As single-mother homes continue to increase, the consequences for children become more apparent in our society.
Why would a culture continue its pressure on removing dads from families when the results are disastrous for the next generation?
Dr. Tim Rarick talks about the consequences of fatherlessness, especially with girls, including early onset puberty, promiscuity, and marital issues.
this is a great discussion with Dr Tim rck on fathers or more precisely
fatherlessness the repercussions for children and families are widespread for
boys and especially maybe for girls numerous studies show that girls struggle with no father or an absent
father in the home a number of these issues show up as children but even as adults there's a lot of information here
I think you'll enjoy this episode is brought to you by cardio Miracle this is the supplement I take every day three
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[Music]
right welcome to Quick show my name is Greg Matson and I am your host in this episode we bring on Dr Tim rck who is a
PhD and professor at uh BYU Idaho in family studies and Child Development and
he also serves On The Board of Health and Welfare for the state of Idaho Tim welcome to the show thanks pleasure to
be here thanks for having me all right so we're gonna talk about fatherlessness its effect on the family on society in
the United States let me talk start off with this here you have talked about fatherlessness and toxic masculinity I
wanted to get this one touched on first what are the connections between a toxic masculinity and fatherlessness in a
family well um I guess you know one of the things you have to kind of Define is
to say okay what how do you define toxic and I there's kind of a un Universal
definition for me toxic masculinity is the natural masculine tendencies that m
typically have more than females um that tend to focus on the
self and tend to uh demean things that are the feminine uh more female tend to
you see women as objects to be used uh anger is a good thing sadness is a bad
thing don't express emotion unless it's anger uh tends to use maybe their
strength or their power to get what they want um and even sadly is blind to a lot
of the the the list I just gave you is not even aware that they're doing that
and if they are aware of it maybe dismisses it or or not honest with themselves about it um also hyper
masculine Tendencies such as um feeling like that they have to always have the
best position and professionally and the highest paid job and the biggest muscles
and things that are uh that aren't necessarily bad but the the motives
behind it and finding their worth and their value in Domination and uh and being very stoic
and not showing a whole lot of emotion so anyhow I could probably keep going on but that's how I would Define some of
toxic masculinity the connection of fathers for Sons particularly is that
fathers according to the research fathers set the tone for how um one research Reacher said that woman
going from girl to Womanhood is much more natur than going from boy to manhood that if boys do not have markers
and guidance particularly from their fathers that how to channel their natural masculine aggression and tendencies and some males just aren't
that masculine but I'm talking about on average it for the most part fathers are the best models for doing that so when a
son sees their dad uh deal with frustration and um
difficulty and well you could use scriptural terms trials and tribulations when sees when a a boy sees his dad deal
with those things patiently and learns how to and and maybe even struggles with his
marriage with his own mom and when they're having struggles and disagreements when he sees his dad learn
how to be patient uh and and channel his anger or
maybe control his anger um and then maybe use that when he is aggressive to
use it for good when his when Sons see their dad do that it that teaches
volumes more than any sort of sermon a dad could give so when fatherlessness is rampant which it is in our country and
many other countries throughout the world you have a lot of boys who do not have that guidance going into manhood
and especially into fatherhood and then they they're less likely to treat according to the research women with
girls in respect they're less likely to share equally and and family responsibilities when they if they do
have a family which is why you see a lot of fatherless boys tend to have children
out of wedlock um that's part of being being a responsible man um they have
unhealth they they're less likely to have healthy views of masculinity and what it means to be a man boys are more
likely to abuse drug and alcohol if they don't have a fell father and gangs are a big one uh gangs become almost like a
bunch of Father figures um it's almost like becomes their own family and so you see prisons as being holding cells
mostly for fatherless boys um and it people can attribute it just
to Poverty or to many other social trends which are factors that matter but
fathers seem to have the largest impact on a son channeling his masculinity or
developing in a healthy way and not being toxic um anyhow that's just a little snapshot of some of the research
on that yeah so a couple things on that first of all I you know just to distinguish that from kind of where Society seems to be going right now in
terms of masculinity as a whole it's all all viewed as toxic in many ways it's right it's like all masculinity is toxic
toxic masculinity is used as kind of an umbrella or catch all phrase for men so I want to make sure we're distinguishing
that I think you did that well in in kind of describing what toxic masculinity is the next thing though is there's also a push in society a real
push against marriage and and and against men being involved sometimes
with the family which is very odd to me right it's it's I don't need a man right
you brought up in one article I saw you know Kate Perry saying I don't need a dude and it's it's like Katy Perry right
it's yeah yet when you look at all of the data and you're just you're you're
just starting to describe some of the issues we're going to talk about here why would you do that why would you do
that for the kids if why why would a woman plan on being a single mother to begin with and
