Welcome to The Pixel Project’s Voices Of Dads Against VAW blog interview series! This series takes our original 30 For 30 Father’s Day interview series to the next level by opening this interview platform all year round to dads worldwide with one (1) dad interview published per month.
We created this interview series:
- To acknowledge the vital role dads play in families, cultures and communities worldwide.
- To showcase men from different walks of life who are fabulous positive non-violent and non-sexist male role models.
- To provide dads worldwide a positive platform to share ideas about stopping sexism, misogyny, and violence against women and girls.
To date, over 150 dads have completed this simple yet thought-provoking interview. If you are a dad who is interested, you can fill in the interview form here.
For our spotlight dad interview for Father’s Day 2023, meet Rich Samalin from the US.
Picture courtesy of Rich Samalin.
The Dad Bio:
Rich Samalin was born and raised in the Bronx, New York. He is a classically trained bass player, a recording engineer, composer, and more. He currently works as the sole audio engineer to George Guidall, heralded as the top audio book voice over artist today. He is married to muralist and painter Lisa Samalin, and they have two sons Matt and Joe, one grandson Oliver, and two cats.
1. What is the best thing about being a Dad?
Seeing my son interact with his son is the money shot. Seeing both my sons in the world, helping others, means everything to me. Even though I considered myself not such a good dad when they were young, it seems like they are both such wonderful, excellent people with strong senses of responsibility. You can’t buy that down the block.
2. A dad is usually the first male role model in a person’s life and fathers do have a significant impact on their sons’ attitude towards women and girls. How has your father (or father figure) influenced the way you see and treat women and girls?
My dad was a hardworking, hard-drinking parent who had great difficulties expressing his feelings unless he was angry or felt threatened. He hated his situation in life and took it out on his family. He only had sons. My mother was intelligent, loving and kind but could not really shield her sons from the worst.
My brother and I both survived and helped create much better families than the one we inhabited for the first years of our lives. We both wonderfully found the arts. I have always felt my father’s negative intentions within myself – learned patterns. I have fought against them my entire life, especially in my relationships with women, since I left home as a teenager.
3. Communities and activists worldwide are starting to recognise that violence against women is not a “women’s issue” but a human rights issue and that men play a role in stopping the violence. How do you think fathers and other male role models can help get young men and boys to take an interest in and step up to help prevent and stop violence against women?
Share the truth about the horrendous consequences to your own life if you treat others – especially men treating women horribly – as lesser, weaker beings. It will create further chaos in your own life if you strike out at others.
Watch Rich speak extensively about his father, fatherhood, raising sons, and being a male ally here: