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So I put to you AS A FACT that modern feminism did not create the system whereby women’s nurturing abilities were valued over men’s. Feminism did not create the system where males were given financial responsibility for families and women were denied jobs. What you are doing is blaming feminism for the very system that feminists have organized to dismantle for at least the last 40 years.
I'm not saying that feminism invented the idea, but that it created the current system.
The distinction I am making is that from the point that the tender years doctrine was dismissed as a reason for determining custody, the feminist movement has prevented society from moving away from those values by creating a system that sustains that bias. In the 1960s, the tender years doctrine began to be removed from laws. However, because of feminist politics, its outcome remains. So it can be said that feminism didnt create the current situation in that mothers were often given custody beginning in the late 19th century, but it can also be said that feminism revived this bias and legislated it into sustainability.
Here is how: in seeking to move control of finances from men to women (lets assume that the stated goal in this effort is to equalize society), family law has been set up to provide finances to women via the application of the same tender years doctrine that contributed to some of the inequality that led to feminism in the first place.
How? As I said in earlier posts, the way that child support from NCP to CP is set up favors the CP. The laws DONT assist CPs in getting their children off welfare lists. In fact, the laws promote welfare payments to single mothers already receiving child support.
Incentives created to force child support violators to pay up provide money to localities to not only collect money, but to enforce high-as-possible support levels.
And the legal application of status quo, restraining orders, child care, etc., have caused there to be a bias against men in the application of custody law.
Statistics show that there are more parents (CP, women) who interfere with "visitation" (40-75%) than there are parents (NCP, men) who fail to pay child support (10%), yet localities spend 340 times more money on support collection than they do on custody enforcement. The term "deadbeat dad" is much more wellknown than "interfering mom," even though the latter group is significantly larger than the former. This is a direct result the feminist bias and of politicians courting feminist groups.
In order to protect abused people, feminist politics has supported blanket laws that allow for quick legal acknowledgement of abuse (via restraining orders, etc) based on unsubstantiated claims of abuse. Feminist politics has also supported legislation that prevents a mother from notifying her spouse of an abortion without there even existing claims of abuse. HIPA law application means that fathers cant get information about an unborn child because the mother is the only legally recognized individual, even within minutes of actual birth. Feminist politics do NOT promote equality. They promote creating a favored class in legal actions, namely women, in regards to anything related to the traditional roles of mother/spouse/caregiver. The fact is, most divorces dont include claims of abuse, and for the ones that do, women's claims of abuse are nearly equal to those from men. Abuse isnt claimed unless there are custody issues.
I believe that most people who identify themselves as "feminists" do indeed support equality, but I dont think the actual laws lobbied for by the political machine that is feminism has generated equality, or even that it truly seeks it.
That fathers rights groups dont acknowledge their "borrowing" of feminist terminology seems a minor point. That fathers rights groups exist despite feminism's decades-old statements of equality is (to me) a telling point.
The degree of parenting that each spouse does in an intact marriage should have nothing to do with how each parent cares for the child or children after divorce. The family dynamic has necessarily changed, and it doesnt matter who did what prior, because now there are two households.
Lip service doesnt equal facts. Just as you can say that fathers rights groups have borrowed terminology from feminist organizations, we can both say that neither group actually behaves consistent with their mission statements. If we were going to confine our discussion to what different groups claim to be in favor of, it would be a pretty short discussion.
NOW doesnt fight for equality. It fights for the financial gain of women.
HOWEVER: by and large women have paid a huge financial price, and continue to pay a financial price, for making a commitment to be with children.
A recent PBS article noted that American women actually control 51.3% of the wealth in this country.
I believe I've demonstrated that that is a myth. The result of most custody fights gives mothers more money and MORE access to welfare services. Legal precedent values the mother's income even over paternal rights (men proved by DNA tests to not be fathers are still paying child support).
But, the fathers’ movement seems to have only increased male power in this one area as its singular goal. It is therefore not for justice but for male power. That's why the outside world matters so much. Can show me strong evidence to the contrary? There's my gauntlet.
That's incorrect. In fact, most fathers entering a custody fight will argue for equal custody, while most mothers argue for primary custody. Most fathers expressly want equal custody, most mothers want primary custody. This is considered one of the primary reasons that fathers have a hard time overcoming the bias in family courts, because their beginning negotiating position is right in the middle, not to one extreme side.
In regards to "child's best interests," that is no basis for a legal argument. That most custody decisions are based on vague concepts, such as "child's welfare," "best interests," etc., these remove the burden of having to make decisions on facts. This puts subjective power in the hands of the court, which has other agendas as well, such as funding its own survival, getting re-elected, continuing the business of support collection, etc. This is the argument for 50-50 custody. One of the most common arguments against presumptive joint custody is that it only works where there are no conflicts between parents. But, due to interfering with visitation rights, based on who initiates divorces, and a clear financial stake in maintaining primary custody, mothers are most often the ones creating the conflict which then makes the NCP-CP relationship strained, thus preventing presumptive equal custody. What fathers rights groups are fighting for is presumptive equal custody, they are fighting for a system where facts rule over subjective decisions subject to outside influences. Where most feminist-based laws give more power to women in family court in order to overcome a mythical disadvantage, what fathers rights groups want is presumed equality. |
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