I've brought this this up before but I was at a I was at a college graduation of my daughter a few years ago
and and I there was a group of girls that were right next to us after the graduation ceremony and they're talking
and they're talking about their future and and and one of the girls after they had talked about you know how one of
them had a boyfriend they wanted to get married to him and and she just came right out and said I don't need a man
those are her exact words which is a regurgitated phrase but it's she said I don't need a man you know if I when I
want to have kids all I can I can have artificial dissemination I can do whatever techn allows me to do all these
things and but I I'm just not planning on having a man and I just thought number one where are you getting that
from who's telling you that apart from society as a as a whole and number two
do you understand the repercussions of that not not just for your kids but for your own
possible happiness I would say yeah well first of all I think you're absolutely
right they don't they don't understand where that will lead a lot of people have these strong positions ideas and
they don't realize what the repercussions are going to be I call them uninformed voters and people are this I mean we we all live in ignorance
and um the goal is to how much can I reduce ignorance and make sure that the decisions I'm making and the positions
that I have are based in an objective science objective philosophy and an
objective truth and Doctrine and uh the scary thing is is when you are when you're certain I'm going to Pardon Me
for quoting a Marvel movie but um actually has some role in playing in in
socializing us and having some of the beliefs and positions sure but in um I
think it's Captain America Civil War uh he's dialoguing uh Spider-Man is introduced for the first time the new
Spider-Man is introduced for the first time and he's dialoguing with Captain America and uh Steve Roger says what did
what did uh Tony tell you meaning what did Iron Man tell you and and Spider-Man says did you think you're right
and you're you're wrong but you think you're right and that makes you dangerous and um I think that's to me
that's one of the most toxic things and one of the most debilitating things for
an individual and for society so this girl who says I don't need a man thinking that she's right and not even
questioning that premise or that position that maybe this has some negative preper cussions not just for
for the future children not just for society but as you said Greg for herself so my little preamble to what I'm about
to say and that is um I think in the name of there's three main ethics and if
you read Jonathan Height's book The Righteous Mind he's quoting other researchers he gives my students in one
of my classes I make them read the righteous well at least part of the righteous mind so they can understand the moral roots of liberals and
conservatives and and Libertarians and where it comes from but he gets three ethics and I when I speak at the UN I
often share these ethics I can so I can try to help the different countries to say look some of your countries are focused on one two or even all three of
these in our Western World especially in the United States we are primarily focused on ethic of autonomy the other
two are ethic of community and ethic of divinity so ethic of
autonomy is that that you kind of become your your personal freedom is the most important thing it's based on the idea
that I'm first and foremost an autonomous or free individual with wants
needs and preferences and I should be free to satisfy those wants needs and preferences I see fit um and that's the
dominant ethic in the US and Canada and especially Western Europe the other two
ethics though one of them is ethic of community um which hey discovers in um
through personal experience not just through intellectual study but when he moves to orisa and lives in the Middle
East ethic of community is I based on the idea again first and foremost that we're members of larger entities such as
families what we're talking uh teams tribes armies companies and and
under this ethic people have an obligation to play their assigned roles so um this is why some communities
develop moral Concepts such as Duty responsibility etc etc and the Divinity one that doesn't just mean God but they
have some sort of God it could be nature it could be
um uh and God's called by variety of names from a variety of religions but it's that we're we're not just um bodies
we're temporary vessels in which a Divine Soul has been implanted and um and that we there do we acknowledge a
higher power so in United States we become so ethic of autonomy and this is what I tell countries at the UN and um
delegates we become so ethic of autonomy that it's actually to our own demise if it's not balanced by all three then
you'll hear people say well I don't need a man because they feel empowered by doing something on their own Steam and I
I'm I'm a fan of empowering women when I go to the um un especially the commission on the status of women and I
have three daughters myself I have four sisters I'm a big believer in women's rights uh gender equality and women
empowerment but to be so focused on ethic of autonomy and telling a woman or a girl that she's empowered by
dismissing men and doing things on her own way and her and on her own strength
um actually hurts her and everyone else and I I really think Greg that a big part of this is coming in the name of
empowerment to so look at you can do this on your own and maybe you can but just because you can doesn't mean you
should and and do what anybody can not anyone but just just giving getting
pregnant and giving birth to a child and providing Three Square meals in a
roof isn't sufficient for human flourishing um and a myriad of problems
can come from that so that you're right they're we're getting it from society um I mentioned Marvel movies there's a
lot of social media and entertainment media that teach that empowerment comes from ironically becoming more masculine
while you're trying to fight masculinity becoming more masculine but it also means that um I do not need men because
