for the whole year. You can make this possible. RolandMartinUnfiltered.com. We always talk about, of course, the importance of fathers and their sons, not fathers, and their daughters. Joining us is clinical psychologist, Dr. Nick Alpert.

Dr. Alpert, how you doing? I am doing well. How are you? I'm doing great. I have my father, got my mother, of course, one brother, three sisters. Dr. Alford, how are you doing? I am doing well. How are you? I'm doing great. I have my father, got my mother, of course, one brother, three sisters. And so can you talk about how critical it is, the relationship that exists, a strong bond between a father and daughters? Oh, my goodness. It is so critically important.

It is imperative. Fathers are really for girls, for young women. That's the first man we fall in love with. That is the man who shows us who we are, how beautiful we are, how smart we are, all of the unique qualities that we have. And most importantly, Roland, that is the man that teaches us how men should treat us and how we should relate to men. So it is so incredibly important. Also, I think when you talk about how a bad relationship can be damaging. Look, I've got two nieces. They lived with, I mean, their mother mother was beaten assaulted physically and sexually by their father and they have a bad view of their father, don't want to be around them and as the godfather, I had to be fiercely protective of them and I remember when he got out of prison he wanted to reach out to them and I asked when you know he got out of prison he wanted to

reach out to them and I asked him I said well you still in the game you're still selling drugs he said no I'm not and I said he said I never was I was like first of all dude you lying to me and I made it clear I said you're not going to spend time with my nieces um at all and I said because I have to be protective of them. So the flip side is that that could actually have, I mean, that could have a negative effect and take girls years to go through and get over and deal with that trauma that was inflicted by that man. That is absolutely correct. There is some interesting research that says even an absent father for a young girl or for a boy is better than having a father who is abusive, who is violent,

who has substance abuse, who cannot be available in a healthy and adaptive way. So you are absolutely correct. So what resources would you recommend for a young father to help him and guide him through this that prepares him for how he must cultivate that relationship with their daughter. So, you know, obviously one of the best ways to learn is by seeing, and we learn through modeling, right? And so when you don't have that, you're at a distinct disadvantage. And so what I would say to any young father who is looking to learn how to be a father or to be a better parent just sort of writ large is to find other role models. And we can look for them and find them in myriad places, right, in our churches,

in our colleges and universities. We have professors in our own families, right? We may have grandparents or uncles who are that, who can be role models. Our Black Greek letter fraternities. So I think there are a number of ways. There are parenting classes, many communities and courts, family courts have these types of classes that can help young African-American men. All right, Dr. Nick Alpert, we certainly appreciate it. Thank you so very much. Thank you. All right, Greg and Michael, I want to talk to y'all about this here. It really does piss me off that we spend so much time and energy around Father's Day.

People, Greg, people could be literally in Australia or Thailand and they will kill themselves to get home for Mother's Day. People could be literally in Australia or Thailand, and they will kill themselves to get home for Mother's Day. But they could be in the same city, in the same state Father's Day. Yeah, man, I see them come fast. That's true, brother. I mean, Mother's Day was created in Philadelphia, really. John wanted to make a department store. It's almost like a marketing kind of thing. It kind of emerged. And Father's Day came in many ways as a response to that. But we know in our communities, and I agree with what Dr. Alfred said,

you know, black men are used to not, you know, getting all that affection. But then again, it's probably Father's Night every time a man come home and get that big piece of chicken, like my daddy did for many years but but when dr ever said i said i won't lose track of that i think about the the song what was it the uh the winstons call him father there's a lot of ways you can be a father and i know that on father's days i get texts from like say former students you don't have any biological children i got a couple of god sons and I got my nephew and I know what it means to be an uncle who's there for a male, uh, male, you know, uh, my nephew, you get texts, you get calls and it's kind of an afterthought, but it's almost a running joke in the black community. You know, black man sitting up waiting on getting them calls for real.

So, you know, maybe it's a little sad, but, uh, maybe, maybe we can do something about it, but I don't know maybe maybe you get those calls rolling it is it is frankly offensive michael i'm sorry that how father's day and it's sort of like a blow-off day no big deal you know okay bye yeah you know i'll see you in two or three months uh when the reality is fathers matter just as much as mothers. Well, I tell you, the pressure on males, not just black males, males, to get to the store, get a card, get flowers, make reservation

for Mother's Day brunch, which is, again, fine. That's just what kind of, if you're raised a certain way, that's just how you were raised and it's important. But on Father's Day, it's more of an individual thing. You're thinking, what am I going to do with my day? Not is it, I would love to spend time, I have three sons, I would love to spend time with them, and I do. But, you know, if I get a call from two of the three, that's a good Father's Day. Not that they, and then they'll be like, oh man, today's Father's Day, I need to text Dad. So yes, it is absolutely a different priority relative from the Mother's Day to a Father's Day. And whether that changes or not, I don't know.

