Men To Fathers

August 04 2010

“It sounds like men are just plain lazy and are hopeful that women will carry them along!   Women have discovered their worth, have better people skills, etc. so are taking advantage of it.   Look at Sarah Palin – from small town mayor to governor to perhaps the new leader of the modern feminist movement.  Do you see a similar guy on the horizon?   I don’t.    Most women work harder than men and put forth more effort to get ahead.  (They have to be better or won’t get promoted.)   Let’s face it…you need to tell the guys to get off their duff, get to work, earn an education, act like men!   Lazy won’t get it and women today won’t put up with it…who wants to be married to a lazy guy?”

What can I say?  What dare I say to the response C. B. Overton sent me in reply to last week’s article?  I’ve know CB for 30 years.  We worked together on a project for the United States Army that is still being used as a model that projected many of the things that are happening in our country today.  When we wrote that the Army’s key to a successful recruit was someone who finished high school, it’s mindboggling that more money is spent by researchers to tell us the same thing. Graduating from high school shows a certain tenacity and stick-to-itiveness. Graduating from high school was an indicator recruiters used as they grew the all-Volunteer force.  Graduating from high school was a ticket to other things.  But graduating from high school is not an end in itself.  Education is the rubric by which our young people are being and will be judged.

CB was my boss; a grandmother who as a research sociologist was a trailblazer in the Army.  She competed with men at a time when men were still the majority in the workforce, and things were not easy. There was a glass ceiling that few women were granted entrance.  Most could just see it.  Bea rose above it.  She learned what worked.  Knew like many before and after her, if she didn’t fit a mold, she’d have to adapt.  She did. Even signing her name, C. B., was a way to eschew her way into the hallowed halls of the Pentagon, and many places that were sacrosanct to men.  In the process this driven woman achieved a level of success at home and in the workforce.  In the process, she and her husband, who was a principal at a public school, raised two boys to leave home.  Both young men got degrees, and as Bea often laughed, they may not have liked what she served them but NOW they appreciate it.  Babying boys is the worse things mothers can do, short of not loving their fathers, and Bea didn’t baby either of their sons.

Our younger son asked me if there was anything I regretted in life.  What an opportunity for a life lesson!  What an opportunity to unload on an adolescent that given a different choice, a different opportunity he may not be there.  Sometimes when we listen God gives us answers so profound we wonder who’s speaking.  What did I tell my son? “There is nothing in our lives that we do that we don’t regret, but there is nothing we can do about it, so why worry about it?”

I’ve made plenty of mistakes.  Each day I think God looks down and sees what Archie will do to have him ROTFL.  For you old folks, that’s ‘rolling on the floor laughing.’  You see I know God has a sense of humor, and everyday he gets at least one laugh from me as I make mistakes I’ve never made before.  I travel a road I’ve not taken.  I have a different take on something I’ve never realized before, because God keeps me grounded.

Right now, he’s grounding men.  He’s been doing it for sometime but many men are just getting the gist.  With more women in the workforce than men, nowadays, men have to step up their game or they will be one of those standing on the corner ‘begging.’  I’m not denigrating those who have been humbled to the point of being homeless, but rather I’m extolling men to look out. You got to do something with all the lemons you’ve been picking, particularly if you haven’t learned how to make lemonade.

I go back to Dr. Overton’s comment [an honorary degree I’ve awarded her, as she’s continued to be a bastion of knowledge for me] and as I go back, I realize she’s right.  I don’t see a man like Sarah Palin who has the chutzpah, gravitas or testicular fortitude to get men to rally behind him and say in the inimitable word as the new anchor in ‘Network,’ “I’m mad as hell, and I’m not going to stand for it anymore.”

And we should be, men.  Spending more money for prisons than we spend on education, that’s something to be mad about.  We have states that are going bankrupt and are releasing small time felons because of overcrowding.  Recently, on the nightly news, it was reported by the California’s Department of Finance, California spends $47,000 annually per inmate.  They also reported that the state also spends 2.8 billion ‘more’ dollars on prisons than higher education.  That’s right. California spends only $6.5 billion dollars on higher education, but $9.3 billion dollars on prisons.  Has anyone thought, maybe that why some men may choose prison over an education?  I’m sure that’s not the reason, but tell me what will those prisoners who will be released early do if they can’t find a job, in a job market where there are more senior citizens working than teenagers, something that’s not happened in my lifetime.  These ex-cons can’t be hoping to find a wife to take care of their felonious ‘lazy’ butt.

Men, we have to get tough.  We have to realize as Dr. Overton admonishes, get off your duff, ‘get to work, earn an education, act like men!   Lazy won’t get it…women today won’t…be married to a lazy guy. Then tell me, who will our young boys have to look to as they attempt to become men who want to be fathers?  Think about it!

“‘if they feel God has deserted them,’ do they think it’s because God left them, or they left God?”

Father Max [p. 38]

from “Murder Behind Closed Doors” by Jere Myles

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Men To Fathers

June 16 2010

“If you don’t tell them, they don’t know, and if you don’t listen, you’ll never know what they are thinking,” is our comment for the day.

It’s not easy to be a child today.  They’re bombarded with all kinds of choices, media, options, and techniques of how to succeed, where to go, why to go there and what will happen if you don’t.  Roles have shifted and in today’s society kids are accosted by rewards they don’t earn, accolades they don’t understand, and teachers who are flummoxed because of all the barriers society places in front of them.

When asked why you want a job, most kids say to buy things.  They’re not taught jobs are a means to an end that go far beyond buying things.  Many young people want IPODs, IPADs or IPHONES.  They get a job to buy one and then quit.  Many realize with the exception of the IPHONES they have completed the process.  They own access.  With the IPHONES, if they can buy it, many parents take up the responsibility of paying for the convenience, the fad, or ‘being like their friends.’ There is little teaching in this process, and rather than understanding the virtue of teaching the responsibility off paying their own way, we acquiesce to a common flaw—we want to be liked.  Why make them pay for something they have not earned? Would our parents have done that?  As parents we sometime forget we are who we are because of our parents, and granted our parents weren’t perfect, but you are where you are because of who your parents were as much as in spite of your parents.  Never forget that.

