Well, obviously she wanted it to come into being to some extent, or she would have had an abortion.
But are you saying that she can’t put it up for adoption?
BTW, to squeeze something in to this reply, I wouldn’t care so much about this debate if it wasn’t for the suggestion that people who are essentially completely innocent of any possible for consent - children, or those taken advantage of while on drugs or drunk, can somehow be railroaded into helping to look after a child who’s creation they not only did not desire, but were not even aware of engaging in (well, you could argue the kid might be aware, but I’d question their knowledge of what they were getting into).
Given my tolerance level for alcohol, I had better be a teetotaler during any SDMB parties…
IMO–never humble–the point is that you are calling for men to have responsibility pre- during- and post-conception, but that you say they have no rights whatsoever during the first trimester (a general standard I think we all can agree on for abortion) whereas women have rights at all of those times, but not necessarily responsibilities.
Let’s turn the tables here, because I think that this is pertinent to the argument. This is not personally anecdotal, but I think it’s applicable to a wider argument. Let’s say that my wife and I have, through failure of birth control, an unexpected pregnancy. Now, in this case, after a marriage of 12 years and a previous child the birth control format is agreed upon, trusted, and the responsibility of both, at least in the aspect that the one helps the other remember. Sometime a few weeks later, she decides she can’t handle another child–the one we’ve got is a handfull–and wants an abortion; I would like to have, keep, love, and financially support that child. Since that fetus carries half of my DNA, since she was as responsible for birth control as I, since the sex was consensual, where in your worldview are my rights as 50% of that child’s parents? You go on and on about financial responsibility, but you don’t mention the rights that should go hand in hand. That’s my child too, dammit, and I don’t care whose uterus it’s in, I should have a say in its disposition. Or don’t you care to answer that point?
[mostly sarcastic]
But men don’t have children. Women do, since, as has been pointed out ad nauseum, they are the ones who get pregnant. Therefore, they should be solely responsible for raising the child.[/mostly sarcastic]
You missed a step: Woman decides to have baby.
No one is suggesting forcing the woman to have an abortion.
If a woman makes a choice about her body, why is someone else held partly responsible for her choice?
What does “legitimately” mean in this paragraph?
We wouldn’t be footing all of it, unless the mother was not supporting the child at all. If a woman decides to have a child which she knows she can’t afford, is it really society’s fault if the child does not have basic neccessities?
Certainly you aren’t implying that the father is the only one responsible for financial support? It seems to me that if a woman makes a choice, she is at least partly responsible for that choice.
I’ll answer it; you have no legal right to any say in your wife’s decision to have an abortion, and you should never have such a right.
The fact that she’s your wife and you had sex with her does not in any way reducew her basic right to liberty. For better or for worse, she may do as she pleased. Her choice could be morally wrong; she might hurt you without justification. But it’s her legal right.
Somehow, saying men get the shaft seems to be wrong so many ways, it wouldn’t matter if the few you mentioned were changed to be reversed. The weight of bias toward men is overwhelming.
Hey, It not just her. She might have a right to breast enlargement, face lift, or tummy tuck, but not a right to kill her child (at least not a moral right).
So you think you should have the right to force your wife to give birth against her will because you want a kid and she doesn’t? That’s a pretty sweet deal for you, considering that your wife will be the one doing all the work and undergoing all the risk when it comes to carrying the fetus to term and giving birth. Not very fair to your wife, though.
If a woman is raped and becomes pregnant should her rapist get a say in what happens to the fetus? After all, it’s his child too, regardless of whose uterus it’s in.
A thimble-full of common sense here; the rapist waves all fathership rights due to the crime, IMO. Stofsky’s reasonable plea is between two reasonable adults with a decision to make.
I’ll answer this point (again, damn AOL!) because it seems pertinent to the discussion. First, I never said what I thought, I just posed a scenario to those who think that a man’s responsibilities are absolute and asked how that fit with their ideas. How is it fair to me that I want the child and she can decide to abort it anyhow? How is it fair to me that she can go through 9 months of pregnancy, at most a day or so of labor, and require me to pay for 18 or more years?
