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I think I would need some kind of spreadsheet to keep track of Nick Cannon’s family situation. (Peridot did a thorough list last November.) He has had twelve children by six women, and five of his kids were born in 2022. This unconventional family arrangement gets more press attention than his career and it’s not hard to see why. He recently talked to the LA Times about what it takes to maintain his family financially, why he has so many children, and how he tries to be a present dad to all his kids:
He earns 9 figures to support his family: When you think about my lifestyle, I have to generate at least $100 million a year,” Cannon, a father of 11 young children from six different women, told Los Angeles Times columnist Amy Kaufman.
He keeps having kids because he’s a people pleaser (!!): Cannon’s family may be big (it’s possible it hasn’t finished growing), but the “Wild N’ Out” creator said he keeps fathering children simply because he’s a people-pleaser. He told Kaufman that a number of his partners were anxious about having children at the right time.
“A lot of them are in the same age group,” he said. “And I just wanted to give them what they desired. I kept saying, ‘I can handle it.’
He keeps separate calendars for each child: “I’ve been villainized,” Cannon said. “I hear all the time: ‘You can’t be present for all those children.’ So therefore I get this deadbeat-dad title.”
Contrary to that label, Cannon said he keeps separate calendars for each of his children, brings his kids to network meetings, chauffeurs them around and even decides his sleeping arrangement based on which child he’ll drop off last.
Quality over quantity: Regardless, he said he still feels guilty about not spending enough time with his kids. But instead of focusing on how much time he spends, Cannon would rather focus on the quality.
“It’s not about what I do for you or what I say to you, it’s about how you feel when I’m with you,” he added. “If you feel loved when you see your dad, that’s what’s gonna resonate.”
[From The LA Times via Yahoo]
There’s…a lot going on here. Nick has said before that he feels guilty for not spending enough time with each of his kids, which is understandable. I’m not a parent, but I would imagine that most working parents wish they could spend more time with their kids. And it’s great that he earns enough to support his family. But that support appears to be distributed inconsistently, based on requests the moms make rather than an organized system. It also comes with strings. He’s said that he won’t support the moms financially if they have other partners, while he can basically do what he wants and continue to have babies with lots of different women. It seems like financial control and an uneven power dynamic. I don’t think that creates a healthy environment for little kids. If mom can get disconnected from financial support at the drop of a hat…where does that leave the kid?
I felt like unpacking that last quote about “It’s not about what I do for you…” because I understand what Nick means but I think he’s still missing something. He’s right in saying that children need to feel that their parents love them. You can tell, as a kid, whether or not your parents are proud of you. It’s just an instinct. However, a dad’s words and actions matter, too! If a parent is loving towards their child, but isn’t consistent, that’s super confusing to little kids. I think that by choosing to have so many children by so many women, Nick has put himself and his kids in this situation. The consequence of that choice is that he can’t possibly give each child what they need. So even if he thinks he’s putting his family first, his choices tell a different story. It’s really all about his ego and his pride.
Note by CB: Welcome our new writer Carina. She loves Old Hollywood, red carpet fashion, and all things glamorous. When she’s not watching old movies or reading the latest gossip, she’s trying to decode Lana Del Rey’s latest Instagram post.
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