Today many young men don’t know how to be men because many women have taken that from us.  Go to any meeting today and how many women do you see wearing pants.  Take that one step further…how many of these same meetings do you go to and see men in dresses.  A simple observation but fill of the meritocracy we claim to have become.  If women thrust themselves into roles that previously were occupied by men, then what are the men to do?  What many men are doing in response is not showing up.  When a woman considers my opening a door for her as a sign of disrespect, I should realize and tell my sons the same, that’s her issue not mine.  But fewer and fewer men are opening doors, and fewer and fewer women are expecting that.  Roles have changed.

Being rewarded for showing up isn’t what it’s all about either.  If you have a job and don’t show up, you get fired.  That’s a given.  But if you are the father of a child and you don’t do what you are supposed to do, something more devastating than getting fired happens.  That child grow up with a view of his dad that will take a generation to erase, even longer if it’s been a cycle where many women don’t want the fathers in their children lives anyway even though statistics show that of the men in prison,  85% of youth in jail & 71% of high school dropouts are from fatherless homes.  When an absent father is accorded this moniker, it’s important to know who gave it, why, and if it’s true.  Many fathers can’t be there because momma won’t let them.  That’s a shame, and these fathers need to fight for the right to keep their children from being a statistic.

Our education is ridden with barriers that are intimidating to teachers.  When you have a child who wants to learn, you find a way.  When you have an idea whose time has come, you find a way.  When you look at the education system as one that is flawed, you need to examine are you part of the solution or not?  During the ‘separate but equal’ era, teachers fought against the odds.  Student like me received some of the best education out there because teachers found a way.  Students like me achieved success because teachers fought for an education that was hard from them to get and they wanted us to be sure we knew education and keeping your ‘eye on the prize’ was important.  Ask kids today, not if they are going to college but rather the question should be ‘what college are you going?’  Having low expectations gets you exactly that…low expectations.  Remember, it’s not easy being a child, but it’s going to be even harder being an adult if we don’t prepare them.

Recently I had a heart-to-heart talk with both our sons.  My younger son needed to understand the concept of apologizing.  I told him it went beyond just saying ‘you’re sorry.’ He wanted to argue.  He wanted to tell me what he knew.  He wanted me to shut up.  As my voice began to rise I told him he needed to listen.  I explained that if he kept doing the same thing he told me he was sorry for, he was clueless.  I told him if he made the same play each time on a video game that got him killed, he’d always get killed and until he listened or paid attention, nothing would change.  Waiting to be told to do the same thing you knew you were responsible to do, like chores, and being sorry each time you were reminded didn’t indicate anything was learned, and if he didn’t MAN up and learn something, he’d be punished.

My older son’s conversation was a bit more adult.  He was dissed at his job for being insignificant–he didn’t matter.  Rather than listen to this crap, he quit.  I asked him who did he think that helped?  My adult conversation castigated him on when you do things that affect people other than yourself in a ‘bad’ way, call someone first before being stupid. Words can only hurt if you let them.  Eleanor Roosevelt tells us that “no one can make you feel inferior except yourself.”

I’m not sure if these conversations registered and they may not resonate for a few days, but the important thing is have them, listen, and remember, as parents, particularly fathers, ours is to provide as well as protect, and teaching is a large part of that.  Keeping the truth from them, making it easy for them only makes it harder later. It’s never too late to say sorry, but it’s always too early to quit, particularly teaching boys to become men.

“That’s where the confusion comes in. Most of them have not left God. They’ve simply left a church that distorts teachings interpreted by men based on some anachronistic fear of being wrong.”

Father Max [p. 38]

from “Murder Behind Closed Doors” by Jere Myles

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Men To Fathers

April 16 2010

Peg Tyre, in her article, The Boy Crisis, indicated something that merits being added here, even though she mentioned it four years ago, but still we are not listening. “A boy without a father figure is like an explorer without a map.”  Family therapist and author Michael Gurian goes further by saying that “an older man reminds a boy in a million different ways that school is crucial to their mission in life.”  And the mission in life for all of us right now is to save our boys. But we are failing.

We are failing by not challenging our boys, our teachers, and our men.  It’s a trifecta that affects our schools, and is already affecting our economy in the worst imaginable way.  Presently our colleges are attracting fewer and fewer boys.  High school dropouts, poor grades, and discipline issues continue to dominate the lives and situation of men more and more.

Hearing teacher offer window dressing on why we can’t keep boys in schools, or how administrators weaken their teachers by saying we can allow single-gendered classes isn’t acceptable.  We need to realize if we don’t wake up, our country will die.  Former President Bush’s call for 70,000 more teachers for our schools four years ago so we could be more competitive seemed to hit the nail on its head.  What happened to that plan? I don’t know. But what was wrong with it to begin with? Having more teachers is good.  But if we don’t have the right kind of teacher we will still be trying to use round-block solutions to solve square-hole problems.  And the problem is how to get men more involved in the lives of our boys.

Where does this start?  It starts with common sense.  People…teachers and parents need to realize what the studies are showing.  Our boys are getting lost in a school system that doesn’t seem to recognize there is a problem. If we don’t realize there is a problem, no one will work toward resolving.  If we don’t realize having more men teachers is part of the solution nothing will happen to correct that.  Our boys are getting lost in a bureaucratic oligarchy that doesn’t understand the need for more male role models to help our young men see and help them plan for their future.  There are 44% fewer males going to college now than 30 years ago. More boys are going to prison now than ever, and soon inmates rather than classmates will create another entitlement program to support families we cannot afford with the over abundance of red ink in our federal budget Our priorities are wrong, if we are more set on bailing out Wall Street than we are at encouraging Main Street..

Part of the answers and the challenges are to find the money to give teachers more money.  If we give the teachers more money then we will attract more men into a teaching profession where currently over 70% are white females.  If we want to relate to our boys, we need men in their lives at all levels, but the first stop after the home is school.  Let’s face it. In today’s economy, a father can barely feed his family on a teacher’s salary.

