I think the same people that think men should be able to opt out of fatherhood if they wanted the child aborted are the same people who think that women make the decision to abort based on convince or that women use abortion as a method of birth-control.

I think their basic premise is if women can "opt out" of motherhood why can't men?

when this topic comes up with my husband - his thing being that "it's unfair" - i say, if a woman wants or needs to get a single cent of public assistance, she HAS to provide the father's name so the state can send him the bill. that's the long and short of it. dont complain about how "women get to choice, but men dont have a choice" complain to the state that is too cheap to provide support for families living in poverty.

There was a fairly lively discussion of this topic recently on this post.

I'm sympathetic in theory to the idea that a man should be able to have the same choice a woman does-but, not at her expense. and I don't see how to avoid that here. I can maybe buy this argument if, and only if, she held a gun to his head and said "no condoms" beyond that, no, he did have a choice. If he is so worried about being a father, he can avoid sex. isn't that the argument used to explain why women shouldn't be allowed have abortions? but, back to serious, if we take the idea that feminism is about equality, how do you get that here? How do you let both parents make a different choice without screwing over the mother?

"How do you let both parents make a different choice without screwing over the mother?"

I would think that if the father opts out and the mother does not want to go it alone she has the choice to abort or carry the child to term and raise it herself or give the child up.

When a man's body is involved -- that would be during sex -- it's his choice entirely. (And I have to add that if I felt I were at risk for creating a pregnancy every time I had an orgasm, I'd be damn careful where and in whose company I had one.)

When a woman's body is involved -- during pregnancy -- the choice is hers. Entirely.

When a child comes into existence -- at birth -- both of its parents share responsibility for it.

The basic disconnect here is women say if a man consents to sex he is consenting to raising the child...

But if a woman consents to sex she still has the choice to abort (or not support) the child.

All this stuff about orgasming and public welfare is a distraction from that core disconnect.

I have wondered about this for a while. n the one hand, I have a right to not have a baby I am unprepared for. I can choose when I have a child. But a man really can't. He can take precautions, like I can, but if they fail? He's stuck with my choice. I have the right to save myself from parenthood if the condom fails, but he doesn't.

I mean, say the father is very poor, or knows he would be a poor father, or wants to finish school, or is mentally ill and knows he could endanger a child. Those are valid reasons why women choose to abort or give a child up for adoption. Why is it all the woman's right here? I mean, as soon as a man gives ANY action towards the child indicating he views said child as his, he should be on the hook, obviously.

I guess I think that men should have some way to say no, they don't want the child. Women have adoption and abortion (ignoring the medical aspect of pregnancy, which obviously does not affect men) when birth control fails. Men don't, and that's not really fair.

As for screwing over the mother... do we screw over the mother or the father? One of them WILL get screwed over. One will lose out. There's no way to make that equal; the best alternative is to give people the most freedom possible.

Jesus Christ - the only thing he would be forced to do would be pay child support. He doesn't have to see the kid, doesn't have to do anything except send cash. The woman has to raise the kid and do everything for it, the man can easily opt out of being a father all except for paying the support.

"The woman has to raise the kid and do everything for it, the man can easily opt out of being a father all except for paying the support."

No, that's just the thing. She doesn't.

If I don't want to have a child because I know I cannot afford to care for them, or would have to quit school to afford it, I can abort or give them up for adoption. A man cannot. I mean, to some men child support isn't a big deal. But to a college student who has to drop out of school and get a job to make payments? Or a man working on minimum wage desperately trying to afford his OWN expenses? Many men paying child support are basically destitute, and can't better their lives with education because that would mean giving up their jobs.

I just want to know, if not being able to afford a child is a good enough reason for ME to be allowed not to have one, why isn't it good enough for a man?

As feminists, we always say that if someone is against abortion, then they shouldn't have one. So what if a woman got pregnant, and didn't believe in abortion? She decides to carry the baby to term and then put it up for adoption. But what if the father wants to keep the baby? Then suddenly, she is in the exact same position as we are talking here. She can't 'opt-out', she'd have to pay child support. And I believe she should pay child support. For the same reason that men have to pay child support in these cases. I think this is the analogous situation, not that a woman's way to 'opt-out' is abortion, but men can just say the words.

I've actually had to deal with this before. A good friend of mine got pregnant and had an abortion even though they were totally against her boyfriend's beliefs and he would never have agreed to it. He was upset that he didn't have a say.

My stance is that feminism IS about equality, but we do not ignore basic biology. For example, men's arms are generally stronger than women's and they are more likely to abuse their significant others (granted, the second part is probably more social than biological). As a result, we need more laws, programs and shelters to protect women from men than for male victims of violent women to help women reach that level of safety than men enjoy. Similarly, women's are the only bodies that can carry children. As a result, women need to be the ones who need choices and options to be able to reach that level of bodily freedom that men enjoy.

It's not that a man shouldn't have a say in what happens to his potential baby, but I do feel that the woman is ultimately the one who should make the decision.

miki mouse: If a woman isn't married, and she arranges for an adoption before the child is born, the man can contest custody and maybe get the child back but he can't sue her for child support, at least not in most states. In some cases he might not even know that he had a child at all. A man isn't legally the father until he's on the birth certificate, so he has no rights to the child until the mother names him as the father or he proves paternity, and the legal parents could simply refuse to have their child's DNA tested.

"It's not that a man shouldn't have a say in what happens to his potential baby, but I do feel that the woman is ultimately the one who should make the decision."

No one wants to force women to have abortions, or to not have abortions. That is her right. We just think that since she CAN get an abortion for socioeconomic reasons, a man should have a way to say "well, if the baby was in me, I would get an abortion for socioeconomic reasons" and not have to pay child support.

