Where Have All the Black Men Gone?

A recurring question has surfaced in mainstream and ethnic media for more than a decade. The phrasing of the question differs depending on who's asking the question and why, but the question tends to boil down to this: Where have all the black men gone? They're missing in churches, missing from their families, missing from college campuses, and absent from work. Black women can't find a man to marry. Black children don't know where to find their fathers. Where are those guys?

Last Father's Day, presidential Barack Obama wagged a finger at all the missing black fathers. At the Apostolic Church of God in Chicago he stepped to the podium and said: "If we are honest with ourselves, we'll admit that too many fathers are missing -- missing from too many lives and too many homes. Too many fathers are MIA. Too many fathers are AWOL. They have abandoned their responsibilities. They're acting like boys instead of men. And the foundations of our families are weaker because of it. You and I know this is true everywhere, but nowhere is this more true than in the African American community."

The next day, social critic and sociologist Michael Eric Dyson published a critique of Obama's speech in Time magazine. He pointed out that the stereotype of black men being poor fathers may well be false. Research shows that black fathers not living at home are actually more likely to keep in contact with their children than fathers of any other ethnic or racial group. Dyson chided Obama for evoking a black stereotype for political gain, noting that "Obama's words may have been spoken to black folk, but they were aimed at those whites still on the fence about whom to send to the White House." Dyson's critique was a fair one, but like other media commentators, he remained silent about where all the absent black fathers could be found.

Here's a hint for all those still scratching their heads about those missing black fathers: Look in prison.

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