I would further this by saying that if fathers’ rights were better respected then more father’s would have the money and ability to live up to their responsibilities. Many fathers give up because the system is set up for them to fail.

My brother has an 11-month-old daughter with a woman that he is not, nor ever was, married to. Within one month of finding out they were pregnant the girlfriend kicked him out of her house and didn’t allow him to be involved in the pregnancy or any decisions moving forward despite his demands to be involved with the life of his daughter. She even played around with abortion for the first few months. She did not allow him to be present during the birth (he was literally banned from the room); did not put his name on the birth certificate; did not allow him a say in the name of the child; he was not allowed to see her for the first four weeks of her life; then was only allowed one hour of supervised visits PER WEEK until the child was eight months old and the courts finally gave him more; refused ALL help he and my family offered until child support was granted. Then she has the nerve to come to court with a bill from her parents for the money they provided her for the first eight months expecting him to pay it; and also – in court – accused him of conspiring with me and my sister to kidnap the daughter and take her out of the country! Of course, the judge nipped that in the bud real quick like.

Why did she do this? He must of done something wrong; he must be a bad person for her to ban him from her and his daughter’s life. I’ll tell you what he did; he got a college education. Yes, she thinks he’s “irresponsible” as a person because he went into debt by $40K to get his college degree. Responsible people don’t go to college, apparently is her line of thinking.

My brother currently brings home $1500/month after taxes each month after just finishing his bachelor’s degree this year. His original child support was ordered at $430/month. She said that was not enough. She took him back to court immediately after the first ruling and today he was ordered to pay $750/month. It’s HALF of his take home pay. After he pays rent ($525) he is left with $225/month for utilities, food and gas to get back and forth to work, student loan payment of $300/month, a 15-year-old car that is on it’s last leg (he cannot now afford to get a new one). He cannot afford to put ANY money away for savings or emergencies, retirement, his daughter’s education, etc. When all is said and done, he is over $300/month IN THE HOLE.

Now I ask you, how is it fair that a man or woman for that matter, is required to pay 50% of their income in child support payments that can virtually put them on the streets? Our system is broken, broken, broken. The only thing the mother of his daugther cares about his money. She does nothing to better her life or her situation. She makes $9.50/hour and doesn’t plan on ever making much more. Why should she? She has my brother to pay her way. She essentially gets a free ride every month while my brother – who is working hard to make a good life for himself and his daughter – is PUNISHED because he is a man. The more he makes, the more she gets.

My brother loves his daughter and wants her to be in his life. He has no problem paying his share for her, but what he and all of us have a problem with is the disproportionate amount of money he is required to pay each month. He is fighting for 50/50 custody with seven days on seven days off, but is told that will not happen until the daughter is at least one. He is now unable to move to where the good paying jobs are because he now has a daughter that he actually has to fight to see.

I think that it should be required that these woman show receipts for how this money is spent on the children. This includes rent. If your rent or mortgage remains the same after the child was born, then the money should not be allowed to go toward this. It should only be allowed to go toward resources that directly benefit the child: food, clothing, child care. Period. Many women are able to remain unemployed or underemployed in order to get a free ride from the father’s (and vice versa). A father should not be punished simply because his anatomy does not allow for the conception and birthing of a child.

It takes two to create the child. A father should have automatic rights and should not be required to pay a disproportionate amount in child support because the mother has the ability to demand it. To me, using a child as a form of control over another is child abuse. The courts are guilty of this; the mother’s are guilty of this (and vice versa in certain instances).

I think the Friend of the Court is a joke. What a blatant waste of tax dollars. My brother is a hard working, tax paying citizen. His lawyer tells him he can do nothing to fight this order. Well, I’ll tell you that as a family, we are not sitting down lightly and accepting this. My brother and I are writing a book about his experience and the millions of other fathers who are victimized by the system simply because they are men. We are dedicating our lives to changing the system. As a mother myself, I’m sickened by the ability of other women to manipulate and victimize to their advantage. It must stop!

That’s a nice sentiment, but the fact remains that in most states, a man is required to pay support for any children that were conceived durning the marriage, even if DNA tests later prove that he is NOT the father.

Interestingly, in the states that abosolve him from such payments, the ex can be liable for repaying him any support he paid up to that point.

We’re making some progress in this area, but a LOT more needs to be done.