I remember growing up, my father used to say to us, Mother's Day is every day. Father's Day is just one day. Maybe you get what you want. Maybe you don't. And so that's just how I was raised with my grandparents. I got to push back on that. If Mother's Day is every day, Father's Day is every day. And I get it, but I really do. And I know somebody probably said, well, the way they can beat the audience.

Because the problem that I have is we literally have a culture that says daddies don't matter. In fact, let me tell you something. This actually happened. I was at, we're a national association of black journalists. We're in Chicago at our convention center a number of years ago. So we're sitting at the table. There's about 10 people at the table. And at the table, there are four lesbians at the table. There's about 10 people at the table. And at the table,

four lesbians at the table. One of them, Latina. Latina. She was talking about how me and my partner, me and my wife, we have a kid and we're raising a kid fine. We don't need a male influence. I don't believe in that. There were two sisters, four lesbians, who said, hold on now, we disagree. We know the importance of our fathers. And they were saying that even if we have kids as lesbians, there has to be a male influence. The dynamic of the conversation was real interesting because these black women saw it totally different in terms of how they feel about this dynamic. I've had this debate even among interracial couples or individuals who have seen me talk about the importance of a man.

But I hear people say, oh, my mama was my daddy. No, she wasn't just like we assume that a father can't be empathetic that a father can't be loving and a father can't be compassionate and so i would never say that a father is a mother and a mother's a father no you are who you are but i think as a society, we literally have created this entire worldview that daddy is optional. No, of course, of course. But I do think that, you know, a lot of it has to do with enslavement. I don't think there is such thing as an American culture. There are many different cultures in this in this state we call america and we look at african people you know you see uh we went through literally particularly when the domestic slave trade explodes in the early 19th century for about 50 years we went through a process where breeding became the way that they

created new people of african descent in this society so you didn't know necessarily who your father was but it had an unintended consequence of creating community mothers and fathers, big mama and them. They weren't necessarily your biological kin. We still see that today. I mean, I'll give you one quick example. At graduation every year, you know, it's very moving to see men embrace their graduate children, particularly the daughters. And I think, again, Dr. Alfred's research is very important in this regard.

When you see these sisters who may not have grown up with their biological father, but then here come their uncles and here come their grandfathers, and you see the pride in these men. There's a certain energy when you get a bunch of men in a circle the same way as when you get a bunch of women. But when you see them come together in those moments of celebration, no one can say that men and fathers are not important. If they've ever been in a space where you see the interaction of that energy in our communities that were attacked biologically but then it expanded our definition of mother and father so no that's probably why those two

sisters pushed back they know what it means to have somebody who's in the father role that may not be the biological parent and that's the thing, Michael, that look, I don't have biological children, but I've raised six of my nieces. I have nine nieces, four nephews. I've raised six of those nine nieces off and on, literally by entire marriage for the last 19 years. And the thing that's interesting, when you talk about that dynamic, when my sister and her two children, one was five, one was two, came to live with us. My wife and I only married about six months.

And I was intentional in terms of how we interacted. Now his was interesting. My nieces couldn't stand when we were affectionate to one another in front of them. And I was like, well first of all, get the hell over to my house. But the reason I was intentional is because

one world view, they saw a black man being physical with their mother. I needed them to see a black man being loving with this wife. I needed that to be corrected. And so when I took the job of the Chicago Defender, it was a hard decision because those four and a half years, five and two, I would be away. And so in the household, it would be my sister, my wife, and then my two nieces. I was serious about the role that male influence and the role that we play.

And so that's why for me, it is deeply embedded in my psyche, in my worldview, the value and the perspective of a son, but I also see it in terms of fully accepting my role as a godfather. If I tell people godfather, it does not mean that I'm going to give you birthday gifts and Christmas gifts. It literally means that if the daddy ain't doing his job, I am to step into the gap

to serve that same role. And I don't know if it's society or a much smaller part of society within your own home of how the dynamic is and how you're raised relative to affection for men. Now, I was raised in a family where the men were very affectionate. I mean, the day I went off to college, my father and I were still kissing each other and hugging each other. And that's just how we were raised. It wasn't abnormal. But when some of my friends would come over and they would see how my father and I interacted, they were like, wow, that was like, yeah, that's how, but that's not how they were raised. They were raised in it. Not that it was wrong, because you can't certainly judge anybody on how they're raised.

