and it made me think, so I’ll raise it here and start a firestorm. I’ll say now that while I have some thoughts, I honestly don’t have the solution to the problem.
Under current US law, if a woman wants to get an abortion, the father has no right to stop her, or even be informed. His willingness to support and/or raise the child are immaterial.
However, if the woman chooses to carry the child to term, the father is obligated to support the child, regardless of the circumstances of conception. (The article gives several instances of “reverse rape”, such as a woman manually procuring semen from a passed-out-drunk male and impregnating herself via a syringe, in which the “father” was later required to pay child support.)
Hence the author’s (a woman, BTW) conclusion that “women have reproductive rights, but men have reproductive responsiblities.”
I’m not sure there is a solution to this problem. But is does make for a juicy knot for the millions to gnaw on.
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I love this topic, It’s something I’ve debated with some of my feminist friends. IMO, yes the articles pretty much right on the issues as you’ve laid them out. The thing is there’s really nothing that can be done to change things absent the following which I don’t see happening either.
State sponsored child development. In this scenario, the goverments role would be to provide and care for the child, form birth until adulthood. Kind of like a professional parent.
The government, gives tax credit or pays the parents for supporting the child. Really just a simpler version of number 1, with the difference being the government gives you the money to make decisions on behalf of the child.
Frankly I don’t see either happening outside of fantasy land.
I guess you could realistically come up with some form of parental “non participatory” agreement. Where a father would be able to disallow all claims to a child including financial responsibility. But there are way to many potential problems.
Of course the above assumes that abortion will remain legal, something I’m not so sure about.
We actually have talked about this before, I think.
Crucial to my take on it is keeping foremost in mind that support is required not to punish the father but to protect the child. The issue of who wanted the child and who didn’t is irrelevant to the problem of supporting a child that does, in fact, exist. If you have a baby, you must support it, period. The fact that you didn’t WANT the baby doesn’t matter, because you have it now and it must be supported and the people most obvious and logical to make responsible for that support are the parents.
Males in general have no right to determine whether a pregnant woman has a child or not – and IMO properly so – because a woman must be granted autonomy over her own body, just as a man is. (And I am NOT inviting ANOTHER debate about the propriety or morality of abortion.) In the final analysis, a man cannot make a woman have a baby (or an abortion) because he cannot make that decision on her behalf.
I see why people tend to yoke these issues together – I didn’t want the baby but now I have to support it, how unfair – but in my mind they are entirely separate. The woman must decide whether to have the baby or not because it is her body; once that decision has been made, however, and the baby born, the good of the child (and society) demands that BOTH the parents support it.
If a man in uncomfortable with having a woman have so much potential control over his life, he ought to take responsibility for birth control himself, to ensure this doesn’t happen.
In the cases of the women ‘raping’ the men, isn’t rape illegal? Shouldn’t they be locked up? Potentially beyond the birth of the baby? It is probably a rarety anyway.
The rest is pretty much on the money. You might even add that a non-biological father can also be held responsible following a divorce for child care. Theoretically, the mother can double dip her ex-husband and ex-lover for child support. I don’t know that any such case has happened, but it’s a theory.
Anyway, the courts have always protected women more than men and children more than either of the above. There is a perceived ‘weakness’ of women that they need more protection than men. The judicial system is rarely fair, but it tries real hard.
What about the case of a friend of my wife? The couple had been married for a few years, she wanted kids, he didn’t. By agreement, the pill was their method of choice. She stopped taking it–in fact deceived him by putting her pills down the sink just in case he looked in the dispenser. Where is the respect for his reproductive choice? He wasn’t irresponsible, he had a trusting (on his part) relationship and an agreement with his wife…
Now she’s left him and he’s got child support for a child he didn’t want and was deceived into fathering.
Sure. Women have been protected from such hardships as voting, owning property and making their own medical decisions.
Frankly, the situation in the OP is a reversal of that historical trend. It is an acknowledgment that women do indeed have a right to make their own medical decisions. To call that an “extra protection” seems unwarranted.
Do the decisions open to men and wmen during a pregnancy balance entirely. No. Neither do the roles they play. Blame biology. The courts have this one right (for now, at least).
Well stofsky…this scenerio doesn’t change a thing really. Because each individual is responsible for their own birth control. Yes, she deceived him but then he could have taken extra precautions to ensure that a child was not produced from this union. Oh yeah, that’s right, I almost forgot. They don’t have a “male pill” or an IUD. Wow! what a concept guess we haven’t worked very hard at laying the responsiblity for birth control on anyone’s doorstep but the woman’s. Wonder why? Could it be that for all these years even the 40 or so since “the pill” was developed that even the medical profession was made up of “good old boys”. If your friend was that adamant about not having kids why didn’t he just have himself cut instead of leaving it up to his woman to bombard her system with a bunch of extra hormones?
I DO NOT agree that these are separate issues. To me we have to competing rights, but the womens “right” usurps the males “right”. I’ve seen abortion rights advocates equate not having the right to abortion as “forced motherhood” and that it’s not right. So I don’t see how it’s acceptable to have “forced fatherhood”
Needs2Knows, last post reminds me of the typical reasoning I see women use on this issue. Up until the delivery “it’s my choice” is the mantra for women, afterwards, it well “he shoulda known better”, or “he coulda done…” Those are not equal positions.
There is in fact an issue here. That women have reproductive rights, and males DO NOT. I’d like to see someone realistically expalin how that’s not the case.
