Nick Cannon explains his stance on why he’d ‘raise a bully’ rather than let his child ‘be bullied’

The TV host’s comments on teaching his kids to “throw hands” sparked backlash as fans push for kinder parenting approaches.

Nick Cannon has made numerous intriguing suggestions regarding parenting. His latest one might take the cake.

During a recent episode of his “We Playin’ Spades” podcast, the 45-year-old entertainer suggested he would rather “raise a bully” than let his child “be bullied,” a comment that raised alarms on social media, with plenty of fans commenting they’d rather raise a child with kindness.

Cannon asked Bre Tiesi, who is the mother of Cannon’s three-year-old son, Legendary Love, when was the last time she got her “ass whooped”. To which Tiesi replied, “Before I came here, by your child.”

The conversation then turned to raising “soft” children, at which point Cannon urged that he’d want his children to know how to defend themselves. “I tell [him] do not hit girls, you can hit boys,” Cannon told Tiesi. “Because them other little boys try to test him. Nah, you gotta throw hands. You gotta teach your child how to defend themself. They are going to get into fights at school.”

He added, “I don’t tell anyone how to raise their kids, but at some point, the confidence as a man of knowing how to [fight], it helps you in life,” before ultimately concluding that he’d “rather raise a bully” than for his child to “be bullied.”

“Teach your kids how to defend themselves,” Cannon said, before pointing to athletics as an outlet for children to teach them about working for something, toughness and perseverance.

2025 has been a journey for the “Masked Singer” host. Earlier this month, his oldest daughter, Monroe, suggested she had only one brother, her twin, Moroccan and that the rest of her siblings were “half-siblings.” In total, Cannon has 12 children: Monroe and Moroccan with ex-wife Mariah Carey, Golden Sagon and Rise Messiah and daughter Powerful Queen with Brittany Bell; twins Zion Mixolydian and Zillion Heir and daughter Beautiful Zeppelin with Abby De La Rosa; son Legendary Love with Bre Tiesi; and daughter Onyx Ice Cole with LaNisha Cole.

Cannon also welcomed two children with Alyssa Scott — son Zen, who died at 5 months old in December 2021 after being diagnosed with brain cancer, and daughter Halo Marie, born Dec. 14, 2022.

In a September interview with “The Breakfast Club,” Cannon said siring 10 additional children after the dissolution of his marriage was a “trauma response.”

“I’m learning that now. It wasn’t like I was acting out. It was more of being careless, being frivolous with my process, because I could do it, because I had the money, because I had the access to whoever and however I wanted to move,” Cannon said.

“[As] opposed to, like, doing a mature thing and saying, ‘hey, well, it probably makes more sense to do this.’ And then, obviously, life happens as well. So it wasn’t like, well, I’m gonna go have 12 kids. It was more about, like, ‘Yo, I’mma just live life and have fun and whatever happens, happens, I can handle it.'”

Watch the “We Playin’ Spades” episode below.