Tracing the Impact of Social Welfare Policies on Fatherlessness in America

What if I told you that the policies meant to uplift single mothers in the 1960s had an unintentional side effect that still resonates today - a surge in fatherlessness? In this conversation, we traverse the controversial terrain of social welfare policies, shining a light on how these well-intended rules inadvertently fueled single-mother households. We offer first-hand accounts and a deep dive into the ripple effects these policies had on subsequent generations. 

Ever wondered why the US social welfare system seems to favor single mothers over single fathers? We sure did, and in this episode, we tackle this bias head on. Delving into the economic realities that make it harder for families to get by, we echo the sentiments expressed on the Breakfast Club, questioning why fathers aren't stepping up for their families. This isn't just about pointing fingers - it's about understanding the systemic factors that hinder the family structure.

We wrap up our conversation, underlining the critical role fathers play in the household and the outcomes when they're absent. We trace back to mid-1960s welfare reforms and draw on census data from 1910-1930 to comprehend the shift in family dynamics. Intriguingly, back then, young black children were more likely to grow up with their fathers present than young white children - a fact that flips the current narrative on its head. Let's grapple with the weighty issue of fatherlessness together and strive to understand its origins.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:02

Hello and welcome to our podcast series, the Father Factor Podcast. I'm your host, byron Ricks, and joining me is my co-host and good friend, josh Wombrod. The objective is to give a voice to fathers who are not able to be with their kids, mothers who are raising kids without fathers, and children who, unfortunately, are growing up without fathers in their lives.

Speaker 3: 0:25

It take more than names to be a man oh yeah. It take more than sex to be a dad oh yeah. It take more than good to be the bad oh yeah, it take more. It take more, more, more, more, more.

Speaker 1: 0:45

Well, hello everyone. My name is Byron Ricks. I'm with my co-host, josh Wombrod. Today we are burning up down here in Texas and around other cities. I see, just got back from Chicago not long ago and it was nice actually, josh, in Chicago. I think it was one of the better days. In the mornings it was 75, 78, and by afternoon it was about 85. For a couple days there Just felt great. I was on Lake Michigan, on the lakefront. They had the, what you call them, the Navy fighters, the Blue Angels.

Speaker 4: 1:25

The Blue Angels. Yeah, the Blue.

Speaker 1: 1:27

Angels. They have a show in Chicago every year, so I didn't get to see the show this year, but I was there while they were practicing. They would fly over Navy Pier and over downtown Chicago in formation and it was cool to watch. Reminded me of when I was a kid growing up there. We used to always go down to the lakefront and watch the Blue Angels shows. You ever seen a Blue Angels show Once?

Speaker 4: 1:49

Yeah, once. Yeah, I was little, though I don't remember where, what state, none of that, but I've seen it once.

Speaker 1: 1:57

We've seen it in Chicago, we've seen it in Indiana and it seems like we've seen it somewhere else, but maybe not. So okay, ladies and gentlemen, today we have a good show for you. We talk about fatherlessness and father's not been in the home, and I got some feedback that, byron, you act like all the fathers don't want to be there. You know there were circumstances that caused us to be not be in our homes. I think you need to do a little research and, interestingly enough, I was listening to the Breakfast Club and Larry Elder was on there and talked about fatherlessness in our neighborhood. Now, I'm not a promoter of Larry Elder or a detractor from either, for that matter, I am.

Speaker 1: 2:49

This show is a politically neutral show, but he did say something that I found interesting and I want to share with you, and hopefully I can get your feedback on it, and Josh and I then we'll unwrap it, as one of Pastor Ray used to say oh, we can unwrap this. So, that said, there's a question out there that's asked why is fatherlessness still going on? Here we are in 2023, and we have so much fatherlessness? Is it because men just somehow have lost their will to be fathers and to father their kids. They just make them. What do you think is going on, josh? You think it's innate?

Speaker 4: 3:36

No, I mean this is the information age. This is also a time of opinion. People are able to find groups of people to support their opinion, find cheerleaders to support the dysfunction. In some cases, support and justify separation. We see struggle right now with inflation. So I mean there's a lot of motive for it. So I know in a lot of my experience and some of the things I've experienced, put it like this there's a reason, there's usually a strategy behind fathers not being at home.

