Posted on 06/08/2003 1:04:53 AM PDT by Z in Oregon
You are exactly right and that also bothered me about the article. Fathers are not there to be deputy diaper changers (although I've been that). Each parent teaches different life skills. And it's not just for the boys. There is no substitute for the mutual love and admiration between a father and daughter. It's quite a responsibility because most likely she's going to be attracted to men who remind her of her dad.
Husbands only initiate divorce in 25% of cases, and that may be even less when the marital union has produced children.
May be less? Doesn't he know? Aren't the statistics available? Or are they merely incovenient to his hypothesis?
Thus, the group of parents that is most likely to lose their children in the event of a divorce (fathers) are the ones most unlikely to intiate the divorce in the first place.
Bogus reasoning. Isn't it just as (or more?) likely that a lot of the men whose wives file for divorce are just plain SOBs? Or perhaps womens' behavior is less likely to cause men (we are by nature oblivious to a lot) to initiate divorce?
One could also presume that children might not be the underlying reasons for or against divorce, and may only delay the decision to file, but ultimately do not affect the rates at all.
Of course, without that crucial statistic -- which the kind author neglected to provide -- we cannot be sure if children have any effect on divorce rates.
Studies show that the single most important determining factor for most women who decide to file for no-fault divorce is the fact that she will most likely get full custody of the kids and the hubby will have to pay her without benefit of seeing his children on a regular basis.
The elephant in the room that nobody wants to talk about is no-fault divorce. One selfish, self-centered person can destroy a family for no reason at all. No-fault needs to be done away with entirely because it is unconstitutional by its very application. Any person accused of a crime has the right to know what crime they have committed, they have the right to a jury trial, they have the right to the presumption of innocence, they have the right to put on a defense and expect the facts to determine the outcome. They are afforded every right the Constitution the grants a citizen of the United States of America. This is not so for the spouse sued under a no-fault statute. Ask what crime you have been accused of committing and the judge will only stare blankly at you and then grant the divorce.
Marriage has become the only contract where the law sides with the party wishing to violate the contract. Imagine what would happen if we let our courts handle business contracts in this same manner. We would have nothing short of chaos. Take a look at what has happened to our families under the system of no-fault divorce these last 30 years - it is absolute chaos! If we don't accept it in our business dealings, why do we accept it for our families?
In writing on divorce in America today, Dr. Stephen Baskerville, author and professor at Howard University says in his article, "The Politics of Family Destruction" in the November 2002 issue of Crisis magazine:
"Our present divorce system in not only unjust but fundamentally dishonest. For all the talk of a "divorce culture", it is not clear that most people today enter into the marriage contract with the intent of breaking it. If the marital vows were changed to ". . .until I grow tired of you" or ". . . for a period of 5 years unless I decide otherwise", and if the state were willing to sanction such an agreement, then divorce would not be such a significant event from a moral point of view. There is no evidence that the content of marital vows or expectations at the time of marriage has changed. The point is that the marriage contract has become unenforceable and therefore fraudulent. Until this changes, it seems pointless and even irresponsible to encourage young people to place their trust and lives in it. If we truly believe our present divorce policy is appropriate, we should at least have the honesty to tell young people up front that marriage provides them with no protection. Let's inform them at the time of their marriage that even if they remain faithful to their vows, they can lose their children, their home, their saving and future earnings, and their freedom. Not only will the government afford them no protection; it will prosecute them as criminals. And let us see how many young people are willing to start families. It is one thing to tolerate divorce, as perhaps we must do in a free society. It is quite another to use the power of the state to impose it on unwilling parents and children. When the courts stop dispensing justice, they must start dispensing injustice. There is no middle ground."
Divorce is a $250 BILLION per year industry that benefits only the people who administrate it. District family courts are the lowest level courts and have the least amount of oversight. This and fact that there are not juries present and in most instances, the courts are closed to the public results in antics on the part of the judges and attorneys that would in any other situation have them up on charges and disbarred.
The problem as I see it is that it's not just a "divorce issue", it's a due process issue. 80% of all divorces are contested by one of the parties. This means that 80% of the time a citizen is being denied due process under the law and we just sit back and tolerate it because it's considered a divorce issue. Kathlyn Smith President Marriage Our Mission
You know, if no fault divorce were legislated out of being, divorce rates would plummet. If men want to have any credibility on this subject, they should address the root of the problem.
Otherwise, they are rightfully accused of being whiners.
An astute observation.
Any time fathers assert their right to parent, they are labelled "whiners"...by those who seek to shut them down, and to shutdown/divert the discussion of parental equality as well.
Custody and Cash are the twin roots of the divorce industry.
Cash has to be regarded as the secondary issue, because money is replaceable. Even so, the marriage contract should explicitly state the husband's and the wife's respective ownership interests in current and future assets, and those ownership interests should remain as delineated in the marriage contract in the event of a divorce.
Custody is the primary issue. A man's heart and soul is intertwined with his identity as a father. That fathers are robbed of their right to parent by family courts daily is the greatest crime against men and the human race ever committed by the U.S. government. Read Stephen Baskervilles "Divorce as Revolution" at
Regarding no-fault divorce, it is usually...incorrectly...put forth as "the root of the problem" by those who claim that the cause of high divorce rates is the "covenant marriage set": adultery, desertion, and domestic violence.
While I support covenant marriage laws, the primary reason that divorces are filed primarily by women is because under current family court practices, women are virtually guaranteed primary/sole custody of the couple's children.
Oh, good, HTML that works.
And domestic violence would increase.
There's got to be a "safety valve" out of abusive and hostile relationships.
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