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Well, I will reread your posts and mine and try to be clearer. I do think you were wrong in saying that the court only decides one thing in these matters, since clearly it decides other issues (custody being one of them, which is why I used it as an example). If that was misplaced, I’m sorry, but I think you have a poor understanding of what courts do in these situations and why they do it.

I will reevaluate it and see if I can be clearer and more on point, if I think I wasn’t. I will say that I am happy that the conventional wisdom of FR as I have read this afternoon isn’t the way it’s done, though the law changes from time to time. ‘The best interests of the child’ standard is better than the best interests of the poor guy standard, even if it brings up to sometimes unjust decisions.

But I am glad that the FR view on this issue is in the minority, and doesn’t look to ever become the standard.

I think you have a poor understanding of what courts do in these situations and why they do it.

I have a sister and brother-in-law who are both attorneys, and I was engaged to a family-law specialist. I understand very well what the courts do. This discussion was never about custody - it was about requiring men to pay child support for children who are not theirs. I never said the court could not do other things. I just said that of the things you claimed were your reasons for supporting this practice (to preserve a relationship between father and child, and to insure continuing support for the child), the law can only enforce one of them, so talking about the other is pointless in this discussion.