Speaker 1: 4:18

In some cases, so you're saying, on a broader scale, there's a systematic yes, yes, because there's Something systemic is going on as well. So it's not just dads not wanting to be there, there's something more systemic going on. Interestingly, you say that because we have a clip coming up and the question on the table is why is fatherlessness still growing? Why is it still growing? And we have a clip that we want to share with you.

Speaker 2: 4:49

Why is fatherlessness still a growing issue in this country? The 1960s, some well-meaning policies were put forth that ended up not doing so well. In fact, they actually incentivized single-mother households. Specifically, in 1964, president Lyndon B Johnson launched his Great Society, an initiative with the goal of beating poverty, reducing crime and promoting equality in America. His welfare system was very generous, particularly for single mothers, but there was one rule that ruined it all the man in the house rule, which essentially said that if you have a working or able-bodied man living in your house, we cannot help you. They even went as far as to send federal agents to these households to make sure that no man was living there. If I was a mom at the time, I would throw the man out of the house too to get that check, and these things don't exactly promote marriage. This is exactly why we shouldn't judge policies based on their intentions, but actually on their results, and these results don't bode well.

Speaker 1: 5:40

Wow, so I'm a little older than you and I actually remember this. I remember I was about 15 years old and I was dating this girl I liked. We had just started dating and I was at her home for the first time and we were just there doing what teenagers do kicking it, getting the feel for each other and lo and behold, this white social worker shows up at the door and everybody in the house was getting a panic, and she was one of ten. So her mother had ten children and they were scurrying around and I didn't know what was going on. It was the first time I had experienced something like that.

Speaker 1: 6:29

And lo and behold, it was a social worker and she was there checking it was two of them actually checking to see if there was a man in the home, and her father used to sneak around and wear disguises and things of that nature and I remember them putting things away. And there was a pair of man shoes right there by a daybed and I was standing there and the family was looking at me and they were motioning. I didn't know why they were motioning, so finally looked down and I saw the man shoes. But I understand this is my first experience with this, so I didn't know what to do. But somehow, as they continued to look at me, I read that non-verbal and I just took my feet on my foot and I slowly pushed her father's shoes under that daybed. So there's some truth to this. There was a systemic process by which it caused a lot of African American men and some non-African American men to leave the home.

Speaker 4: 7:40

No, for sure. I mean I can tell you story after story, just my experience so. But like this, I know people that have gotten married for the tax benefits.

Speaker 1: 7:50

Yes, right which? There is no tax benefit, by the way.

Speaker 4: 7:54

Right, but some people do that. But I also know people that have not gotten married or engaged or full on lived together, even though they live together Because it's more. It's a better financial decision to keep the benefits that were in place, such as food stamps, section 8, whatever the case is. So I had friends that literally live out of totes. They'd have totes that you buy at Walmart with the lids. That's where their clothes and shoes they'd get dressed At the baby mama's house. They can put the lid back on there and then they can dip out, but there's no sign of them truly living there.

Speaker 1: 8:34

That's 2023 we're talking about now. Well, I mean, this is a few years back.

Speaker 4: 8:38

Okay, but I mean, I'm not going to expose nobody.

Speaker 1: 8:42

No, no, I'm not asking you to expose anyone.

Speaker 4: 8:44

I still know people, I was a recent even. I know that you've got to get rid of the evidence of mail in the house.

Speaker 1: 8:53

Well see, that helps answer the question. You know, why is this deal growing? I guess because the systematic process is still in place, that the welfare system will not help a woman with if there's a man in her life, right, okay, now you had an interesting story that I want you to share about welfare, because I know that in our audience knows that you were a single dad for a little while and now you happily married two kids, et cetera, et cetera. But tell us about your welfare experience as a man.

Speaker 4: 9:31

Well, as a man I can tell you, as a child too. But as a man I was a single father and I had friends around me, single mother friends, you know, family type, male in the house type friends, all of that right. But what's crazy is me and a friend we both, you know, we rode together to the food stamp office to get the benefits. I'm trying to get the insurance and some food stamps for my daughter. I'm looking for a job. We struggling and we sit there for the. You know, like the 63 hours they make you wait and I think they do things intentionally just to make you aggressive when they come back there because I know I just remember being agitated when I get in front

Speaker 4: 10:13

of them. Yes, but I go through all of the same questions. She did all of that, of course, different rooms, but we know the process, it's a form and she come out she's smiling. I'm coming out on Big Mad, like what'd they give you? She said I think it was like $370 or $380 a month in food stamps. I got $34 because I was a man, right, and, mind you, we both had a child the same age. You know, we both had a daughter the same age.