I’m not going to ask Washington for diddly. I challenge men at the grass-root level, fathers and husbands to get involve in local school.  Challenge teacher to be more understanding to the needs of boys.  And for those of you who can– take a pay cut…become a teacher, I did, after 20 years in the Army.  Why?  Because I hope, I can make a difference in some young man’s life, as more male teachers can make a difference.

Men, our mission should be to save our boys, and as Richard Bach said, “Here’s a test to see if your mission in life is complete. If you’re alive, then it isn’t.”  Nothing should be more important to you right now than finding a way to make a difference in the life of some young boy you know.  Find a way and start now! Realize if we don’t do something, we will be on our way to divorcing our kids.

It’s been stated that the number one predictor of divorce is the habitual avoidance of conflict.  The sad thing is we avoid conflict because we believe it will cause divorce. Like the cartoon where the couple explains to the marriage counselor, “We never talk anymore. We figured out that’s when we have all our fights.” We have to learn to agree to disagree, otherwise our kids are lost.  We have to step up and realize change begins with us dads.  Our boys need us.  Our country needs us.  And we need us.  People are truly afraid of men getting organized, and it’s because when we have a plan, no one can execute better.

So what is our plan?  What about showing up?  What about starting individual groups focused on male education?  What about showing non-believers we can give them something to believe.  Men do care.  Men do want a change.  Men realize we are part of the solution, and the simple answer here is:  show up; be an example; and realize…we can’t continue to let women do their work and ours too.  If we do, then we may as well put on heels and fall down, because we have abrogated our responsibility to patriarch our young men into being the fathers and men we need to make our country great.

“If I’m different because of what some busybody said. If you’re convinced I’ve changed, that I don’t love

you anymore, or I’m no longer your child, then yes, I guess I am one of ‘them.’ But I guess that makes you one of them too.”

Suzie Moore [p. 20]

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Men to Fathers

February 15 2010

“The seminal event to the 20th century,” is what Brad Lemee calls Woodstock as he talks about the picture a 17 year old boy, Dan Garson took.  Dan Garson later died at 40 but left behind a legacy of one of the largest outdoor concerts ever. It changed many people’s lives.  Captured on film and on vinyl, it’s a reminder of a time gone by. But as we look into the mirror, ask yourself what is the seminal event of the last decade and how do you figure it will change the future?

As we move toward the new decade, and the New Year, I want to share something about health, personality, society and life you might want to read.  It was sent to me that I think each of us should take time to read, and then it’s your choice.

Recently I sustained a small accident.  My friends indicated that there are easier ways of getting out of work, but the fact remains, men need to look out for their health and in that regard, here are some things for you to consider:

1.      Drink plenty of water. We were told to drink eight glasses when we grew up.  2.  Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince and dinner like a beggar. None of us are getting younger and weight can contribute to a bit of baggage we could do without. 3.  Eat more foods that grow on trees and plants and eat less food that is manufactured in plants.  It’s healthier.  4.  Live with the 3 E’s — Energy, Enthusiasm and Empathy.  We men generally have no problem with the first two, but we could start by sharing how to learn to be in the moment to enjoy the first two, especially with our families. 5.  Make time to pray. The operative word here is ‘make.’  We mean well, and we think that God will make time for us.  He doesn’t make time for us, He generally just waits.  Pray.  6.  Play more games. I think we know this one by heart, but it’s generally who and what we play that’s important. 7.  Read more books than you did in 2009. Hopefully it’s more than two, otherwise…what a waste!  8.  Sit in silence for at least 10 minutes each day. Try working some enthusiasm in here!  9.  Sleep for 7 hours. It’s a fact, we have become sleep deprived, and if you want to be on the edge…fail to get adequate amounts of sleep. 10.. Take a 10-30 minutes walk daily. While you walk, smile.

Personality: 11.  Don’t compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about. As Max Ehrmann reminds us with Desiderata, you will become vain and bitter .12.  Don’t have negative thoughts or things you cannot control. Instead invest your energy in the positive present moment. Remember, you are the change you want to see in the world. 13.  Don’t overdo. Keep your limits. It will be there tomorrow, and if it doesn’t get done, as I’ve learned it won’t kill you. 14.  Don’t take yourself so seriously. No one else does. This is where being able to laugh is important, and why we pay psychiatrists so much and pay so much to see Robin Williams or Whoopi Goldberg .15.  Don’t waste your precious energy on gossip.  Will it change anything? 16.  Dream more while you are awake. We all have the potential to be a Susan Doyle, with or without the eyebrows. 17.  Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need. 18.  Forget issues of the past. Don’t remind your partner with his/her mistakes of the past. That will ruin your present happiness. This is key, and should be posted on your refrigerator on your forehead.
19.  Life is too short to waste time hating anyone.  Yet we do.  Parents, children, republicans or democrats, it doesn’t matter don’t hate others. 20.  Make peace with your past so it won’t spoil the present.  21.  No one is in charge of your happiness except you. No one can change you but you! 22.  Realize that life is a school and you are here to learn. Problems are simply part of the curriculum that appear and fade away like algebra class but the lessons you learn will last a lifetime. Every house we have built, I’ve had to use fractions. 23.  Smile and laugh more.  24.  You don’t have to win every argument, agree to disagree. Learn to let go!

Society: 25.  Call your family often. They may come a day when they are all that you have. 26.  Each day give something good to others. It doesn’t hurt. 27.  Forgive everyone for everything, imagine the weight you are carrying by refusing to lighten the load. 28.  Spend time with people over the age of 70 and under the age of 6. Both can teach you how much you don’t know.  I know. 29.  Try to make at least three people smile each   day. Especially after you read this. 30.  What other people think of you is none of your business. Stay out of it and remember you can’t make people love you. 31.  Your job won’t take care of you when you are sick. Your friends will. Stay in touch. Nothing is worse than to be in need and have no one to fill that, or to want to be needed and to be denied the opportunity.

