Should Sons Be Raised Differently? Fathers vs Daughters | Middle Ground

my best friend is a boy we had this brilliant idea let's get a place together my dad's not cool with it human nature is like if they're living together they're going to hook up sexually [Music] my name is rihanna i'm 20 years old i'm gabriella i'm 20 years old my name is i'm 14. and i'm really excited to have this conversation with my dad today i'm pretty excited to talk to my dad about certain things deep conversations uh i feel a little bit nervous to talk to my dad today my relationship with my dad is good we've been through a lot of stuff together he raised me on his own with no mom so that has definitely built us stronger together [Music] my name is benjamin and i'm the father of one beautiful and infinitely talented and loving 14 year old young lady my name is mike i'm a father of three girls hi my name is brian i'm a father of two once you became a dad what was your biggest lesson that it's the true meaning of our existence that's the thing i wanted most in my entire life is to be a father and it's everything i've ever expected i'm gabriella and this is my dad mike i'm mike and this is my daughter gabriella my name is benjamin and this is my beautiful daughter si lally my name is c lally and my dad is benjamin hi i'm rihanna this is my dad brian this is my daughter rihanna daughters please go to the left fathers please go to the right step forward if you agree with the statement daughters must be raised differently than sons it's not so much because of them but because of the society we live in but i know if i had a 14 year old boy and i wanted to send them out to the corner store i would feel pretty confident in doing that but for my daughter it's a different situation and it's not her fault it's because of society like i said i agree right where i have to be more careful she's very strong and capable of you know defending herself in a lot of ways but at the end of the day she's not as big as strong as a dude yeah and i'm going to worry about that so because of that i feel i have to be more protective of her i agree and defend her i agree is exactly the same thing so i don't have a son i only have daughters but if i had a son i don't think i would raise him any differently the type of scenario that you're talking about i completely agree but i think is i think this world is dangerous for both male and female one time i was in the eighth grade and i guess i didn't tell my dad i was going to city walk with my friends and i didn't come home till like midnight or 11 pm and the cops were like all over my block i dialed 9-1-1 i said my daughter's gone i know where she's at she doesn't answer her phone if i was my brother because he's three years older than me so at the time i was like 14 he'd be 17 my dad would be liking whatever you know if he calls me calls me but if it's me it's like oh my god my daughter is missing i think he can be a little overprotective when it comes to like having friends that are guys i think he assumes a lot and i think he should just assume the best not the worst me too just a cool friendship there are no guy friends no i'm just kidding i wouldn't like i wouldn't let any boys in our apartment burbank especially not in your bedroom you know my best friend is a boy we're very very very close and we're both in between housing situations right now for when we go back to college we had this brilliant idea let's get a place together we're best friends we hang out 24 7. my dad's not cool with it i'm just not gonna challenge it because no reason to why aren't you cool with it if you don't mind me asking because i think there's a place in the time for everything and i don't think that i'm ready for her to move in with a guy that i don't know and you know human nature is like if they're living together they're gonna hook up sexually [Laughter] like there's no way ever can i ask you this um let's say you're 20 right 20 years old say you had a 20 year old son and he was in a living situation where you want to have a female roommate i think the answer to him i think the answer is obvious okay because as you said now i'm gonna go back to agreeing with you that you have to treat it a little differently but i think if i had a son and he was 20 and he would want to live with a girl i wouldn't have any objection would you find it weird if you had a son and he was 20 and he wanted to live with a girl and there was nothing romantic there at all no i wouldn't find it weird i know how guys are you know when they're young they got a lot of testosterone and girls like to tease it's dangerous for chicks i mean they got to really watch their stuff but what if we're just sitting down and we look good is that still teasing someone you can't it can be it depends on what you're doing but i feel like girls don't even try doing it intentional sometimes people are just good at looking if you raise them equally then they'll learn and grow up to see each other as equals instead of like having like misogyny and stuff like that i completely agree with that me too blaming the girls kind of puts the onus on the girls to stop that gross behavior when the onus is on the boys and the people who are raising them and the media that they're watching what would you say is the biggest challenge for you too probably something like communication and just understanding how i feel and sometimes that i don't agree with things that he thinks recently i decided i wanted to live with my mom because i just get a lot of intense anxiety around him and it might be a little awkward i struggled to communicate my feelings to my family a lot of the times i just don't know how my dad will react to some of my feelings and i just don't want i don't like for him to see me upset because i know it upsets him a lot i do remember very vividly one time him telling me that whatever my energy is he's gonna put the same energy back i remember he told me that one time and it kind of just stuck with me and i always think about it so i'm always thinking how do what do i say how do i put myself like when i'm angry and stuff i feel that i've been a very open father and understanding and i try to let her know that i'm not going to judge her i'm not here to judge her i'm here to help her i definitely feel that she doesn't feel comfortable expressing herself to me fully and it's so strange you know because we grew up so close we grew up so close we were together all the time i feel like when she became a teenager it was like all that changed everything it was like alternate universe like what is this what is going on you just have to give her some space definitely i don't know i guess uh it scares me a lot to disappoint him that makes sense but just know that you're never gonna disappoint me like nothing you do will ever disappoint me i love you infinitely for who you are and i accept you fully for who you are i love you unconditionally okay sorry it's okay love it's okay yeah it's totally okay you don't disappoint me you never will i didn't really have my mom to run to when i started my period like all the girl things literally like yeah i see my mom here and there but my dad took custody me at such a young age so that made us like have a really strong relationship he's also like my best friend i tell him everything i tell him who i'm dating this and that and the cool thing is about him is like dads could be like don't do this don't do that but if anything he just gives me really good advice that's really sweet she hides about 20 percent of stuff for me and i had about 20 