Who needs two parents? Everyone.
I come from a single-parent home. My mother did her best at being a mother, and she was a success.
I would never disrespect my mother by saying that she did a mediocre job – just an inherently incomplete one. She could never compensate for the lack of having a father in the home.
Yes, my father was always around, but he never lived at home with us.
Because of this, there are parts of me that are incomplete. I never had a live-in male role model.
As important as it is for girls to have a man to emulate, it is just as imperative for a man to offer influence.
Moreover, it is worse when young men – especially blacks – do not have a father figure in the home.
So many young black men miss out on having a father teach them how to treat women, be successful, have a strong work ethic and do household repair.
My point is not that it cannot be done. Our campus and community is filled with success stories – myself being one of them – of people who grew up in single-family households but triumphed.
However, we must carry on the community and family ideals that have sustained us thus far. Having two parents, be they stepparents or parents of the same sex, to bounce ideas off of provides children or young adults with a broader frame of reference.
And I don’t know anyone raised in a single parent home who does not wish that there had been another parent present.
So, I implore you to protect yourselves, at least until marriage, to give your children and our future a fighting chance.