Life: 32.  Do the right thing! If you don’t know what that is, ask someone over 70 or under 6. 33.  Get rid of anything that isn’t useful, beautiful or joyful. 34.  GOD heals everything.  35.  However good or bad a situation is, it will change. That’s why there’s prayer and therapy. 36.   No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and   show up. This is something we need to teach by doing, especially to our young men. 37.   The best is yet to come. 38.   When you awake alive in the morning, thank GOD for it. Duh?  Who else would you? 39.   Your Inner most is always happy. So, be happy.  You have the power to create, so do that.

Hopefully this has given you something to think about.  Read it.  Relish it.  I encourage you to share it, and live it as we remember, “Yesterday is history, tomorrow a mystery, and today is a gift, that’s why they call it the present.”  Take it, use it and give it to those we love, especially the young trying to be grow into adults.

Archie R. Wortham, PhD
Educator & Writer

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Men To Fathers

December 17 2009

The bell still rings for me as it does for all who truly believe,” writes Chris Van Allsburg in The Polar Express.

“Never undervalue gratitude” I told our older son.  People do things for us all the time, and there are things in front of us we refuse to see. What better way to begin the 1st of my traditional holiday series as we remember before we go a step further, “things don’t change, we change.” Thoreau tells us that.  So whenever I get the chance, to share this story I do. It’s part of a ritual each year for me to either introduce or reintroduce it to those who read the column regularly.  Van Allsburg’s story reminds me of a time I think we all have forgotten.  It reminds me of a time when we have allowed too much negativism to enter our lives and forget about why we should do good.

Allsburg’s story reminds me, whether we are in a recession or not that our lives seem more touched by tragedy than by goodness.  We have the pleasure of living in a country that’s free. We forget that. We have the opportunity to see our kids grow to fulfill their dreams.  We forget that. For those of us who can enter any door of any establishment, we must not forget.  We must remember having to go to the back door of some establishments, have fountains we could drink from, or enlist to fight for a country that didn’t acknowledge our personal freedoms to vote, hold office, or marry who we loved.  We’ve come along way, and part of that has been become many of us whose blood, sweat and tears earned us a place in the most hallowed walls of our country never stopped hearing that bell.  I love The Polar Express, and next week I’ll talk more about how important gratitude is not just one day a year, but today I want to talk about being free to do the right thing, because it is the right thing.

Daily, either on TV or in the newspaper people I see or read about those who would rather be seen as victims, than share what they still have and possibly could become if they weren’t so jaded.  But we all are victims.   Everyday we choose not to do something nice makes us a victim to a society that has become jaded.  Jaded by politicians.  Jaded by TV and movies.  Jaded by the music we listen to and the icons we adore.  Jaded by dads who would rather father than be fathers.  Jaded by mothers who would rather leave their babies on the street, kill them in their womb, or keep them rather than let somebody [more able] raise them.  Does it sound like I’m angry?

I am, but I have mellowed a bit in my anger over the years, as I’ve tried to give back.  I’m angry at every person who has to wait for something bad to happen to do good, so I started doing more good.  That mellowed me.  I’m angry at every teacher who only contacts parents when their children are doing something wrong, rather than telling them when they’ve done something right, so I started going to some of these schools and acknowledging some of the children, and those teachers who needed to be encouraged, they were doing something right.  That mellowed me.   I’m angry everyone seems to wait for an Elf Louise, or ‘secret Santa’ to brighten the lives in our neighborhood, our offices, even our homes so I started my own ritual. I started putting out dollars in various places for people to find to make them think something they should know:  They’re special.  God loves them.  Things don’t change, we change.

The message in the book is about faith and belief.  It is a message “for all who truly believe.”  Each year as Christmas has gotten closer, I’m amazed at how my anger dissipates as I learn to believe in the things I’d forgotten to believe in.  Each year seems to bless me with being able to experience childhood I’d forgotten.  When kids really did believe they could grow up to be president.

Many of the experiences which made me who I am came before I realized I was an okay person, who, like dew at dawn I had a purpose and was destined to do something that made a difference, that no matter how strong the winds that bend us are, we can withstand it.   Me?  I grew, in many cases, marching to a different drummer.  It was a drumbeat that changed as I changed.  The little drummer boy I became seemed only to come alive when I could hear the bell–that ever so often fell silent. And why?  What caused the silence? I don’t really know.  Maybe it was because I didn’t want to think the bell had lost it ringer.  Maybe it was because I was too involved in trying to be something I was not, and I didn’t allow others to be with me. Maybe it was because I was scared.  That’s a big one!  Especially as I grew up as a black man.

Scared I was the only one listening for the bell to ring. Scared I could be wrong and everyone else was right. Scared I could never measure up to what society, my family or I expected of myself. Scared my faith was mislaid. But somehow my faith overcame my fear because I want my kids to see and hear every drumbeat I make, and I want to see theirs.  Kids are a powerful reminder that what I believe…they too will believe. What I ignore…they too will ignore as unimportant, insignificant, and meaningless. I became aware that an absence of laughter in their lives was because laughter was lacking in my own. I mellowed.  I started laughing.

Men are poor at telling things like it is.  But when things get tough, men can stand up to the plate, and swing.  We may not hit a home run, but for the most part, that’s not what our families want of us.  They merely want us to Stand up to the plate.  So stand up now.  Make a decision.  Do something that makes your child proud, as an offering out of love, and appreciation that you can do this without being forced. Just like “our father” did for us.

Remember it is more blessed to give than receive…so in honor of your child, why not give a dollar or a hug to someone, with a note, “Pay it Forward.” God did.

