From: Lee
To: PoliticallyActiveDads@yahoogroups.ca
Sent: Tuesday, January 24, 2006 6:49 AM
Subject: [PoliticallyActiveDads] Sent today: Fatherhood myths and the people who perpetuate them
Dear Mr. Cohen,
After reading the article you wrote about F4J and fathers I had to write you.
I have been involved in fathers and non-custodia parents rights for over 20 years in the US and the UK,
a funny thing to do when you're a mother who's never lost custody or contact with her children. The one
thing I have noticed over all these years is the
strength and consistency of desire of these men to be
involved
with their children and to be good parents.
These men are not fighting about child support,
they're not interested in control or in causing grief
to their ex partners- they simply want to father their
children. They want the rights that they are due as
human beings.
Why is it assumed that just because a woman has a
uterus she's better equipped to parent? Let me ask you
a simple question: how many times have you been out
and heard or seen a mother shouting at and hitting or
dragging her child around a supermarket? How many
times have you ever seen a man with a child do the
same? I'm not saying it doesn't happen, it does. I'm
just asking you to make the simple observation as to
who, as a parent, remains calm and in control. If, as
a man, you were denied a job based on your gender
you'd fight like Hell. Why shouldn't a man, denied the
right to parent his child do the same?
I could simply
quote statistics to you all day
long, I'm sure you've gotten enough of that since
writing the piece, but I'm asking you to look at the
situation as a human being. Are you less capable of
caring for your children than your partner? If so,
why? Is it because society and your partner have told
you all your life that you're incapable? Are you
afraid of being criticized because a female stands
beside you deriding everything you do from nappy
adjustment to hair styling? Or have you simply
accepted the societal mores and stepped back as soon
as you found out you were going to be a parent?
You, Sir, are no less capable or qualified to be a
parent than any female in the office around you. Look
around- do any of them have special parenting skills?
Have any of them studied child development? Do they
have special child need sensors in their brains? Nope.
So, why do they deny the fathers of their children
the
right to be a parent? Why is it they will fight tooth
and nail, in spite of all the evidence telling them
the importance of a father's presence in their child's
life, to keep him from having any association with
their child other than as a tax free income? Speaking
of which, how much child support do you think really
goes to the improvement of the child's welfare? How
much of it goes on nights out, alcohol, and
cigarettes, which, by the way, are bad for children.
If these same mothers who claim to have the best
interests of their child at heart can smoke and drink
around the child and even while pregnant are to decide
how, when, and how much a father is to see his child,
isn't it time we started to question their motives and
their judgment?
The officials and politicians who decide the rules
say you can't divide a child like a CD collection,
but, every time a court orders contact they are
doing
just that. Why 20% of the time? That's a division. Why
not a straight 50% divide of the child's time between
the parents? That's easy. It's because the tax credits
and benefits systems are set up to reward a parent who
withholds contact from the other parent. If a
non-custodial parent has access to their child for more
than 104 days a year, child support is reduced. The
more contact, the lower the child support. There's
also the confusion that an already ridiculously inept
system would suffer. Who gets the child benefit? Who
gets the tax credit? These official organizations
simply have no concept of 50%. Half and half. Fair
shares. Equality. It's all just too confusing to them.
Joint physical custody would also render the
already useless child support agency even less viable,
which I personally think would be a good thing
considering just how badly organized and run they are
and
always have been. Think of all those poor
bureaucrats out of work.
For your sake, Mr. Cohen, I sincerely hope you
never find yourself caught up in the Hell of trying to
see your child. A great relationship and a great
marriage does not make a great divorce.
Kindest regards,
Lee Dempsey
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