He was only taken to task for the "tar baby" part of the comment. Politicians only apologize for those things that the media or citizens complain about, not the totality of their stupid comments.

By the way, congratulations on getting custody.

The issue of father's rights is extremely disappointing to me. So many times I see kids living with mothers, when they would have had a better life if the court had given the father custody.

I know of a situation that took place in Colorado several years back. The mother was serving 5 years for assault and drug dealing, the father owned his own business, made good money, and owned his own home. Of course the Mom got full custody.

My husband was a bit luckier. The mother of his son did everything in her power to prove what an unfit mother she was. Three different child support claims in three different counties (Which to this day if she ever tries to get child support she'll be arrested for fraud), living on welfare in a house Family Services nearly condemned, missing court date after court date, and when she did show up in court she looked like she just finished her shift working the corner. In the end what it came down too was the Judge felt my stepson was better off with my husband, the state of Colorado didn't need another mouth on welfare, and if the mother ever felt like cleaning up her act the Courts would revisit the case.

That was ten years ago. The funny thing is my husband and his family spent many years helping the mother out to get to the point of Joint Custody they are at now. In fact she was one of my bridesmaids, she is now married and has three more lovely children, a career, owns her own home and is very thankful for what has been done for her, and even though he is a 16 year old pain in the ass, I think my stepson is better off having both parents raise him.

I agree with you completely. I would have loved to have had my father in my life... my mom even moved several times without telling him where we were. Luckily, he found us.

My mother spent child support on booze and cigarettes. We were evicted twice. It was just an all-around messy situation. My father didn't even bother fighting for custody when they divorced because he didn't want to put us through that and he knew he would lose. He just stayed as involved as she would let him, and tried his best to make sure we were clothed and fed.

And that's just not the way it should work.

very, very good article and an excellent critique of the currently flawed system. i would love to see bitch_phd's response.

Linking to Glenn Sacks to back up an argument like this isn't biased at all. Nor is a cite called "fathermag.com"

I would definitely NOT like to hear it. There's enough trolls around these days as it is.

That may be true, but it doesn't excuse you basing your research upon such morons.

Your first link, fathermag.com, doesn't exactly scream objectivity. Here's a small smattering of bias just from the article you linked.

Not to mention the completely un-cited and illogical claims the article makes.

(the mother is not the issue here.)

(Uhhh, citation?)

I was not able to access your link from glennslacks.com. Are you sure that's the correct URL? The quote you gave me doesn't give me much hope that it's unlike the last one.

Lies, damned lies and statistics. As I'm sure you well know, in many states (Including Ohio) there are several different types of custody. There's sole physical custody. There's joint physical custody. There's sole legal custody, and there's joint legal custody. The difference between these is explained here. (Note that's a New Hampshire site, but the information is pretty applicable to other states). The statistic about women compromising 85% of custodial parents above ignores that. It also asserts that fathers seeking sole custody obtain it in less than 10% of cases. Assuming that means sole legal and physical custody, what it does not mention is that awarding sole legal and physical custody is disfavored by courts in general. If both parents are willing and able to do it, they will rarely award it. It also ignores the flat statistical realities of the situation. Women are more likely to contest an award of sole custody than men.

So, I'll reserve full judgment here on whether the glennslacks.com link is worthwhile, but I have my deep suspicions. Regardless, you could have chosen to focus your research on more credible sources. Here is one. This one is clearly slanted towards fathers, but it at least cites its studies. There are others out there.

It should also be noted that child support and child support enforcement laws (such as the ones proposed by Obama and Clinton above) are written to be gender-neutral. They may not be enforced with the same vigor against women as they are men, but part of that is because men are more unlikely to complain about not receiving child support. Regardless, if you are owed child support and have not received it, you have the same legal rights (at least in theory) as a custodial mother would.

I'm sorry that you had a difficult divorce and child custody situation. I have no doubt that it was acrimonious and unpleasant. Most divorces (especially divorces with children) are. It's certainly true that many courts in many jurisdictions are more skeptical of paternal custodian rights than they are maternal. That is not the way it is meant to be, and that's unfortunate. It should be noted that the topic of Family Law is not at all standardized across the 50 states. Every state has wildly different laws and presumptions. Your experience may have been different somewhere else. It may not have been, but it's worth mentioning. Regardless, in my experience, the topic of "Father's Rights" is generally a front for not-so-veiled sexism and backlash against egalitarian feminist gains. I'm not saying that's what you're doing here, but that one website you cited to certainly was.

(Finally, if you're going to casually mention that Hillary Clinton has skeletons in her closet with late child support payments, you should really, really cite to something like that. I assume you mean her brother and that's fine, but that kind of allegation can be unfairly dangerous and damaging without support. Just a tip from one writer to another.)

^^^^Exactly. I wonder if anyone actually clicked on any of the links. Fathermag.com and Glenn Sack are just about as biased as you can get.

Oh, it's Glenn Sacks not Slacks. I guess his website is down. I've never heard of the guy, but just googled him. Seems like a real winner.

the waters seem to be very muddied here considering the variability of custody laws across states and the different degrees and types of custody. is there a federal agency that compiles data on this topic? that would seem like the least biased source.

i'm glad that things worked out for you and your daughter since i would assume that the fact your ex was willing to sign away sole custody simply so she could remarry was a sign of her maternal fitness. however, its difficult to be objective when only hearing one side which is probably the way many of these stories are presented.

also, i am by no means supporting john mccain but i read the article you linked to and it would seem to me (and subrosa will tell me if i'm wrong) that he was simply stating a position that reflected a belief in maintaining the separation of powers. the president has no place overturning a family court decision or any judicial decision, for that matter. as i understand it, if the people don't like a final court decision it is up to the legislature not the executive branch to amend the law.

Before my dad met my mom, he had two adopted kids with a woman who was mentally unstable (paranoid, delusional, and incredibly short-tempered, not to mention I think borderline schizophrenic) and on more than once occasion hit both kids. My dad never hit me a day in his life and both my brother and sister now say he was a great parent. But the court at the time didn't manage to see it, and gave custory rights to the crazy mother, who eventually followed her cue and proceeded to have a breakdown. My brother then came to live with my dad and his new wife, my mom, but my sister stayed with her mom.

I don't know enough about the whole thing to make an educated statement on the issue as a whole, but I know my father doesn't have much love for this system.

Subrosa has raised legitimate complaints, but I also feel that you are a great person DR. I wish more fathers would fight for the rights of their children. You definitely have my respect, not that you ever haven't. For whatever reason, I've been aware of this problem you've had for a long time, and I have a lot of respect for your fight and the fact that you've made it public. We can't all be perfect scholars, but we can be warriors. You've got my respect. Thanks for the article.

You're a good guy, and a good father. And I agree that there's a long way to go before fathers can be on truly equal footing in the legal sense. And that's just sad.

-TM

Lets see if I can help out here.

Accoring to the official Census site:

As for 10% of fathers getting custody, the article doesn't say when the study in question was done, but I found this (it's in PDF), courtesy of the Monthly Vital Statistics Report from the Centers for Disease Control, which, indeed, in '89 and '90, fathers got custody around 10% of the time. And yes, "joint" was counted separately. I've yet to find a more recent report, as the site only went up to '97, and I couldn't find the pertinent info.

Also, this little tidbit is courtesy of the Health & Human Services site, just because:

So, "damned lies and statistics?" Hardly.

-TM