It is not just “a little longer”. It is the little longer where a vague probability turns into a certainty.
One presumes that an unwanted pregnancy was equally unwanted by both (assuming no deception or horrible lack of communication), and that there were precautions against it that both considered sufficient.
Up until the moment of conception, both parties have the same rights. After conception you enter a completely different scenario where one party has rights and the other does not.
Yes you do - and that is fair.
The OP seems to look at this as a pair of situations:
The truth is, though, it is actually split into three periods:
The only part of “unfairness” here is arguably (2). However, given that the mother is the one bearing ALL of the risk in period (2), it isn’t, and in my mind shouldn’t be, considered unfair that this extremely limited time period of differing options exists.
And I never understood why anyone thinks there must exist some perfect legal formulation that fixes this, if only we debated long enough.
I believe there is also, and should be, a difference in when the government can step in and force an individual to do something. The bar for government interference should be different for financial issues (child support) and biological issues (abortion). Whatever you think about abortion specifically, the government in general needs to apply a higher standard on when it is permissible to interfere in our bodies than our bank accounts.
Jonathan
Except that you’re looking at it, as others upthread have stated, only from the rights of the two parents.
I am unaware, though prepared to be schooled, of any event that would allow a parent to abandon their responsibilities to support a child financially. I am fairly certain that the rights of the child overrule any agreement to avoid such support because the child cannot enter into such an agreement.
Even if the two parties work it out to each others satisfaction I’m pretty certain that it’s informal and can be recalled if circumstances change. That is, if the mother says ‘Hey, I’m rich and can make it work without my sperm donor. You’re off the hook.’ the father can be still on the hook should the mother’s circumstances change and she wants him to contribute.
I am unsure if you were responding to me, but I will address some of your points anyway. As for an agreement to get out of parental responsibilities, there are three that I am aware of: adoption, safe haven abandonment, and anonymous sperm donation.
In general, what I was attempting to say was that the government should be less able to intrude in matter concerning a person’s physical body than in matters that involve property. For example, they can force me pay taxes and give it to the homeless, but they cannot and should not be able to force me to give blood to a blood bank.
If there was a no cost, no risk method of transferring a embryo/fetus to an artificial womb, then it would change the whole equation. Then you could separate the financial from the medical. As it is now, you can’t force a woman to provide support for a child she does not want without first forcing her to carry the child to term.
Jonathan
Abortion concerns a woman’s right to terminant a pregnancy that involves her body. Not wanting a baby is usually the motivation for abortion, but the operative motivation is not wanting to stay pregnant…which is an important distinction.
This topic comes up periodically and what’s rarely discussed is the greater implications of allowing men to “opt out” if a woman doesn’t abort a child that he doesn’t want. What incentive would men have to act responsibly with respect to reproduction? As it stands, women still carry the bigger share of responsibilities because they are not only expected to carry babies to term and delivery them, but they are usually the primary caregiver and stand to lose as much if not more money as men in the process of raising them, even when both parents want the child. Allowing men to “opt out” means 100% of the risk associated with sex falls on the woman’s shoulders. Why would men care about wearing condoms, if they knew that regardless of what happened, they’d have no consequences to face?
At least as it stands now, there are disincentives for irresponsible sex for both men and women. Abortion is not a pain-free option, and most women would much rather have safe sex that use that as a contraceptive.
The GQ answer is that the law isn’t designed to apportion responsibility for the birth of the child between the parents. It’s a duty owed to the child regardless of the culpabilty of the parents. Once the child is born, the wheres, whys and hows of how it got here take a back seat to the fact that it’s here now, and it needs food and shelter. Child support isn’t intended to reward or punish either of the parents for the birth of the child; it’s a duty owed to the child by both parents.
The man makes his decision when he sticks it in. He is responsible for his own sperm. We get this same specious argument as to why fathers should be allowed to abandon their children every few months it seems like. The rules aren’t fair because the biology isn’t fair. Any male who isn’t comfortable with the idea that he may become a father should not be putting his sperm in anybody. It’s an easy thing to avoid.
How about “if you don’t wear a condom, you don’t get to have sex” for a consequence? It’s easier to act with certainty (in this case, by not having sex with someone) based on tangible evidence than based on someone’s possible future actions.