men are the problem and if we can do this on our own steam then it shows how strong we are and I think it gets it
backwards and and and honestly when men do say the same thing as I don't need women and I can do this on my own we're
back to the toxic masculinity and um this ethic of autonomy when it pervades
everything um I'm going to quote another movie which under Disney um Pixar uh
Incredibles one if everybody's super nobody is and what I what I found in
countries and especially our country when we're so focused on autonomy if everybody gets what they want and if
everybody's autonomous nobody is there's no way you can satisfy every single want
and need and also still have some sort of community and responsibility and Duty
because then you just have uh what did height say he said um the more
autonomous you are focused on on that ethic the more you see the world as a bunch of separate objects rather than in
relationships and and so if that's my lens I'm viewing the world through then
it makes sense to me why I might hear a girl say I don't eat guys because I can
do it my own thing yeah it also it's also divisive I mean it's just it's it's
designed to be Divi divisive and uh unfortunately we seem to be going further and further down that path um
yeah I well let me ask you right now I mean you do a lot of work there at the UN are we do are we reversing any of this is this or is this becoming more
and more of a snowball that that is just growing and growing and being these these ideas are being promulgated
throughout throughout the world uh the answer is yes to both which sounds contradictory so to to the the
negative side uh the I would call it the anti family like you do your own thing the
the divisiveness the polarization um the family breakdown the
that is getting stronger in some regard um and again that's been going on for a very long time at the UN and in uh a lot
of Western countries and again because of this ethic of autonomy and um and the name of
freedom but I have also seen for the last 10 years the pro family depending on how you want to Define that but
people who believe that the family really is the fundamental unit of the society rather than the
individual um I've seen um more and more men and women rise
up and speak against us and say look yes we believe in autonomy we believe in Freedom we we believe in human rights
but not at to the expense of healthy uh functioning societies that are
sustainable so I have seen major push back I've seen delegates speak up with
that who haden't spoken up before I've seen more non-governmental organizations be created I've seen uh uh big ocean
women which is an example of an NGO that's just come on since I've been going to the UN and I forgot what they
call themselves um something some brand of feminism and it's a rebranding of of
you know the second third and fourth wave feminism you're talking about the Utah group right
yeah yeah uh Carolina Allen in fact I remember the first time she went there I was there with her she said I have this
idea for an NGO they've a large group of women who are like I guess they call them feminist moms or I I don't know and
you have to be careful how you use some of these terms because they can be misconstrued a whole variety of ways but
they're just an example of many uh men and women whove risen up and decided to speak up and say we're not going to take
this anymore and there're they actually multiple perspectives I'll give you a quick example my wife is very
introverted she does not like to be in the public eye she does um but she likes
people she went with me to the UN once and we attended this event that was called what women want this is probably
2016 what women want and it was this panelist of of men but mostly women who
are saying this is what women want and it was all about getting out of the home the home is a present cell marriage is a
torture chamber and the reality is in some countries and in sub subculture that is the case but to project that and
say that represent 8 billion people on the planet and that actually is and so therefore to create this caricature this
is how it is in every country and therefore it's almost like creating a semi Straw Men argument and then beating
up the straw men and say look what we've want so that's what it was it was all about this is what uh this and by the
way this is what women want they what they want freedom they want Liberation from children they want Liberation from
marriage and they want more pay they want to be enfor Fortune 500 companies you know all the things this external
validation which um is not really empowering you can never Empower
somebody from the outside in men or women so that's what it was all about during the Q&A session my wife who
doesn't speak up with me she raises her hand and she said um you've probably heard the phrase uh by the way she
raises her hand I thought to myself oh do not raise your hand I do not want them attacking my wife you know this
protective Instinct don't attack her I know what some these people are going to say and they're going to go after you
but my wife so uh boldly but calmly said you've heard the phrase the squeaky whe gets the grease and the panelists like
yeah well it seems like um you we're hearing one squeaky will but there's
three other Wills on this vehicle and here's what I want as a woman and she talks about motherhood and how she
chooses to be a mom and that being a wife is empowering and how she loves
anyhow she said all these things and I'm going oh my gosh I cannot believe she said that so boldly so how are you going
to get what all women want rather than what you think women want through this very narrow lens and I saw this uh
casade of hands go up after that and woman after woman would say yeah yeah what she just said I I totally agree
with that but it took someone to break the silence and so I guess I'm using that as a microcosm of saying yeah uh
the anti- family Powers have been emboldened but I've also seen the pro- family Powers speak up and it's giving
more voice because uh man I'm quoting a lot of movies the Pixar movie movie bugs life if you let one ant stand up to us
they will all stand up those ants outnumber us 100 to 100 to one and if they ever figure it out there goes our
way of life and I've seen that happen at the UN that it's not about us winning so
