Across America, the social issue of absent fathers and fatherless families has become a growing trend with each passing decade, infesting our society with an abundance of young men who lack moral guidance and continue the cycle of absent fathers by relinquishing and avoiding the responsibilities of fatherhood. Fatherlessness is an issue that can affect people of all ethnicities across the world; however I centered my research around the effects of fatherless families and absent fathers specifically in America. In only three decades ranging from 1960 to 1990, the amount of children living separate from their natural fathers nearly doubled from 17 percent to 36 percent (Popenoe 2). Children growing up in fatherless families with physically, emotionally, or financially absent fathers can lead to negative effects to a child’s well-being and development. Resulting in violence, substance abuse, depression, and many other social issues that plague America today with little help from the government. Children raised in single mother households are more likely to live in poverty than those who live with both parents due to the loss of financial support (Bruce par.10). Boys raised in single parent households have a higher chance of dropping out of school and out of work, however absent fathers don’t only affect their sons but their daughters too. Girls raised in single parent families are twice as likely to have an out-of-wedlock birth than those raised by both parents (Wilson 3). Children raised in fatherless families are susceptible to develop problematic behaviors that could lead to undesired actions and consequences if left untouched and damaged further through resentment of their absent father, poverty, and life. These harmful emotions and behaviors could lead to violence and juvenile crime, more young boys with hate and anger in their hearts and with guns and knives in their hands. Their mixture of negative emotions can lead to eating disorders, depression, or suicidal thoughts. As well as coming to the false solution of masking their problems with substance abuse and premature sex leading to out-of-wedlock births, rape, or death. Absent fathers are devastating to the development of sons and daughters as fathers provide a role model of authority, discipline, self-control, and compassion to their sons. A father is the most important man in a girl’s life and provides a sense of emotional and physical security, as well as giving insight to male-female relationships. Teaching their daughters, as they grows older, how to develop healthy heterosexual relationships (Wilson 11). Children living in fatherless families are more prone to dangers of the outside world because without a father they are under less parental supervision, protection, and are emotionally unstable leaving them vulnerable to find solace in drugs, alcohol, sex, crime, and violence. The issue of fatherlessness is a self-perpetuating cycle producing an abundance of men who wish to evade the parental responsibilities that come along with being a father. These weakened men finally become the one thing that brought them hardship during adolescence, passing on a fear of fatherhood and a lack of moral teachings from father to son. Then as the son grows into a man and finally comes faced with becoming a father; he continues the cycle by running away from fatherhood leaving the mother to raise the child on her own. These men ensure the s