You want to feel bad for a man? Think about the guy who donated sperm to the octuplet mom. Since it was a friend, and not through a service, if she sues for child support, or if she goes on welfare, he will be on the hook for child support for 14 kids:eek:.
This guy probably thought he was only donating for one or two kids, not the sports league this woman is trying to give birth to.
Jonathan
ETA: That is just an outlier, and does not change the fundamental situation of women getting pregnant the normal way.
As I’ve stated every other time this has come up, I’ll support an ‘opt-out’ clause for fathers as soon as birth control and abortion are free and accessible. That means health care that covers the BC of a woman’s choice and OTC Plan B (as well as pharmacists who will actually dispense them), further funding for more forms of female BC and their side-effects, a street date for the male birth control pill that seems to have been in the work for decades, safe OBGYN and abortion facilities in every city that can service women in under 48 hours, an investigation of tax-funded ‘pregnancy crisis centers’ parading as Planned Parenthoods, reasonable counseling, openly pro-choice politicians who don’t have to footnote everything they say with with the word ‘tragedy,’ bosses who’d be just as fine with an employee taking time off for an abortion as they would for a root canal, movies and TV wherein an unwanted pregnancy doesn’t mean a lucky miscarriage or life-ruining abortion, etc., etc.
Each person is responsible to the extent that a decision involves his or her own body. The male’s body stops being involved earlier, so he has to make his decision earlier. He made his decision that he was ok with potentially accepting the responsibility of fatherhood as soon as he decided to ejaculate in someone else’s body.
I guess you are responding to the cumulative exhaustion of having had discussed this before, but that did nothing against my ignorance. I have not had the benefit of those previous debates. Care to elaborate?
Tell me about safe haven abandonment. I think this is when parents can give their newborn to the State, right? That would be a great example of how it is possible for a parent to be free of the financial responsibilities of raising the child.
If once the baby is born, the parents can agree to surrender the baby to the care of the State, why can’t one parent do the same without the agreement of the other?
It is not as if having sex is a constitutional right. Consensual sex is something you do of your own accord and in full knowledge of the potential consequences. If you cannot find the opportunity to do it in the terms you like, then you do without.
A bit in line with Quartz’s post, if women had to bear 100% of the risk of sex (which seems logical to me since they keep 100% of the decision making), then that also means they would be more careful about their sexual lives and their pregnancy/maternity decisions.
If a man doesn’t want to wear a condom, why would women care to have sex with him? Even further, if this results in some sort of document people sign before sex agreeing to sharing the risk of sex and predetermining what will happen in case of pregnancy, then even more power to all parts. Dude won’t sign, he doesn’t get laid.
The argument I have found the most compelling, is the case for it being in defense of the baby and their financial security. But then that conflicts with the lack of defense for that same baby to live. How can we defend the right of a baby to financial security when that baby doesn’t have a right to be born yet.
This is sound advice on a individual basis, but not very useful as social policy. It’s not something that women are going to universally enforce, and pregnancies are going to happen and babies are going to be born, and those who made those babies need to be responsible for them.
Do we really want to have a social policy that puts no accountability at all on fathers and places the responsibility for children 100% on women? Does that really strike people as sensible or good for children?
What if the guy says he wants the baby, then changes his mind after it’s born? Should that be allowed?
What if he changes his mnd in the 3rd trimester after it’s too late for an abortion?
What should be the deadline for when Mr. Wonderful has to make his decision, and how should it be legally documented?
Are the sperm donors going to be forced to pay for the abortions? Is anyone willing to make abortions easier to obtain?
It sounds like people want to give men the freedom to spawn all the babies they want with no accountability, and to force women to choose between having an abortion or between raising a baby alone, and quite possibly having to take public assitance to do it.
What it really amounts to is that the guys who want to be allowed to “opt out” of their responsibilities are really just asking that the taxpayers be responsible for their offspring.
Um…in America babies do actually have a right to live. It’s against the law to kill them.
It’s not a baby until it’s born. A fetus isn’t a baby.
Well, obviously, once there is no option to opt out for the woman, there should be no option to opt out for the man.
Substitute “baby” for “fetus” then and reread the post. Why secure the financial rights of something that doesn’t have life secured yet?
The fetus’ life is protected to an extent. What it is not entitled to do is use the body of an unwilling person to survive.
Or, being more careful about their sexual lives. Just like you are expecting men to be. Doesn’t sound like so much of a stretch.