much is it just us about to quote Elder Maxwell giving people a choice and leaving them with the truth because if
you're only given one perspective you can't make an informed decision and then they can't make really agency is limited
when you're only limited to one or two ideas so I've seen more
um uh pro- family ideas have a voice and make a make some inroads anyhow so
that's that's a long answer to a very good question no no that's a great answer by the way the big ocean women
it's maternal femininity or feminism maternal feminism is is their phrase maternal feminism yeah so okay but
anyway yeah I've met a couple of those women there that uh that that put that together all right uh hookup culture how
is Father fatherlessness uh how does that affect what we call hookup culture today why
would that matter um well I guess go I'm g go back
to defining hookup culture it's generally spoken as uh two people getting together to
have sexual intimacy devoid of emotional intimacy intellectual intimacy and and
especially spiritual intimacy so I view intimacy and and other researchers have defined it this way as more holistic you
got four domains spiritual intellectual emotional and physical the hookup culture is primar is is solely physical
um it's devoid of commitment and it's uh about physically hooking up with each
other and maybe you hook up for uh multiple t uh occasions of intercourse
maybe it's just a one night stand but it's very pervasive on college campuses
and actually from what I've seen in the literature is that it's
um college students think it is happening like everyone's hooking up all
the time when the reality is they're not hooking it up nearly as much as the perception so what that does that
perception breathes more of the same so there's this pressure from college students even at BYU Idaho which I call
the there's there's a diet version of the hookup culture and we call them nicmos non-committal makeups yes I call
the diet version yes I haven't heard com from the so it comes from the same philosophy of
of physical intimacy devoid of the other three domains of intimacy and uh lacking
commitment um so hookup culture and it's really broken down quite well in Mark
regis's book called cheap sex and he's a researcher out of University of Texas Austin brilliant
sociologist um and he writes about it so well and what one one of the things I love about a book when you when they
write on social family marriage dating issues or just any of those issues is
when you can't totally tell where the ideologically and politically where they stand they're just sharing what we know
and they help you draw your own conclusions rather than just you know preaching at you because I feel like you convince more people that
way when you just preach to the choir even though choir Gets Out Of Tune and that's necessary sometimes um but this
his book he he the subtitle is the um I think it's the breakdown of men marriage
and monogamy and he talks about the hookup culture being just like we we view sex more um more or less as
something that everybody should be able to have and the social structures and barriers in place
to that would uh and the social norms that used to exist that would encourage commitment ENC encourage the other types
of intimacy where you actually get to know someone you care about them Beyond just using their bodies for your own
pleasure those things have eroded over the years and now there's really no incentive for women and especially men
to stick around so how does fatherless play into that well um I've talked about
how fathers impact on boys fathers impact on girls um research is is
finding again and again that fathers are basically the entry point into the male
species for the daughters so he sets the tone for all future male relationships she starts to figure out
what what it means to be a man uh from from our dad's perspective and what boys want what they
think about and um how they should treat women he sets the tone for what she feel
like she she can expect and deserve in in men so the first and I think I wrote
an article on this but the father is the first and most important and most influential love in a girl's life and so
fatherless daughters are much more likely to um they're going to start puberty earlier they're going to have
sexual intercourse earlier they're going to have multiple sexual partners throughout their life again compared to
daughters who have involved fathers of course there's always exceptions to this there's always girls who have loved invol loving involved fathers who break
this Norm but on average for the most part girls who are raised in Father absent homes or father who are
emotionally absent too and physically there they're more likely to have more sex and they're more likely to allow
themselves to be exploited by men um because they see that this is what men want uh I
did some I don't want to get too deep into it but I did a my own informal kind of qualitative analysis of
stories of women who were in the porn industry and they were actresses in the porn industry strippers um prostitutes
and that they got out they were part of this uh nonprofit to help them get out of this situation with the sexual
exploitation and again and again I read quotes in fact I think I have a quote right here let me see if I can put pull
it up um one woman said I loved the
attention from everyone but now I look back it's not the kind of attention I needed but I was young naive and
motivated by the money and the fame it was easy for an agent male agent to take
advantage of me for so many years and another one I felt that no one could truly love me another one I was going to
get the attention I always loved and wanted I loved and craved attention I was desperate for love I wanted
sorry this always gets me I I wanted a father so much and so the Lesser version
of maybe the porn industry would be the hookup culture I'm not saying they're the exact same thing however the you
know pornography fuels the hookup culture the hook the hookup culture or you could say sexual exploitation fuels
pornography the two thing feed up each other so fatherlessness is it as it
plays an integral role in this because if a woman feels empowered From the Inside Out by her father
