How to Comfort Your Child When a Beloved Celebrity Dies

All fathers want to console their children, but telling them to stop crying like a girl isn’t the way

Left to right: Mac Miller, Pop Smoke, Juice WRLD. Photo illustration; Sources: Bertrand Rindoff Petroff/Getty Images; David Wolff — Patrick/Getty Images; John Shearer/Getty Images

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“Hey, kid,” I said in the doorway of my 15-year-old son’s room. It was late last year, and he had just told me about the death of Chicago rapper Juice WRLD. “You know you can talk to your dad, too?”

“He doesn’t know who he is,” my son replied.

“I kinda didn’t either,” I said with a light chuckle.

“Yeah, but you care,” he said.

I couldn’t argue, but I wanted to explain. I wanted to explain to him that his dad did care. I wanted to explain to him that it’s not easy for any parent to talk to their kids about loss — and that Black men face specific obstacles that make this type of vulnerability even more difficult.

Given the spate of deaths in hip-hop in this past year — from Nipsey Hussle to Juice WRLD and more recently Pop Smoke — it’s a timely discussion that needs to be had. How can Black fathers help their children through the deaths of their favorite musicians? Ebony White, assistant clinical professor of counseling and…