Pennsylvania Abortion Case Raises Question of Choice for Men

John Stachokus, the Pennsylvania would-be father who lost his bid to block his ex-girlfriend's abortion, has found himself in a position familiar to millions of American men: He has a large personal stake in a decision in which he is not allowed to take any part. His wishes are irrelevant.

When it comes to reproduction, in America today women have rights and men merely have responsibilities.

When a woman wants a child and a man does not, the woman can have the child anyway -- and demand 18 years of child support from the father. This remains true even if the father had made it clear that he did not want to have children, and even if the woman had previously agreed to respect his wishes.

For decades, leading feminist organizations such as the National Organization for Women and the National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League have argued that women should have reproductive rights because nobody should be able to tell them what to do with their own bodies. Thus the slogan "My Body, My Choice."

But the sacrifices required to pay 18 years of child support should not be discounted, either. The average American father works a 51-hour work week, one of the longest in the industrialized world. It is men, overwhelmingly, who do our society's hazardous jobs.

Nearly 50 American workers are injured every minute of the 40-hour work week. On average, every day 17 die -- 16 of them male. Couldn't men who work long hours or do hazardous jobs -- and who suffer the concomitant physical ailments and injuries -- argue that their bodies are on the line, too? Where is their choice?

NOW and NARAL were legitimately concerned that the Pennsylvania anti-abortion injunction, which was issued on a temporary basis last Wednesday and dissolved the following Monday, could have established a precedent for giving men and the government control over an important aspect of women's lives.

But when a woman forces a man to be responsible for a child only she wants, is she not exercising control over his life? And when the massive government child-support apparatus hounds the reluctant father for financial support, takes a third of his income and jails him if he comes up short, isn't the government exercising control over his life?

Advocates of reproductive choice for men -- the right of an unmarried man to sign away his parenting rights and responsibilities upon learning of an unwanted pregnancy -- have a legitimate claim, based on the same arguments that feminists have used to support their case for choice for women.

When the situation is reversed and the woman does not want to have a child and the man does -- as is the case with Stachokus and his ex-girlfriend, Tanya Meyers -- once again, women have rights and men do not.

A woman who doesn't want her child can terminate the pregnancy against the father's wishes, or put their child up for adoption, sometimes without the father's permission. In some states, she can even return the baby to the hospital within a week of birth. More than 1 million American women legally walk away from motherhood every year.

Perhaps, as some have argued, Stachokus was using his legal maneuvers as a way to exercise control over the ex-girlfriend who broke up with him. More likely he was simply a proud papa-to-be. Maybe he imagined his child to be a little daddy's girl, or a son he would proudly raise to be a man. Or perhaps he is just a stand-up guy who wanted to live up to what he sees as his responsibilities.

Even if Stachokus had persuaded Meyers to have their child, he probably would not have been allowed to be a meaningful part of his child's life. Meyers does not want to marry or stay with him. Legal precedents -- and a stubbornly held but baseless cultural notion that children fare better with their mothers -- suggest that, even though he was willing to take full or partial custody, he would have had little chance of getting it.

Many unwed and divorced fathers face a difficult struggle to remain a part of their children's lives.

Custodial mothers frequently violate fathers' visitation rights, and courts do little to enforce them. Some custodial mothers move hundreds or even thousands of miles away from their children's fathers, and it is frequently difficult for these dads to maintain regular contact with their kids.

Stachokus may have ended up like the hundreds of thousands of American fathers who love children they are not able or allowed to see, and whose suffering is ignored by a society that seems capable only of denigrating fathers.

John, whatever move you made, you never had a chance. Welcome to modern American fatherhood.

(Glenn Sacks writes about gender issues from the male perspective. Diana Thompson is the founder and executive director of the American Coalition for Fathers and Children.)

