An Open Letter to Ryan O’Neal
Just when I thought Joe Jackson (Michael’s “father”) might be my poster boy for reprehensible parenting, you’ve come along to challenge him for the honor. According to media reports, you tried to pick up your own daughter Tatum at Farrah Fawcett’s funeral, with the one-two punch, “You have a drink? You have a car?”
You are quoted as telling Vanity Fair contributing editor Leslie Bennetts, “I’m a hopeless father. I don’t know why. I don’t think I was supposed to be a father. Just look around at my work—they’re either in jail or they should be.” You go on to say that you aren’t in touch with your children any longer and have “never been happier.”
Here’s a psychological newsflash: Not recognizing your own daughter is the kind of thing that gets etched on your tombstone, under the heading SCUMBAG. Trying to pick her up at Farrah’s funeral—or any woman’s—goes right underneath that entry. And stating publicly that you’re happier not seeing or speaking to your own kids makes it a Trifecta. You’re gonna keep some guy who etches letters in granite very busy.
No wonder Tatum was hooked on heroin and Redmond is in jail for a drug offense. You obviously have a really bad habit of inflicting pain on people, and they turn to one or another intoxicant to try to relieve it. I mean, it’s one thing to try picking up your adult daughter, it’s another to do whatever you did to her as a little girl. Exactly what was that, Ryan?
I know, you think I’m being a little hard on you, but I’m not.
See, when I use the term “scumbag,” I mean it in the clinical sense, and with no hatred toward you, whatsoever. I mean that something happened to you in your own personal development that led you to think so little of yourself and so little of others that you can’t see the beauty it is to bring a new life into this world and be able to nourish it. You must question your own self-worth so deeply that now the only thing you can pay attention to is how to pump yourself up narcissistically and avoid the deeper questions you have about whether you’re worth anything at all—to yourself or anyone else.
You tell Ms. Bennetts that you’d “take back” your kids—as in, return them to their Maker; as in, kill them off. Well, you came close, setting them up for their drug abuse. But here’s the thing: The real ambivalence you have at core isn’t about them at all. It’s about you and whether you deserve to exist. I don’t believe you could have been well-loved and turn out unable to love. Your own family somehow made you wonder whether you deserved to be born, whether you were really a keeper. How?
You did deserve to live. You were once an innocent child, full of human potential and the capacity to love yourself and others endlessly. You were cheated of that potential, and I am sorry that happened to you. Now, facing the particular traumas you lived through and feeling all the pain of having lived through them is the only way back to being fully human.
Life is an amazing journey and, even with you facing leukemia, the end isn’t written until a man’s last acts and final words. You can still reclaim your humanity and capacity to love and offer it to the children you brought into this world. And then very different words might mark your resting place and very different things may be said of you.
I have seen people resurrected by embracing the truth at 18, and at 48, and at 78. It is never, ever too late.
Tags: abuse, child abuse, Dr. Keith Ablow, drugs, Farrah Fawcett, father, jail, Joe Jackson, prison, Ryan O'Neal, self-esteem, Tatum O'Neal, Vanity Fair
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Amen! I couldn’t have said it better! So many people think making babies makes them a father…it does not! It takes a special kind of man to be a father. More than that, it takes an incredible amount of selflessness and love to be a GREAT DADDY! Our job is to teach, to train, to mold these little people as they grow so that some day they can be happy, well adjusted, responsible adults that will in turn do the same for their own children.
Raising our children in a Christian Home has statistically proven to give them much more advantages in learning to love one another than the like of Ryan O’Neal will ever understand.
I agree with you 100% that he is lacking that training and love that is so essential to a childs proper development. Somewhere along the line his parents forgot that life is not about YOU it’s about what you do for others.
I feel so sad for his children. Shame on him.
You are to easy on Ryan O’Neil. The longer we are on this planet, the more we have to be grateful for each day given us. He has had no qualms of consciously inflicting degrading insults upon his children. This even when his youngest is incarcerated, and dealing with a terminal illness and death of a parent. Ryan is a low life, out of choice, whom required his children to think of them selves the same. Hopefully they can and will survive, with a spirit of Love, not tough self disregard. They have suffered immensely, for his lack of class, and character. With the next generation, hopefully doing better. I love Tatum, she is a class act survivor. Rise above the scum, is what I say to Red, Griffin, and Tatum. That is a toughness that old man Ryan will never have. Haa!
Ryan O’Neil is a low life, by choice. The longer we’re on this planet the more it behooves us to appreciate others with love. It seems he required his children to be self depreciating and self destructive, so he won’t be in bed alone with negativity. To have such a negative, & hostile attitude, with your child mother
suffering with a terminal illness, then dying makes him look like a useless appendage, really he the a disease. Best wishes for those that are able to survive, him. They have an inner strength that he could never comprehend let alone posses.
Keith Ablow: Congratulations on your letter to this Scumbag. But…he will never learn. He is such a low ente that could be the perfect a cell mate to Hugo Chavez.
Thank you for your letter!
Dr. Ablow, God bless you. I am impressed and I am hundred percent agree with you. People will learn more about Ryan and Alana’s love affair soon, Farrah find out before she died, that was a shocked for her.
I 100% agree. This man Ryan O’Neal had it all and chose to destroy all the good god handed him on a silver platter, He had Farrah one of the sweetest and one of the most gorgeous women in the world with her own acomplishments,A beautiful talented daughter and 3 other decent kids and he was a movie star and he chose to destroy it all. I once liked Ryan has a kid,but in the past 20yrs began to despise him.
He will die alone and probably go straight to hell,unless he changes and finds love for his children,himself and god.Until then good luck Ryan you have it coming unless you change
This is a stellar post, Dr. Ablow! One of your very best, I believe!
Not only do you let Mr. O’Neal have it in no uncertain terms (and rightfully so!), but you then turn around and offer him empathy, understanding, and a chance to redeem himself.
You are a brilliant, courageous, and extraordinary man, Dr. Ablow.
Just wanted you to know that about yourself…
What Farrah Fawcett ever saw in this loser is beyond me. God help poor Redmond.
Farrah was beautiful, talented and seem very sweet. I guess her only flaw was Ryan O’neal
Very well said, Dr. Ablow. I have always thought it was a tragedy that Tatum….such a beautiful and talented little girl……and her brother were abandoned and left to raise themselves when Ryan began his affair with Farrah, and wondered how anyone could do that to their children. Your explanation about his lack of self worth, and apparent lack of love when he was a child, gives insight into his behavior. I hope he and his children can heal their relationship, and all live happily for the rest of their lives.
Ryan O’Neal is one of the most selfish men I have ever heard of in my entire life. Truly someone to be pitied. I think Farrah
Fawcett had his number……after all, I hear she left him nothing in her will. She was a true Texas beauty and a very smart cookie.
I agree that Mr. O’Neal doesn’t deserve to be a parent, or grandparent, and the fact that his daughter has tried to show respect for him by attending the funeral seems to be lost on Ryan. His children would do well to stay away from him completely and realize that others in the world will cherish them. It took me 50 years of misery before I finally got the message that my own mother was abusive, selfish and incapable of unconditional, nurturing love. She had a toxic influence on my father and me, and it ruined many years of my life because I kept punishing myself, thinking I was unworthy of being loved.
well, I guess Fox censors any letters that show a difference of opinion….very disappointed….