Not always true. I know someone who had a very rocky relationship (this happens OFTEN), the husband left just six months after their wedding date…he came back to the house to talk things through and figure out what to do next…instead, the wife begged him to give her another chance…to stay in the house with her even if it meant they would go to a lawyer to work out their financials, etc…he stayed…the entire time they dated and they were married she was on the pill…she KNEW he did not want children. While they were trying to work things out, she was much nicer to him, etc. and he decided to give their relationship a break for a few months to see if they could work things out. Less than 3 weeks after he returned home, she was pregnant. Mind you, she told him she was on the pill, when in actuality, she had stopped taking the pill in order to get pregnant. Here we are two years later and he wants out. Once the baby was born, she went back to her old ways. She is now threatening him with the outrageous child support she will get in the hopes that this will scare him and make him stay with her once again. This has been their ENTIRE relationship. This is continuosly done by women when they have problems in their relationship…mind you, by sick, mentally incompetent women…but it is done. My husband and his ex for years did not have a good relationship…the same thing happened here…she continuosly complained about him going out, cheating, etc (no he did not cheat), yet after realizing that they were just becoming enemies, she got pregnant. Mind you, I do understand that the man can also keep it in his pants, he also believed that she was on the pill, etc…less than a year after their daughter was born, he left. Again, I do not in anyway agree with men not supporting children they want or even children they don’t want, but I am tired of men being told they should’ve kept it in their pants, when the “poor woman” actually KNEW what she was doing and tried to get pregnant just to keep her husband. There are also so many cases of women who claim their ex-husbands were abusive, losers, lazy, etc…yet they not only had one child with them, but two, three or more…shouldn’t those women who go to court and tell the judges their ex-husbands are all these things also be held responsible for putting their own agendas of keeping a man ahead of the welfare of their children? Their need to keep a man was more important than the impact a bad father (as many claim) would have on their children, yet nobody holds those women responsible. They only feel sorry for them. The system is completely sick. Something must be done.

As far as all the parents out there who pay child support for children that are not even theirs, there should be a law which forces hospitals to give DNA tests to babies when they are born. If not, at least, there should not be ANY child support order enforced until there is a DNA test performed. If a father shows up for a DNA test and the mother and child do not, there should NOT be any child support order until the mother and child are tested. If a mother and child show up, but the father does not, then and only then, should a child support order be enforced…yet once it is enforced, if the father takes a DNA test, regardless of WHEN that test is done, he should NOT be made to pay for a child that is not his. If anyone is concerned about the best interests of the child, then if the father is found not to be the father, the best interest of that child should not be that the alleged father continues to pay support, but that the state gets involved in the case to ensure that the mother is actually a fit parent…someone who lies or sleeps with more than one man where they can’t figure out who the father of their child is, is not, by any means, a fit parent…and should never be called a fit mother.

The real father was served child support papers over a year ago by me and I’m still fighting it. His DNA testing proved him to be all 3’s father.(I paid for this too as well as his testing) When our affair ended, so did our friendship. I still to this day love the man because he is my girls daddy. He was and is still married to someone else…he had another little girl a year after my last was born his first with his wife. Mine daughers are almost 5, 11, and 13.
Regardless of us both not being responsible back then….I am the responsible one now. I am not after child support from him as much as I believe my children deserve the right to know whom their real father is. They deserve to know the medical situations behind his family history. They deserve to know why their father….doesn’t claim to be nor love them. In my own mind…I think we were just like a dog and puppys that he dumped off. He never looked back. This does hurt people and children. His father (my children’s granddad has already passed away and their grand mother is ill…I have begged him to let them know of the 3 girls he would not) Next week we will be going to court..I do not know what the outcome will be. What ever it is…WE, Me and my daughters will still hold up our head and keep on living our life the best way that we can. As far as the man….I don’t know how he can sleep at night knowing that he left his children behind. I still praise him in my home and let the girls believe that he is a good man because he did help bring them into the world. They are all my blessings! If anyone has any ideas on this please let me know…I’m in SC and the children were conceived in Sc. I have spent out 3000.00 thus far on a lawyer that hasn’t done anything. She first told me that she could do something and the children deserved it(within 3mths and promised me emergency child support) …now after a year she has pretty much given up my case.(I had paid her in full for this case) I have turned it over to DSS for help. Thanks for listening.

“It has been, and I think always will be, a solid common law principle that the natural father of a child, even one born against his wishes and desires, is financially responsible for certain costs. The same principle applies to the female, of course, were she to abandon her child in the sole care of the father.”

No, the same principles emphatically do not apply to the mother, who can abandon her baby at a fire house or hospital for three days after birth and just … walk … away. True, she can’t abandon the baby to the father, but what would that mean? Logically you don’t abandon a baby to a specific person, you just abandon hir in general.

-dk

If both parents are responsible for the support of a child, why have I been paying child support for 16 years while my ex-wife has remained unemployed?

I support the child, she does not. Nor is she required to.