For the last few weeks, the article “ Six ways single mothers can raise a sorry black man” by Dr. Boyce Watkins has been circulating the web. With a title like that, of course the post hasn’t come without controversy.

I agree with Dr. Watkins that things like coddling, allowing laziness and rewarding “playa” behavior will result in a sorry man. I believe this is not just exclusive to single mothers, or black mothers, but as a society overall we have lowered the bar for many of our young men. We’ve granted the “boys will be boys” excuse too often for shoddy morals and sloppy lifestyle decisions to the point that we aren’t raising enough of our boys to become men.

However, the onus of raising a good black man vs. a sorry one can’t be put entirely on mothers themselves. One of the biggest pieces of the puzzle that Dr. Watkins only briefly touches on in the article is that as mothers we need, yes, need, strong fathers around.

I am not suggesting that it is impossible to raise a responsible child as a single mother. I was raised by a single mother and was once a single mother myself. But what I am saying is that trying to be it all, do it all and show it all is extremely hard. There are mothers out there doing their best to create that balance each day, but we cannot deny the stress that comes with stretching yourself thin trying to do all things, and the gaps that come with trying to teach manhood, something that as women we’ve never learned.

I am the mother of a son and a daughter, and having my husband there to parent with me gives me the freedom to parent in the way that comes naturally to me. I will not deny that my natural inclination is to be more nurturing while his is often to dole out discipline. But it’s for this reason that I need him there as much as he needs me.

I can tell my husband when I think he needs to ease up a little… just like he can let me know when I’m being too soft. My husband naturally does with my son all of the things that don’t interest me, like wrestling and playing football in the yard, while my son can learn from me the things that I already know how to teach him.

Even beyond that, I don’t have to always “show” my son how to be a good man, because the example is modeled in front of him every day. I don’t have to always tell him “this is how you treat a woman” or “this is how a man handles responsibilities” because he sees how to do that on a daily basis.

If it were necessary, I could step up to the plate and try my best to embody both roles. But having my husband there takes away the burden that comes with having the entire responsibility of parenting fall on my shoulders. My husband allows me to be mom in the best way that I know how.

Black women alone cannot be held solely responsible for raising good black men. In order to stop raising “sorry black men”  we need women willing to understand that fathers still have value, and men willing to step up and model something different.