“…the biggest hurdle we have to leap is the one we place in front of ourselves. No one cares if you live or die unless you care.”
from Murder on the Pier,” by Jere Myles, [p. 142]

Archie R. Wortham, PhD
Educator & Writer

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Men To Fathers

October 20 2009

“You do what you have to do, but we need milk,” Denzel Washington’s wife tells him in the remake of “Pelham 123.” Sometimes we are faced with adversity and it’s then we step up to the plate and do what needs to be done to take care of our families. Education has always been the best cure to many of our ills. Many choose not to see that, and in the process the values many of us held as more precious than gold has been tarnished by the things many have chosen as replacements, such as clothes, cars and concubines.   I wrote that last week.
This week I’d like to focus on the “cultural shift in many communities that makes it downright un-male to be studious, while we’ve celebrated the academic achievement of girls.  The pendulum has swung too far…it’s time to find balance—perhaps for the first time.”  Those words belong to Mary Broaderick, president of the Connecticut Association of School Boards.
Author John McWhorter’s commented similarly as he talked about therapeutic alienation, where people, because of insecurity disassociate themselves with what’s going on around them. Ironically, that’s happening in many communities today, where education was once important, it is now shrouded by an idea it is downright un-black to do anything that might be associated with being white, like getting good grades, living in the ‘burbs, getting off welfare, planning on going to college or even becoming president.
I realize those comments might be a bit strong, but not in light of the political fabric facing us today, and no stronger than the comments of Dr. Bill Cosby who told the women of Spellman College a couple of years ago that the black race has nothing left but its women, partly because too few black males are graduating from high school. Cosby went on to say these are the same male students who “have memorized the lyrics of very difficult rap songs…and know how to send their sperm cells out and then walk away from the responsibility of something called fatherhood.”  And that’s the connector. The connector for Dr. Cosby’s words and those of Mary Broaderick and as President Obama recently related, the connector is—fatherhood.  And why has this happened?  It’s because many men today have abrogated their responsibility encouraged by a feminist society who don’t believe its men can accomplish the great things our ancestors created.  And that leads me to somewhat take an issue with Dr. Cosby’s comments as I think maybe women have been too much in the front, so many men have felt unneeded and unwanted as I ask where have all the women gone?
And don’t give me any bull.  If nothing else, your ancestors left you to do better than they did, and if you don’t think you can…then you can’t, or rather won’t.  I’m riled.  I’m riled as I also think about how Jesse Jackson commented last year that Barack Obama talked down to black people and that he [Jesse] wanted “to cut his balls off.”  How soon we forget!!  Have we lost sight of what the education system has been doing ever since we desegregated the schools and took so many of the black teachers out…in an effort to reflect the school population?  With that…so many of the dreams we nourished and nurtured vanished!
I began to wonder if boys today have dreams, and if they do…do they believe in their dreams as fewer and fewer take up the gauntlet and try, even graduate from high school. I question their commitment, which for many run as far as their immediate gratification of success, success predicated on a ‘dollar made’ a ‘pat on the back,’ or a beautiful ‘ride.’ They seem to forget in this hard world that one ‘aw-shucks’ wipes away a whole barrels of ‘attaboys.’  We have to be careful about that dream.  Many used to dream of becoming a Supreme Court Justice.  Then we got Thurgood Marshall.  Some dreamed of becoming an astronaut, then we got Robert Henry Lawrence, Jr.  We even had women who might have dreamed of become Secretary of State, and then we got Condoleezza Rice.  Damn.  Then we dreamed of the White House.  Is it over now?
It wasn’t easy getting where we are.  But it’s not over yet.  If we don’t realize how little we have accomplished, we will be lulled into thinking we’ve made it, when we haven’t.  There are many in the wings who think because we are in the White House, we have had our run, that we need to be reminded of our place.  But where is our place?  What is our place?
Today I look at many of those women and I ask as the Peter Seeger asked “Where have all the young girls gone?”  They have been hidden.  They have burned bras.  They have stormed the White House.   Most subtly they have discarded the dresses they used to wear, and not only put on pants, many of them are wearing them in houses where men are ominously absent.  As society and researchers ask where all the young men are?  Many of them have gone to war because that’s the only place many feel they can be men anymore. That’s a shame.
It’s a shame because we need them to keep young men off the street.  It’s a shame because they are needed in the classroom where there has been a significant decline in the number of men in the classroom, which is currently at a 40 year low.  It’s a shame because as I notice in my classroom, male enrollment is at an all-time low and it’s continuing to decline.  Women are outdistancing men in college and the same is true in the professional arenas of medicine as litigators. Many women are even choosing sperm donors over actual men. Women don’t need us.  Do they?
I don’t know.  But until we ask them…we won’t find out.  Until they ask us…they won’t find out. But the cultural shift that has happened in many communities makes it downright un-female to be feminine, wear dresses and celebrate the academic achievement of boys.  Until we become mutually respectful, celebrate the achievement of both, we won’t have the renaissance of male involvement we so desperately need.  “The pendulum has swung too far…it’s time to find balance—perhaps for the first time,” as we find out where have all the graveyard of men gone?

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Men to Fathers

August 18 2009

“They can be great people Kal-El.  They wish to be.  They only lack the light to show the way,”   Jor-El tells his son in “Superman Returns.”  That’s something for all of us to mull over this summer, as it applies to parents, teachers and especially students.

Greatness is elusive.  Nevertheless, our search for greatness and be enlightened by it are things that should never be diminished. “You do what you have to do, but we need milk,” Denzel Washington’s wife tells him in the remake of “Pelham 123.” Sometimes we are faced with adversity and it’s then we step up to the plate and do what needs to be done to take care of our families. Education has always been the best cure to many of our ills. Many choose not to see that, and in the process the values many of us held as more precious than gold has been tarnished by the things many have chosen as replacements, such as clothes, cars and concubines.

It’s ironic how those things we choose to value change our entire perspective as it becomes clear what we view as important.  The irony is our kids reflect our values.  When we as a parent or teacher see that, and don’t like what we see, do we ask how that happened?  When we lower the bar, and make it so easy to cross what have we accomplished?  More graduates?  Less conflict?  When we become scared of our shadows, we fail to realize the fear our kids have when one day they discover how ill prepared we’ve allowed them to become.

