Taye Diggs melts hearts with rare pic of curly-haired biracial son flashing a contagious smile

Taye Diggs celebrated Valentine’s Day with the most special person in his life: his son Walker. The “Empire” actor seems to be sticking to the boy’s desires, as he recently revealed Walker doesn’t want him to date women.

Taye Diggs is a favorite among female fans thanks to his good looks, but the actor is not interested in spending Valentine’s Day with a date. Instead, he celebrated with his eight-year-old son Walker, whom he shares with ex-wife Idina Menzel.

The 48-year-old took to Instagram to share an adorable pic kissing Walker’s cheek as the boy flashed a huge smile to the camera. Diggs edited the pic adding three black hearts over their heads, and captioned it:

“Happy Valentine’s day to all the proud and loving parents out there. #differentkindalove.”

Fans took over the comment section to gush about Diggs’ adorable display of fatherly love. “Love it — very sweet picture. Happy Valentine's day” wrote one user. Another added, “This is such a beautiful pic, you seem like a great dad! Keep up the great work!! Happy Valentine’s Day to you as well.”

Diggs, who played Benny in the 1996 Broadway debut of “Rent” and the 2005 film adaptation, recently joined the original Broadway cast on Fox’s new live version of the musical, sharing the stage with Menzel, with whom he was married for ten years.

And while Menzel has moved on, and re-married in 2017, Diggs is still on the market. However, the doting father might be holding back from dating because of his son, as he recently told People that the boy is getting more candid and honest:

“He said the other day that he doesn’t want me to have a girlfriend. He said ‘I want you to myself.’ Then he said, ‘is that okay to say dad?’ and I was like ‘yeah, man I want you to be able to tell me anything.’ I get that.”

He also shared the advice he intends to give Walker when he grows old enough to start dating:

“Be real, be polite, and don’t worry about waiting. It’s cool to wait. Don’t rush.”

Although Walker is mostly out of the spotlight and his parents rarely share pics with him on social media, the boy’s race was heavily discussed three years ago, when Taye came under fire for stating that he wants people to refer to the boy as “biracial” instead of “black.”

Diggs told The Grio:

“When you [call biracial kids Black], you risk disrespecting that one half of who you are, and that’s my fear. I don’t want my son to be in a situation where he calls himself Black, and everyone thinks he has a Black mom and a Black dad, and then they see a White mother, they wonder, ‘Oh, what’s going on?'”

After months of enduring criticism from fans, Taye finally opened to BET stating that he was misunderstood, but adding that the controversy gave him an opportunity “to talk about issues that we don’t really talk about.”