Inspirational or unrealistic? Blacks discuss what Obamas represent

COLUMBIA, S.C. • The traditional family - mom, dad and 2.3 kids - is becoming a dated notion in an America with more single parents, unwed mothers and blended families.

The trends are magnified for African-Americans, according to the latest U.S. Census data.

More than two-thirds of African-American babies are born to unwed mothers, compared with more than a third for all races. Twice as many black women - almost 4 in 10 - have never been married, compared with white women.

Enter President-elect Barack Obama and his perfect nuclear family. Two Ivy League-educated adults, supportive of each other and their two children.

Some African-Americans say the Obamas are an unrealistic ideal, a midcentury throwback, a false standard.

Others say they are an inspirational example of what the African-American family can be - even a post-racial example of the new 21st-century American family.

Patricia Stone Motes, a family researcher at Clemson's Institute on Family and Neighborhood Life, is among the inspired.

"Across all races and income levels ... the Obamas are seen as the American Dream," Motes said, adding that both Barack and Michelle Obama are self-made.

"You can be raised by a single mother. You can have an African father and a white mother from Kansas and, with hard work, be president. They represent the possibilities for all people in a modern America."

But do they really?

The (Columbia, S.C.) State talked to African-American families about the state of the black family. They were asked how President-elect Obama and his family may or may not change the image of black families. And will the Obamas' ascension to the White House encourage conversations about problems confronting African-American families?

"I hope it inspires ..."

Milton Mack wasn't yet alive in the 1950s. But he has heard some of what it was like then for many black families. There were struggles, but there was cohesiveness, too.

Mack, a 31-year-old Columbia, S.C., resident who does woodwork for builders, hopes the sparkling image of the Obama family in the White House will bring back a little of what used to be.

"Back in '50s and '60s, we were about family," Mack said. "Now, we seem to have lost touch. When you see Obama on television, you see him embrace his children. You see him with his wife."

That imagery is important to Mack's wife, Pamela Kimpson Mack, a 37-year-old pharmaceutical saleswoman.

"It looks rosy, with them being Ivy-bred," Pamela Mack said. "But they came from working-class families. They had meager beginnings. I think people have lost sight of that."

The Obama family imagery could be especially inspirational for black men, Pamela Mack said. "It will help people who have given up on themselves. It will inspire black males to dig a little deeper and push a little harder."

"It's not realistic for a lot of people"

Carla Ba was 18 and in love.

She married her handsome suitor from West Africa and had three children. But in the late 1990s, the couple split. "I was married, but I was basically a single mom," Ba said.

While the Obamas represent a U.S. ideal, it's an unrealistic one for many 21st-century families, Ba said.

"What (the Obamas) represent is pretty. It's nice. But it's not realistic for a lot of people living in today's world," she said. "It's like a Kool-Aid commercial."

The notion of family has changed a lot in the past 50 years, Ba said. In some ways, for the better. In some ways, for the worse.

Ba worries about the growing number of U.S. children of all races raised without male role models in the home and women having children out of wedlock.

But she also thinks many women have gained from the new definition of marriage, women who now can focus on their education and personal growth before marriage and children.

"It used to be a scarlet letter on a woman if she wasn't married by 25. That's not true anymore," she said.

It's also benefited women trapped in unhealthy marriages. "What do women do whose husbands are abusive? Does she stay with the man anyway? Trapped? Today, they can leave."

Ba, who voted for Obama, said she enjoys seeing the soon-to-be first family on TV. But she isn't aspiring to be like them.

"I'm happy. I'm not married, but I'm a happy woman," she said, laughing.

"They're a different perspective"

Two years ago, Curtis Richardson was divorced and raising his two young daughters alone.

But the 37-year-old Northeast Richland, S.C., business development manager never soured on marriage.

Tamika Richardson, a 36-year-old nurse, became Curtis' bride 15 months ago. She gave him what he grew up with and longed for - a family with two loving parents doting on their children.

"My parents were together almost 30 years, until my father died," Curtis Richardson said.
Obama's election, his call to fathers to take seriously their roles in their children's lives and the Obamas' example are good for the country - not just African-Americans, Curtis and Tamika Richardson say.

Curtis Richardson's years as a single father made him keenly aware of - and sensitive to - the image of black fathers as being absent.

"A co-worker once asked me, ‘Why don't the brothers want to take care of their kids?'" Richardson said.

The co-worker is white and meant no harm, Richardson said, adding that he understands why such questions are asked.

He, too, is troubled by dwindling marriage rates and worries about the effect absentee fathers have on children.

Tamika Richardson likes that the Obamas provide a counterweight to the attention given to the problems affecting black families. "They're a different perspective of the kind of people we are."

"I see a future now"

Twice a week in an office park in Lexington, Ky., a group of noncustodial fathers gathers to learn. And vent. And grow.

The nonprofit Fatherhood Initiative's single goal is to remove any obstacle to these men assuming their roles as fathers. That means conducting parenting classes, helping the men find jobs and giving them a hand in navigating the Family Court system, said the program's site manager, Charles Brown.

On Father's Day, Barack Obama talked about how absentee fathers cripple families. He issued a challenge to all fathers to become active in their children's lives.

But it's the men like the ones in the Fatherhood Initiative - who sometimes struggle to fulfill their parental duties and who live on the economic margin - who are the subject of policy debates about fathers.

Should society nurture these men or punish them?

Obama wants to do both.

Most men in the program, Brown said, are ordered there by the courts after failing to keep up with child-support payments. Others volunteer to be a part of the group, using the program as a support group to deal with ex-wives and cope with being a father from afar.

"It's making a man out of me," said Jonathan Walker, 27, of Batesburg-Leesville, S.C. Walker, who makes a living installing cable, has four children. Now, he said, he's far more hands-on with his children. He credits the program.

"Anything that's going on, I'm there. I see a future with my kids now - a long future."

OBAMA ON FAMILY AND FATHERHOOD

What he has said, what he proposes:

Obama 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. They have abandoned their responsibilities, acting like boys instead of men. And the foundations of our families are weaker because of it."
- Father's Day speech, June 15 in Chicago

Obama proposes

The Responsible Fatherhood and Healthy Families Act, which would:

• Remove some of the government penalties on married families
• Crack down on men avoiding child support payments
• Ensure that support payments go to families instead of state bureaucracies
• Fund support services for fathers and their families
• Support domestic-violence prevention efforts

Source: www.barackobama.com