In this post, you're complaining that a man can be compelled to support a child to term (not in our state; they can be compelled to pay for birthing expenses in a paternity case but child support cannot start until a) paternity is established and b) a child support order is entered, in that order); you complain that in many cases he is compelled to support a child that isn't his, confusing marital presumption cases with paternity cases:

That can of worm is already open. Already, courts can comple a man to support a child to term, and in many cases when he can prove it isn't his.

I'm pointing out that there is a downside to this legal debate.

You're also presuming that all women get custody and all men pay child support. That's simply not true. Not only are men getting custody--and not just shared custody, but sole physical custody, but women most certainly pay child support.

Until men get pregnant, they will not have equivalent interests or rights.

Either all human beings (including those in the womb) are created equal or they are not.

If you are somehow deluded into thinking that (simply because is it the nature of man to be either male or female) that they have difference "human rights" based solely on their physicality, you are sadly mistaken.

Where the rights of one group of humans
(as sorted by the simpleminded who judge them first by their sex, color, ethnicity, intelligence, development, perfection or some other accident of personality)
impinge on the rights of another, these so-called "rights" must needs be faux egalitarian precedents.

The "woman's right" to claim sovereignty over the body she herself has failed to govern at the expense of the wholly distinct life within her womb is just such a travesty.

"Already, courts can comple (sic) a man to support a child to term, and in many cases when he can prove it isn't his. "

Do you agree with the above statement is accurate? Your paternity argument just describes the vehicle for the man to support the child until the child is 18. Plus birthing expenses even.

If your state does not let the woman name the father and requires a DNA paternity test in all cases, it is the only one I know of. Usually the woman names the man as father and it's his effort and expense that is paid to prove he's not.

Now, with what you know, what percentage would you assign to the woman, getting full custody and child support, and what percentage would you assign to the man getting those same conditions? The fact that it happens is only an exception that proves the rule.

Do you agree that the court system should be frontloaded in favor of the woman's choice?

So? A woman can get an abortion on her own now and the court supports her. Notice (in reference to your earlier statement about it being a legislative decision) that there is no written law giving her this "right", just court precedent striking down all state laws to the contrary.

But suppose a woman wants to bring a child into the world but the man does not? If we grant the rights of a man to have a say in having a child, wouldn't the opposite naturally follow? That was Catspaw's point, I think. You might wind up with more abortions that way.

But suppose a woman wants to bring a child into the world but the man does not? If we grant the rights of a man to have a say in having a child, wouldn't the opposite naturally follow?

Abortion is widespread and accessable. If states could make laws restricting it, the above problem would not exist. In order to keep the above from happening, those who are against abortion are forced to follow the feminist line precisely and place all sovereignty on the woman's side.

This is a miscarraige of justice. In order to balance justice, the possibility of a man winning in an abortion conflict will just have to be allowed. To give both sides of any issue equal access, the chance of abuse has to be accepted because it will happen.

But the ripples of unequal justice will eventually tear the whole system down and in areas not having to do with bringing a infant to term and supporting it because people will lose faith in the entire system. People are questioning the system now. From that point it will be only a matter of time. The entire structure of our nation depends on faith in our system of justice.

I'm more than willing to see whatever small increase of abortions that will happen if men could weigh in on the matter legally. I seriously doubt that the number of abortions will increase enough to disturb current statistics noticeably. Women natually, without artificial legal precedent, pull more weight in family and childhood issues.

The only thing to do is to turn the tide against abortion. This is slowly happening. People I know five years ago, who were for wholesale abortion are not now.

No, I'm saying that the system that administrates justice in family matters is corrupted in favor of anything a woman wants, up to and including blatant miscarriages of justice, and there are powerful agencies pursuing their own interests behind it. Their interests have nothing to do with justice or the solidity of marriage and family, and their power is dependent on keeping the sexes at each other's throats.

Excellent thinking, but neither the courts nor legislators need to put their two-cents' worth into this, a private decision.

Causing an adult to support his (or her) offspring is not a new legal concept, it's as old as the hills. But child support laws and paternity testing make it that much tougher for the irresponsible unmarried male to avoid the consequences of his voluntary choice- no man concieves a child against his will.

