The story so far
76% of young people in custody had an absent father.
Centre for Social Justice
Children with separated, single or step-parents are 50% more likely to fail at school
Centre for Social Justice
A boy growing up with no father figure may face significant disadvantages. This is not implying poor parenting of the mother nor diminishing their vital importance. Rather the findings reveal the challenge facing mothers seeking to bring-up a child alone. Single mothers provide an incredible service for their children and we commend you.
THE FATHERLESS CRISIS
In the UK, 65% of children aged 12-16, in low-income households, do not live with both parents, about 92% of these living with their mother. (SOURCE: Centre for social Justice and Department for Work and Pensions).
Male role models such as male teachers have become rarer and modern careers no longer offer a means for boys to work alongside men. An increase in digital communication and lone working can isolate boys further.
Sadly, many boys discover masculinity by finding an alternative path, such as gangs and crime.
A child sitting their GCSEs today is more likely to own a smartphone than be living at home with their father.
Centre for Social Justice
THE CONSEQUENCES
Crime and gangs
A 2009 report on street gangs (Dying to Belong) provided clear evidence that ‘family breakdown, and in particular fatherlessness, appears to be a key driver of gang culture’.
Indeed, following the 2011 street riots in London and Manchester, the Daily Telegraph noted that a common denominator amongst the rioters is that they were gang members with no father living at home.
There has been a 700 per cent increase in incarceration in the USA since the 1970s – in the UK it has more than doubled. Dad deprivation is directly related to that, and to suicide, which is the number one killer of British men aged under 45.
Warren Farrell (quoted in the Daily Telegraph).
Well-being
School-aged children with good relationships with their fathers are less likely to experience depression, exhibit disruptive behaviour, or to lie than children without good father-child relationships.
Mosley J and Thompson E, 1995
Self-esteem
Where father and mother are separated, continued contact with fathers is mostly non-existent. A lot of kids have never met their fathers. They lack male role models to give them a rounded view of what it is to be male and suffer from a lack of self-esteem: when asked, their anger about this loss comes out in descriptions of their fathers as a “waste of space”, and in describing themselves as ‘rubbish’.
Anne McLaren, Project Manager at Fun in Action
Long-term physical and mental health
The boys we mentor have typically experienced signifcant early-life trauma (such as parental separation). Studies on the impact of early life trauma have shown it increases the risk of long disease, liver disease, depression and attempted siucide later in life (Source; Kaiser ACE Study, May 1998).
Early adversity dramatically affects health across a lifetime.
Nadine Burke Harris MD
Fatherlessness is the most harmful demographic trend of this generation. It is the leading cause of declining child well-being in our society. It is also the engine driving our most urgent social problems, from crime to adolescent pregnancy to child sexual abuse to domestic violence against women.
David Blankenhorn (Fatherless America).