Oh…I’ve heard many of the excuses.  He doesn’t know how to do that…meaning mothers want an excuse to keep their kids babies as they maneuver a certain degree of control that often evolves into conflict when fathers try to make men out of sons who are able to carry their own weight. The tragedy of this can be seemed in boomerang children who are robbing their parents of their retirement in an attempt to make their child’s road easier than the road they traveled.  Am I making sense?  And the worse manifestation of this are schools where the dumbing-down process allows many students to take AP classes just so they wouldn’t have to be in the general population. You know what I mean!  If I can get an 80 in an AP class, that’s the same as a 90 in a regular class.  And we wonder why scores decline.

Teachers and parents have menaced our young people by becoming too permissive, allowing privilege to take away power, and in the process enabling children to be pitiable.  Many parents are raising a pack of whining, overly indulged babies who have no intention of taking care of anyone but themselves.  And if your children have not given any indication they are willing to give something back, then take notice to what I’m saying.  We don’t groom a Warren Buffet every day, but more important, when we start siding with Hip-Hop artist who capitalize on degrading women and marginalizing our vocabulary by using words we can’t repeat, then we create Gomorrahs in our communities.

So how do we stop this? I have one word, and it begins with an F and ends with a K.  We bring on the heavy artillery to put fires out.  We create a need and desire that is so passionate we can scale any building that’s burning and reacquaint ourselves with the same fire our parents had for education.  We call on the firetruck that stirred our ancestors and move toward the light, inspiring our kids to lead, rather than follow like blind dumb sheep.

Vanessa Rodriguez, a former Fox Tech graduate, eloquently eulogized the possibilities by admonishing parents from asking, “Are you going to college?” To resurrect this urge for higher education, parents and counselors should be asking, “Where are you going to college.”  It’s the old adage, if you have no idea of where you’re going, how do you know when you’ve arrived?  Ms. Rodriguez rightly asserted that one factor that contributes to the lack of college-bound teens is a lack of parental involvement.  I would additionally stress that the lack of paternal involvement should be mentioned at every opportunity to make sure teachers know both parents care, and more importantly, that college aspirants know that both parents care.

In our home, we surround our sons with the gospel that “Education is essential, and college is an expectation.”  It’s never too early, nor is it ever too late to stress this, as parents help their kids see the light.  We engage ourselves, rather than just hope.  We talk to people we know, rather than wait for them to contact us.  We live the thought that if you want to have what I have, then do what I did to get it.  Moreover, tell them they can do even better!

There are easy ways to do this.  Start making kids do more. Chores have their place, right next to consequences that should exist as reminders that attitudes have to be monitored, and simple tasks can help that.  Chores are important and there is no need for an allowance with these. Meeting with teachers early is another way to generate interest in college, and prohibit the possibilities of wrong choices based on incomplete or inaccurate information.

I would like to see a group of dads do something Ms. Rodriquez alluded by having periodic sessions where students met and talked about college, especially the work necessary to fill out application, write essays and understand that where you go is almost as important as going. If any of you are interested in doing something like this in your community, if this is the light you needed, then move toward it. There are many organizations in San Antonio trying to do this:  Nippy Betz and Empowering 21; Claudette Lewis and the Cherice Cochrane Foundation, and Devethia Thompson of the National Society of Black Engineers are just a few.

As our sons move closer to becoming men, we must realize, if we want them to achieve to be great, we must let them see what lit our paths.  They must know what we value; what we dream; that if they want the world to be their oyster. It takes a lot work to become its pearl; and even more to become a man who can take care of a family, as we men should be grooming our boys to do.

“There is too much hate in the world….if I tried to affirm that I was the only one right I would be as narrow-minded and self-righteous as you want to accuse the church.” -Jon Rose
from Murder on the Pier,” by Jere Myles, [p. 171]

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Men to Fathers – “Has America Overcome?”

June 10 2009

“Racism is coming out of the closet as people realize we have not overcome.”

It’s been more than forty years since I graduated from high school.  I went to a segregated high school.  My teachers reflected my culture.  When I graduated from high school, I had had a male teacher, at least one, in each of my years in high school.  They knew the people who raised me.  The members of my church knew my teachers and the people in my neighborhood were strong supporters and believed that one day I would be judged by the content of my character, not my color.  I knew growing up that one day we would see a black man in the White House who lived there, rather than cleaned the halls, or was a guest at state dinner.  That was a dream.

I remember reading two books while I was in high school that typified what I feel our country is experiencing.  One book was by Irving Wallace—The Man. The other book was by Sammy Davis, Jr., called Yes I Can! These books told stories that apply even today.  Wallace’s book, more than 49 years ahead of its time was about a black man becoming president.  It talked about how the country dealt with the rule of succession, because Douglas Dilman, was not elected, but became presidents as result of an accident.  The vice-president had died, and before the senate could  confirm a new vice-president, an accident took the lives of the Speaker of the House, and the president.  Dilman was the president pro-temp of the senate.  It was an education for me, and made me think at the age of 16 that maybe I could become presidents.  That’s what dreams are all about, things being presented in a way they inspire.

Yes I Can, the autobiography of Sammy Davis Jr., talks about how he struggled to become an entertainer in an environment where blacks didn’t have it easy.  It addressed the anger and humiliation he suffered in the military, and the fact that he took up fighting to get revenge on a white soldier that had beat him up.  Davis Jr., was achieved a skill level where he was able to fight back.  He was in the Army, an organization where desegregation occurred earlier than it did in schools.  The severity of the subsequent beating from Davis, Jr., didn’t resolve anything.  As the white bigot told Sergeant Davis, you are still a nig—.

As we fight our personal battles, the thing many of us seem to forget in the era of hope, new beginning and change is that many of the dreams we once had, have not come to fruition.  A member of a different race residing in a house on the same block does not change the fabric of the community unless the community allows that to happen. The tenant does the same things.  They breathe the same air, drink the same water, and believe in a country their ancestors believe.  However there are some who can’t wrap their minds around this.  There are some who still think only some people can discuss certain issues.  There are some people who can’t conceive of the content of one’s character meaning that people of a different sex or color can be just as smart, just as fair, or just as good as the previous owners.

