Do men have any reproductive rights?
I interviewed Tennessee State Representative Stacey Campfield on his "Baby Daddy Bill" at PJTV. This bill seeks to petition to the court to disestablish paternity after DNA evidence reveals a baby was not sired by the man on the birth certificate. Join us for a fascinating discussion.
Labels: men's activism, men's rights (or lack thereof), PJTV
posted by Helen at 9:20 PM
27 Comments:
Very interesting interview.
How anyone could oppose this bill is beyond me. Sexist seems to be the only word for it.
The double whammy (getting paid by the husband they cheated on as well as the real daddy) is mind-boggling.
Dr. H., I really appreciate your efforts to stand up for the rights of all people not just those who share your gender.
Merry Christmas.
The bill will fail because radical feminists have brainwashed a majority of the public that men are to screwed over by society once they turn 18.
Trust,
Merry Christmas to you.
Alex,
Don't give up, the tide will turn.
Of course it goes without saying the biological father should pay child support and be an active parent. That's the way the law applies to single men.
Unfortunately, that's not the way the law applies to married men. It's called presumptive paternity, and it's been an essential element of the marriage contract for over 600 years. If she is your wife, they are your children, you will pay child support. Period. Even if none of the children are actually yours.
There was a case out of Dallas some ten or fifteen years ago, which was fully documented in the Dallas Morning News, that involved this man who had married this woman, and four kids and ten years later, had gotten divorced. One of the children had cystic fibrosis, which is a genetic disease resulting from two recessive alleles (one from each parent). So this man went to get tested should he decide to get married again, and it turned out that he didn't carry the allele. In fact, he came to find out that only one of the children was his. This woman had conceived four children with four different men, all while she was married, but only one of those men has to pay child support, her husband at the time.
So this man is shelling out 1/3 of his income to pay for three children he did not father. He took his case to court. Denied. He took his case to the appelate court. Denied. He took his case to the Texas Supreme Court. Denied. He took his case to the federal appeals court. Denied. He took his case all the way to the United States Supreme Court. Denied.
The court has no choice but to enforce the controlling legal document, which in this case is the marriage contract and the doctrine of presumptive paternity.
I don't think this is a matter of chivalry--although some men, like the idiot representative in the video, make it appear so by pretending to stand up for the rights of children and/or women. Nor do I think it's a matter of feminism--even though some women make it appear so by championing their superiority over men and by claiming to right centuries of oppression.
I think it's a matter of a flaw in the law. Paternity tests did not exist when the law was written, and the law simply has not caught up with the science.
Fairness, justice, equality are not an issue here. The issue is the law, and until that changes there will continue to be more and more cases like the one above.
There are literally millions of men in this country paying child support for children they did not conceive. And there's nothing they can do about it.
Yes, it is fraud on the adulterous woman's part. It's also deception, misrepresentation and theft. Are any of those real crimes going to be prosecuted? No. Why? Because the law is set up to protect women from men. There is no law to protect men from women.
I applaud Mr. Campbell's efforts to introduce this bill, but let's get serious, similar bills should be introduced in every state in the union. Until men stand up and demand that the law be changed, nothing's going to be any different.
As it stands now, community property, community funds and sweat equity combined with presumptive paternity and no-fault divorce makes the marriage contract a recipe for bankruptcy, served up to any man who's stupid enough to put a ring on the finger of a woman he does not know, who is not honest and whom he cannot trust. It's that simple.
Oh, and Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night.
**Of course it goes without saying the biological father should pay child support and be an active parent. That's the way the law applies to single men **
Over thousands of years in Western Civilization there was no such notion that men should have to pay for bastard children. Part of the reason we have such as epidemic of “single mothers” is that we subsidize the behavior. Remove child support and government welfare and you will quickly find a dramatic decrease in illegitimate children.
The most interesting parts were that Campfield sounds like a quite reasonable, likable fellow. If you read some of the liberal Tennessee blogs you'd think he was the devil incarnate.
Secondly, the clip showing Briley questioning Campfield in the legislature shows how the Democrats turned every attempt Campfield made in promoting anything resembling men's rights into an "anti-woman" or "anti-child" issue. There's one video I couldn't find that show's past Tennessee Speaker Naifeh, in violation of House rules, refusing to let Campfield speak from the floor.
Campfield is doggedly determined.
This comment has been removed by the author.
Forget the fact that it is impossible for a moment, and consider a scenario with the following factors:
* Man commits adultery.
* Man lies to woman about adultery.
* Man divorces woman.
* Through lies and fraud, man collects money from woman for 15 years for a child that is not hers
* Man's lies and adultery is exposed.
