Posted on 04/10/2007 1:21:59 PM PDT by Quick or Dead
JEFFERSON CITY — David Salazar is what many would call a "duped dad."
Repeatedly, courts have ordered him to pay child support for a 5-year-old girl, even though no one — not a judge and not the child's mother — claims he's the father.
In the eyes of many, Salazar, of Buchanan County, is the victim of a law that traps men into the child support payments, even though they can prove they're not the dads.
-snip-
That kind of statement angers Sen. Chris Koster, who is sponsoring the Missouri bill.
Koster, R-Harrisonville, said he knew children would be harmed as men used DNA to break paternity. But he said the current law mocked justice by pretending that a man is a father even when the evidence proves otherwise.
His bill would allow men to bring forward DNA evidence at any time to prove they are not obligated to pay child support.
-snip-
Linda Elrod, director of the Children and Family Law Center at Washburn University, said she was saddened by cases where DNA evidence was used to challenge paternity. She said the cases not only cut off support payments but often ruptured a mature parental bond.
Others, such as Jacobs, want to set a two-year deadline for using genetic tests to challenge paternity. She said courts also needed the discretion to weigh the quality of a parental relationship and the best interest of a child.
But Koster said such arguments by law professors ignored the fundamental truth in many cases — that the man is not the father and should not be obligated to pretend he is.
"It would be just as arbitrary to hang the responsibility of supporting the child with those professors," he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at stltoday.com ...
Makes no sense and not at all what I advocate. Thanks for playing, you get a complimentary copy of our home game.
No doubt, but her conduct and behavior doesn't have anything to do with his personal relationship with any amount of children he recognized as his his own.
One common pattern on this thread is a fixation with the misconduct of the mother, though it is peripheral to how an adult male should carry his continuing relationship with children who recognize him as dad. That relationship is valid no matter how poorly the man's wife behaved - it really doesn't have much to do with the relationship at all.
No, you clearly said that the courts only handle the financial end of things. And clearly you’re wrong, they handle more. Asking why it was raised is silly: you were the one that opened the door to that when you narrowly - and wrongly - described the court’s role and function.
I have no problem holding the mother accountable in cases of fraud and have said so specifically. I'm speaking of the child, not the mother. The child didn't defraud anyone, something the mighty freeper he-man club simply can't cope with. In their desire to punish the mother, the are too anxious to punish anybody. Folks here seem perturbed because they can't seem to read very well.
“I only seek to continue to hold the man accountatle when he has already established a father-child relationship with the child, and the child knows the man as their ‘daddy.’ Like I said, any way we cut that will case harm, so I say harm the adult rather than harm the child. “
Is the child’s relationship with the father one of parental love or one of money? Your arguments waver on this point. I have a hard time with your assertion that there is a parental bond but that this bond is expressed by money sent to the CP.
I think your thinking derives from a scenario where the NCP has known and raised a child not his and then the couple separates.
Firstly, there are many situations in which support attaches. I’m sure somewhere in the 400 posts you’ve probably read a few. People get judgement against them in absentia while they’re serving in the military, if they don’t appear in court (sometimes they get bad advice); paternity is asserted for any children born in wedlock no matter what. Upshot is that frequently the relationship you’re thinking of between Dad and kid is non-existent. There is no bond other than “Mommy gets a check” in many cases, often at the express design of Mom.
The law ought to be able to handle these situations and presently it cannot. It has only one hammer and uses it to drive nails and screws alike: establish support against someone, anyone, and then enforce that for 19.5 years. They clear murderers and rapists on DNA evidence, but not child support payors. Hmm.
“I don’t know where you got the impression that I felt the child may starve.” You’ve used the term ‘harm’ in your reply and previously. ‘Harm’ means that the child would be impacted if not-Dad’s support obligation ceases. If Mom is able to provide, then there is no harm if Mom doesn’t get a check from not-Dad; if she is not able to provide, she will get a check from the State anyway and not-Dad was only reimbursing the State.
The other aspect of ‘harm’ is the established relationship you mention between not-Dad and child, which has nothing to do with cash but is a factor of love and parenting time.
Personally I think it does a child considerable harm to teach him or her that government exists to take money from people who aren’t Dad and give it to Moms.
The problem is that the whole system is driven by money. The money works like this. The Feds have various programs, entitled IV-A and IV-D and Medicaid and so forth, which are administered by the states. The Feds provide incentive money to the states to collect support in reimbursement of these programs, so that we, the taxpayers, aren’t paying for kids which ought to be supported by biodad. This is a good idea as it takes people off welfare. Child support is usually a good thing.
However, whenever you have incentive money, that’s the result you get. Therefore the State is driven, in the same way as States are hungry for tobacco revenue at the same time as they claim to want people to stop smoking, to get those collections. Thus the laws are set up so that in the event of an injustice as in the situations described in this thread, there is no recourse.
At the same time, just like liberals flock to journalism and so most journalists are Democrats, misandrists love to work in child support. In this state custody goes to Mom 93% of the time. When you combine a system that’s set up to extract money, worker bias, and no possibility of recourse, there will be and is trouble.
Again, the idea of child support is ok, but any system in which there is no appeal is just asking to be abused. These abuses are coming to light and need to be addressed, not blown off with blanket statements about “it’s for the children.”
If the man cultivated a personal parental relationship with the child, the child is his. I’m glad the law sees it that way, even though the law & order contingent on FR can’t seem to cope with it.