I hesitate to judge Mr. Obama too soon or too harshly.  I also hesitate to judge Mr. Bush too soon or too harshly.  History is the better score keeper than I ever can be, become my life has not even stretched a generation.  I will however not hesitate to judge those who judge me for my thoughts, or even worse, for the color of my skin, and haven’t even gotten to know me.  That’s sad.  That’s unconstitutional and illegal.  I expect to be treated as well as Miranda was treated, and my right read to me my rights before I’m assailed as a person who doesn’t deserve to be in a class for Mensa students, or in a congregation for people who don’t believe in my God, or denied the opportunity to compete for a position because my ancestors were forced to come to this country, rather than to have paid for my own passage as a freed man.

We were told, as black people, we needed to prepare ourselves for the future by getting an education.  We were told a ‘mind was a terrible thing to waste.’ Education is probably our most underdeveloped resource in America, regardless of race creed or color.  We saw teachers who reflected us when our schools were segregated and we heard everyday, “if I can do it, you can.”

What are we seeing today with a teaching force that doesn’t reflect America?  What are we doing today with schools that intentionally allow students who don’t meet standards in classes that were supposedly limited to a select few, regardless of color?  What do we do when we still have people questioning our integrity because I don’t look like them, talk like them or believe like them?  Is this  the America our ancestors died for?  Is this the country our constitution fashioned when they talked about inalienable rights?   When we can’t refer to Mr. Obama, without thinking of him first as black, we have indeed failed to meet the challenges we can be proud of, and yield to the unfortunate piracy of Neanderthal thinking.  It’s sinister.  It’s reproachable.  Most of all, it’s un-American.

I think as the country continues to find itself, as we try to move toward not mortgaging our children’s future, if we can address the concerns of what made us great can make us greater. I think we will pass on to our children a future as recent figures tell us this:  among the people who are unemployed, 12.6% don’t have a high school diploma; 8.3% do, and those that have a college degree, only 4.1% are unemployed.  Racially, blacks are the most undereducated, and unemployed with an unemployment rate of 13.8%, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistic.  The facts haven’t changed.  We have not overcome, and if we don’t get back in the classrooms there will be less opportunities for any person of color to follow in the footsteps of any president, not just a black one.

“Change begins in the hearts of me.  That’s where the heart of the church is”
-Jonathan Rose

from Murder on the Pier,” by Jere Myles, [p. 36]

Archie R. Wortham, PhD
Educator & Writer

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Men to Fathers: Racism…What We’ve Learned

April 04 2009

By Archie Wortham

“My father hated people who preached about morality. We’re all good when it suits us…that doesn’t count. It’s when you want so badly to do something wrong—when you’re about to make a fortune from a dishonest deal…or lie to get yourself out of terrible trouble—that’s when you need rules. Your integrity is like a sword…you shouldn’t wave it until you’re about to put it to the test,” Sister Caris, a nun, says on page 545 of Ken Follett’s book ‘World Without End’ when confronted with why would she give someone starving the last of her food.

Is that the situation we’re facing now? Is America asking us to get up off our behinds to help each other? Is it criminal to help our fellowman by taking from Peter to pay Paul? Is the racial divide broadening or are we just being lead to believe that as long as we are doing well, we don’t have to worry about those who are not, particularly if it doesn’t take any bread off our table? I can’t be sure.

But one thing for sure, giving handouts is not the same as giving a hand up. Empowering others is not the same as enabling them. And we must be weary of change for change sake, as opposed to programs that will in fact effect change, and the people who might want to resist that. Some of us have worked hard to get ahead, and there is nothing wrong with giving others the knowledge to do the same, but be cognizant that there are
many who don’t want minorities, whether they are men, women, black or white to succeed if it will affect their status. Each of us deserve to be free, but sometimes those that get freed deny others the same rights or chances.

Consider what someone sent me about a scene that supposedly happened on a British Airways flight between Johannesburg and London.

A well-off white South African woman, about 50 years old, was seated next to a Black man. Obviously disturbed by this, she called the air Hostess. “Madam, what is the matter,” the Hostess asked. “You obviously do not see it then?” she responded. “‘You placed me next to a Black man. I can’t possibly sit next to this disgusting human. Give me an alternative seat.’

“Please calm down Madam.” the stewardess relied. “The flight is very full today, but I’ll tell you what I’ll do-I’ll go and check to see if we have any seats available in club or first class.” The woman cocks a snooty look at the black man beside her (not to mention many of the surrounding passengers). A few minutes later the stewardess returned with the news, which she delivers to the lady, who cannot help but look at the people around her with a smug and self satisfied grin: “Madam, unfortunately, as I suspected, economy is full. I’ve
spoken to the cabin services director, and club is also full. However, we do have one seat in first class.”

Before the lady has a chance to answer, the stewardess continues … “It is most extraordinary to make this kind of upgrade, however, and I have had to get special permission from the captain. But, given the
circumstances, the captain felt that it was outrageous that someone be forced to sit next to such an obnoxious person.” With which, she turned to the black man sitting next to the woman, and said: “So if you’d like to get your things, sir, I have your seat ready for you…” At which point, apparently the surrounding passengers stood and gave a standing ovation while the black guy walks up to the front of the plane.

What’s important here is that… people will forget what you said…people will forget what you did….but people will never forget how you made them feel. I’ll admit the veracity of this story has not been proven, but it still tells us that though some of us may have earned the right to a first-class ticket, it sometimes takes others to be strong enough to stand up, be counted and support the fact we’ve earned it.

Some of you may see yourself as the stewardess. Some may see you as the young man. Others may even identify with the South African lady as you prejudge someone of a different race. But how many of you realized that you will sit comfortably in your seat and not exchange places with the lady or the young man who was insulted. We all have an opportunity to earn a first-class ticket, but some of us either won’t use it, or once we have it, we don’t want to share it with anyone we think doesn’t deserve it. We do good when it suits us,
unlike what former Congressman J. C. Watts tells us, “Character is doing the right thing when no one is looking.”