What I was trying to do was turn this argument back to what I see as the base of it: that women have all the reproductive rights and that men have only reproductive responsibilities (except the right to wear a condom. Whoopee!). In the earlier true case I posted, this woman deceptively got impregnated, carried the child to term, and her now-ex-husband is having his paycheck garnisheed. Where are his reproductive rights? In the hypothetical scenario you responded to, I would have no right to a child I wanted–and I notice there was no mention of whether my (ex in this scenario) wife would be responsible for child support.
As is the nature of a lot of threads on this board, we’re dealing with a lot of grey areas. I believe in the absolute autonomy of a woman where her body is concerned. But as a father and a man, I have some real problems with the fact that there is no legal or, apparently in a lot of this thread’s posters’ eyes, moral recourse for a man in either of these situations.
Ideally men and women should not be having sex without first discussing and agreeing upon what they will do if a pregnancy results. Of course, we do not live in an ideal world. But forcing women to bear children they do not want is not going to make it any more ideal.
You wouldn’t be paying the woman for her trouble, you’d be paying for the child. Is this less fair than letting the child grow up in poverty?
It’s a shame that people deceive one another, but how would depriving an innocent child of support help matters?
Men have the same reproductive rights as women – the right to control their own bodies. What men don’t have is the right to control women’s bodies, which means that a man cannot force a woman to have an abortion or prevent her from having one. I think it’s more than a little scary that there are men who think they should have the right to control women’s bodies as well as their own.
The autonomy of any person over their own body should and must be inviolate. Without it, no freedom is meaningful.
Yes, it is possible to construct hypotheticals in which men receive poor treatment due to the biological necessity for a fetus to develop inside a woman’s body. It is posible to construct hypotheticals which show that any right we sanctify for an individual may have a negative impact upon another individual. In the real world, rights and opportunities often conflict. Particularly when, as in these hypotheticals, one party is acting unethically.
Many moral responses to unethical behavior are possible. Sometimes, legal remedies are also in place, but that is by no means certain. I find the argument that one should be absolved of the consequences of one’s actions if said consequences were accidental to be far from compelling. When you have sex, there is a chance that the woman will become pregnant. Even if you don’t want her to; even if you take steps to prevent it; even if you both have agreed that you don’t want it to happen. When a woman becomes pregnant, there is a chance she will not give birth. Even if you want her to; even if you agreed beforehand that you wanted a child; even if you do everything in your power to encourage fetal development.
One of the factors you cannot control, if you are the man, is the actions of the woman. Now, if those actions were purposely deceptive, you can apply whatever moral pressure you feel appropriate; you can look for a civil remedy; you can stomp your feet and shout.
You cannot force her to abort the pregnancy.
You cannot force her to carry teh pregnancy to term.
You cannot renounce your responsibility to the child, should a child actually be born.
Any of those solutions creates a greater inequity and carries a greater social cost than the “injustice” demanded by biology.
If neonatal technology ever proceeds to the point that it is possible for a fetus to develop and thrive outside of a mother’s womb, then another recourse may be available.
On a side note:
An implicit principal that seems to underlie many of the posts here is that the woman’s choice whether to carry a pregnancy to term is “free”. This is not the case. There are real physical consequences associated with both options. In all but the most extreme cases, there are also real emotionl costs associated with both choices.
The emotional costs are similar for the man, but the physical costs are borne only by the woman.
Too bad that we don’t have to create “hypotheticals”; there are real world examples of the situations.
I don’t want to argue about a man’s right to have a say in whether a child should actually be born or not, that is up to the woman, no matter what circumstances the pregnancy occurred under. However, there may be a real emotional cost to the man as well, you have to realize that.
The thing I have the most problem with is forcing men to be responsible for children they had no choice in creating. An accident is different; there are risks with any form of birth control. No, I am talking about the real life examples that I already cited. You might just as well randomly pick someone off the street to support the child; it would be just as fair.
I’ll be the first to say that real dead-beat dads enrage me. It is not just to avoid real responsibility. It is also not just to saddle an innocent person with responsibility that is not theirs. I highly doubt that these few cases would mean “swelling the welfare rolls”. There just aren’t that many, but they do exist. Each of these types of cases is grossly unfair, and should not be tolerated.
The only physical cost I’ve noticed to date is that I get to lift things a bit more frequently than before. Seems like a bergain compared to the load she is carrying.