from her she doesn't tell me everything because i don't want to know too much you know so i i went through a lot of mental health stuff and physical health stuff in the last two years when i was 18 i wasn't ready to say anything to anybody i'm a very private person and my dad is too so he understands and he never he never pried and he never asked too many questions and i like to keep everything that was going on to myself because otherwise it felt like i was including more people into my problem and the second time was kind of when it hit me like i can't do this alone and i need my biggest support system to be there for me and it's always going to be my parents especially my dad we went through this together i mean she had to go through this we i was there just to support her and so so was her mom but he definitely made our relationship so much stronger i mean i i i wouldn't have it any other way nobody wants to be vulnerable in front of their family but you know if you're vulner if you get sick their your kids are there to take care of you when i broke my health broke down i'm on kidney dialysis she takes me to dialysis three times a week she feeds me i just go agree and i'm hungry i feel like my dad takes care of me by paying my rent paying my car insurance getting me anything i need so the least i could do for him when his health isn't good is take care of him so my grandpa died five years ago my dad went to go be in israel say goodbye to his dad spend time with his family but my dad was there for a month and we didn't see him for that month and i realized a couple years later that he went so he wouldn't have to grieve in front of us it just made me sad that he felt like he couldn't do that and now i understand why i know that i'm the backbone of the family and i like and i'm the only man of the house so i wouldn't want to see myself breaking down in front of anyone of my family i don't think there was a situation that i needed to but i i wouldn't think that i'd be comfortable opening up that much i feel similar i feel like i have to be strong just because i can't show her what i'm going through because then i'm kind of putting her through it similar to what you said you know just recently she made a big decision she decided that she wanted to stay with her mom full time since she was two years old we've always shared custody 50 50 down the middle so i went from seeing her half of the time to here and there and it hurt me hurt me a lot it hurt me down to my core but at the end of the day that was her decision and she thought it was best for her mental health so i agreed with it but i can't sit here and say that night i didn't go home and cry you know but obviously that's not something i want her to see because i want her to be happy regardless of anything raising a 14 year old young lady being a man myself there's a bit of a disconnect and in this world of social media and instant gratifications and all these things that we have to deal with it's the biggest challenge i've ever had i have had moments i felt like i failed my family my hospitalizations have put some financial strain on my family and they've taken a huge emotional toll on my family my parents and my sisters and the first time it was like yeah this is horrible but we have to get through it and the second time i just kept saying to myself i can't believe i let this happen again i can't believe i'm back here and i can't believe i'm doing this to my family all over again i'm really insecure about things that i do and just myself in general so i constantly feel like i'm such a disappointment to especially my dad well the question was if you feel you failed or disappointed your family i i don't i mean why why do you i don't think i disappointed you i just feel if i had been a little bit more diligent i wouldn't have found myself in the position that i was in in august yeah but you also have to remember that you were fighting and it was a little stronger than than you and eventually took over and we needed to fight back and we fought back and we won it but you definitely did not disappoint us or failed us in any way that's absolutely not the case my angel i tried to get her you know through my lawyer and the judge just blew me away and i told last thing i told the judge was you know the police told me a long time ago if they keep coming out somebody's going to go to jail and they they had been out between her and her mother having fist fights and she was just a kid i really just needed to get out of that situation it was just bad for me health wise to be with my mom i mean i love her she's my mom we're okay now because we're away your part because we're apart but living with her is a different story when you live with someone it's different my dad at the time it was such a coincidence because i was like i just need to get out of here she hit me in my face at that moment i had a bloody nose and my dad specifically that time got off work like three hours early and he opened the door and he saw me and she went to jail and ever since he's had custody of me wow you know i think i probably should have sat down in the filled your family because in some ways i do feel that i did fail you and in the way that i filled you was setting those expectations on you you know when she was born i i wanted her to be so perfect i put her in gymnastics i taught her multiple languages if she was in a very specific school that she went to and i feel like me having those thoughts and those ideas of what a perfect daughter would be put too much pressure definitely and at the end of the day that's my fault so i understand why she feels the way you do but i am sorry i apologize to you forever putting those expectations on you you're great just the way you are and i'm just happy that we're here we're having this moment you know i told my dad that we were doing this video he had no idea what was going on and i'm just grateful that he trusted me enough to just come no questions asked if it wasn't for you i would not be the strong person i am the outspoken person i am or the opinionated person i am i wouldn't have zero tolerance for [ __ ] and it's all because of you that i'm able to live my life in the strongest way i possibly can i'm gonna repeat something you said because i found it beautiful and i completely agree with you but there's nothing in this world that you could ever do that would disappoint me what i feel towards you and your sisters is just endless love and nothing can ever change that i just want to say that i'm thankful that i have a dad that loves me unconditionally and obviously saved me from an abusive relationship with my mother because if i didn't have a dad and i was living with my mother i don't know where i would be right now so i'm happy and thankful i have him she's a lovely kid and she's actually my caregiver you know right now she's not working and she runs all my urns she takes me everywhere i want to go and does everything for me so i'm very proud to have her as a daughter i guess i feel like you kind of made me strong so thank you a lot for that and i love you a lot too [Music] you

Channel: Jubilee

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Keywords: jubilee, jubilee media, jubilee project, middle ground, spectrum, odd man out, versus 1, embrace empathy, live deeper, love language, blind devotion, jubilee middle ground fathers vs daughters, fathers vs daughters, parenting, fatherhood, father daughter relationship, raising daughters vs raising sons

Id: 64gzH3OPmQY

Length: 16min 41sec (1001 seconds)

Published: Sun Jan 10 2021