Of course the woman has the ultimate say in whether or not the child is born, because it's her body. But at the same time, the man could be seriously affected as well since he can't give up a child for adoption and couldn't have any say in an abortion. So he should have a way of abdicating responsibility for the child, provided he never acted as a father towards them.

there's just not a way to make this "fair" in the truest sense. biology doesn't allow it. yes, a man who did not want a child could be compelled to pay money for its support, but we're talking MONEY here, not his body or his attention or anything else. the reason that abortion is a fundamental right of a woman ultimately is that it is her BODY that is necessary for the development of a fetus and we don't in this country, have laws mandating that any person (born or otherwise) permit the use of his or her body to sustain the life of another person.

one's body and one's pocketbook are not the same thing. we compel people to pay for things they would rather not all the time. it's not an ideal situation, but it's the only way we can afford women the right to control of their own bodies, but also ensure that children brought into this world will have support.

imagine if this were put into action-- with the amount of deadbeat fathers out there, do you think that these guys wouldn't totally just straight up LIE to get out of paying support if there were a way to do so? we've got an evidence problem--what standard of proof would there have to be that the man used every protection available to him to keep his partner from getting pregnant? who would get to make that determination? what amount of public resources would have to be used to facilitate this process? one of the arguments for abortions rights is that just because you make abortion illegal doesn't mean it will go away, and that there is no real, feasible system for dealing with illegal abortions--how will the women be punished? how will we investigate every alleged miscarriage to make sure it wasn't intentional, etc. these same practical arguments apply to the "opt out of fatherhood" idea.

with regard to adoption, i can at least see some room for argument--if a woman wishes to put her baby up for adoption but the child's father wants to raise it himself, i can see that maybe the father should have some say.

i'd just like to add that for very poor men, child support becomes less of a burden (if at all). the amount of child support someone owes (at least in California) is determined by a number of factors, but obviously the non-custodial parent's income and expenses are a huge factor, AS IS the income of THE CUSTODIAL PARENT. it's not like under the current system we force broke college students to pony up unreal sums of child support to a wealthy other parent.

i'd also like to add that child support is not a father pays, mother collects unilateral system. i'd imagine that a man who is the custodial parent of his children would very much feel the need for support from their mother if she were making significantly more money and he were unable to work (or only able to work much less lucrative jobs) because of child care responsibilities. this is a situation that, in view of the rising level of education in women and the increase in incidence of stay at home dads, is not so rare as to not be worth considering to the MRAs who harp on about child support.

riley st. clair, in this country women are allowed to chose an abortion for socioeconomic reasons that have nothing to do with their body, purely because they would suffer too much financial strain from having a child. We don't make women drop out of school or work three jobs at minimum wage to support a child.

It wouldn't be too hard to do it. A man could file a form within a reasonable time of learning of the pregnancy (or child, if the woman waited until after the child was born). The woman could then contest it if the man had acted as a father to the child previously, or if he lied and said he hadn't known beforehand that she was pregnant when he did. It would cost a lot less than a child custody dispute, unless of course he was found to need to pay.

"what standard of proof would there have to be that the man used every protection available to him to keep his partner from getting pregnant?"

We don't require this of women, why would we require it of men? Men aren't inherently more responsible than women.

"i'd just like to add that for very poor men, child support becomes less of a burden (if at all). the amount of child support someone owes (at least in California) is determined by a number of factors, but obviously the non-custodial parent's income and expenses are a huge factor, AS IS the income of THE CUSTODIAL PARENT. it's not like under the current system we force broke college students to pony up unreal sums of child support to a wealthy other parent."

Just because he's ponying it up for another broke college student doesn't make it any easier on him. And just because he doesn't pay as much as a rich man doesn't mean it's easy; most college-age men who have to pay child support and don't have rich parents drop out of school to work.

Ultimately the issue is this: A woman who does not want to pay child support (and also does not want to be primary caregiver) has options. She can not let the father know, and give the kid up for adoption (and usually even if he does know she can get away with not paying child support if she tries to put the kid up for adoption early in life). She can abort for socioeconomic reasons. Yet a man who has the EXACT SAME CONCERNS about financial burdens has no options.

Besides, the government's idea of a fair amount of income to contribute in child support is often radically different than what a person can actually afford.

I guess I am just bothered by this mentality that a woman is a fragile little butterfly who could be crushed by socioeconomic concerns relating to having a child, but a man is big and strong and will have no trouble meeting the payment requirements. Either both genders have real socioeconomic concerns that warrant a decision not to have or raise a child, or neither gender does.

well, and honestly, Brianna_G, given the amount of money that the mother is spending on the baby in any case where she'd get child support, it isn't screwing over the father. at least not in comparison. And Steven, that disconnect is thrown at women all the time. Funny how you object when it's men who get told no baby=no sex. And I would like to see cases or stats on fathers being denied child support when they raise the baby. I know alimony is gender neutral, I'd assume this is as well, though I haven't looked it up. rileystclair,it was my understanding that if a mother wants to give the baby up for adoption, a father has to sign on as well-or, if he wanted the child, raise it himself. but that could vary by state.

The only way there would be equal decision-making in having or not having a child is when there's equal childbearing and childrearing. There can't be equality in childbearing, and women are still more responsible for their children than men are. MRAs are complaining about a problem that essentially does not exist in our society. They don't believe that men should have to pay child support for children they don't want, but men don't have to pay child support for children they don't want. If they did, then more than 40% of non-custodial parents would be sending full and regular child support payments.

Another figment of the MRA imagination is that this is a women's rights issue. Women's rights advocates care about justice for children because the vast majority of single parents are women. But this is really a child's rights issue. A child has to be taken care of by her or his parents, period. It doesn't make a difference whether or not the child was or is wanted. That's why children that aren't in their biological parents' care get money from the government. The kids have to be supported somehow.

I believe that visitation rights should be contingent on child support. If a parent doesn't pay full and regular child support payments, then his (usually his) visitation rights should be limited. If he misses a payment completely, then he doesn't get to see his kid. I doubt there's a father out there that wants to see his kid regularly but doesn't want to make sure he is fed, clothed, and sheltered.

"given the amount of money that the mother is spending on the baby in any case where she'd get child support, it isn't screwing over the father. at least not in comparison."

A woman has the right to not have to pay for a child AT ALL in any context, because she can abort or place the child for adoption without notifying the father. A man does not have that right. THAT is the inequality.

"rileystclair,it was my understanding that if a mother wants to give the baby up for adoption, a father has to sign on as well-or, if he wanted the child, raise it himself."

That only applies if he was already on the birth certificate when she placed the child. IF she doesn't name him on the birth certificate, she can still get child support later with a paternity test but he has no legal rights to the child until she does.

"Funny how you object when it's men who get told no baby=no sex."

I personally object to it BOTH times. Because, you know, I actually believe in equality of the sexes.

"They don't believe that men should have to pay child support for children they don't want, but men don't have to pay child support for children they don't want. If they did, then more than 40% of non-custodial parents would be sending full and regular child support payments."

A man who does not pay child support can't get a normal job. He has to hide out from the cops most of the time. He's breaking the law. So basically, because many men are deadbeats (and how many of them are actually like the man in the article above, versus abusive or nasty ex-husbands?), the good, honest men who simply can't afford a child and would want an abortion or adoption should be forced to pay?

Yes, failure to pay child support is a real problem, but it's not like it's legal or makes their lives easy.

"But this is really a child's rights issue. A child has to be taken care of by her or his parents, period."