But why the whining about child support when the real question is, when does a man get to exercise his choice?

The man is not forced to conceive the child. He should keep it in the pants or get sterilized.

I can't believe anyone would say that. Should the female not get sterilized too? Why is it that the male has most of the responsibility (other than carrying the child till birth) and 0% of the choices?

I am 100% anti-death and pro-life, but so long as a woman can control the life and death of a man's child, the man should have the right to choose weather or not he will have any part in the child's life. It is evil that anyone can kill a child through abortion. It is just plain wrong that a man has no way to protect the life of his child.

When does a man get to exercise his choice? I'd suggest it's starts before ejaculation. If a man wants to engage in the sex act, especially with a woman not his wife, I'd hope he makes doggone sure that this sex act does not result in a child that he and she are not willing shoulder responsibility for for the next two decades (in some states more, in some states less). Look deeply into the other person's eyes and ask the question, "do I want to have this person in my life for the next twenty years or so? Do I want to pay for the wedding (or the reception) for our child with this person? Am I willing to stay up all night with a puking child? Will our child need orthodontia? How many times can I watch Beauty and the Beast without going stark raving mad?" Admittedly, it does take the romance out of it, but that's what having unprotected sex with someone one barely knows (and I don't consider a relationship of less than a year a long-term relationship) is all about.

And if he and she (or he or she) do not want the responsibility of a child, then they can either abstain from sex, be sterilized or use a 100% foolproof method of birth control (and there ain't no such beast). A modicum of self-control might come in handy from time to time.

The act of sex is also very much the act of procreation when the sex act is performed with a woman of child-bearing years, even if one or both people think they have a foolproof form of birth control. If one chooses to have sex indiscriminately, more than likely a child is the end result. If one or both parties don't want to reproduce, that's most certainly something to consider before one succumbs to the desires of the flesh, as it were.

"I think some people forget that child support or not, a woman is committed to raising that child just as much, if not moreso, than the father."

Shouldn't you say instead -"I think some people forget that women kill thier babies by the millions each year."

You forget that the main reason for this topic is that a Man wanted to save the life of his child, was willing to raise it on his own, and the mother can kill it against his will.

Yeah, she was commited to raising of the child... or should that be razing?

"Until men get pregnant, they will not have equivalent interests or rights. The woman will always have more at stake than the man. End of story."

How is that possible?

You cannot believe how horrid and dispicable that viewpoint is to me. This is the viewpoint you use to justify the murder of a child?

The woman can, at any point in the child's life (should she choose not to murder it.) simply drop the child off on Dad's doorstep and run. The man will not find the courts sympathic to him if he tries to track her down and get support. The male has a commitment to give the woman money for 18 years of the child's life... and may not even have the right to see the child. The woman who has much less of a stake in it. She can kill the child-she can give the child up-she can dump the child on someone else, but 18 years, daddy best pay.

The current system is wrong, it is vile, and it needs fixed.

"If we grant the rights of a man to have a say in having a child, wouldn't the opposite naturally follow? That was Catspaw's point, I think. You might wind up with more abortions that way."

How so? If a man can act to stop the abortion of a child, then a woman could too. A man could never force an abortion, neither could a woman. The Dad would have to face the guilt of the abortion, something he does not do now because he has no real choice.

I think that giveing the man a choice to 'abort' his father status would lead to the end of abortion. Eventualy women would loose the ability to blame the male, and the male would loose his ability to blame the female. It would lead to greater accountability.

Shouldn't you say instead -"I think some people forget that women kill thier babies by the millions each year."

No. I was commenting on the idea that men have few, if any, rights as to whether or not they will support a child they have fathered. When a woman chooses to have an abortion instead of a baby, child support is a moot point.

You forget that the main reason for this topic is that a Man wanted to save the life of his child, was willing to raise it on his own, and the mother can kill it against his will.

And you failed to realize that threads can and do make many twists and turns on this forum.

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