Former President Barack Obama made an appearance on his wife’s podcast this week to shut down divorce rumors and claim that men need gay and “non-binary” friends.
Why does the former president think this? Apparently, he thinks straight men can’t understand empathy if they don’t have gay and “non-binary” friends. These friends, he claims, need to tell men when they are being “ignorant.”
“That’s one of the things that I think a lot of times boys need,” the former president said. “Not just exposure to one guy, one dad, no matter how good the dad is. He can’t be everything. That boy may need somebody to give the boy some perspective on the dad.”
“One of the most valuable things I learned as a guy was I had a gay professor in college at a time when openly gay folks still weren’t out a lot, who became one of my favorite professors and was a great guy and would call me out when I started saying stuff that was ignorant,” he explained.
"You need that to show empathy and kindness and by the way, you need that person in your friend group so if you have a boy who is gay or non-binary, they have somebody that they go, "Okay, I'm not alone in this."
WATCH: Barack Obama says men need gay friends to tell them when they're "ignorant."
— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) July 17, 2025
"You need that person in your friend group so if you have a boy who is gay or non-binary, they have somebody that they go, "OK, I'm not alone in this." pic.twitter.com/9pR9TimJOi
Barack and Michelle Obama never had sons. In fact, Townhall previously reported how Michelle Obama said that she felt “so glad” she never had a son with her husband.
“I’m so glad I didn’t have a boy,” Michelle Obama previously stated on her podcast.
“Because he would have been a Barack Obama,” she added.
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