Given the unwavering violence, safeguarding children is beginning to seem like an impossible task. But African-American families didn’t just start living in neighborhoods affected by violence. I grew up in a part of the city where I saw a bloody fight just about every day. Many of the black people who are now living in the ‘burbs, or in Hyde Park, or the South Loop, survived those tough neighborhoods because they were brought up under the mama rules.
Daddy had rules, too, but in most instances he was the enforcer.
Frankly, I’m sick of people pointing to the absence of black fathers as being at the root of the violence we are experiencing. Of course, kids who grow up in a two-parent family are less likely to grow up in an impoverished community, and that alone will reduce their risk of becoming victims. But when Papa was a rolling stone, Mama kept the family going.
So unless someone is going to bring back shotgun weddings, or unlock the prisons and let out offenders under the condition that they marry their babies’ mamas, or hire an unemployed black man so that he can put a ring on it and get off of his mother’s couch, we need to move on.
Black women aren’t helpless in this situation. Sure, they want more brothers to step up. But there are steps that single mothers can take today to help reduce a child’s risk of harm.I call them the mama rules. And if you live in a neighborhood where shots are fired on a regular basis, observing these simple rules might help save your child’s life.