When present fathers do more harm than good

Since July, we have witnessed the takedown of alleged criminal masterminds – men paraded through courtrooms, pleading for bail, some even professing their innocence through media appearances.

But beneath the spectacle lies a quieter tragedy: fathers standing beside their children, not to protect them, but to implicate them.

So, today, we speak to the men – those who looted the state’s purse and orchestrated deaths so brutal, so numerous, they’ve left a civic wound. These are the fathers who were present. And so we must ask: is a present, yet toxic, father truly better than an absent one?

At the other end of the spectrum we find fathers who abdicated responsibility entirely. Their sudden appearances – often during adolescence – shock us more than their absence.

These are the eclipse fathers: rare, majestic and, ultimately, useless. They arrive with promises, sell pie-in-the-sky and vanish, leaving mothers to quietly fulfil broken dreams so the child never sees the eclipse for what it is – a shadow.

But even these eclipse fathers seem less damaging than the ones who introduce their children to criminality. The “friend fathers”.

ALSO READ: Landmark ruling: Couples can now share parental leave

The ones who watch their children misbehave, defend them, ride or die with them. The fathers who know their sons are neighbourhood terrors, yet still ask for R2 for a loose cigarette, knowing full well the money is ill-gotten.

The kind who let their friends buy their child a mansion in a Middle Eastern country – at the expense of an entire nation.

We’ve seen them: children dragged into courtrooms not just by circumstance, but by proximity to their father figures.

These were the present fathers. Would the absent ones have been better?

There are fathers who disappeared when the mother entered the delivery room.

And there are those who stayed – only to become the child’s gateway to criminality.

ALSO READ: Black Dads Unplugged: Creating a positive narrative of black fathers

Unless we’re honest with ourselves, we’ll keep regurgitating these types of adults. The ones who cannot shield their children.

The ones who become their accomplices.

And yet, we scream about parental rights.

But weighed against the damage done, are we truly qualified to enforce contact between children and their possible abusers – male or female?

This is our society. Kept under a hawk’s eye. Because fathers disappear.

And when they don’t, they sometimes do worse.