Do you support the Father's Rights Movement?

[Taverner]

That is, the movement to give shared and more parental rights to Fathers during a divorce...

As it is now, it is extremely sexist - if both parents sue for custody, often times the woman gets sole custody. Automatically assuming a woman is a better parent is sexist. I've known many women who make horrible mothers, and many women who make great mothers. The same goes for men.

14 votes, 0 passes | Time left: Unlimited
	Yes, I support Father's rights
	12 (86%)
	No - women are naturally gifted in a way men aren't
	1 (7%)
	other
	1 (7%)
	0 DU members did not wish to select any of the options provided.
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[marybourg]

1. Oh, I thought it was a movement to give fathers

the right to carry the pregnancy to term and do the birthing.

[DURHAM D]

8. LOL

Great response to a stupid poll.

[MotherPetrie]

3. Talk about a biased poll wording.

Trashing.

[Marrah_G]

4. I don't know enough about the movement so I picked other

If it had just said " Do you believe father's should have equal rights in regards to parenting" I would have said yes.

[Go Vols]

5. I raised

my two kids from age 5-8 alone and got custody of both.I remember the court papers being worded towards women getting custody instead of the men.

My kids even got me cards on mothers day and thought it was funny.

[The River]

6. I Was A Custodial Father

to a teenage daughter.

"Rights" are not given, they are taken and exercised.

[leftstreet]

7. Election season is officially over

[seabeyond]

9. i choose other. i do not support MRA. i do support father rights and fight for it equally

as i do with a mothers rights.

i do know there is an inequity in the courts. the state matters. it is getting better and more people are becoming aware of the issue, and the mom should no be the automatic go to. i also know that men with money are more likely to get better treatment in courts switching the balance of inequity.

most of us do not have that kind of money.

and i have two brothers that raised their kids. one brother fought for a decade and spent over 125k and still the girl was given to the mother. the judge said... (really), my brother is a very good father and it is so important the daughter has him in her life, but the mother is not physically abusing the girl so she needs to be with the mother.

5 yrs later, the mother kidnapped the child, at 12. the courts gave daughter to brother. had no rights or privileges to daughter. adn totally fucked up the girl. we have spent 8 yrs dealing with the after effects.

so i say this because i know there are issues.

but, not the MRA. it has gone extreme.

[cali]

10. LOL! Fantastic push polling.

I believe the so-called fathers' rights movement has a lot of nasty strands in it- misogyny for one.

and the day of women getting sole custody automatically is gone.

Custody cases should be looked at individually, and when possible, shared custody is the best way to go.

[LynneSin]

11. As long as the father in question didn't rape the mother which resulted in a pregnancy

If a man rapes a woman and she becomes pregnant then I think that man has no rights to visit the child.

[seabeyond]

14. and isnt it sad we have to make this clarification. i think that says a hell of a lot. yes... nt

[LynneSin]

20. I know

[cali]

26. The so-called men's movement is pretty ugly stuff.

I've posted some links in this thread.

[DURHAM D]

12. You said -

"As it is now, it is extremely sexist - if both parents sue for custody, often times the woman gets sole custody."

BS

[Violet_Crumble]

43. +1000. And I will never support any movement to give parents custody based on their gender...

Tavener describes that movement as: 'That is, the movement to give shared and more parental rights to Fathers during a divorce...' I'm calling a big BS on that one. Where I live, custody is decided based on what's best for the child, not on what gender the parent is. And what's this 'during a divorce' stuff? I'd take a guess that many parents aren't married and therefore never get divorced. I was never married and my ex never suffered from not having any parental rights. In fact, right up till my child hit 18, he had the right to stop me taking her out of the country without his permission, even though he'd made the choice not to be part of her life...

btw, when it comes to claims that fathers are so hard done by, etc, here's one recent case that happened here where things like the Hague Convention ensure that both parents rights are protected when it comes to their children. My only complaint with how that case turned out was that it took so long for an outcome to happen, and that was because the mother broke even more laws than she'd already done in hiding the children and stuff. After watching the way she carried on and what she put her children through, she's the epitome of a bad mother, imo...

http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2012/s3604081.htm

[msanthrope]

13. I support equal protection under law. nt

[DevonRex]

29. +1. nt

[liberal_at_heart]

35. me too

[LadyHawkAZ]

15. Custody shouldn't be determined by gender

each case should be decided on its individual merits or lack thereof. I assume that's what you mean?

