The Baby-Mama Palavar by JOHN ATTAH

One of the most popular slang in the Nigerian entertainment industry of recent is the term “Baby-Mama” which literally describes a single mother or a lady who gave birth outside marriage. This practice has being in existence for so long but it gained headlines when entertainers, especially musicians popularized it by impregnating and having babies from their girlfriends and groupies.

The crazy thing about this trend is, it seems the ladies who are most times dumped after having the babies have no problem with this bizarre practice as most of them jostle to be baby-mamas to male entertainers. The entertainers who naturally flee from the so called “bondage” of marriage see this as a leeway to having children with no string attached as most of them even go to the extent of having many children from different women including unashamed beauty queens and regulars, while their teaming fans and colleagues applaud their “manliness”.

While this practice rages on, the society bears the brunt of this menace. Apart from it being ungodly, it debases womanhood as the men (entertainers) now see young women as just a means to making babies but not good enough to wife. A woman is meant to be matrimonially attached before childbearing but due to their unabashed nature, they make themselves a readily available object to satisfy the ultimate desire of men- children; without conjugal affiliation.

If this trend continues unabated (as most young men are keying into it), the society would soon be filled with kids from single homes which are at the risk of developing behavioral patterns inimical to the larger society. Some people might argue this point but a child is naturally preordained to grow up in a secured home where both parents are available to guide and nurture them. A baby-mama scenario entails the child growing up in a home where the second parent visits once in a while; this attendant lack of sufficient bound from both parents in turn affects the psychological and behavioral construct of the child. No amount of visitation or gifts can fill up the void of the presence of both parents in a child’s life.

This baby-mama practice also has the tendency to expose the child to domestic violence and general insecurity. Recently, there was a heavy social media war between a baby-mama and baby-dada- who tried to sneak a seven-month-old kid out of the country under the guise of Medicare.

This social media war degenerated to the level of accusation being made of the kid being infected by disease by one of the parent. The unprintable names the partners labeled each other during the war of words would permanently remain on the internet and the kid would someday grow up and read how his/her parents fought dirty. Tell me how the grown up child would feel about his or herself, with possible jibes being thrown at them by their peers. We continually read and hear of teenagers committing suicide as a result of bullying by their peers; this presents a veritable tool to unleashing all sorts of jibes at the young child which may lead to reclusiveness, serious bodily harm or death.

Obviously, most, if not all the perpetrators of this act sees no harm in it. For the man, it’s just the easiest way to beget children, with no string attached while for the lady, well… They know better. The earlier the ladies realize the harm they are causing to themselves, the earlier for them to save themselves from this menace. Finding a man to settle down with is not easy to come by for a single lady; how much more a single mother.

NB. Meanwhile, shout-out to the Baby-Mama crooner who publicly stated that she wants to be a wifey, not a baby-mama but her recent music video screams how she ain't eve worth a baby-mama material.