Yesterday, on Father's Day appropriately, Senator Barack Obama addressed a congregation in Chicago about the importance of young men supporting their families and taking the responsibility to raise the children they have.  Suggesting that too many fathers are absent from their children's lives, the Democratic Presidential candidate said this:

"We need fathers to realize that responsibility does not end at conception. We need them to realize that what makes you a man is not the ability to have a child -- it's the courage to raise one."

Might I suggest that what would be even more courageous would be rewinding the clock a bit, say nine months or so earlier? Responsibility, it seems to me, begins long before sex, pregnancy, and birth.  What makes you a man is having the courage to wait to become a father until he is really ready to raise a child.  For some that means not having sex at all; for many it means making sure you and your partner use condoms and birth control every single time.

Don't get me wrong; I think the Senator's thoughts about responsible fatherhood are right on target.  Where I grew up, a situation like mine--living with both mom and dad--made me a part of the "weird" family.  We usually ate dinner together, and my dad would come fetch me from doing ultra-cool things with my pre-teen friends to do so.  And research without question shows that kids generally do better when both parents are around.

But why is it that when it comes to male involvement and responsible fatherhood programs, there is so little focus on encouraging men to be responsible by preventing an unplanned pregnancy--before a child or even a pregnancy is involved?  While there are numerous attorneys general and child support enforcement officials all over the country doing great work to make sure men take responsibility for their actions and support the lives they helped create, I suspect their jobs would be a whole lot easier if we devoted more attention to making sure they don't become daddies in the first place.