Speaker 1: 10:42

Okay, Did they say to you? Did they say to you you're a male and you get less?

Speaker 4: 10:49

Yes, because you're a man. All we can do is give the Medicaid to her, to the daughter, but you can't get it, okay, and then we're giving you $34 a month to help put towards feeding her. Okay.

Speaker 1: 11:04

But the female they gave $300 and and she had insurance. And insurance it's about $370-ish somewhere around there.

Speaker 4: 11:10

So they gave her over $300,. They gave you $30.

Speaker 1: 11:13

Yeah, almost $400 in food and she got insurance and you didn't get insurance. Correct, because you are a male.

Speaker 4: 11:19

Right, wow, so yeah, that was. You know some of my experience, I mean, even with homelessness. You know a homeless single mother is going to be able to find shelter. A homeless single father's not. I've been there. Wow, they'll take your child from you. Oh, she can stay here and you can come back in the morning to get her. But you know you'd be met with a clipboard in CPS when you come back the next morning and say, oh, actually, no, no, I'm good now we got a room, okay, and we dip, so it's. There's definitely a difference between how they handle. They will enable and support a single mother by not a single father, rather the circumstances Not in the same fashion.

Speaker 4: 11:57

No, wow, that's interesting, and but the same thing goes for a family, the family unit. They're not going to give the same support to the family unit. What do you mean by that, now? The family unit? Well mom and dad are there. You got an able bodied man in there. He should be able to take care of the rent.

Speaker 2: 12:11

He should be able to take care of the CPS.

Speaker 4: 12:13

So it's, it's, it's. The system is sent to, oh, help a single parent. But when you compare side by side, there is a, there is a sex component to it, male and female, based on the type of support you get Okay Interesting.

Speaker 1: 12:31

You know, I said that I listened to the breakfast club. I'm a breakfast club fan and they had Larry Elder on the breakfast club. We're going to cue this up because he had something to say. In fact he was running for president but if I remember correctly, he didn't have all the qualifications. So I hear now he's suing the RNC, but that's another whole story for another day. But again, I'm not endorsing him and I'm not not endorsing him. This is non political. But he did say something relative to our program and to our audience and I again want to play that and I want to then have us comment on it.

Speaker 5: 13:12

It's in this country. Half of them are black victims, almost all killed by other blacks. How do you explain that If it isn't for the absence of fathers? Are you prepared to say black people just genetically inclined to commit more crime? I doubt it, and the go to reaction often is poverty and systemic racism. Here's the problem. 1940, when there was blatant racism this is before Brown versus Board of Education before the Civil Rights Act of 64, KKK was still alive and well 87% of blacks lived under the poverty line. Now it's about 14%. You can't blame it on poverty, you can't blame it on racism. It is the breakdown of the nuclear, intact family and neither side is talking about it. The left doesn't talk about it because they caused it with the welfare.

Speaker 1: 13:55

Okay now would you play that back? I want to hear that 87% stat again 이죠R.

Speaker 5: 14:47

Now it's about 14%. You can't blame it on poverty. You can't blame it on racism. It is the breakdown of the nuclear intact family and neither side is talking about it.

Speaker 1: 14:59

Well, so according to Hiss that 87% in 1940, 87% of blacks lived under the poverty line and today it is 14%, and he's attributing that to the destruction of the families. He's contributing that to black on black crime, to destruction of the families.

Speaker 4: 15:25

So I mean I mean that's interesting. I mean that's an interesting because I have thoughts on the word poverty line alone. Okay, because the poverty line isn't what the poverty line really is. With inflation, they've not adjusted the poverty line very much overall. So with inflation and what they call especially when you're talking about getting assistance, support, all of that what they call poverty is, and what they call middle class, what they call rich, all of that is it's not been adjusted.

Speaker 4: 15:59

I think according we can see that even with minimum wage, with the type of inflation we're looking at, so we got multiple things going on at one time. It's all time. It's all time harder to live now than ever. So having a man on the house is even more risky than ever because if I get caught, I really can't afford. With the way groceries are inflated, I really can't afford. Way in childcare is inflated. And even nowadays you got couples that won't take pictures together, that are, I hate to say, playing the system. Some cases they are playing the system because they will go, look at profiles, they will research and investigate to ensure that there's an absence of a male, because if you do have an intact family, then why are we supporting your family? Why isn't he?