STOFSKY, it sounds like your friend’s trust in his wife was obviously misplaced. I’m not going to defend deceitful behavior but only reiterate that the mother’s duplicity is not the fault of the innocent child, and the support your friend pays is for the child’s sake, not the mother’s. So, yeah, it’s not fair to him, but there is no other option that would be fairer to him that would not potentially hurt the child by depriving it of support.
That’s a harsh line, N2K. Any successful relationship involves trust. The couple in question had decided that the pill was right for them (and who are we to say that this decision was wrong, especially without the facts?). This decision having been made, both partners are entitled to trust that the other is playing their part. Your solution is vasectomy? Maybe they were considering having kids a few years down the line. She has to trust that he wouldn’t go ahead and have the snip anyway, he trusts that she is taking the pill.
I agree with your assessment of the male pill. But that’s a whole different issue.
Has American society really reached the point where couples can’t trust eachother, so that each individual must themselves take precautions? I hope not.
To nod towards the OP, I agree with Jodi. But then, I always was a pragmatist.
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If a man in uncomfortable with having a woman have so much potential control over his life, he ought to take responsibility for birth control himself, to ensure this doesn’t happen.
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But this goes both ways–the occasional baby is wanted by the fater. A pregnant woman can manipulate the father of her baby by threatening to abort. I have known guys who found out they had impregnated women after the abortion, and it is pretty devastating.
Talking about the issue of having the child (as opposed to supporting an existing child), I think this is correct, and as it should be – because it’s the woman who is physically having the child and no man has the right to compel a woman to do that or NOT to do that.
Because, in your discussion of “competing rights,” you are leaving out the paramount “right” of the only truly innocent party – the right of the baby to be supported. So it is not the rights of the mother that you must weigh against the rights of the father, but rather the rights of the baby against the rights of the father – and the right of the baby to be supported must win.
They are NOT equal positions becuase the BABY is entitled to support from BOTH parents. Regardless of whether the baby was conceived and born through duplicity or rape or without the permission of one parent – none of that matters TO THE BABY, who MUST be supported. It is THE BABY’S rights that override the father’s desire to be free from a child he did not want.
It is not the case because every male has the right to control his own reproductivity. If you don’t want children, then wear a condom. If you put yourself in the position where a baby might result from your actions, then you ought to be prepared to live with the consequences. If you’re not, then take steps to make sure you’re safe.
Look, this very situation happened to my brother. He was going out with this girl (a total flake) and they agreed that she would be responsible for birth control, but she WASN’T responsible. Now he has a two-year-old daughter. And however he might feel about the circumstances of her conception and birth, or the actions of her mother, he knows that the situation is not his daughter’s fault, she is STILL his daughter and he must be responsible for her. I really don’t think it’s that hard to understand why this must be so and ought to be so.
“Reverse” Rape? Males are more often murderers than females, but we don’t call female murderers “reverse murderers.” A duck is a duck, and rape is rape. There’s no “reverse” about it. The term “reverse rape” strikes me as almost as asinine as “reverse discrimination,” but for entirely different reasons.
I agree also…the CHILD is the MOST important concern, however concieved. But what most people, even some women, cannot or will not see is that WOMEN have been given the role in society to monitor responsibility for childbirth. The sole responsibilty lies on our backs. When we fail then men cry foul. I maintain that if you are adamant about not producing a child then the burden ultimately lies with your choice. It has nothing to do with trust in a relationship, that is a purely antecdotal situation. But men are just now seeing that they can no longer leave this burden solely up to the woman. They too must monitor their behavior or face up to the consequences. I think it’s about damned time.
Perhaps men should be crying out for some male type of birth control. That way they can be responsible too and have some even more tools at their disposal thereby giving them more control over THEIR reproductive rights.
** BUT, a woman can force a man to be a father, changing the focus doesn’t change that fact.
Because, in your discussion of “competing rights,” you are leaving out the paramount “right” of the only truly innocent party – the right of the baby to be supported. So it is not the rights of the mother that you must weigh against the rights of the father, but rather the rights of the baby against the rights of the father – and the right of the baby to be supported must win.
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Again, you’re still allowing a basic right, whether or not to be a parent solely at the fancy of the woman, where again is the man’s right?
They are NOT equal positions becuase the BABY is entitled to support from BOTH parents. Regardless of whether the baby was conceived and born through duplicity or rape or without the permission of one parent – none of that matters TO THE BABY, who MUST be supported. It is THE BABY’S rights that override the father’s desire to be free from a child he did not want.
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So are you acknowledging that the only party WITHOUT rights are the male?
It is not the case because every male has the right to control his own reproductivity. If you don’t want children, then wear a condom. If you put yourself in the position where a baby might result from your actions, then you ought to be prepared to live with the consequences. If you’re not, then take steps to make sure you’re safe.
Look, this very situation happened to my brother. He was going out with this girl (a total flake) and they agreed that she would be responsible for birth control, but she WASN’T responsible. Now he has a two-year-old daughter. And however he might feel about the circumstances of her conception and birth, or the actions of her mother, he knows that the situation is not his daughter’s fault, she is STILL his daughter and he must be responsible for her. I really don’t think it’s that hard to understand why this must be so and ought to be so.
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You’ve pointed out situations yourself where the father can be denied that right, as have a few other posters. You still havn’t addressed that point, you’ve merely shifted the focus. While I understand the the child has a right to be supported, you haven’t satisfactorily addressed that we are in fact giving women a right that we’re denying men.