True, the actual number may be higher. That’s a pretty high number of people who were suspicious enough to pursue this.
She lied about something in her relationship, but that doesn't mean she lied about everything to her husband. Nobody has been completely honest with their spouse at all times - does that make them all dishonest people, or does it make them people who have been dishonest? Clearly the latter, that's reality.
If a man, once presented with a claim that he is the father of a child, objects and seeks to prove that he is not the father, the results of DNA testing should control his liability for support. However, if the man assumes paternity and treats the child as his own, he should be estopped from denying it at a later, opportune, time. Give each man a fair shot to challenge paternity if he wishes. If he doesn’t challenge it, he should live with the future risk that he may be shown not to be the biological father, but the “true” and financially supportive, father.
It doesn't waver - it is about both. If the personal relationship exists, then money is a component of the relationship. It's not either-or, and I don't know what makes so many Freepers consistently reduce it to such a simple dynamic.
If a man is biologically the father of a child, he should be responsible for financially supporting that child. If the man self-identified as the father, but not the biodad, in some circumstances he should be responsible too.
Your unusually narrow reading of the word 'harm' to justify comments others made about starvation is silly and immature. Certainly my use of the word harm doesn't mean to convey any kind of harm a child may bear.
I'm very pleased that the kind of thinking I have seen on the thread isn't the way the courts handle it. It's not perfect, but the behavior I have seen here shouldn't be encouraged and I am glad it isn't. Men who are unduly fearful should just never get married, or get married with a complex prenup and not have children, and avoid these traps entirely. Of course, such fearful men have to find a good woman first, and women have a habit of rejecting fearful men. That's to their credit, of course, as difficult as it is for many in the FR 'women suck' continent to swallow.
Regardless, you still haven't been able to dispute the basis of my statement, which is that the only one of the concerns you espouse that the courts can deal with is the financial one - making the man pay.
You said, in part: 3. If Mom won’t give up the biodad, put her in jail for fraud and let the kid stay with nonbiodad.
She isn’t a criminal nor should she be. All she did was have sex with a man who wasn’t her husband. That isn’t, nor should be, a criminal matter.
***
It isn’t criminal to have sex with a man not your husband, but it is, or should be, criminal to refuse to disclose who that man is.
Lots of ‘should’ in your response, which is valid insofar as ‘should’ goes. Unfortunately, in many situations paternity is legally established without the opportunity for challenge.
Two of those situations are:
- Ex parte judgement, which occurs in various circumstances ranging from ‘guy tries to avoid his responsibility’ to ‘guy is serving overseas and has no idea he’s being hit for a 20-year monetary obligation.’ Nice way to treat our soldiers.
- Wedlock: all children born in wedlock are legally the husband’s, even if those children’s true parentage are the cause of the divorce.
There are other circumstances in which there is no due cause. However your “should” stands well on its own. If the system were amended so that no support order was established without first definitively establishing true paternity, this whole problem wouldn’t occur. DNA testing is routine in cases of uncertain paternity and it ought to be conducted 100% of the time.
I think any man who seeks a paternity test, without any visible reason to suspect a child is not his, just to avoid paying child support is scum. But what about the man who goes along for years assuming the child is his, only to have mom throw the fact that he is not the father in his face during a divorce? While I woulh hope he would still want to continue the relationship, in that case I don’t think the state should be able to require it.
You said, in part: Sorry its not. By law, like it or not any child born in wedlock is by law the responsibility of the Husband.
***
This is not the law in every state.
I discussed that at length. Courts can (and have) enforced conduct, too, as I explained.
And yes, my training is as an attorney. I know it may not be as impressive as managing a Radio Shack on weekend, but I like it! ;-)
What I'm trying to explain to you is that your conclusion is based on how narrowly you define the argument.
You define it so narrowly that your conclusion is unavoidable, not superior morally.
The use of the term 'hit' was your term, not mine.
I don't agree, but if enough folks can convince the lawmakers of your position, I'd be fine with that 'should.' Thankfully, most people even reject something like spousal notification of a woman seeking an abortion, so I doubt you can convince many people to make your suggestion into law.
But if most people want that, fair is fair. I can see how it would be useful in situations like this. As of now, it isn't the law, and that's a good thing.
The reason it is consistently fixated on is because it is so damn important. It is a betrayal of trust, physically and emotionally that says that the cheating spouse has so little respect for the other person that they will not only take your feelings (dare I say, your RELATIONSHIP and BOND) to manipulate their spouse into believing they do love them for their own benefit.
What the point of contention your fans seem to have with you is your lack of recognition for the fact that feelings and relationships change. Our feelings change for people we call friends, girlfriends, boyfriends, respected authorities, and even enemies. A man's feelings can change for a child just like his feelings for a woman can change once he realizes he's been duped. And no, your point is not valid that a woman "forgot" who might have knocked her up unless there are so many candidates or she's blind. A man might no longer feel a bond with a child that is not theirs, it sucks for the kid, but it's understandable considering that the basis for the relationship was that they were biologically related.
My argument is in cases like I narrowly describe. I never suggested it should be the blanket policy, and have explicitly said so. So in that respect, we agree.
Thanks for saying my conclusion is unavoidable, I agree. That being said, too many Freeper males have a lot invested in avoiding the unavoidable. Speaks volumes for them.
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