Well the whole world has been looking at what’s going on in America. Way before the guard changed in the White House, America has been engaged in trying to cope with incestuous relationships among it’s politicians, media, pop culture and Hollywood where no one was being held accountable for the images we have been flooding the mainstream audiences. Men are emasculated and effete, ignorant and immoral from Raymond Baron to Bill Clinton. Women are iconic saviors [even in James Bond movies] from Nancy Pelosi to Hillary. The white knights saving the damsels in distress are damsels themselves in pants suit. The picture has to change.

The fulcrum of change begins not with hope, but an admission that something is not right in our capitols around the country if we cannot see the writing in the chalk boards: boys are failing in school; men no longer aspire to teach in schools; and prisons are becoming the only ivy league schools many of our young men of color are granted admission. And many feel like the South African, these men don’t deserve it any better.

We need to fix this. Our integrity, no longer the sword of our forefathers, has become dull and blunt so many of us are afraid to wave it let alone use it. Pick up the gauntlet regardless of the political correctness that has caused so much ED in our country we have lost all understanding of what it’s like to have men in the classroom, in college, or even in the home. That’s the bailout this country need: a renaissance of educated men.

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Men to Fathers: Cleaning Up the Mess

January 01 2009

“The notes are there right under your fingers.  You need to take the time to learn them,” Ray Charles told Jamie Foxx, when Foxx hit the wrong key.  Foxx won an Oscar playing the icon Charles.  All we have to do is learn the music God has waiting for us under our fingers.  And once we learn them, dads, we can teach them to our kids as we listen to their heartbeats, and let them hear ours, and encourage them to make their own!

That’s such a valuable truth.  Sometimes we just don’t see the truth, even when it’s staring us in the face, especially in the eyes of our children.  My brother, who is older than me, sent me the following story I’d like to share with you.  It’s about pancakes.

“Six-year-old Brandon decided one Saturday morning to fix his parents pancakes. He found a big bowl and spoon, pulled a chair to the counter, opened the cupboard and pulled out the heavy flour canister, spilling it on the floor.  He scooped some of the flour into the bowl with his hands, mixed in most of a cup of milk and added some sugar, leaving a floury trail on the floor which by now had a few tracks left by his kitten. Brandon was covered with flour and getting frustrated. He wanted this to be something very good for Mom and Dad, but it was getting very bad.  He didn’t know what to do next, whether to put it all into the oven or on the stove and he didn’t know how the stove worked.

“Suddenly he saw his kitten licking from the bowl of mix and reached to push her away, knocking the egg carton to the floor. Frantically he tried to clean up this monumental mess but slipped on the eggs, getting his pajamas white and sticky.  And just then he saw Dad standing at the door. Big crocodile tears welled up in Brandon’s eyes. All he’d wanted to do was something good, but he’d made a terrible mess. He was sure a scolding was coming, maybe even a spanking. But his father just watched him.  Then, walking through the mess, he picked up his crying son, hugged him and loved him, getting his own pajamas white and sticky in the process!

“That’s how God deals with us. We try to do something good in life, but it turns into a mess. Our marriage gets all sticky or we insult a friend, or we can’t stand our job, or our health goes sour.  Sometimes we just stand there in tears because we can’t think of anything else to do. That’s when God picks us up and loves us and forgives us, even though some of our mess gets all over Him. “

It really hurts when the truth is in front of us and we ignore it.  It really hurts even more when those we love see the truth, try to tell us this truth, and we refuse to listen.  Sometimes in the process of trying to make pancakes we get lost in the ingredients rather than what we need to do, or why we are trying to do it. I don’t know about you, but I can see that pancake picture as vividly as I have two boys who test me constantly, even after one has moved out.  I can see that father standing there near tears, both of joy and pain.  Joy that his little one is trying to do something that will be appreciated accepted and enjoyed.  Pain of knowing our children will make messes, and sometimes their pain cannot compare to the pain we feel because sometimes we are not willing to get sticky in the process. Pain of knowing their mess is their mess and we have to let them sort it out. Sometime a man just forgets what it takes to be a dad.

I see myself reflecting as God must reflect as I try to think what I should do.  Lately, I’m come to understand a bit of what that dad will see later.  I’ve learned to wait to be asked, and then reserve the right to say no.  I think if many of us, especially with children who have left home remember that, our nation might be better; our neighborhoods might be better; and our families might be better.  I think this applies also to teachers as we try to remember it is our job to teach and empower our students.  Some time that means we can’t be intimidated by people outside the classroom who tell us that by discriminating success from failure we are doing irreparable damage to children, as some would have us to believe by ‘patting them on the head for achieving a level of success on tests.’  We can’t always succeed by not failing. We only fail if we quit.  If we don’t have standards, don’t have notes, then how are we going to know what’s right, or if the music we play is the right song?  You’re right.  We don’t know.

If we could remember our time here is measured in ways we can’t imagine.  If we could remember that, we could live life better.  If we could remember that no matter what we are loved by a father whose depth we can’t understand, our lives could be better.  If we can teach our kids to know they are gifts from God, and that God knew that no one could parent them better than we can, then I think our families could be better.

And one other thing, as you search for the notes in your life, remember the present we have is because of the past our parents gave us.  Keep that close to us as we try to plan what we are leaving for our children.  As we prepare them, caution ourselves to not do too much, because then we won’t leave them anything they can claim as their own.  That’s the key to a good musician, teacher, parent, and child.  When we understand what we have built, what we are leaving, we then know who we are.  That’s the most momentous truth to life…grasping and holding onto something that is really ours!

We need to remember these truths, share them, and make pancakes.  My brother sent this story to me.  If you like it, send it to someone you know.  Maybe it will make someone else’s life better.  It did for me.  Thanks big brother.

“It’s so hard to deny yourself a part of yourself because you’ve grown to believe it’s wrong.” from “Murder on the Pier,” by Jere Myles, [p. 141]

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