[redqueen]

16. I believe fathers should be much more involved with parenting.

However, for me, the term "fathers rights" will always be associated with this crap:
http://www.salon.com/2009/11/05/mens_rights/?mobile.html

[grasswire]

17. lots of good info at www.fathersandfamilies.org

...for those who are not acquainted with the issues facing fathers in custody matters.

http://www.fathersandfamilies.org

or see fathersandfamilies on facebook

[blue_heron]

18. I think it's very complicated

In general, I do. But I've seen dad's who have greater financial resources vindictively take the mother to court because 'they can'. Public defenders are limited to criminal cases, leaving a mother trying to pay a lawyer to keep her rights. In one case, the dad really had no interest. But his mother did, and she paid for his lawyer. When it was his turn for visitation is was grandma who was the caregiver. It primarily should be what is In the best interest of the child(ren) and spending their college education funds on lawyers is not. It is very sad almost in all cases

[PowerToThePeople]

19. i did vote yes, but changed to other

I do not know enough about the movement to say.

btw- father,primary financial supporter, and primary caregiver here. But, there are reason's for this that are not "I am the better parent." Mostly, periods of unemployment.

[HuckleB]

21. I support equal rights for both parents. I'm suspicious of "father's rights" movement, however.

One thing I would like to see is a movement toward educating all parents on how to help their children through a divorce. Basically, to help them put the kids first. Thus, finding a way to communicate with their ex on making things as similar as possible at both homes, and, which is much more important, making sure they understand the damage that can be done by bashing the other parent to the kids.

Hate your ex all you want, but don't spew it on your kids. That's the thing that messes things up.

[moriah]

39. "Hate your ex all you want, but don't spew it on your kids." +100 n/t

[cali]

22. Here is some reading on this "movement"

"Men's Rights" Groups Have Become Frighteningly Effective

They’re changing custody rights and domestic violence laws.

Posted: Thursday, November 5, 2009 7:45am
By Kathryn Joyce



At the end of October, National Domestic Violence Awareness Month, members of the men’s movement group RADAR (Respecting Accuracy in Domestic Abuse Reporting) gathered on the steps of Congress to lobby against what they say are the suppressed truths about domestic violence: that false allegations are rampant, that a feminist-run court system fraudulently separates innocent fathers from children, that battered women’s shelters are running a racket that funnels federal dollars to feminists, that domestic-violence laws give cover to cagey mail-order brides seeking Green Cards, and finally, that men are victims of an unrecognized epidemic of violence at the hands of abusive wives.

<snip>

One of the respectable new faces of the movement is Glenn Sacks, a fathers' rights columnist and radio host with 50,000 e-mail followers, and a pragmatist in a world of angry dreamers. Sacks is a former feminist and abortion-clinic defender who disavows what he calls “the not-insubstantial lunatic fringe of the fathers’ rights movement.” He recently merged his successful media group with the shared-parenting organization Fathers and Families in a bid to build a mainstream fathers' rights organ on par with the National Organization for Women. Many of Sacks’ arguments—for a court assumption of shared parenting in the case of divorce, or against child-support rigidity in the midst of recession—can sound reasonable.

But do any of their arguments hold up? Many of the men for whom Sacks advocates are involved in extreme cases, says Joanie Dawson, a writer and domestic-violence advocate who has covered the fathers’ rights movement. The great majority of custody cases, in which shared parenting is a legitimate option, are settled or resolved privately. But of the 15 percent that go to family court—the cases that fathers’ rights groups target—at least half include alleged domestic abuse.

http://www.doublex.com/section/news-politics/mens-rights-groups-have-become-frighteningly-effective?page=0,0


http://www.xyonline.net/content/responding-mens-rights-groups

http://www.hugoschwyzer.net/2004/09/29/masculinity-and-the-failure-of-the-mens-rights-movement-updated/

Excellent articles at the links.

[Taverner]

32. There are too many assholes involved

Many because they have an axe to grind

But the issue in itself - shouldn't post-divorce parenting be at least 50/50?

[Le Taz Hot]

23. Absolutely.

And I have the DU scars to prove it. A long time ago I posted about this, asking why is it that XX% of time (I don't remember the exact percentage but it was WAY over 50% -- something like 75+%) custody is granted to the mother. I questioned the status quo that the mother is always the better parent. I've seen too many instances where that most definitely is NOT true. I had all the figures, did days worth of research and spent a LOT of time writing about the unfairness dished out to fathers who, too often, end up being nothing more than check writers. Holy shit did I ever step into it. All kinds of extraneous issues came into the discussion. Everything from deadbeat dads (like there are no deadbeat moms), child support, etc. The ISSUE was child custody and the unfairness towards men and favoritism toward women. I think that was the first time I was labeled a misogynist.