Well, no. A parent can place a child for adoption, or not have them in the first place. There are ways around that "child's right." The kids do have to be supported, but why does it have to be by a person who would have aborted them if it had been their body? Or who thinks they should be with a loving family who can afford them? Why does a woman get to decide that she does not have to take care of her child (assuming the decision is made early), but a man does not?

Men are concerned because they think it's unfair that they are not being treated equally. Women, like myself, think it's unfair because it makes two assumptions: First, that the woman should be more affected by having a child; second, that a woman cannot handle socioeconomic stress but a man can.

If a man claims socioeconomic concerns but is living in a mansion, obviously the court should say STFU, but we're talking about men who are legitimately financially unable to provide for a child, or would suffer immense hardship in trying to do

"I believe that visitation rights should be contingent on child support. If a parent doesn't pay full and regular child support payments, then his (usually his) visitation rights should be limited. If he misses a payment completely, then he doesn't get to see his kid."

Any man who would opt out and still see his kids should be involuntarily opted back in, of course. If he acts like a father, or wants to, he pays child support. Period. But these are situations where the man does NOT intend to act like a father, doesn't want visitation, doesn't want any of it-- and still has to pay. He's not really a father in anything but DNA. Those are the only situations that anyone thinks a father should have the right to opt out in.

It will always, and should always, be harder for men to get out of it than women, because after all, a woman has a physical commitment as well as a financial one. But in cases where a) the man never acted as a father in any way nor does so in the future and b) he can prove economic distress if he had to pay child support for 18 years, as in, he's low-income, no-income, heavily in debt, or a student, I support a way for the man to dissolve paternity rights. Which means NO rights to the children, no tax benefit, nothing-- he's a stranger to them, just like any other man. And as soon as he has them over for Thanksgiving or whatever, he's back to paying support.

I am for men being able to opt out of fatherhood--and for women being able to have abortions, as many as they like, without coercion.

It's a sucky situation. Any way, someone gets screwed over. However, I really think that a baby shouldn't be born without the consent of both parents, and if the mother wants to have a baby it's her choice. The unfortunate thing is that at both steps, pregnancy and birth, the woman can chose to reject parenthood. She has the power to give up the child for adoption without having a real risk of paying support if the father chooses to use his parental power to deny an adoption.

I guess it makes me more pro-abortion than I would like, but I think in this situation, abortion or adoption is the best choice--forcing a man OR a woman to support a child they don't want is not a good option, and when a woman makes the decision to risk a pregnancy, she should decide abortion, adoption, or prepare to support it on her own. I know that sounds like putting too much responsibility on the woman, but when you have all the choices you have all the responsibility, and is it so bad to hope that we can decide to have a child with a man after finding out he actually wants it too?

"riley st. clair, in this country women are allowed to chose an abortion for socioeconomic reasons that have nothing to do with their body, purely because they would suffer too much financial strain from having a child. We don't make women drop out of school or work three jobs at minimum wage to support a child."

i vehemently disagree. where, pray tell, has that rationale been supported in any court ruling? the right to abortion is based in the right to privacy. bodily integrity is central to that right. by your logic, if a woman is rich, she could be denied an abortion. the right is not based in personal wealth or lack thereof, so your point fails. one's body is not one's pocketbook, i reiterate.

"It wouldn't be too hard to do it. A man could file a form within a reasonable time of learning of the pregnancy (or child, if the woman waited until after the child was born). The woman could then contest it if the man had acted as a father to the child previously, or if he lied and said he hadn't known beforehand that she was pregnant when he did. It would cost a lot less than a child custody dispute, unless of course he was found to need to pay."

what is a reasonable time? what if the woman's decision to keep the child or have an abortion is contingent on whether the man decides to submit to support? what if the woman doesn't know she's pregnant right away and by the time the man's "reasonable time to opt-out" is up, it is too late for the woman to obtain an abortion? whose rights prevail?

there are so many issues here. i disagree that this would necessarily cost less than a child support action (which is what i assume you mean by "child custody dispute", which, at least in some states, are two separate matters).

"what standard of proof would there have to be that the man used every protection available to him to keep his partner from getting pregnant?"

We don't require this of women, why would we require it of men? Men aren't inherently more responsible than women."

um, we certainly would need a standard of proof and someone to mediate a dispute if there is one, as you mentioned there could be--if the man says he didn't know she was pregnant and the woman says he knew right away because she told him. like i said, this presents a huge evidentiary problem, and there has to be a standard by which to judge these. does the woman have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the man acted in some way to opt-in or does she just have to prove that by a preponderance standard? also, who has the burden of proof to begin with--the man or the woman? anytime you're going talking about a legal dispute, you've got to determine who makes the final decision--a judge, a jury, a commissioner, a child support services representative, etc and how that dispute will be decided.

"i vehemently disagree. where, pray tell, has that rationale been supported in any court ruling? the right to abortion is based in the right to privacy. bodily integrity is central to that right. by your logic, if a woman is rich, she could be denied an abortion. the right is not based in personal wealth or lack thereof, so your point fails. one's body is not one's pocketbook, i reiterate."

I guarantee you no woman can be arrested for having an abortion, or stopped from having one, if she says it is just for socioeconomic reasons and she has no health concerns. She has the right to make the decision WHATEVER her reasons are. The right is based on privacy, but that includes privacy to make personal decisions based on socioeconomic status. The only difference is that a man's ONLY potential concern could be socioeconomic status, rather than health, parenting ability, whatever, so he wouldn't have a right to privacy because everyone would know anyway.

"what is a reasonable time?"

Five weeks after notification, or before the third trimester? Wouldn't be too hard to set one.

"what if the woman's decision to keep the child or have an abortion is contingent on whether the man decides to submit to support?"

Then she should tell him sooner, rather than later, and that is her personal choice. Many women chose abortions because their partners aren't ready to be parents and they don't want to do it alone, that's not new.

"What if the woman doesn't know she's pregnant right away and by the time the man's "reasonable time to opt-out" is up, it is too late for the woman to obtain an abortion?"

The right to opt out covers a woman's right to place a kid for adoption as well. But assuming you didn't allow it to and found alternative ways of correcting those inequalities, you could fairly say that a man could not opt-out after the third trimester unless he could prove before a judge that the woman intentionally concealed the pregnancy (as an accuser he would have the clear burden of proof).

"whose rights prevail?"

The woman will always have more rights as her body is involved, and biology decided that. She doesn't have the right to have support from a man who is not acting as a father, but she has ultimate control over the child's existence, and the only practical way to do it would be to put the burden of proof on the man in most cases.

"I disagree that this would necessarily cost less than a child support action (which is what i assume you mean by "child custody dispute", which, at least in some states, are two separate matters)."

