Pitbull keeps his private life sacred, often opting to keep his fatherly duties completely under the radar.
“I feel that if you love something, you don’t want the world to know about it, [so] you protect it,” Pitbull, 45, told Billboard in an interview published Thursday, October 8. “Look, when my kids get to a certain age — and some are — and they want to make their own decisions as far as how they want to live their life and how they want to welcome the world to it, that’s on them.”
As for any of his children under the age of 18, the “Fireball” musician has been wary about letting them join him in the public eye. (Pitbull is reportedly a father of six, per Rolling Stone, but has not publicly offered many details about his family size.)
“I’m very private [about] what I do, so I don’t wanna put them in my world ’cause they’re not built for it yet,” he told Billboard. “It’s my responsibility as a parent to protect them. So, if I put you in my world and now you go to school and everybody’s like, ‘Oh, ’cause you’re Pitbull’s kid … come here.’ How are you gonna ever know who’s your friend? They don’t know.”
Pitbull, real name Armando Pérez, further acknowledged that his surname is so “common” to help conceal his kids’ lineage.
“I protect them because I love them,” Pitbull stressed to the outlet, adding that he maintains his “Mr. Worldwide” stage persona at home with his brood. “I always got music going on. When I am relaxing, I’m always looking at a documentary. I love documentaries. I love to learn, but as far as that, I’m the wild card in my kids’ life.”
According to Pitbull, his kids are among his biggest fans.
“They love it; they lose their mind,” he recalled of his kids’ reaction to his popular music videos. “This is the joke with the kids, especially the small ones, you teach them in life to tell the truth, and then I have to teach them how to lie about their truth. ‘Where do you live?’ [And they respond,] ‘Oh, I live …’ No, you don’t. You don’t live here.”
Pitbull also noted that his kids are only allowed to join social media once they turn of age.
“If they wanna make their own decision, that’s on them,” he stated of his adult children. “I always tell them, ‘Listen to me. How many tattoos you got?’ Some got little tattoos, but when they had no tattoos, [I told them] when you put up a picture or you put up a video, it’s a tattoo for life.”