and she she does she has this father whole in her heart in fact there's this book called father need that talks about
this I believe every child is born with a a spot in their heart that's shaped like a mom and a dad and mom and dad
need to fill that in and if Dad for for example the daughters are not filling that in she will that doesn't go away
she craves male attention and she will get it in whatever way she can even and
often they don't even realize that that's why they're doing it so um
a lot of these uh girls that I'd studied and again this is more in the porn industry had had talked about how much
they loved the attention from men um one woman I spoke with said when I I
wondered after and this is after she got out it was more retrospect she said I wondered when I danced for men
um and I got the attention that if I would have had the same thoughts and
feelings if my dad would have um if my dad would have paid attention to
me when I was wearing a dress and we man sorry this real kiding me right
that's right when uh when when uh I wore a dress and and I
was a younger girl and paid attention to me and um and love me so uh fathers
really do set such an incredible tone for how the girls see themselves how how the girls see men and and their value
and worth and I really strongly believe um and this is not just
me but the evidence is showing that hookup culture is fueling a lot of this because people are trying to seek
attention and when you're primary and Erica uh talked about this I think on your one of your previous podcasts and
Eric and I have talked kind of nerded out on this a bit but that primary that first attachment of with mother and
father that again if that doesn't go away we still try to bond and attach usually in toxic and unhealthy ways even
if we are ignorant to it so you know it's fascinating where you're now saying then that uh
with because I think this goes to everything you're saying here but the the biology of a girl that is going to
go through puberty is affected by the socialization in her family right that that is really
something and and this is you know the first time I heard this it was from I think it was Jordan Peterson about a
year ago and I was like what and it's it's yeah the girls actually enter
puberty earlier when they don't have a father in the home or don't have the the fatherly
uh you know some someone around them that's uh their father around them how is that possible number one and number
two what do you think that means well there's a few different explanations for it one of them is the
like the the the most commonly used one is the evolutionary psychology explanation and that is from The
evolutionary psychology perspective the perpetual ation of the species and survival of the fittest our ancestors
we've evolved over time to be able to you know pass on the best genes and to be able to survive and have our
prosperity survive um or posterity sorry Prosperity
Prost posterity man goodness there you posterity survive and um so a lot of
researchers will say that the female's body when it s senses threat from the environment uh oh we're not going to be
able to perpetuate our species um and they feel unsafe and U uncared for that
naturally the biolog the biology kicks in we better start to be able to reproduce soon because and it's not like
the woman's thinking this or the female body is even thinking sure it's more of an evolutionary response so when the
father isn't around um to offer that protection and that reassurance there seems to be a
stress response that the body starts to manarchy occurs sooner that's the onset puberty the first menstrual cycle and um
it kicks in sooner that's the evolutionary perspective to say okay now we've got to you know we don't have we
do not have a father figure a male Father Figure obviously to protect us so
we not we need to be able to to get ready to reproduce and and move on
sooner with this um so that's the evolutionary explanation for it and I
was talking with a a woman I think it was kakan at the UN once I
was speaking at an event I was talking about mother father daughter relationships she's lesbian she comes up she talks about her and her partner who
have a daughter and she said well what does this mean for my girl and she was really being sincere she wasn't trying
to be um argumentative or anything and I said um I bet you love your daughter uh
very much you and your partner she said oh yes very much and I Saidi bet you're phenomenal caretakers for her like
mothers but according to the research um your daughter is going to need a father
figure and you I don't care how masculine the female is or if you put 50 females to take care of that girl she
needs a father figure you can pretend to be a father figure so you I I advise her
to find a brother or someone someone that they know that is a very trusted male that could be a father
figure in her girl's life because my job isn't to break up their family you know at that point it's not my Steward you
got to learn to stay in your lane but um yeah the research is showing over and over again that it's it has to do with
the male father not uh two caretakers that um have an impact on the
onset of puberty and menarchy and and sexual activity so I don't remember what
your other question was but I hope I got you well well you were saying how how it might have happened and what does it
mean I I guess is what I was saying what what what does that mean yeah yeah so what that means
is um I guess for the girl what that means is that she's again more likely to
have sexual activity and find maybe find her worth in in getting M's
attention and sexual activity or you know perhaps using her body to get
attention um and thinking that oh well now I'm worth something and if you replicate that thousands if not million
times over what does that mean for Society well you're probably going to have a lot more girls who don't realize
obviously who don't realize what they're worth who don't understand the purpose of sex um who see marriage
as kind of what we talked about earlier is something that's restrictive to their autonomy and their
freedom um and there there's plenty of men sadly out there plenty of men out there who
are happy to pick up those pieces and to use the women who have that particular