Child custody disputes are very costly, involve multiple court visits, and police action to prosecute nonpayers. This could be resolved in one or two court sessions, if the court sided with the man; if not, it would be a standard custody situation anyway. There would be no need for enforcement and the bureaucracy/police hours associated with that.

"we certainly would need a standard of proof and someone to mediate a dispute if there is one, as you mentioned there could be--if the man says he didn't know she was pregnant and the woman says he knew right away because she told him"

We don't need a standard of proof that he TRIED TO PREVENT PREGNANCY. Ie we don't need to have the condom wrapper or anything, same as a woman doesn't need to prove she used BC to get an abortion.

The burden of proof would have to be on him, and the assumption would be once she knew, she would tell him unless he could prove otherwise. That would be the most practical way to do it. At most you could require women to notify their partners in front of a notary or something (notaries are ridiculously easy to find).

"anytime you're going talking about a legal dispute, you've got to determine who makes the final decision--a judge, a jury, a commissioner, a child support services representative, etc and how that dispute will be decided."

A judge. That was easy. Or whoever. Pick one. That would be really easy for legislators to decide.

Seriously, all the above "problems" could be laid out in the law pretty clearly. Obviously the default is that the man is responsible so if he doesn't want to be, it's his job to prove he shouldn't be. other than that, the rest of it would be straightforward to lay out in the law.

Introducing socioeconomic concerns into the argument is a red herring. Women can have abortions for any reason whatsoever. No woman is forced to prove that her reason for aborting is that she can't afford a child. If she does not want to have a baby, she does not have to -- period, end of story.

The one place where socioeconomic considerations enter the discussion is the different societal response to men and women who bring it up. A woman who aborts or adopts out because she feels she cannot afford a child is empowered, exercising self-determination, and responsible. A man who voices the same concerns is a no-good, uncaring deadbeat.

The "reasonable time limit" is also a red herring. As far as I understand it, a child can be placed for adoption at any time. There is no time limit placed on a single mother telling her, "You kept the baby past the five week trial period, now you have to go the whole eighteen years." As it stands now, a single woman can elect not to have the child in the first place, or to adopt the child out at any time in the future, should her circumstances, in her sole discretion, demand it.

The idea of any paternal actions triggering automatic opt-in is yet a third red herring. A mother who wants to adopt out is not scrutinized for evidence of pre-existing motherly action thereby disallowing the adoption.

How this concept should be framed is that a man who wishes to opt out must sign away all ties to the child. He cannot opt out of the payments while still enjoying the fatherhood relationship. But if he wants to be free to turn his back, he should be exactly as free as the mother is -- no more, no less.

As for men crying about "no baby = no sex": That was the standard argument used against women for decades. "If you don't want a baby, keep your legs closed." It was unacceptable then, it was fought against, and with the advent of effective birth control and abortion, eventually overturned...for women. For men, however, it is still in full force. The legal realities have not caught up the technical realities. For men, consent to sex equals consent to a child. And a number of people here seem quite content to leave it that way. I thought feminists didn't believe in double standards.

I think we should be very careful about this subject. This seems to be part of the men's rights movement, where privileged males are seeing the progress that women are making towards equality, and getting scared because the gap is closing. This is much less about equality for men as it is men wanting to preserve inequality for women.

Think about it: a few men whose partners don't follow their wishes regarding having a baby vs. so many women whose partners refuse to wear condoms and bounce when a woman gets pregnant. This is not to say that we should ignore the rights of the few for the many, but that there are so many whose rights are neglected that we really need to focus on them first. There are so many ways in which a man can skip out on his children that this is really a non-issue for the most part.

For those couples where the woman is calling all the shots and the man gets left in the dust, I am sorry. However, Dr. Phil is very good at sensationalizing stories that contain morals that he wants people to hold.

Which in this case is men should reassert their rights over a woman's body. No, thanks.

It would be helpful if we manage to not conflate the burdens of child-BEARING with the burdens of child-REARING.

Women must retain full sovereignty over their bodies, including their reproductive systems. This much at least should be self-evident. It is wrong to force women either to bear an unwanted child or to undergo an unwanted abortion. The one who is not subjecting his body to the pregnancy necessarily must have no say in the decision on whether the pregnancy is to continue. THIS is the inequity rooted in biology, and as such must stand.

By the same token, however, this means that pregnancy and childbearing are entirely elective on the part of the woman. Holding the man's feet to the fire for a decision that he has no say in is inherently wrong.

It is the subsequent eighteen years that are the remaining question. Women currently have rights to walk away from parenthood that men do not have. And no, a man running out on his obligations is NOT a non-issue. For starters, it makes him a criminal. Secondly, it leaves the welfare of the child unaddressed.

When a woman adopts her child out, she surrenders her rights to the child along with her responsibilities to that child; the state acts as agent to find a suitable replacement. This same procedure can be applied equally to men and women; that it currently is not applied equally is what is at issue.

If a woman knows that the man in question does not want a child, she still retains all her reproductinve options: to abort, to adopt out, or to keep the child herself. (Or perhaps to be a little more selective about whom she sleeps with in the first place -- a suggestion that some on this thread have made about men, with no apparent irony. God forbid both sexes should be equally choosy.)

A woman should be able to tell a man, "No condom, no sex." This is true as much for prevention of disease as it is for prevention of pregnancy. Putting men on the hook for unwanted pregnancies does not address this problem, it merely creates two problems that are only superficially offsetting.

In short, things could be handled more equitably -- without infringing on the rights of the woman.

"As far as I understand it, a child can be placed for adoption at any time. There is no time limit placed on a single mother telling her, "You kept the baby past the five week trial period, now you have to go the whole eighteen years."

Placement much after birth requires the father's permission. There's a narrow window where he's not on the birth certificate yet and she doesn't need his blessing. I'm okay with a time limit, considering that.

Placement is also more challenging the older the child is.

"The idea of any paternal actions triggering automatic opt-in is yet a third red herring. A mother who wants to adopt out is not scrutinized for evidence of pre-existing motherly action thereby disallowing the adoption."

I don't like it either, but at the same time, there needs to be a way to prevent dads who are simply deadbeats from using this. I mean, I have a lot more problem with a divorced man who raised his kids for a few years, and is still seeing them now and then, opting out than a man who has never even met the kid.

"This is much less about equality for men as it is men wanting to preserve inequality for women."

This is about acknowledging that women and men are EQUAL in ALL aspects. I'm not an MRA, I disagree with most of what they say, but I don't like that you are saying that women are less able to handle economic concerns, so they should be allowed to abort for those reasons, but men can. You are basically saying men are better able to provide financial support than women, which is inherently sexist.

"Which in this case is men should reassert their rights over a woman's body. No, thanks."