What part of, “The emotional costs are similar for the man” was unclear?
I have never argued that there are no emotional costs to the man. I have not disagreed that a neither a 12 year old victim of statutory rape nor a rape victim should be financially liable for a child resulting from their victimization.
A husband deceived by his wife is a different story. Marriage is a contract that binds in many ways. I would no more absolve a husband of financial responsibility for a child he did not want than I would absolve him of financial responsibility for a credit card purchase of which he did not approve.
Under no circumstances would I agree that a general principal allowing men to badicate their responsibilities for children they father is a good idea morally, socially, or judicially.
If your hypothetical now ex-wife did carry the baby to term and you were awarded (by the court) sole custodianship, yes, in my state, she would have to pay the child support to you.
Fathers can terminate their rights. Some women (myself included) would gladly accept a termination of rights and financial responsibility. Individual states see visitation rights and financial responsibilities differently. In my state, they are two seperate issues. The father may have contact with his child regardless of whether he pays child support.
As for the OP, I’m not sure where I stand on the issue at hand. Having been a pregnant woman trying to decide whether to keep or abort, I’ll just have to say that it is a difficult decision and each situation is different. My son’s father wanted me to keep the baby and marry him or abort if I wasn’t going to stay with him. (He was abusive after I became pregnant.) It was never about the baby with him, it was about trying to manipulate me - and it still is. He doesn’t pay child support, but in my state he has visitation rights, though with his background he has supervised visitation. He has lurked outside my home on several occasions. I am afraid of him and afraid for my son.
Pregnancy & subsequent childbirth is more than just enduring 9 months and a day or two of labor. Physically it takes a minimum of 6 weeks for a woman’s body to heal after childbirth. Also, the mother experiences pain and possible mastitis if she doesn’t nurse the baby. (Ask any woman how it feels to wean soon after birth.) She may still have some milk in her breasts for up to a year after she weans. In addition to the physical discomfort lingers the anguish a mother (if the child’s father doesn’t want him/her) endures over what she will tell the child about his/her father when s/he is old enough to ask about him. If the relationship was abusive, the mother worries about this tie that she will always have to the child’s father, especially if the father chooses to attend visitation. Even if the biomother doesn’t want the baby and gives it to the father (or adoptive parents) or chose to have an abortion, the emotional anguish over that decision still exists.
There is no clear answer. It is my feeling that since I chose to carry my son to term, I am responsible for him. I don’t feel that his father should have to support him if he doesn’t want the baby. However, since he visits, I think he should shoulder some of the financial responsibility as well. If it was up to me, I’d terminate his rights and his financial responsibility and be done with him.
What I would do (even though it doesn’t matter): If I had decided I didn’t want the baby and my son’s father really wanted the baby, I’d have a hard time with that decision as well. If he was the sort of person that I thought would take good care of the child, (not abusive, not in trouble with the law, etc.) I’d endure the pregnancy and waive my parental & financial rights, or I’d give him sole custody and I would pay child support, depending on the circumstances. Since he’s not the sort of person who would take good care of a child, and assuming I didn’t want the baby, I’d either abort or seek out adoptive parents. If the pregnancy would result in my death (or severe disbility), I’d probably abort.
The bottomline: it’s still the woman’s body and her choice whether to endure the pregnancy. Pregnancy is not just a nine month ordeal whether a woman keeps the baby, puts the baby up for adoption, or gives the baby to its father.
What rights would you grant the father during the first trimester? Are you saying that if the father does not want the baby he should have to make the woman abort it? This is like the third time I’ve asked this question (of differnt people), so I’d appreciate an answer.
If you answer is “no, he shouldn’t be able to compel her to have an abortion, but he shouldn’t be held financially responsible for the child,” the answer to this – for the umpteenth time – is that SOMEONE has to be financially responsible for the child and that “SOMEONE” should be the parents. If the mother cannot support the child on her own, and the burden of supporting it must therefore be borne by either the father or society – because obviously the child MUST be supported – then the father should bear that burden. He is at least in part responsible; society is not.
Are you saying that you have the right to prevent her from having an abortion if she wants one? Is the converse true as well – do you have the right to COMPEL her to have an abortion if she DOESN’T want one? Why or why not?