philosophy yes so you see a lot you're going to see a lot less marriage you're going to see a lot less involved fathers
because now what that means that you're GNA create a vicious cycle where a a girl who has an uninvolved father is
seven times more likely to become pregnant as a teen than a girl who has an involv father wow so seven times more
likely what does that mean for um what does that mean for poverty rates what
does that mean for uh marriage rates what does that mean for abortion rates
and what does that mean for just the economy in general so there's a lot of
uh domino effect there or ripple effect if you will okay now this is interesting also
it says that a uh that that also there is B better marital quality with these
women when they have later pubertal puberty
development what is that is that more of a Cause an affecting are we getting correlation mixed up in there at all and
it's just a matter of well because they didn't have a father involved therefore they had early puberty development and
also their marital quality is lower does the actual early puberty actually have
specifically an effect on their marital quality later on well I don't know if it's the early
puberty that has the and this is just my interpretation of the research but I I don't know if it's the earlier puberty
that's the problem it's the earlier puberty means now your your physical body is outpacing your neurological
development and so prefrontal CeX um is massively under construction in toddlerhood and then again in
adolescence which is why you see them make a lot of impulsive short side decisions um I one of the things I do on
the side is I coach tennis for the local high school here and I'm trying to teach them about their brains because they'll always go for the money shot they're
always going to try to hit the winner um even when it's the stupidest time to do it and Tennis is about um strategy and
knowing when to pull the trigger and when not to teenagers have a hard time doing that so that they really need some
guidance and some nuring to help them um it's been called that the prefrontal cortex is the parent in the
room and and teenagers really need to have that so if you got a girl whose
biological development is outpacing her neurological development and I would also say even her Social Development she
is a lot more ATT attractive to boys because she's developing uh physical attributes that are attractive to boys
and to young men and and if she already has the lack of self-worth and self-esteem and
insecurity because there is no uh father figure around to help fill that and to
meet that need and that attachment then she is more likely to have more sexual activity more likely
again to allow herself to either use others or allow herself to be used and more likely it shows to also have a um I
call it the toxic spectrum of trust where you either mistrust and demean all
that is male and masculine and there's been a couple studies on that where you it says that perhaps some radical
feminists um who hate men um one of the contributing factors
was a terrible experience with their own father not the only Factor but that's one of the contributing factors so I
wouldn't just say oh you have early uh puberty so therefore you're going to have po equality it's more of a Cascade
of like the domino effect now they're having more sexual activity they're less likely to know how to bond with men and
if you have a if research shows that more sexual activity before marriage leads to more marital instability and
more likely to have divorce less marital satisfaction so I would say it's a myriad of factors or ingredients
contributing to the casserole that is marital breakdown if you if if that makes sense and one of them we know is
the early onset of puberty but that's also because the father um what the impact he's having on the biological
development the social and emotional development and the attachment of with male relationships and so it just kind
of sets the stage which sounds so fatalistic but I've seen many women and men who have overcome fatherlessness
which if you want to talk about that later we can sure yeah well there's always ageny there's always effort there's always prayer there's always
opportunities to do those things so there's a there's an explosion in in mental health uh illness throughout the
Youth and Young adults especially and especially with women how much of this might be
correlated with fatherlessness to begin with because that's certainly increasing I've got numbers here I can go over
later but you know the you know the number of children now that are born out of
wedlock just it was consistent for a while actually dipped a little bit but it's now increasing
again is there a correlation to this we got a we've got a a breakdown of let's call it the breakdown of the family is
there mental health is is some of that at least a a direct result of
fatherlessness absolutely um so studies on eating disorders
fatherless girls are much much more likely at risk of developing an eating disorder bulimia
anorexia um there's multiple studies on the impact on self-esteem um what is an eating
disorder it's a mental illness and it's not disordered eating is the symptom but there's an internal uh neurological and
attachment issue there where perhaps they um I mean mental illness is by
definition is that you see reality a particular way that is not reality but
your mind thinks that it is so for example someone who's depressed might say to them I'm such a
terrible person I'll never amount to anything I I suck at everything um well if somebody never learns to
really challenge those beliefs what a cognitive psychologist would call self-defeating beliefs and you just
believe that you inhabit that then uh that's why it's a mental illness because you're believing something that's not
true and it's self-defeating um fathers have a play an integral role
in uh sons and daughters but particularly daughters like I said with selfesteem with eating disorders anxiety
depression yes uh smartphones social media and entertainment media are all playing a significant role in that but
what I like to ask is how can we put those two factors together what role do fathers play in helping their daughters