Speaker 1: 16:47

And that's a good question. Actually I'm playing devil's advocate a little bit. If indeed you do have the father in the home, what's the reason that that father cannot provide for his family?

Speaker 4: 17:06

I mean I'm not sure there's a hundred different answers to that, but I mean you're going to think about where they live, what is the availability of jobs, what is the cost of living, what are all the details involved?

Speaker 1: 17:22

What are their education levels? And then, is there some systemic process going on as it relates to them getting jobs? Absolutely there is. And them keeping jobs.

Speaker 4: 17:34

Think about the criminal system. That's a money making industry and a great way to help reduce the ability to take away rights, because back in the day, it was blacks and women couldn't vote. Well, now, who isn't allowed to vote? Who doesn't have the right to vote?

Speaker 1: 17:59

People that are here illegally In felons, oh, okay, well, yeah, in felons, felons. So but, in certain states, aren't they Certain states? They've reinstated it Some of it. They've not reinstated them, but allowed them to vote. Now I might be Florida, who knows? Florida is a lot of things.

Speaker 4: 18:17

So I mean, if you think over the history of time, the rights that are taken away, there's just a lot of opposition to make it more challenging to provide, especially if you've had a felony. And then also you look at the statistics of blacks with black males with felons on the record, right. So as we really dive into this, and how many of those guys would have committed a felony or got caught for a felony if dad was in the home, you know, look at the perpetuating cycle. And now this guy's out of the home and he got kids and it's. We look into the cycle and it's like a well-leaved machine, okay.

Speaker 1: 18:59

So we have a situation where a family can't get assistance when a father is in the home. We have situations where fathers themselves, because of lack of education or incarceration, are not able to have the jobs that they need to take care of their families. Now I'm going to ask another question why does people? Why do people why do men and women for that matter make all these babies and they can't take care of them?

Speaker 4: 19:36

Oh, man oh wow, this is a fun one for me because I mean, I'm on everybody's neck with this one right.

Speaker 4: 19:45

Well, for one, it just depends on the thought process, the person. Some people just need to be healed and the thought of having something that loves them unconditionally is enough to keep producing, because eventually they grow up. In some cases, the more kids you have, the more assistance you get. My wife was talking about something she read recently that if you have I can't remember how many kids, you no longer have to pay taxes, property taxes, so you got certain child support courts that will let fathers off after a certain number of kids, Really, so it just Let them off.

Speaker 4: 20:24

I mean let them off. You got too many kids. You don't have to pay child support, no more.

Speaker 1: 20:29

I never heard that before in my life. Oh yeah, now I'm going to have to look that up, you look that up, I'm going to have to look that up.

Speaker 4: 20:35

It's certain places. But the other part of it is that for each child you get a certain amount of assistance. And I know again, I'm not going to expose people, but I know people that play the system and they know how to play the system so well. Babies get you more food stamps. Some of these people are selling their food stamps for cash. Right, you get your rent covered. Some of the Section 8 programs will get to be a single.

Speaker 1: 21:04

The new welfare laws that were intended to be relief, actually for the underserved has served to dismantle, systematically. Dismantle men in the household of families, both black and white in Hispanic as well, we just not just black and we have some stats that we're going to share with you rolling here next, as it relates to the impact that this law had on America, as I said, it's because in the mid-60s, lyndon Johnson launched what he called the War on Poverty In Charlemagne.

Speaker 5: 21:41

Literally, they sent social workers door to door in the inner city. I remember this, advising women of the availability of welfare, provided there was no man in the house. It created an economic incentive for women to marry the government. Same thing with whites. In 1965, 8% of whites entered the world without a father in the home area to the mother. Now it's about 25%, also up three-fold. Look at census data no-transcript 1920 1930. In places like Milwaukee, chicago, philadelphia, a young black kid was slightly more likely to be brought into a world with a father in the home, married to the mother, than a young white kid. We have incentivized this kind of bad behavior and it's had a disproportionately bad effect on the black community.

Speaker 5: 22:20

I'm gonna ask the question what do white people do wrong?