* Man then collects money from the women he committed adultery with, while keeping the money he fraudulently got from his ex wife.
Basically, the man benefited from adultery and fraud, doubling the amount he would have had if he were a faithful husband.
Now, is there a representative of feminist alive who would think that this was fine, since it was best for the children?
I still don't know what anyones opinion of pre-marital sex is to this situation. That guy is an idiot.
Merry Christmas.
For some this is a real big deal. Paternaty, even if proved wrong guy, still makes the named man responsible for the feeding and upkeep of the child, even after divorce, meaning the real daddy, if identifiable, gets off scot free. More importantly, I think, as long as the state has someone to blame, the state has to pay no bills. And there's the real hold up!
"It's called presumptive paternity, and it's been an essential element of the marriage contract for over 600 years." -- GawainsGhost
I think it's safe to say that GawainsGhost is merely pointing this out and not advocating it; but essential element or not, it ought to be changed. I'll bet for more than half of those 600 years, it was more or less understood as an "essential element" of marriage that it was no big deal if a man beat his wife, much less an adulterous wife. Undoubtedly, more than a few men more or less got off scott free for killing an adulterous wife.
Times change -- so, it's about time that the "presumption" that bastard children born on the sly during a marriage are not the responsibility of the husband/non-father.
Presumptive paternity was not a problem until recently because the husband had several legal benefits:
1) The law gave him automatic custody rights if he wasn't an unfit parent and he divorced his wife.
2) Adultery was a crime in most jurisdictions.
3) Society wasn't particularly sympathetic to a cheating spouse (who did so without a damn good excuse) getting kicked to the curb, or even becoming the victim of violence from their faithful spouse.
I think most men would have no problem with presumptive paternity if the old laws and norms were still in effect, as it would mean that they could, today, kick their wife to the curb and make HER pay the child support for the children they had already come to love and know as their own.
Here's the deal: men lose their reproductive rights when they leave their reproductive material in the posession of a woman.
Is it right? no. But that is the way it is. Is it going to change? maybe. But you're going to need a mighty thick skin to deal with all the crap coming your way.
Remember, this is for the benefit of the children!
The flip side of presumptive paternity in marriage is that the husband (and/or his family) used to have considerable power over the actions of the wife. In some cultures, he/they still do. The fear of paternity fraud seems to be the principal reason why Saudi women, particularly wives, are so constricted in their movements and why Chinese mothers-in-law can and very often do make their daughters-in-law's lives a living hell.
I don't think the bill goes far enough. I want women to have an active legal obligation to ensure that correct man is identified as a child's biological father and for paternity fraud to be a felony. The "Dr. Laura defense", that the woman had so many sexual partners that she honestly doesn't know who the father is, is simply not acceptable.
Darth Aggie is exactly correct. There was another case in the news a few years ago about these two doctors who were having an affair. She performed oral sex on him, then behind his back spit his semen into a plastic bag, put it in the freezer and later used a turkey baster to impregnate herself. No, really. She then slapped him with a paternity suit.
So the guy sued, claiming, I guess sexual fraud. The court ruled, "Upon ejaculation plaintiff tendered to defendant free and clear title to ownership of property from donor to donee." Those were the exact words from the ruling printed in the newspaper. And he was ordered to pay child support.
"Free and clear title to ownership of property from donor to donee," think about that. That is now precedent, meaning unless or until it is overruled by a higher court it stands as the law of the land.
But it's like I've always said. 1 sperm cell = 20%. 1 gold ring = 50%. Invest wisely.
Stephen Baskerville has a book out that addresses this issue, as well as what he can only term the divorce "industry" ("providing financial incentives for mothers to divorce"), quite in depth: "Taken Into Custody" (The War Against Fathers, Marriage, and the Family)
Some excerpts are on my blog…
http://no-pasaran.blogspot.com/2008/06/witch-hunts-in-contemporary-america-is.html
"child support today has nothing to do with fathers abandoning their children, reneging on their marital vows, of even agreeing to a divorce. It is automatically assessed on all non-custodial parents, even those divorced over their objections and who lose their children through no legal fault or agreement of their own. It is an entitlement, in short, for all divorcing mothers…
"…child support is no longer primarily a method for requiring men to take responsibility for the offspring they have sired and then abandoned, as most people are led to believe. Overwhelmingly it is now a regime whereby 'a father is forced to finance the filching of his own children.'
"What we confront here is a bureaucratic machine of a kind that has never before been seen in the United States or the other English-speaking democracies. … The implications reach far beyond fathers and even beyond the family itself, for forcibly severing the intimate bond between parents and their children threatens the liberties of all of us.