regulate their social media intake U to regulate their smartphone use um fathers
here here's some things that fathers tend to do different than Mom according to research and and and I I use the like
the spoon and fork analogy so there's a term child development called difference equals deficit error meaning it's an
errored way of thinking to think just because there's a difference somebody has a deficit and that's what our
society wants to do wants to put men and women against each other um I mean if I could paraphrase was it third Nephi
11:29 um uh contention is not of me but is of the devil for he strs up the
hearts of men to contend with anger one against another I like to add he stirreth up the hearts of men and women
to contend with Ager once with one with another and you'll see um these strong movements to try to whether it's promote
gender equality or to empower somebody and it's an US versus them mentality and it it is not empowering at all um so
when we talk about how moms and dads are different I always get a little bit um I guess I have to give a lot of
disclaimers and I don't think we should have to to say look Spoon and Fork are different but they they both feed a
person and they serve different functions if I'm having yogurt I want a spoon if I'm having grilled chicken I want a fork they both can feed me um it
doesn't mean that one's better than the other so in this case fathers have a
have had a greater impact on mothers in when it comes to their children it they're more likely to discourage
children from whining and feeling sorry for themselves of course that's going to be taken to a toxic level where they're
constantly correcting and demeaning their children but um there is some
significant value and I've even found to my own marriage my own family that I'm much more likely to discourage that moms
are more likely to uh uh empathize and connect with the emotion which is extremely empowering and dads need to
learn how to do that but there is just as much value and to discourage children
from whining not in a demeaning way but to help them understand look Layman look lemel what how's how's that going for
you has that done anything for you I'm more likely to say that to my CH children I have a couple of my children
that seem to just go straight to murmuring about things and we've had a lot of conversations I they know I care
about their feelings and I try to you know connect first before I correct and I try not to correct all the time but
when I do I try to help them say how's that going for you has that whining led to anything I
said when I when I complain and I do sometimes it's never really solved anything that's another thing dads are
more likely to focus on solving problems instead of complaining uh the more likely to encourage Independence and
self-reliance they're more likely to ask questions regarding where why and what even for children at a young age and it
used to be believed that dads just doesn't know do not know how to talk to young children but research is finding that actually moves cognitive
development in a very unique way um they're more likely to teach children than moms to teach how to take
responsibility for their mistakes um and they're also more likely to have um try
to protect them um from the outside world while getting them to take risks so RIS risk taking is enormously
important if it's done in a you know a healthy way and in a measured way what the heck does that have to do you may be
going Greg Greg what does it have to do with anything well if you have an involved father who has a loving and
communicated relationship with their daughter um that is up to date on how
screens and social media and entertainment media are impacting not just adults but impacting children
particularly maybe the female the young female brain the father can use those
natural tendencies he has if again natural to use good um to to be more
protective and say you know what maybe we should get you a smartphone at a later age with uh heavy
restrictions um and if you can take more of a um maybe like a family counsel
perspective where we counsil together and you sit down with your daughter once in a while and say hey um and they like
my for example my daughter said can I have Instagram uh we said no for the longest time but
we taught her why um and we tried to help her understand that wife very
significantly but dads are are more likely than M moms by the way Mom do have a protective Instinct and moms do
offer correction and they do discourage whining I've just seen in the research and in my I guess anecdotally that
fathers have a great regulatory capacity to to stop crap from coming into the
home especially if he's aware of it there's some men out there who are completely oblivious and they're not
using the abilities that they have but if a dad's involved in his daughter's life she will feel safe she'll feel less
likely to want to bond with things on social media and get her her self-worth and her attention for that and the dad's
more likely to put those restrictions and those um those fences around and
then to uh maybe expand those fences as de as developmentally appropriate so yeah I think there's a strong a factor
here between mental health uh social or should we should say screen media and
involved fathers sorry that was kind of a long way to get there but I wanted to lay the background on it no that's
that's good good I wonder if you can explain some statistics to me and and see if what your your your
interpretation of this is uh and I've seen this from a couple of different uh studies but right now 70% of all
divorces are initiated by women 90% of divorces with a college
educated woman are initiated by the woman
yet among parents that are 6 26 to 31 so we're talking younger here where maybe
those divorces haven't happened yet but uh who did not graduate from college 70% of the more of the of the
mothers and 70% of the fathers had at least one child outside of marriage and
81% of those births reported by women and 8 7% of those reported by men had
occurred to non-college graduates so there's a larger outof wedlock birth
rate among non- college educated individuals but there's a much higher
divorce rate especially from women but you know overall even from women that