NO ONE wants men to be able to FORCE a woman to have or not have an abortion. They just want an option where, if she HAS the child, the father doesn't have to have them if he can't. The woman still has to have ultimate bodily sovereignty, she just doesn't have sovereignty over someone else's finances.

Women will always control when children are born. That's biology. But men should have an ability to say, well, I don't want a child, and I would abort for my own reasons (which we would then know are socioeconomic, because there's not much other reason out there), and, assuming he doesn't act like a father-- since it's important that he understands he doesn't get to opt out on payment and still see the kids, and important that he understands that by doing this, he does not HAVE kids-- be free to live his life.

"When a man's body is involved -- that would be during sex -- it's his choice entirely. (And I have to add that if I felt I were at risk for creating a pregnancy every time I had an orgasm, I'd be damn careful where and in whose company I had one.)

When a woman's body is involved -- during pregnancy -- the choice is hers. Entirely.

When a child comes into existence -- at birth -- both of its parents share responsibility for it."

Cactus Wren,
You're saying here that women's bodies aren't involved in sex - when sex is consensual, even, women are not even involved in the process of penis-vagina interaction?! I can see how this follows in cases of sexual assault, but in consensual sex, women have just as much say in what goes on with their vaginas as men do in what goes on with their penises. You can just as easily say that women should be damn careful about who they sleep with as you said men should be in your comment - I call bullshit on this one.

---
Hear me out. I'm not saying men should be able to get out on child support at a moment's notice. I think they should be able to get out of child support if they make a written and legal statement and get it legally approved (with the signature of him and the mother) before the pregnancy reached the stage at which abortion would be illegal in whatever state they live. However, I feel that this statement should have a much higher bearing in situations in which contraceptive failure (or contraceptive deception - which I've seen first hand [more like second hand, as it happened to a good friend of mine and not me], so don't give me the "women don't ever lie about being on birth control" bullshit) was the cause, and not as much bearing in situations in which the dude or chick just decided not to use a condom.

My ideas are still in the stages of being processed and fleshed out - I know that it's problematic to make potentially arbitrary delineations between when a man should and shouldn't be able to opt out of fatherhood, but I do know that I feel strongly about the idea that they should be able to, just like women should be able to opt out of motherhood. If a woman has the option of deciding to abort or adopt at any time up to x weeks (depending on the state), I think the father should have the option of deciding to opt out until that time as well.

This becomes more problematic in cases of "Surprise!!! Turns out you fathered a baby six years ago!!!" in which case the man would have been unable to withdraw his ability to be a father during the aforementioned time period - I am still not sure what I would do in those situations. Maybe pay half of the child support he otherwise would have, and not pay child support for the years before being informed of his paternal status?

---
I believe in reproductive choice for everyone involved - I know that women lie and I know that men lie. I know that women have a much harder time in the process of incubating a fetus and the time following birth, but I don't think that excuses them for making reproduction their decision and their decision alone. I know that I would not want to father a child that I was told wouldn't come into existence because my girlfriend "was on the pill" (when, really, she wasn't) - (once again, this happened to a very close friend of mine, and how he is raising a child that he had no interest in having because his girlfriend is bonkers. He loves his kid, but had absolutely no interest in being a father until much later in life - he's 22-ish now)

---
If you tell me "if he didn't want to have a baby, he shouldn't have had sex with her!!" I'll tell you "if she didn't want to have a baby, she shouldn't have had sex with him" right back. It takes two to make an infant (obviously discounting incidents of sexual assault).

I'd also like to call all of you out on your stereotypes.

You're talking about all these "deadbeat dads" who fuck-and-run, but "acknowledge the very few who are legitimately not bad people, who just can't afford to pay for a child"

To me, that's analogous to talking about all those "slutty strumpets who run around, fucking every man they see, and in the end of it all don't even know who the father of their baby is"

These are all cultural stereotypes, and we CANNOT make judgments about what is right or wrong, or what should be considered right or wrong in a legal context, based on them.

We need to talk real, concrete, RIGHTS-related talk. Equality-related talk. Not prejudice-based talk.

"This becomes more problematic in cases of "Surprise!!! Turns out you fathered a baby six years ago!!!" in which case the man would have been unable to withdraw his ability to be a father during the aforementioned time period - I am still not sure what I would do in those situations. Maybe pay half of the child support he otherwise would have, and not pay child support for the years before being informed of his paternal status?"

Well, I'd say if he could prove before a judge that she frauded him-- that she knew the kid was his, was easily able to contact him, and did not tell him-- that's fraud on her part, and he should not be liable or responsible because of her deception. I agree there's a bit of a gray area if he, say, was out of the country and unavailable, or it was the result of a hookup and she didn't know his number. In those cases I could see simply not requiring someone pay back child support (unless she can then prove that he was intentionally avoiding her or something).

BriannaG, you're not even reading entire comments before retorting. I think you need to calm down and read and listen to what people say here before responding, because you end up repeating what the people who you supposedly disagree with have already said.

Instrumentjamlord: "And no, a man running out on his obligations is NOT a non-issue. For starters, it makes him a criminal. Secondly, it leaves the welfare of the child unaddressed."

What I meant was that this issue of men opting out of fatherhood is a non-issue. You might disagree with that as well, but I didn't mean it wasn't an issue that he doesn't pay child support. I think this is very much an issue. Sorry for the vagueness.

Brianna G.: "This is about acknowledging that women and men are EQUAL in ALL aspects. I'm not an MRA, I disagree with most of what they say, but I don't like that you are saying that women are less able to handle economic concerns, so they should be allowed to abort for those reasons, but men can. You are basically saying men are better able to provide financial support than women, which is inherently sexist."

I wasn't talking about economic concerns specifically at all. I'm talking about how women are still not equal. You say they "are equal in all aspects" but this is simply not true. I agree that they should be, and perhaps in my post I was too harsh on men. I do agree that until men are equal to women on issues such as child rearing, showing emotions, feminine forms of expression, we will not be equal as well.

I agree with Lainapox: "We need to talk real, concrete, RIGHTS-related talk. Equality-related talk. Not prejudice-based talk." I guess what prejudiced me was the fact that these fathers were on Dr. Phil, and I have a hard time believing that this is more than a sensationalistic piece which serves to take our attention away from those who really need choices regarding pregnancy and child rearing: women. Many of you in this post talk about how women have so many choices, and I agree that we have more choices than we used to and that the right wants to take away, however, there are still many women who do not have choices be it for socioeconomic, religious, political, geographical etc. reasons.

I think this is a great theoretical discussion to have, but I envision it more in the context of taking place when women are at the doorstep of equality rather than just walking through the front gate.