"What is taking place here should be made very clear: Citizens who are completely innocent of any legal wrongdoing and simply minding their own business — not seeking any litigation and neither convicted nor accused of any legal infraction, criminal or civil — are ordered into court and told to write checks to officials of the court or they will be summarily arrested and jailed. Judges also order citizens to sell their houses and other property and turn proceeds over to lawyers and other cronies they never hired. Summoning legally unimpeachable citizens to court and forcing them to empty their bank accounts to people they have neither hired for services they have requested nor received on threat of physical punishment is what most people would call a protection racket…"
More info here:
http://www.stephenbaskerville.net/
Yeah. Make no mistake about it. This is IT. This is THE issue. It seems big but probably not THAT big. It is just one issue in mens rights. But, it is an issue much like rape in feminism.
This is the source of most of the social inequities that prompted women's lib in the first place.
I Tennessee it but i dont Tenne-believe it.(Sorry)
This legislation seems something that no reasonable person could oppose.The idea that this is "anti-child" is nothing but an excuse, after all, what about any children that the man may have actually fathered? Are they not missing out on daddy's income because it's going to someone he didn't father? Is that not "anti-child"?
@Porky said... "This legislation seems something that no reasonable person could oppose."
____
Key word: reasonable.
If I went out and knocked up some bimbo behind my wife's back, then got custody of the child, no reasonable person would even entertain the notion that my wife should pay child support because it is "best for the child" and no one would play the "it's anti-child card" if the law didn't make her. And there would be an uproar if I collected support from both my wife and the mistress.
This is about pandering, and about misandry. There is nothing more sexist than a feminist. They think men are worthless at best, evil at worst. They have no compassion for men, unless it is a womanizing president with a (D) by their name. If anything unfair happens to men, they are glad it happened. They don't realize men have feelings and rights too, so consumed by their selfish sexism. Of course, any man who doesn't take it is a misogynist in their book.
Just for fun, if you have MS Word, fire it up and type in "misandry." It will flag it as a mispelled word.
After reviewing a number of statistics on the matter, I am pretty convinced that the general rate of paternity fraud is something like 5-7%. I'm not talking about just when something is fishy and someone directly contests paternity -- but just in general, a case where the man thinks it is his but little does he know it isn't. I'm counting fathers, not children, and I am almost implicitly not talking about ex-felons who married crack whores. This is just what regular middle class people can expect -- everything from accountants to medical doctors to university professors leading otherwise normal lives.
That strikes me as OUTRAGEOUSLY high. If this were chances of being gunned down or blown up on the way to work, I would say you probably live in Fallujah or something. Had I known this earlier on in life I would have most definitely never married. How can you really love your wife or your kids with those kinds of odds? It would be like saying "I feel safe," in a place like Iraq. Of course you are probably right to think your kids are your own, but you just simply don't have nearly the certainty you would normally need to.
It is remarkable to me just how little people even talk about the personal side of this. 90% of the time is just all about paying child support -- no one even mentions the outrageous crime against both the father and the children taking place. That would be like me saying: "Well, it is in the best interests of the children for you to have your rapist's baby and even actually marry him. You should try to start building a relationship with him as soon as you find out your pregnant. Though some hard feelings in a situation like this are perfectly understandable, try to remember that you HAVE conceived a child with him. You should try to love him as the father of your child together...."
@: ""Well, it is in the best interests of the children for you to have your rapist's baby."
Dr. H., Adrian made a good point. I bet most "best interest of the child" advocates also believe in abortion in cases of rape. Would not forcing the mother to give birth to the rapists baby be "in the best interest of the child?"
I used to intern at the state senate at home, and I wish I was wise enough (wayyyyyyy) back then to have asked that question.
Dr. Helen,
Thanks for posting this. When the Rep. mentioned the hypothetical case of a woman being paid twice for the same child, I would have asked him, "why isn't the real father forced to pay back the duped father, instead of paying the mother?!" Of course it's easy to sit back and watch interviews videos, and say "I would have done so and so.."
To Trust:
If you had asked that question, all you would have done is infuriate the women. Trust me on this, women do not like being told that they are (behaving like) hypocrites. That's why Dr. Helen's contention that men don't complain enough strikes me as ridiculous.
You know, listening to him and that other fellow go at it gave me a bright idea: why not try to codify what the state is already doing so that everyone will know what they're getting into?
Here's my proposal:
Rep. Campfield should draft legislation that, in very clear language, would provide a means for state agencies to assign any man with the means to take care of a child as the financial supporter of said child.
Such legislation, if passed, would have several effects.
First, it would simply codify what the state is already doing. If a woman can lie to a man about the paternity of the child and then go to the state and have the state interpret the laws so as to reinforce her lie and then steal an innocent man's property, then the codification of said practice would simply clear up any misunderstandings.