It's just different and not right. And it doesn't make it wrong or right. But I was just raised. We were just very affectionate. So with my kids who were three sons. But now that they're at that age, they're like, Dad, please, please, please. But when they were younger, they knew that Dad was going to kiss him goodnight. They knew when they went off to college that dad was going to kiss them goodnight. They knew when they went off to college I was going to kiss them goodbye. Okay, okay, okay. So, Michael, so, Michael, so, Michael, when your son say, dad, please, please, please, what's your response? I don't give a shit.

I still grab him, hug him, grab him in the neck, and I give him a kiss on the cheek. There you go. See, there you go. See, Greg, that's how I roll. All my nieces and nephews know. You walk your ass in the house, I don't speak for my brother

or my three sisters. Your ass don't hug me. You won't greet me. And if you don't, you getting jacked. That's a very black thing. You don't come in the house and not speak, man. That's true. I mean, that's generally speaking.

You can come in the house and speak. Your You don't come in the house and not speak, man. Right. That's true. I mean, that's generally speaking. No, no, no, no, no, no. You can come in the house and speak. Your ass don't come hug me. Oh, now see, yeah, you've taken it to the next level. Now, I'll say this. I don't, you know, we didn't do a lot of hugging. I didn't hug my father a lot. But I'll tell you what. My father went to work every day of his life.

And I watched my father get up 4 a.m. every day for years. Some of my earliest memories as a child in Nashville, my father getting up, whistling, washing his face, going to bed, and then one time we didn't even have a car, he walked to work. And my father, as he became an elder and he transitioned in 2001, he was 79 years old, my father was the kind of man who didn't have a whole lot of words, but he demonstrated and his brother lived across the street, my uncle, and they had 89 children. So, you know, when you saw these men, the affection they showed was through their dedication of what they did every day. My father was like that. And last thing I say is and I really echo what you said about displaying affection in front of children. My father and mother didn't kiss a whole lot in front of us. But you know how we knew that my father loved my mother.

My mother loved my father. It was the little things they did to support each other as they work. And we knew my father got mad. We knew we were in trouble when he would look at us and say, boys, I love your mother. Now, that would usually come after we had done something in the house. And she said, I'm going to tell your father when he comes home. And he'd come in and say, boys, I love your mother. We knew that we had crossed a line with her that couldn't be uncrossed.

But I'm saying there are a lot of ways to show affection. And sometimes it's the subtle things that let you know. And that's why I go to work every day. And ain't nobody going to outwork me, brother. Just like ain't nobody going to outwork you. Because you had a man in the house that showed you what it meant. And that was the way in some ways he displayed love and affection because i know reginald martin senior was the same kind of man and i see i see how hard you work and i know a lot of that comes from you seeing that in

one of the ways that love and affection was displayed for you and the thing for me is i mean it's like i had hug this but it's not like it was a lot it's really not like how i do my my nieces and nephews um but for me it's also it's also a sign of respect, and this is also what you're going to do. And in fact, Michael, I have a couple of my nieces, the two oldest nieces, both in college, and I have one who just graduated. Two just graduated. And so my niece paid nieces, my niece, Faith. So, like my grandfather, I saw my grandfather

and my different of my cousins or whatever, he would grab one and he would kiss him like 30, 40 times in a row. And so, again, seeing that, I actually had done the same thing with a couple of my nieces.

So Faith, just graduated from high school, was going to Howard University in the fall. I didn't say to her, she's like, no, no, no, stop. I said, girl, let me explain something to you. Let me explain something to you. I don't care how old you get. I don't care how old you think. I don't care

if you're married. You understand your uncle is going to show a level of affection to you. And not his whole, but not his whole. And so it's like, no, this is not how it's going to be. And that's how you and, you know, it's interesting you had that conversation because my my niece is 12. And when she was really, really young young we were very very very still very affection affection and family but then i got to she got to a certain age and now i'm wondering

do i need to kind of pare back that affection a little bit so i may be i don't know if i'm overcompensating maybe i need to ask the doctor about if i'm overcompensating right or not but it sounds like maybe i need to have the conversation you had, which is, hey, I don't care how you look, how old you are, who you're dating, who you're going to the prom. Your Uncle Sonny is going to stay up on you and be affectionate with you. And maybe I should do that so then there's no confusion and she understands that. Doc, does that make sense? It makes sense. What Roland did make sense.