I think it would also be helpful to know if any other countries have tried something with respect to this issue?

However, there is something else that is troubling me about this.

Am I correct that part of the argument here is that mothers have the option to abort but fathers do not? And that this is inherently unequal so we need a mechanism to allow men a similar option?

Are you then saying that it's more "equitable" when women don't have access to abortion? What about those parental abortion notification laws? So are you going to have different rules when the mother doesn't have access to abortion due to geography, age or some other circumstance?

I raise this point because I think using abortion here is sort of a red herring. In cases where the couple doesn't want to commit to joint parenting, there will be little to no parental investment from the father until the child is born.

Therefore he cannot give up something that he never had. Once the child is born both parents should be treated equally (and I understand that the system as it is has many flaws).

For example, in cases where mom wants to put the kid up for adoption, the father should have the chance to opt in and raise the kid; and the mother must pay child support. This is what we ask of fathers so we should treat moms the same.

I can think of a lot of other things that we can change to make things more equitable for men and fatherhood, such as making changes regarding establishing paternity at birth to prevent men from rearing children that are not theirs.

I agree with Lainapox about focusing on equality-based talk, not on socioeconomic status or other factors that may or may not contribute to a person's decision-making process. From a strictly rights-based perspective, the man should have the right to a) be told about a pregnancy as early as possible and b) express their opinion about whether they'd like to be involved or not. The woman should consider his wishes, but I still think that the decision should ultimately be hers. Otherwise, we're taking a bunch of steps back by giving the man some power over what she does with her body.

I think nightingale has the right idea - it sucks regardless, and that maybe in these cases, adoption or abortion is the best way to go, rather than forcing one parent to provide for a child that they made clear they didn't want. And in that situation, I think it would be fair to let the mother decide whether to abort the pregnancy or give the baby up for adoption.

a quick follow-up --
@vegankitty: I agree with a lot of what you said, especially about the timing of this discussion. The fact that Dr. Phil was covering this issue was interesting to me, and I wanted to get a sense of what other Feministing readers thought about it. I don't think his decision to have this discussion at this time was well thought out. Still, the discussion happened, and I'm guessing that lots of people watched it. (Do lots of people watch Dr. Phil?) The timing for this debate is all kinds of wrong, but people out there are having it, which made me want to think more about and learn more about an issue that I honestly hadn't really spent much time thinking about previously.

and the moral of the story is:

Be careful who you fuck

"From a strictly rights-based perspective, the man should have the right to a) be told about a pregnancy as early as possible and b) express their opinion about whether they'd like to be involved or not."

But we live in a world where women in bad relationships have to hide their pregnancies because they're in physical danger from the father. In crafting any law (and that's what we're talking about here), we have to consider not just principles of fairness, but real world consequences.

That's why the system as it currently stands uses judges: human beings are better at dealing with these kinds of complicated situations than inflexible laws are. (That's not to say there aren't bad judges, but that's another story.)

Ultimately, though, Hara has the real point of this, for men and for women. Sex is good fun, but if you don't trust the person you're with, you shouldn't be with that person. And both partners should insist on condoms until the relationship is well established (at least!).

thanks, mikeT.
i was beginning to feel like one of the only sane people on this thread. this is just way too fraught for abuse and complicated to involve the legal system. these issues are better resolved between the parties themselves. we should be encouraging people of both sexes in a relationship to communicate and we should focus on preventing domestic violence and situations in which it is dangerous for a woman to tell her partner that she is pregnant in the first place.

i think that such a scheme as proposed by brianna g and others would have a huge negative impact on single moms that far outweighs the inconvenience of child support payments actually made by dads who wanted no part in the pregnancy/childrearing.

@MikeT: I'll admit, my comment gave a pretty cut and dried "solution" for something that I know is anything but simple. Thanks for calling me out on it. Trying to think through a way that this could be regulated (and going back and reading what I'd written) only made me realize that dealing with these situations legally would be damn near impossible to do.

and, @rileystclair - at the risk of being corny, I appreciate the comments, particularly your last one. I wanted to get a sense of what people thought about this issue, so thanks. I had no idea that my first post would result in this much back and forth!

@MikeT: What exactly do you think judges do? Yes, they listen to cases on an individual basis, and then they make decisions based on legal codes (aka laws). There needs to be something set on the books so that judges don't just make up arbitrary decisions, which would then get over-turned for being unconstitutional. There needs to be some sort of framework involved in this discussion.

While I agree that this is a complicated issue, there are other complicated issues like murder, rape, domestic violence, illegal wiretapping...and somehow we trust the legal system to battle all of those matters! The problem with thinking that human beings can fix this issue without "inflexible laws" is that it doesn't mesh with the reality of the vast range of perspective in our country. Like for instance, that if we didn't have laws, some judge could decide that abortion was never legal, while in the very same district on the very next day another judge could demand that all pregnancies must be aborted.

There must be a framework on which all this human judgment is based on, and I don't feel as though our country has done a really bang-up job of figuring out a way to deal with this issue that is completely fair to both men and women. To say that it's a tricky problem so we shouldn't bother with making laws on it seems like a bit of a cop-out.

Does anyone know how often these situations pose a serious problem? As in, a woman and a man can't find common ground on their own and need to involve the legal system?

Or, as someone earlier said, how other countries have dealt with this issue?

Sothenna, I agree that there need to be legal guidelines, but there also needs to be flexibility written into those codes to deal with the messiness of the world. If you thought I was saying that there should be no laws at all, then I obviously wasn't being clear.

To remove an ambiguity: I am arguing that we, as a society, need to be very, very careful in crafting family law, because the situations that end up in the legal system are, unfortunately, messed up in one way or another. All divorces are ugly, but the least ugly ones are able to settle things without the intervention of a judge.

I do think that the judicial system is still fairly sexist, because court systems tend to be conservative (in the classic sense, meaning slow to change) and so they're preserving mores from 20, 30, 50 years ago. In family law, this does tend to mean women are more likely to get alimony, custody, etc., which is not always good for the kids.

But we have to be careful about making changes because the biggest group advocating for changes to family law seems to be men looking to get out of paying child support, which is a group I have absolutely no sympathy for.

And I mean that quite literally. I realize this might make me seem like a hardass, but I'm okay with that. There's a child involved, and that child's needs come first.

Even if you had no interest in becoming a father, and the mother decided to keep the kid and raise it, and now your wages are garnished, and you're only making 3/4 of what you'd be making if she's aborted or put it up for adoption. Congratulations, dude, you're making what the average woman would be making if she had your job. After we fix wage inequity, then we can get to your problem.