Second, it would protect the interests of both men and children. Men, after hearing of such legislation, which I'm sure would be plastered across every newspaper and on every news channel because of how outrageous it is, would have an incentive to leave the state of Tennessee: heavy taxation. Those who stayed after knowing that they were at risk of being a target of the state would be doing so with the full knowledge that they are taking that risk and therefore would have no excuse in the future. Children's interests would be protected by having some random person provide for their well-being (I would venture to guess that the Democrats would be more than happy to back such a proposal once they hear this).
Third, it would raise awareness of what is already going on. As I mentioned already, the codification of the practice would clear up any misunderstanding. The reason that nothing is done about this is that there is not enough awareness. Men obviously have an interest in what is going on. If more knew about what was going on, they would probably care. Even if they didn't care before, they would after the state started taking their money. Women's interest is less immediate. Their interest is not a personal interest but an interest on behalf of those that they love: their fathers, brothers, uncles, friends, husbands, and children. If women experience, even only if by secondhand, the effects of the existing practice, they will be more inclined to demand justice.
If not passed, such a proposal could still work to his advantage.
If defeated, he could then go to those who opposed such legislation and point out that the state already engages in such a practice. I'm sure that he already has ample evidence to back up such a claim. Faced with that evidence and their opposition to the practice, he would then be in a much better position to push for a solution to this problem.
Also, the defeat of the bill, like the passage of it, would help to raise awareness of the existing problem. As I already mentioned, the problem is awareness. If people are faced with being aware of the problem and know that they are at risk of becoming a target of some malicious woman and the state, they would be more likely (hopefully) to do something about it.
Does anybody else see a problem with what I'm proposing? If so, please help me out, because I intend to present my proposal to Rep. Campfield. I'm already scouring the Tennessee code and court records so that I my proposal to him will look as professional as possible. I recognize that it would be a tremendous risk on his part and whomever he got to present such a bill, but hopefully he will see the wisdom in such a plan.
One more thing, as a matter of strategy, such a bill could be presented by an ally while he presents his bill, which would obviously be the more just of the two. The failure of the first, if indeed it failed, and the outrage that it sparks could be used to garner support for the second. Thoughts?
"Though the courts promiscuously invoke both traditional stereotypes about motherhood and modern ideas of women's rights, it is really a question of money and power, specifically that of the lucrative divorce industry, which offers parents — usually but not necessarily mothers — a tempting package of financial and emotional incentives to file for divorce."
writes Stephen Baskerville further in "Taken Into Custody" (The War Against Fathers, Marriage, and the Family):
http://no-pasaran.blogspot.com/2008/06/witch-hunts-in-contemporary-america-is.html
http://www.amazon.com/Taken-into-Custody-Fatherhood-Marriage/dp/1581825943
"…the state and its agents are not neutral parties. They have a very tangible interest in declaring … an impasse [in a marriage]. It creates a major extension of state power. Through divorce, the modern state achieves one of its most coveted and dangerous ambitions: to control the private lives of its citizens
Far more than marriage, divorce by its nature requires active government intervention
Far from being a private matter, it inherently denies not only the inviolibility of marriage but the very concept of a private sphere of life
What the government then offers to the parent who invites it in is the promise that her invitation will be rewarded; the state will establish her as a puppet government, a satrap of the state within the family. This requires that not the faithless but the faithful parent be punished
What we are describing here is the divorce industry, a massive and largely hidden governmental and quasi-governmental machine consisting of judges, lawyers, psychologists and psychiatrists, social workers, child protective services, child-support enforcement agents, mediators, counselors, and feminist groups, plus an extensive host of economic interests, such as divorce planners, forensic accountants, real estate appraisers, and many others. These officials and professionals invariably profess to be motivated by concern for the "best interest" of the other people's children. Yet their services are activated only with the dissolution of families and the removal of parents. Whatever pieties they may proclaim therefore, the hard reality is that they have a concrete interest in encouraging family break-up, and virtually all their power and earnings derive from the harm that divorce inflicts on children. "Fights over control of the children," reports one former divorce insider, "are where most of the billable hours in family court are consumed."
…today power has been assumed by officials, who act in [the childrens'] name and claim to represent their interests: judges, lawyers, psychotherapists, social workers, mediators, counselors, bureaucratic police, and a swarm of other human parasites who derive powerful political sustenance and lucrative financial nourishment from the cannibalized father"
There are more quotes from Baskerville's book here:
http://drhelen.blogspot.com/2008/12/don.html#2614836615559709745
http://drhelen.blogspot.com/2008/12/don.html#5161880360646783504
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