I haven't read any responses on this yet but I'm anxious to see if anything has changed since then (probably 8 years ago or so).

[moriah]

42. And as children age, the "best parent" may change.

If a couple divorces while a mother is still breastfeeding, I can see why there would be a presumption that the child should remain with the mother. But then let's say, 6 years down the road, the mother is letting the child be babysat by the TV and video games because she doesn't often take her son to the park to let him run his energy out... it might be time that the father would be the best parent, even if the mother was originally the best choice for the child.

My personal opinion -- whichever home is the best for the child is the one that should be chosen, but I also think that parents ought to work together more and develop their own workable custody arrangements, so that they aren't having to fight it out in court. It's better for the kids to see their parents working together to make sure they're taken care of than it is for them to see their parents fighting over them.

[Blue_Tires]

24. On paper, yes

but they've let too many crazies co-opt their name and mission...Too many of the prominent Men's/Father's Rights Movement bloggers read like Stormfront sometimes...

This site names and shames the worst of the worst:

http://manboobz.com/

[Taverner]

31. This is true

[cali]

25. These groups are like groups for white rights.

Ugly stuff.

[Johonny]

28. I used to think that way but

I know people screwed by the system. The system is so saturated with failed relationships and dead beat parents it takes a lot of fighting to make it work for you. Often you "win" on paper but the family court process doesn't follow through with enforcement. I know a lot of fathers that wanted to be in their kids life but were denied the opportunity not by the law but the laziness of the law to be enforced. The mechanism seems in place to assume you are a dead beat and for lawyers to make maximum $ getting both parties in a divorce fighting and mad. It's a great environment to make a lot of money in the hate industry. The process generally leaves men and women vastly bitter and kids as tools to use between the parties. At least from my experience of people I know.

One could argue it is a failure at least in California to pay enough taxes into our family court system to make it work. You're talking about a lot of social workers that simply don't have the time and resources to properly evaluate situations. In the mean time you have divorce lawyers that know just how to play people to keep the divorce going long after it is over. It scares a lot of people out of thinking about marriage.

[Taverner]

33. Yes there are people with an axe to grind involved at times

But the problem is still the problem

[liberal_at_heart]

34. my brother in law was basically being screwed in the courts

They ended up getting back together but up until that point he was getting screwed. She ran away with the kid. When she came back he got the kid but he had to go to court to get custody and child support. There was a time before she left where there was an order for him to pay child support. So when she ran off with the kid he was still under an order to pay. He had to go to court to reverse it. They did put an support order for her to pay after he got custody, but they never made her pay the child support.

[Comrade_McKenzie]

27. As long as there's no history of domestic violence, yes... nt

[Taverner]

30. Agree 100%

[liberal_at_heart]

36. do support legal rights of fathers, do not support some of the organizations involved

[bemildred]

37. I support The ERA. NT

[Taverner]

41. I do too - if the ERA had passed in the 70s....

A lot of things would have been solved earlier.

Marriage equality, father's rights - and quite possibly less violence against women.

[bemildred]

44. Yep. I just think that's the right way to do it, same rules for everybody.

Kids need more protections too.
As a twice divorced father, I do of course support father's rights.

[Hippo_Tron]

38. As others have said, the concept yes, but not the organized movement

Men control 83% of the seats in the Senate, 84.3% of the seats in the House, 6 out of 9 seats on the Supreme Court. Every single President of the United States has been a man.

The fact that parental rights laws suck is an isolated matter that is the result of the fact that people wrote bad laws and have failed to change them. It's not the result of a systematic attempt by women (or anyone else) to relegate men to second class citizenship.

Organizing men around supposed "men's issues" is silly right wing pretend that privileged people are actually victims nonsense.

[Taverner]

40. OK - the issue - not the "movement"

[Joseph Sparacino]

45. Fighting for Fathers to be there for their children

I have been fighting for the rights of Fathers my entire career. It is surprising to me that at a time when children are threatened by so many things in society as they are today that some stereotypes remain which suggest Dads have no clue and aren't needed. Society works better for children when Dad is there and bringing his strength and experience to set an example and help.

[hrmjustin]

46. Welcome to DU!

[Taverner]

47. Agreed. Kids need a village, but if they have a dad, they need him

If they have a mom, they need that too