I should add that I do think when a father takes sole custody from a woman who wanted to put the baby up from adoption, he should be able to sue for child support.

Sorry if the last bit of my message above comes off as cranky. I was up at 4 with a crying baby and a migraining wife, and it's left my default emotional state on the cranky side of reasonable.

If the process of a man declaring that he does not want to have a child when the woman he has slept with is pregnant involves him walking through a gauntlet of people with signs with pictures of starving children who scream at him "You're a terrible father!" and "Don't abandon me, Daddy!" into a clinic, where as soon as he signs the papers to refuse his parental rights, he lays down on a table and a doctor uses tools to surgically scrape out his colon through his anus, possibly with inadequate anesthetic, then I might start to think it could possibly be fair.

Men have control over their bodies. Women have control over their bodies. The reason women get more control over whether or not a pregnancy comes into existence or not is that it happens inside a woman's body, and she can't actually *stop* it without surgery or medication, both of which can be grueling and traumatic... or she can undergo nine painful, body-transforming months with excruciating pain at the end and then give the child away and never see it again. Men are not faced with these choices.

We have had "men don't have to pay for children they don't want" before. It caused massive poverty for women and children.

If men do not want to be forced to pay child support for children they do not want, they are essentially demanding the right to blackmail women into undergoing surgery or medical treatments that the women may not want, or else face financial penalties. This is not acceptable.

As men are the dominant voices in our media, our politics, and our sciences, they *could* create alternatives. For example, the male pill, which pharmaceutical companies (generally run by, and staffed at the highest levels of management by, mostly men), has not had the resources put into it that it could have because Big Pharma thinks men don't want it and wouldn't use it. Proposals have been made for such things as magnetic vasectomies with remote controls to allow men to reverse them at will. If men demand birth control options that allow them condomless sex without causing pregnancy, they will get them... but the demand really isn't there. Instead of whining about how they should have the right to opt out of paying for born children, MRAs should be pressuring medical research companies into creating better birth control for men.

Also, if we moved to a model where children with only one parent paying for them were well supported because all children receive some sort of stipend from the government that pays for their basic needs, we could let men off the hook. But this would involve men who want to get out of personally paying child support for their kids persuading the rest of the country that we *all* should pay child support for their kids. Not only don't I think this will fly, but given that the majority of Republican, anti-tax, gut the social safety net support comes from men, it appears that such a strategy would be even *more* unpopular among men than among women.

Once a child is born, it is entitled to support from both its parents. If the mother then bails and leaves the dad with the kids, she has to pay child support -- it's not an obligation for *men* to pay but for non-custodial parents. The alternative is that *born* children, with minds, who are not biologically dependent on another human's body, will suffer. Besides, our jurisprudence says that there's nothing unfair about making people pay money for an obligation, but there is something very unfair about making people pay with their body parts... which is why, when you subtract anti-woman attitudes from the equation, our system of law suggests that abortion should be legal but born children are owed support from both parents.

Biology isn't fair, folks. The technology of abortion exists to ameliorate a massive unfairness to women; you want to fix that unfairness on your own side, it needs to be done with technology, not the law. You are the majority of the world's inventors, doctors, and medical researchers. Get cracking.

I think one of the main concerns I have with the child support issue is that research is showing that it hasn't actually changed child poverty rates over the last 30 years. (http://law.bepress.com/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2189&context=expresso is a really good study done on child support) One of the main problems I see with the program as it stands is that when mother is living in poverty and is on welfare, paid child support payments go not to the children, but to repay the welfare costs for the state. Unless the child support payments outweigh the amount of welfare assistance, the children will never see a dime of their father's support money.

I agree that a child's needs must come first, but the way our system is currently set up seems to negatively affect both women and men. The same study showed that about a third of young, non-custodial fathers can't pay child support because of their own poverty. And yet the way our system stands, a woman can't receive welfare benefits unless she names the father of her children. When the father's name is given, the state then begins the process of collecting reimbursement for the welfare payments they've given out, and this normally includes wage garnishing, income tax garnishing, and many times the father will have his license revoked. If a father is already having trouble making enough money to pay for his own living expenses, it seems kind of ridiculous to me that we should punish him for being poor. (Keep in mind that child support payments actually increase when the payments go to the child and not to the state as reimbursement.)

Also, the mathematical standard that is used to decide child support payments has been found to be weighted against low income, non-custodial parents. The formula looks at how much it would cost to raise a child in a two person family, and then assigns payments based on the outcome. However, when a person is living in poverty the amount that must be spent on child support gets skewed into being a much larger percentage of overall income, which makes it that much harder for the father to pay while at the same time covering his own cost of living.

I guess what I'm saying is that when a person can afford to pay for child support I completely agree with them supporting their children (especially in situations like divorce, where both parties were informed and interested in having children), but I feel as though our system right now isn't helping out families in poverty. There needs to be a better system out there than having the state give welfare payments to the custodial parent and then treating the non-custodial parent as a wallet to dip into for reimbursement. In situations where the non-custodial parent is too poor to pay child support, our country needs to continue providing financial aid to impoverished children without turning their non-custodial parents into criminals.

I note that a large factor in the lack of funds stems from the fact that two households are being run out of the same funds that could be combined to run a single household, if only the partners could stand to live with each other.

In this sense "be careful who you fuck" is more than mere snark.

My previous post was not meant to imply that poverty itself is not a huge factor. Of course it it. Addressing basic wage unfairness is an entirely separate sphere of activity that needs to be pursued for its own sake. Living in poverty sucks under pretty much all conditions, whether or not children and child support are involved.

However, I see this dynamic played out even in higher economic strata. Dad moves out, has to start paying for his own living quarters (perhaps even buys a too-expensive house, whereby his available support dollars are reduced), and suddenly the former family unit's total living expenses go way up, beyond the combined means of the participants.

Hara: "and the moral of the story is: Be careful who you fuck"

It doesn't work. Check the comment "Posted by mayfly | October 7, 2008 7:51 PM" to the recent post here: http://community.feministing.com/2008/10/the-forced-paternity-objectors.html#comments

miki mouse,
I knew of a 16 year old that had the same situation happen to her. She didnt believe in abortion so she had the baby. The "father" wasnt involved at all with her during her pregnancy. She was planning on giving it up for adoption. After she had the baby she had signed the consent forms to give the baby up for adoption, however, the "father" didnt want to give the baby up for adoption. She had to keep it because she wasnt about to entrust the baby to the father and lose her rights.

@gopher:"She had to keep it because she wasnt about to entrust the baby to the father and lose her rights."

I'm pretty ignorant about the process, but doesn't the mother lose rights upon adoption anyway?

