Shemar Moore recently caught some heat on social media after he expressed his thoughts about marriage in an interview with PEOPLE magazine. Shemar revealed that despite his current girlfriend Jesiree Dizon being his ‘partner in crime’ and welcoming his first child with her in 2023, he just ‘doesn’t see marriage’ in their future.
“To me, it's just like tomorrow's not guaranteed, but Jesiree, I'll give you everything I got today and tomorrow,” he said. “She is my partner. She is the mother of Frankie. Frankie has a dope-ass mama, and I'm going to try to be a dope-ass daddy. And we going to do that until God calls my name."
He did offer a bit of reasoning for his unfavourable attitude towards exchanging vows – and he says it had to do with what he saw, or perhaps didn’t see, as he became an adult.
"I didn't have a good role model of marriage in my life. Not my mother, not my father. Nobody close to me,” he revealed.
Shemar went on to describe questions he always had about who made the ‘rule’ of marriage, and said he often posed questions to his late mother, Marilyn, about the purpose of prenups and the need for them perhaps being an indication of a lack of trust.
While I love a nuclear family and was lucky enough to grow up in one, a few years ago I had to make the tough decision that my daughter’s childhood would look very different from mine. But part of being able to make that choice was because like Shemar, I don’t believe that marriage is the only kind of commitment that supports healthy families. And to be quite frank, unhappy, unhealthy marriages can often leave both kids and parents worse off than they would be had the adults foregone nuptials, so I really respect what Shemar is saying here. But why don’t a lot of others?
Some of the comments suggested Shemar is incompetent:

Others feel his lack of desire for marriage is a reflection of how little he feels for her:

And some even assumed it would be in Jesiree’s best interest to leave:

Though the comments are certainly harsh, there’s a reason for the wrath and it might be the timing of the conversation. In recent weeks, dialogue with men like football star Cam Newton and Nick Cannon have sparked some fiery debates online. A conversation between Cam and Dr. Cheyenne Bryant, a psychologist and producer on Teen Mom, went viral after he revealed that despite having eight children with three different women, he insists he wants more kids, but isn’t all that interested in marriage. Even worse, he said he doesn’t see his track record of procreating with multiple women and leaving those households without a live-in father figure as him creating broken families. But Dr. Bryant eloquently informed him that that was most certainly the case. And as for Nick Cannon, nothing else needs to be said.
So it’s understandable that men wanting or having children without marriage is a bit of a hot topic on the internet. It’s also understandable that it can be triggering for people because it very well may have been a reality for them in their own lives, the repercussions of which are impossible to measure. But Shemar is showing us one very clear repercussion of growing up without a healthy marriage modelled in front of you, and it’s the fear of it.
There are huge differences between men like Cam and Nick and someone like Shemar. Sure, they all had their days of promiscuity and may or may not still be in that promiscuity and this isn’t something that Shemar is dishonest about. In the interview, he reflected on one of his biggest regrets, which was not helping his mother fulfill her dream of becoming a grandmother before she passed away in 2020. He said he was focused on…other things.
Shemar told PEOPLE he feels like it was ‘selfish’ for investing so much time and energy into his career, ‘chasing girls’, living his life and ‘kicking it’ with his friends when he could’ve been focused on settling down and starting a family sooner. But if you were to ask a lot of women, many would agree that even in his promiscuity, he was being responsible by not having children recklessly. Because who do you think their primary caregivers would be after Shemar decided it was time for him to move on to the next woman?
This isn’t to say that Cam and Nick don’t enjoy being fathers. I mean, why else would anyone put themselves in the positions they’re in? But what is obvious is that they don’t enjoy the commitment component – the one that entails committing to the woman who has the children. And rather than forego the joy of parenthood in their pursuit of women like Shemar did, they continue to do both. Simultaneously.
Shemar could have wanted to be a father for decades, and I imagine the opportunity came up very frequently – just look at him. But he delayed having children until he knew he was ready to commit, not only to his child but to the woman who birthed her. He exercised discernment, responsibility and discipline, even if that meant his mother passing without becoming a grandmother to his children. He waited until he found someone that, while he may not see himself marrying, he can see himself committing to. Cam and Nick could never.
There’s another part of this though, and it’s the very sinister aspect of women’s fertility that men often take advantage of in order to keep women dependent on them, or at least connected to them in some way. We saw this with Cardi B and Offset, who deemed himself the winner of their ongoing, contentious split. Offset threw the fact that Cardi B was the mother of his children in her face, as if they weren’t his kids, too. I wrote about that here.
That’s a reflection of how easy it is for men to separate themselves not only from their children, but the women who birthed them. And so I can’t help but wonder if men like Cam and Nick look at the women who have had their children as some sort of trophy collection, some sort of possession of theirs that forever carries their branding. It sounds harsh and awful, but there’s not much I would put past men who have trouble seeing the ethical and logistical issues that arise in having that many children, go on to brag about it and refuse to identify or acknowledge potential pitfalls.
The hate that Shemar is getting for being very open and very honest about being fearful of marriage would be much better off being cast in the direction of Cam and Nick and the hoard of men following in their footsteps. Plus, it’s entirely unwarranted. Because while the keyboard ninjas handing out their unsolicited advice are suggesting Jesiree should leave, she’s sitting pretty with arguably one of the most handsome men in the world raising not only the child they had together, but the two she entered into the relationship with. Ring or not, it sounds like she’s winning to me.