Should You Take Your Children To Jail Visits?

I was listening to The Breakfast Club when the Ask Yee segment caught my attention. The question was essentially about a man being in jail and wanting his 4 year old daughter to visit him, should her mother bring her to jail for the visitation or not. Her mother expressed that she didn’t want to take their child to the jail because she was afraid the young child would tell everyone. In my opinion, that’s not a good enough reason for a child to not visit their father in jail — but I can think of some.

I spoke on this topic briefly when Apollo Nida complained that Phaedra Parks wouldn’t bring the couple’s two young sons to jail to visit him. She eventually agreed to bring them on holidays, which in my opinion is fine. Here’s the thing, nothing about jail is kid friendly and if you wanted to see your child, you’d do less illegal sh*t to get locked up. Don’t get me wrong, I’m speaking of the career criminal, not the person who’s been wrongfully jailed, or made one bad decision. I’m talking about the person who’s in and out of jail like they have a boyfriend there. 

Jails are not clean. They are filthy and like 8 out of 10 of the people that walk in and out of them are filthy too. Nobody wants to take a small child to that type of environment. Then there’s the long waiting periods. Anyone with a small child knows that children don’t like to sit still and wait in one place for an extended period of time. There’s no way they’ll be quiet and well behaved as you wait 2 hours to see someone behind a glass wall for 30 minutes. It’s hard enough with one child, try two or three. 

Then there are women who are trying to protect the image their child has of their father. They don’t want to take their child to a jail to see their father dressed in an orange jumpsuit. A father is supposed to be their child’s first hero. From an early age kids are taught that jail is where bad people go. What kind of picture does that paint to a child about their dad? That he can’t get his life together? He can’t, but a child doesn’t have to know that. 

Jails are hardly ever near where you live. They’re normally in the outskirts somewhere, which means that you have to pack up your little ones and plan an entire day’s outing. Forget the fact that you have a million things you need to do that day. You must now deal with the man who did something illegal to land himself behind bars. Basically, it’s like you’re in jail too.

I totally understand that solitude and being away from your family can take a major toll on someone. I understand that missing milestones in your children’s lives must suck. But fellas, you’ve got to understand that there is absolutely nothing fun about your family paying for your wrongdoings either. Maybe a compromise is in order, visitations once a month, or on holidays and birthdays.