In one scenario here, the baby would have been adopted by total strangers, in the other the father...

what am I missing? I would assume between the two options it's better for the kid to be raised by kin...

This is always an extremely contentious issue because as someone(s) noted above under our current system someone invariably gets “screwed”.

However, I think if there was an honest debate recognizing that we are applying old customs, social norms and laws that are less effective today than when fist developed, we could design a system that in general (there will always be exceptions) make the system more effective and equal.

For example, the option of notification and legally opting out was raised. I think this would be the corner stone of any fair system recognizing that men’s time to make a decision would be very limited because you would never want to put the women in a situation where her control on her body was lost.

However, the flip side to opting out is that a father who chooses not to opt out could be forced to sign a notice of “opting in”. This would make future support issues simpler. You opted in; the support payment formula says you pay X – done. In addition, as you are rebuilding the entire system you could also explore interesting options such as making the federal government that payee, so they pay up front and then collect child support payments just like they collect income tax (wanna bet people would be making those payments).

This rebuild of the system could also benefit women directly as implicit in this system is the right to, and ability to access, abortion or adoption assistance etc. (this is particularly true when you consider that both men and women would have a personal vested interest in ensuring women have this right and access, because a loss of women’s rights would erode men’s rights).

There is also the hope that this would decrease domestic dispute and/or violence as both parties would be empowered to protect their interest without resorting to violence to be empowered. This would not stop all cases of violence, but it might decrease them which would be positive.

Lastly, forcing these discussions up front might mean people make wiser decisions and explore all their options. Most people I know (parents and none parents alike) have expressed a desire at one time or another for parental licensing. That is not going to happen, but if parenthood is the road chosen after both parents have considered their choices and chosen to be a parent then hopefully they will be better more thoughtful parents, not angry people who may feel trapped due to a lack of options.

I can't believe how many people missed the point. From what I've read as a synopsis for this episode, this is the situation. The couple had sex, got pregnant and split up. She wanted the baby. He said abort it. She said no and had the baby. So far, she's in the right. It is *her* body. So she kept the baby and is now asking for child support through the state. He says this is sexist and unequal.

Here's the sitch. Child-support isn't a woman's right. It's a child's right. It doesn't matter if a woman gets the child, or a man gets the child. Whoever is taking of the kid gets the check. According to the law, this is equal. There are no extra requirements of visitation or "take-your-kid-to-work day". That's it. You don't even pay the check to the parent in question. You pay it to the state, and the state pays the parent.

All this episode did was bring about the classic anti-feminist argument "what about the menz". It's not about men and women. It's about a child. And no. The "father" doesn't get a say on whether or not she has the baby. He's not the one pregnant.

I got pregnant and the father begged me to have an abortion. When I chose to have the child I was made to feel like a selfish destroyer of his future. I didn't want an abortion, not because I don't "believe" in it but because I felt in my situation it was okay to carry the child to term. Unfortunatley there hasn't been a day since I've been pregnant where I haven't felt the need to justify my decision not to abort. When I explain my situation to people who ask, most of them feel sympathy for the absent father. Like I trapped him into this. One person actually said to me, "you must be really pro-life". Um, no. We were talking about a child that I had decided to carry and would soon be a human being! It's unbelieveable to me.

Women caught up in an unplanned pregnancy ultimately have no easy choice at all. You're damned if you do, damned if you don't. In the end, men aren't the ones who have to undergo abortions, they aren't the ones who would have to carry a child for nine months and then give it up in the case of adoption. I think this discussion stems from the fact that men want to undermine women once again. The argument wouldn't be so heated if men could compassionately look at a women's situation and feel empathetic for her. In our patriarchal, male dominated, selfish society, this isn't likely to happen often. The "men's rights" movement sounds to me like the insane squabblings of men who misunderstand equality and injustice. Women are the oppressed gender, not men. I don't feel bad for men who are forced into fatherhood. They reap so many other benefits of our unfair society that to me their welfare is a non-issue.

"The argument wouldn't be so heated if men could compassionately look at a women's situation and feel empathetic for her. In our patriarchal, male dominated, selfish society, this isn't likely to happen often. The "men's rights" movement sounds to me like the insane squabblings of men who misunderstand equality and injustice. Women are the oppressed gender, not men. I don't feel bad for men who are forced into fatherhood. They reap so many other benefits of our unfair society that to me their welfare is a non-issue."

Oh God, thank you, thank you, thank you, for saying this. This issue to me stinks of MRA whiners that are only concerned about undermining women's rights. I'm not concerned about the welfare of the MRA's, men are not oppressed in this society. I'm too preoccupied with worrying about getting equal pay for equal work, fighting the erosion of reproductive choice, and trying to keep myself safe from would be assailants if I happen to go out of my house by myself.

Much of this MRA issue seems to be about "opting out" of fatherhood in order to shirk responsibility of child support. If you look at what happens in reality, women do not have the option of "opting out". Abortion is not an "opt out". The fact is that there are BY FAR more single mothers than there are single fathers. Thus it seems that plenty of men already have no problem with "opting out" if they so want to do so because by and large it's the mothers who are taking all the responsibility in raising these children. We should be more concerned about the situations of these millions of single mothers and children rather than a few hundred MRA's who didn't get their way. As another person said earlier this is also a child's right's issue...and a child has a right to be financially supported so that it's needs are met. And in order for that to happen a mother either needs to either be financially secure on her own (independent of the father) or she needs the support of supplemental income via child support from the father.

If men are so concerned about their "rights" and not having to pay child support because they feel they want to "opt out of being a father" (a choice the majority of women don't have by the way)...then how about men start advocating for the rights of children to be financially supported through changes to the welfare system and possible the creation of a poverty safety net for single mothers so that mothers to not have to worry each month about whether or not they will receive child support from the "opt out" father, how about men advocate that women have access to safe abortions if by chance a man gets a women pregnant and she wishes to have an abortion, how about men start advocating for male birth control so they have greater control over preventing unwanted pregnancies, how about men advocate for government funded child care like they have in many other countries so that it is not so much a financial burden on mothers....and for that matter advocating for equal pay would do a whole lot of good in raising the financial situations of mothers so that it would be easier to support a child sans the support of the "opt out father". It seems to me that if the financial situation of mothers is secure, than single mothers will not even need a check from the "opt out father". (I'm pretty sure that the majority of women would rather be financially secure and able to support their child themselves, than living in poverty and having to rely on a check from a father each month that most probably won't ever get anyways.)

The point is, the MRA's never discuss any possible solutions that might help the mother and child (and thus help them) because they are only worried about expanding their own rights at the EXPENSE of women's rights.

We will surprise to find the high quality cheap Ed Hardy in much.Everyone will focus on Ed Hardy