Speaker 1: 22:22

Wow, you know the interesting stat there 8% of white dads were not in the home. And today, yesterday, 8%. Today is 25% of white dads not in the home. So this fatherlessness is reaching across cultures. I remember when I wrote my book Searching for Dad Nine Side Effects of Growing Up Fatherless and how to Overcome them, I was told by several in non-black communities that the book would not resonate well with in the white community because they didn't have that issue. And now we see that, yeah, they have that issue too, just like every culture does. Right now, fatherlessness has become an epidemic, it seems, in America.

Speaker 4: 23:16

Absolutely. I mean, and this is something that knows no, no limit, right? Because it's one of the we've hurt, hurt people, hurt people, right? So if I come up without a father in my in the home, I'm more likely to walk away from my children, right? So that's where we see generations and generations of fatherless children and and mothers raising kids and a whole tribe full of mothers, a community of mothers, coming together, raising children together and no father around and then excuse I've heard a million times when my dad wasn't there for me and it's like so you can repeat the same.

Speaker 1: 24:02

Yeah, that happens, but that didn't happen with me. In fact, I went the opposite direction because I didn't have a father Right, and so did you in a sense. I mean, I don't know that you, well, you've had two fathers, but your father experience did not cause you to perpetrate that experience or pass it on or to to be that type of father. You chose to be a good father.

Speaker 4: 24:27

Right, you know, that's the thing is. I remember being a kid coming up and just wondering you know what it was. What features did I get from my dad? Does he look like me? Things of that nature, right In and under bad days, just imagining if he was, was he near, was he waiting for me outside the school, right, but he just don't know what I look like. And those thoughts, in addition to some of the poor examples when I was with my father or even when we was with white dad right there, there was terrible examples in the home. However, I could have used those and some of the stuff I see play out. You know, there's certain things that I did pick up that I've had to go more intentionally against, but the choice and I think you that was the right choice of words is choice to. I chose to be as effective and attentive of a father as I possibly could be.

Speaker 1: 25:18

You know there's another stat I want to play Larry again because of the stat he said of the number of black men that were in the home pre the welfare, the welfare process. You're right. What are the reasons that you think fathers aren't in the home?

Speaker 5: 25:41

As I said, it's because in the mid 60s, lyndon Johnson launched what he called the war on poverty and Charlemagne. Literally, they sent social workers door to door in the inner city. I remember this, advising women of the availability of welfare, provided there was no man in the house. It created an economic incentive for women to marry the government. Same thing with whites. In 1965, 8% of whites into the world without a father in the home married to the mother. Now it's about 25%, also up threefold. Look at census data 1910, 1920, 1930. In places like Milwaukee, chicago, philadelphia, a young black kid was slightly more likely to be brought into a world with a father in the home married to the mother than a young white kid. We have incentivized this kind of bad behavior and it's had a disproportionately bad effect on the black community.

Speaker 1: 26:27

Wow. So 1910, 1920, there were more black fathers in the home than they are now Because of the, as he said, black women, black moms were incentivized Not to have that black man around, right. But then we also know now the same was true for Hispanics, whites and whatever other ethnic group that was at that and under that poverty line they couldn't have a dad at home, right. And so it's. It's systemic from the, from a government perspective, that it had let this charge. But then we as a people Need to now figure out how to father our kids, because we're at 2023. Right now. We have to learn how to father our kids and we have to learn how to interact with our baby's mothers and ex-wives and husbands, because the kids are the ones that are suffering.

Speaker 1: 27:41

I say to dads all the time All your kids are equally yours. If you have children by more than one woman, they're still Equally yours and they still deserve the same protection, the same love, the same caring. They still deserve the same Everything. If you take one somewhere, you ought to be able to take the other one somewhere, and she ought to want to do that. I'm talking to dads right now. You ought to want to do that you need to step up and take care of your Children, as Malcolm X said, by any means necessary. By any means necessary, we have to be better fathers.

Speaker 4: 28:22

No, absolutely. I mean, that's the thing. There's no excuse. You know, I remember driving what two and a half hours one way every Friday morning to get Jelena before we're to get Jelena before I had work, because I work from 8 to noon on Fridays, so I'd leave, drive two and a half hours to pick her up, drive back two and a half hours She'd kick with me in the office while I was wrapping up my day on Friday and that noon we were free to go and I had to take her back on Sunday and then come back. So you gotta think that's. I drove ten hours a week just to see my child every week. So there's no excuse by any means necessary, because there's gonna come a day that that child comes to their own judgment, their own opinion, and it could be a lot of times it's about mom. They'd see mom for who she is, whether good or bad, but they also gonna see who dad is. Dad always tried, dad was around or dad didn't care.