are college educated almost seems like a disparity there in terms of people that
keep order and sacrifice and are
altruistic why why would those numbers be different so why is there such a a it
seems contradictory evidence between college or the lack of education
and um out of wedlock births and then the other one is the divorce rate amongst college educated yes well I I
guess my interpretation for the college educated divorce rate is um well first
of all I think college educated or not obviously you read the statistics that women are more likely to initiate
divorce than men um there are some things that women are attuned to much much more in
relationships than men are about that relationship and it usually has to do with emotional intimacy and emotional
needs um but why that statistic goes up amongst college educated women well I
think there's there's at least two ways you can look at it one of them you can interpret it and say well it's because
they went to college and they realize they don't have to put up with crap from men and they've been brainwashed into
thinking you need a man to be married to to feel empowered and provide for you
and so um so once they get college educated they get out of that prison
sale another way possible way to look at it is because they're being taught that
um they're not being taught things in college and sadly enough even in the social sciences and in my field they're not being taught things that are about
commitment and about sacrifice and about holistic intimacy rather than just one
area of intimacy and they're being told so many things about their freedom and their rights and their empowerment and
um they deserve rights they deserve Freedom they deserve empowerment but not in the ways that are solely from ethic
of autonomy because it actually doesn't help them in the long run so I think there's two ways to interpret that and I
I my interpretation would be more of the latter they're being told that they don't need men and the patriarchy is the
problem um the the intersectionality theory of queer theory gender Theory
Theory critical race Theory and there's multiple theories there um and I think you've talked about it before on your
podcast um it is not favorable for men and it's not favorable for commitment and it's not favorable for marriage and
if that's what you're being taught whether you're in the humanity social science or something else um and you
come from maybe a family that's potentially either broken or you do not maybe maybe they're
your parents are married but they're really not that involved they're more focused on just making money and providing the basis basics of life if
that's what you come from and then you're being fed this through entertainment social media and then particularly from academics who have
phds and seem extremely wise and intelligent why wouldn't you buy hook line and sinker and why wouldn't you
start to see marriage as something that's terrible but there are plenty of marriages that probably do need to end
in divorce and the woman is right to initiate it but for every one of those there's multiple that don't need to
happen um sadly I know some in my own Community I know personally that didn't
need to happen and they they do happen um
and so I guess anyhow the long and short of it is I would say that's probably the
the latter to that's how I would hypothesize um I think women in that in
that you know they college educated they're more likely also to have a career they're most a lot more likely to
have Financial stability for themselves so it's an easier process they're not as dependent true and those things aren't
necessarily bad what's that right right right and oh sorry I just kind of talked over those
my and those things aren't necessarily bad I there's nothing wrong with woman having career and being able to provide for themselves so it does it does make
it easier um but I wouldn't say that's the primary cause for sure yeah okay um
now go ahead no go ahead I was just going to mention the uh
the the education when it comes to ad wedlock childbearing
um that's a tricky one again because we humans are um multifaceted and we're not
it's the hard Sciences like engineering physics it's nice to have cleancut
formulas where you can almost always get the same outcome if you put in the same input um and there are laws that govern human
relationships and human development but because of the X Factor of autonomy or moral agency uh it's hard to boil it boil it
down to like th this is the factor or this is the variable so there's a whole
slew of things that could explain the out of wedlock Child R and um the lack
of Education I know in other countries outside the us um I and a couple others published an article on um for women in
subsaharan Africa who when their maternal education went up the intimate
partner violence went down and it might be because they've learned that maybe there were some things in some of their
subcultures where they live that were heavy on the patriarchy and were toxic maybe toxic masculinity rained and they
just thought that was normal and maybe in their education they got up or maybe was the education that facilitated them
to get out of a particular uh toxic relationship so um but there's a lot of
people out outside the US who um when it comes to ad the woodlock
childbearing I I I just think it becomes and also in the US I know there's certain particularly in inner cities
where that becomes the norm I've talked to women who said that this is just like it's normal for you to have children
like to once you get to be a teen or a young adult everybody in the neighborhood and in the city um that's
just a normal thing and if that's all you've known it doesn't mean that uh it makes it right but it makes it
understandable um so a lack of Education what's the chicken and what's the egg is
having a child young make it harder to get a college degree yes sure so which one came first sure that's good any
there's other variables to explore there too Yeah Tim love the discussion it sounds to me like there's a lot of other
things I'd like to talk to you about maybe in a future interview um really good stuff appreciate you coming on the
program hey thanks for having me I appreciate it
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