By Ryan Bomberger, Co-Founder of The Radiance Foundation
(a home-schooling adoptive dad of four)

Imagine a world without dads.

Ok. The exercise is over, because you wouldn’t be here to imagine anything if it weren’t for those who are 50% biologically responsible for your existence.

Nature is an extraordinary thing. It reveals to us how important every piece of the biological puzzle is to Life. Each gender, female and male, is significant and different and wondrous.

But what happens when we pretend that they’re interchangeable or dispensable?

The puzzle starts to fall apart leaving gaping holes. We see that in our modern society as the epidemic of fatherlessness is leaving behind massive voids. The sexual revolution should have taught our nation one thing: irresponsibility leads to instability. Today, 39.6% of American children are born to unmarried mothers, with a culture-shifting 58% of them in mostly unstable cohabitating unions. Back in the 1940s, unmarried births amounted to 3.8% of all births in the United States, less than a tenth of what it is now. Tragically, as well, abortion has become a violent form of “birth control” with 85.9% of America’s 862,320 abortions (in 2017) occurring among unmarried women.

Roe never empowered women. It empowered men to have sex and run. This is what happens when people choose abandonment over accountability.

Nothing replaces a father. Not a woman. Not a live-in boyfriend. Not government insistence programs (which often insist that fathers stay out of the picture).

The repercussions are serious as study after study reveals the impact of father absence. This isn’t to disparage single moms who do all they can to love and provide for their child(ren). Neither nature nor Nature’s God intended for women to play both the role of mother and father. According to the 2018 US Census Bureau report on poverty, single female led homes are 5.3 times more impoverished than two-parent married homes. (Just to compare, single father-led homes are 2.7 times more impoverished.) Among children, lack of involved fathers has led to higher high school drop out rates, higher usage of drugs, 2x higher rates of suicide, 7x higher instances of teenage pregnancy, 2x higher rates of obesity (among girls), higher incarceration rates, higher instances of violent crime, higher rates of abuse and neglect (10x higher), higher abortion rates, lower college graduation rates, lower employment rates…lower opportunities to thrive and succeed.

Hollywood mostly portrays fathers as buffoons and disconnected reluctant participants. Disney, one of the leading influencers of children and tweens, typically conveys a world where parents don’t exist altogether. So nearly every sitcom churns out sassy, witty, self-absorbed kids who journey through life without parental guidance.

Our society is being socially, and radically, re-engineered to believe that men and women are simply interchangeable. They’re not. In our reality-show obsessed culture, a failed father and husband (Bruce Jenner) automatically becomes a pop culture icon and ESPY hero for exchanging his manhood for fake femininity. Despite the recent supremely wrong Supreme Court decision that has now recklessly redefined “sex”, he’s no more a woman than former disgraced NAACP Chapter President, Rachel Dolezal (who is caucasian), is African-American.

Fatherlessness is destructive. And the statistical disparity in its impact is alarming: 69.4% among blacks, 68.2% among Native Americans/Alaska Natives, 51.8% among Hispanics, 50.4% among Native Hawaiians/Pacific Islanders, 28.2% among Non-Hispanic Whites, and 11.7% among the those of Asian descent. Hollywood, mainstream media, and academia can pretend dads are optional, but reality doesn’t need reassignment surgery. Despite rampant fatherlessness in urban communities, civil rights groups like the NAACP and the National Urban League, ignore the devastating epidemic. In fact, in the National Urban League’s 2015 “State of Black America: Save Our Cities” annual document detailing the issues facing the black community, there’s not one single mention of “fathers” or “fatherlessness” in the body of the report. Ferguson, Baltimore, DC, NYC and cities across this nation exude the brokenness. Fatherlessness is the most apparent yet most ignored social issue in the black community. Save the family–the strength of any community–and you will “Save Our Cities”.

Many in the education establishment insist that changing the standards of learning will bring massive changes to communities, especially those more economically depressed. Common Core Standards, though, will never impact a child’s possibilities like a community whose common core includes involved dads. Fathers who are present and continually engaged in their child’s life help shield against the social ills and crushed opportunities that are all too common in vulnerable, fatherless communities.

Father absence is painful regardless of hue of skin, ethnicity or socioeconomic circumstances. It is felt by over 20 million children in this country today.

In today’s society many don’t have a father to celebrate. That sobering reality is created by dads who’ve chosen self over sacrifice, by social policies that try to exclude men, and fake feminist activists who ignore the urgent necessity of fathers. But this epidemic has a cure. It requires fathers, adoptive fathers, mentors and other role models to defy the national trend and put it in reverse. There are great resources on fatherhoood (here, here and here) to help educate young men to understand why they matter, how to treat others (especially women) like they matter, and why dads matters. I am forever grateful that I had an amazing father to model love, devotion, dependability, integrity, compassion and unwavering faith. His and my mother’s love formed me into the husband and father that I am today.

I am forever grateful that I had an amazing father to model love, devotion, dependability, integrity, compassion, humor and unwavering faith. My dad’s and my mom’s unconditional love and heart for the broken are what have formed me into the  husband and father that I am today. I cannot sit idly by while political leaders pretend that dads are expendable.

Women are invaluable. Men are invaluable. And children (born and unborn) are our priceless posterity. They are worth every effort to provide an environment where they are loved, protected and nurtured and where their beautiful potential can be unleashed.