The speech Obama gave today for Father’s Day has a good message, not just for fathers, or for African-Americans, but for all Americans. In short, he said that it’s time to raise expectations, to rekindle the value of empathy, and to believe we can actually do the things that higher expectations and empathy tell us need to be done.
He talks about how some people’s expectations early in his campaign, that a black man couldn’t be elected president, would have been self-defeating if they’d been listened to:
“We didn’t set high enough expectations for ourselves. We believed that someone else could do it but we can’t do it. And that filters down to our children. When we set low expectations for ourselves we set them low for our children.”
He uses Chris Rock’s joke to make the point:
“He says too many of our men brag about doing things they’re supposed to do. They’ll say, ‘Well, I’m not in jail.” Well, you’re not supposed to be in jail!”
Expectations set limits or expand them. What we expect to achieve determines not just what we try to achieve but also what even occurs to us to try to achieve.
“Don’t get carried away with that eighth grade graduation. You’re supposed to graduate from the eighth grade… Let’s just tell them now you’re going to ninth grade, and tenth grade, and then you’re going to graduate, then you’re going to college, maybe you’ll get a PhD, maybe a law degree, maybe you’ll get a medical degree…
It’s up to us – as fathers and parents – to instill this ethic of excellence in our children. It’s up to us to say to our daughters, don’t ever let images on TV tell you what you are worth, because I expect you to dream without limit and reach for those goals. It’s up to us to tell our sons, those songs on the radio may glorify violence, but in my house we glorify achievement, self respect, and hard work. It’s up to us to set these high expectations. And that means meeting those expectations ourselves. That means setting examples of excellence in our own lives.
The second thing we need to do as fathers is pass along the value of empathy to our children. Not sympathy, but empathy – the ability to stand in somebody else’s shoes; to look at the world through their eyes. Sometimes it’s so easy to get caught up in “us,” that we forget about our obligations to one another. There’s a culture in our society that says remembering these obligations is somehow soft – that we can’t show weakness, and so therefore we can’t show kindness…
That’s why we pass on the values of empathy and kindness to our children by living them. We need to show our kids that you’re not strong by putting other people down – you’re strong by lifting them up.”
This pointing out where expectations have become skewed and hilariously (sadly?) lowered versus what they really should be is a great approach. Just think how it could be applied to some of the major issues we face, like health care, Iraq, globalization, climate change, infrastructure, and rising income inequality, to name just a few:
- “We’ve got the best health care in the world, for the well-off. That’s great and all, but you’re not supposed to provide great health care just for the well-off. Civilized nations provide medical care for ALL their citizens. Every other developed nation in the world somehow manages it. Why not us?”
- “Violence and American casualties are finally going down in Iraq after the surge. Adding 30,000 more troops can accomplish that. But there aren’t supposed to be ANY American troops getting killed or injured in Iraq, a country that never attacked or threatened us. Plenty of other countries manage to not start wars with sovereign countries that haven’t attacked or threatened them and then occupy them for years and years without an exit strategy.”
- “Building wealth and spreading opportunity is one of America’s finest achievements, but it’s not supposed to be for one class of Americans at the expense of another. Taxes are supposed to be for educating the next generation – the whole next generation, not just your own kids – and for maintaining bridges and levees so they don’t collapse. Other countries do this and think it’s worth it!”
- “American consumption drives the industry of the world, but we’re not supposed to use such a disproportionate share of the world’s food and natural resources. We’re not supposed to drive species after species to extinction and leave the global ecosystem in ruins. Previous generations believed in trying to hand over a better world and a better life to their children. That’s what you’re supposed to do. Really!”
This Father’s Day speech is going to be painted as just aimed at men, particularly African-American men, but I think the essential message in it has much broader applicability. It’s a great speech with a great message and worth watching in its entirety. The transcript of the prepared remarks can be found here, but it really doesn’t do justice to what he actually said or the reaction from the congregation.