The father has every right to the child that the mother has EXCEPT the right to decide it should not exist. He does not have that right because it is not his body and therefore not his decision to make. Again, do you disagree with this? Do you think men should be able to make abort children the men do not want?
Let’s ratchet the hostility down a tad, shall we? I have not yet stated that there is any point I “do not care to address,” and have instead tried to address every point raised. The question is not whether you should have a say in the childs “disposition” but whether you should have to pay to support your own biological children – whether they exist with or without your consent. Again – and I feel like a broken record here – you should, because if you don’t and the mother can’t, then who will? Society? I continue to maintain that it is MORE unfair to make society care for children that it neither wants NOR HELPED TO PRODUCE than it is to place that burden on the people creating the child – the parents.
BLACK KNIGHT says:
This begs the question of who should be secondarily responsible for the child if the mother cannot be “solely responsible” for it. Assuming that we agree the child MUST be supported, who should step in to do so – the father, or society?
We should not have to foot ANY of it, because WE didn’t sleep with her and run the risk that, whether through accident or design, a baby would result. And it is immaterial to try to assign “fault,” since I hope we can agree that the baby MUST be given “basic necessities.” What do you suggest instead? That if the mother cannot support it and that father won’t, the baby be left to starve?
Obviously she is; I have said repeatedly that she is.
Then STOFSKY says:
The answer to the first question is that it’s fair because it is her body and while you may have some say it what she does, she must have the last word – especially if we’re talking about trying to make her NOT have a baby. The answer to the second is that the support is for the baby – not the mother – and you, as its father, have an obligation to support it, regardless of the circumstances of its conception or birth, which are obviously not the baby’s fault.
What “reproductive right” would you give men that they do not have? The right to tell women they must abort children not wanted by men?
Where are the rights of the baby? Why are none of you men concerned about that? Assuming the child exists – with or without the father’s consent – does it or does it not have the right to be supported? If so, does that right outweigh the father’s right to be free from a financial obligation? If not, who do you think should support the child if the mother cannot? We seem to be going round and round on this, so please answer these questions.
Of course she would be. I’ve already said this. Once the child is born, BOTH parents are EQUALLY responsible for it. It’s not as if we’re talking about sticking fathers with a responsibility mothers do not bear as well.
Let me ask again: What legal or moral recourse do you think the man should have? The right to disavow his own unwanted children? Who then should be responsible for their support, if the mother cannot support them alone?
DEMISE says:
I’m glad we agree on this, and I don’t think anyone has argued that there is not a real emotional cost to men regarding a woman’s decision to have or not have a baby.
We force them to be responsible because SOMEONE must be, or the baby would suffer. Who should be responsible? The parents. I have no problem letting a man off the hook if he did not want a child AND the mother can support it alone. But in the vast majority of cases, she can’t. Even most middle-income Americans cannot support a child on only one income.
But the examples you cite are incredibly rare. Someone stealing a man’s sperm? Please. I’m not saying it couldn’t happen, but it doesn’t happen much. What does happen often is two people just fall into bed and from accident, design, or lack of foresight, a baby results. I absolutely reject letting men off the hook from the results of their actions just because they don’t want to be fathers. I am talking her about non-coerced, voluntary sex – which happens a lot more frequently in the real world than the theft of sperm.
Me too.
How is a man who engages in unprotected consensual sex, from which a baby results an “innocent person”? Even if the woman lied to him and he believed her, and therefore stupidly did not take responsibility for his own reproductive choices, who is more innocent – him or his child?
“Few cases” of what? Sperm stealing? Statutory rape? I agree that these cases ARE few – which is precisely why they should not be the type of cases we are really discussing when confronting the problem. The more likely scenario is the one I’ve outlined above. As far as those extraordinary cases are concerned, like female-on-male rape, I don’t have any problem absolving a man of his parental responsibilities there either – on a case by case basis.
This is the most realistic scenario:
Man and woman have consensual sex.
Woman turns up pregnat.
Man does not want baby; woman does.
Woman has baby.
In that scenario, I think it is indefensible to absolve the father of his financial responsibility for his child, leaving the probable lack of support to be made up by the rest of us, who are manifestly not to blame for the pregnancy. To me, it’s as simple as that.