Speaker 1: 29:25

You know, I just saw YouTube on Dominique Wilkins and his parents broke up when he was about seven, eight years old, I believe, or was it ten somewhere. He was a kid and I think his mother had about seven or eight kids total and the dad wasn't around and his sister learned that the father was in the same city I think that was Atlanta at the time and had her brother go find him and he was in a homeless shelter and he had diabetes. He was not in good shape because as a young man, you know, he chased the ladies, he didn't really take care of his family, but they all had fond memories of him when he was around. They said that he loved on them, they felt like he loved them, but the streets just had him, you know. But he had showed them so much love that this Dominique Wilkins sister took him in and took care of him and the kids rallied around him.

Speaker 1: 30:27

And that story just amazed me because you know, he wasn't there with them but when he was there he showed them love and affection and he connected with his kids and I just thought that was a beautiful thing. He made an impact. He made an impact, you know. It kind of remind me of Jeff Herod, when he was on our show and he said well, my dad wasn't there that much, but I love my dad. You know he made an impact. Then you have fathers who grow up in the home with their children and the children can't stand them.

Speaker 4: 31:02

Yeah, right, right Now. I mean that's something in the world and I know we got a rap. But my daughter is starting to have that revelation. You know she's getting ready to be 18 in October and she's talking to me about you know, I've talked to some of my friends and I've realized that a lot of them, even though they have their parents in the home, they don't have the open relationship that we have. And here she was. You know we struggle in our relationship, but no, not sure that we don't. You just said that.

Speaker 1: 31:33

Teenage age right, Exactly, Exactly. And that's another thing I want to stress to my audience. You know we talk about men not being in home. That's a physical aspect that we talk about a lot, but men can be at home physically and not be connected spiritually and emotionally. Don't don't. They don't show or give that love and that intensity that the kids need, that the wife needs, that the girlfriend needs, that helps the kid understand what it looks like and feel it and see it for themselves. And that's why it's important to have a healthy as relationship as possible. That's why it's important not to fight in front of the kids if at all possible. I know nobody's perfect, because we as parents male and female, man and woman we as parents must be the model, the role model for our kids. We must teach by showing, by action, by doing as parents.

Speaker 4: 32:31

Remember our job as parents are to raise successful adults. And why successful adults mean? That doesn't mean that monetary value. We're not here to make up for our childhood. We're not here to buy them everything. We're not here to make them the what is it? The? The inclusive club? No, we're here to set them up for reality so that when they leave our homes they're not met with that dooming of how bad life can be Right.

Speaker 1: 33:00

Which is something that you know. We're gonna wrap up here. Maybe we'll pick that up because you have a lot of helicopter parents. You know, I'm the president and chairman of the board of a of a charter school legacy preparatory charter school in Mesquite campus, and we have a, a plane on campus and not all the parents. We have a lot of great parents, but every now and then you have that helicopter parent. You know that helicopter parent. So we're gonna wrap up here with this segment. We're gonna pick this back up. My name is Byron ricks. I've been with my co-host, josh warm brought you. I've been listening to the father factor. Need you to hit us up on our website?

Speaker 4: 33:43

Yes, fatherfactorpodcastcom.

Speaker 1: 33:46

Also send us an email. You know we want to hear from you. Just like we got this topic, we want to expand on it. But why do you think fatherlessness is this is the question of the day? Why do you think fatherlessness is growing in America, or is it? What's your thought, what's your hypothesis?

Speaker 4: 34:08

And one thing we'll also do is we'll we'll put that question on social medias so you can engage with us, answer it, shout out to us, right? But the biggest thing, subscribe and then leave us a rating and review through Apple Spotify. Whoever you listen to us on, go ahead and review us, let others find us and share and share, of course always share, because sharing is caring.

Speaker 1: 34:32

You've been listening to the father factor. Why? Because father's count. Dads, all your children are equally yours. Hey, thank you. This is Byron the father factor podcast. Thank you for listening. If you'd like what you heard, subscribe and share and tell us your thoughts. We'd like to hear from you. Perhaps you can be on our show. And to the fathers out there remember all your children are equally yours.