I just never thought about how to handle that. That makes sense. Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah. I mean, look, it should happen. And the reason, and again, I know that people, because I'm having some internet issues, I can't pull up the social media. And I know people are saying, man, you're going way too hard on this.

No, let me tell you something. I know a number of brothers whose dad is not here. Mine is 72. My mom will be 72 in November. They're still with me. Michael, you lost your father in a very, very public way in a plane crash. Greg, you lost your father. And what I say to people is

how these brothers miss their fathers, which means you've got to show that love where they're at. That's real. I think Greg, and I want the doctors to be there.

Dear Greg, we've got to get away. And I totally understand your point, Greg. when we say dads, because Chris Rock said in his comment special,, we didn't want to show that affection and how much they meant to us when they were alive. And to me, that's not smart. No, no, that's real. I mean, I'll give a very quick example. There's a brother who's on faculty at Morehouse College. He taught at Fordham University, City College of New York for a number of years. And for the years when I first met him at Temple University, he was actually on my dissertation committee.

His name is Nate Norman. He retired from Temple and moved to Atlanta and then went right back to work. We all call him Pop. He is known all over the world as Pop. Pop see you the first five minutes, he will give you a bear hug. There's not a moment. He does this with his sons. He has two sons, including one who swam for the brother when he knew the movie Pride,

when they talk about Philadelphia PDR, Department of Recreation. The reason that Norman moved to Philadelphia is because his son Mike was an Olympic class swimmer. He was one of the guys who swam for him. And what he demonstrated, to your point, is that I show affection. And one of the reasons that we loved him and love him to this day, and he went to Atlanta and got a whole new crop of young people, these young brothers at Morehouse, is that he going to put his hands on you. Now, in this society, that can be, that line gets a little blurred.

So, again, I'd ask too, Mike, Brother Powell, I'd ask Dr. Albert how we handle this in a society where we're taught now to ask permission and kind of mute, but you have some people, and I think about these men in particular who are affectionate, who not only do that with their biological children, they do that with community children and it creates a safe space. Pop helps everybody and he works and he does all this work and I've never seen anyone in the almost 25 years I've known him that's ever been offended by that. And he is consistent with it.

And I think in this moment, we're in a social moment when I wonder how we protect that kind of affection showing because it can be dicey. I don't know what we do. I don't know the answer to that. Maybe you can help us with it. I think that I agree. I think it's dicey. I think that we are living in a time, in a generational space where people are very unfortunately having to have difficult conversations with their youth, with their kids about appropriate

touches and inappropriate touches. And I think that it's sad. It saddens me. But I could see how a simple bear hug could be misconstrued. I can see that. And so, yeah, I think things have changed greatly generationally, and that's unfortunate. Let me be real clear for all y'all watching.

I got nine nieces, four nephews. Their asses will be getting bear hugs. They will get a bear hug. If I will kiss them on the cheek, I might sit here and give them a noogie on their head. I might do, I will play with them. I will, because I'm telling you. My paternal grandfather is gone. My maternal grandmother is gone.

My maternal grandmother, I did not know my paternal grandfather. I did not know my maternal grandfather, I did not know my paternal grandfather, I did not know my paternal grandfather, I did not know my dad's grandfather. And I can tell you this, I'm lucky to have both my parents still living. But when you talk to people and mamas and daddies are gone Those are the moments they remember Those are the moments that they think about They think about that love That affection, they think about how they talk to them How they rip them

They might get mad at you Why you always playing, why you always joking But when somebody is gone That's what they miss And I just think that for a lot of us I really and truly believe this, we have got to return to a period where daddy's mad.

We've got to be willing to say it. We have to exhibit it. We must apologize for it. We must stop this nonsense in major mass media where daddy is inept, knows nothing, can't take care of a kid, don't know how to fix food, and only mothers know how to do

that. Because those of us who've had fathers who've been that important in our lives, I just think that we make a grand mistake when we marginalize that male figure. And that to me is dangerous. We should not marginalize mama. We should not marginalize daddy. We should not marginalize daddy or that godfather or that uncle if they meant all that to us. So I just think that's pretty important for us to do. Alright folks, back to that Roblox unfiltered video in just one moment.

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