Father's Rights; Another Myth in the United States

On October 16, 1999, at 12:58 in the afternoon, my life had changed, forever. After rushing my wife at the time to the local emergency room, her water broken, she finally gave birth to my daughter after 21 hours of labor.

I was an emotional mess. Watching the birth of my daughter had to be one of the most humbling moments of my life. Feelings of joy, seeing all ten fingers, and all ten toes, overwhelming feelings of love, and fear for her future and how I was going to provide for her had overtaken me.

I then decided it was my time to exit this marriage due to many personal and viable reasons. I stayed in it because I know how Father's Rights are an outright myth in Family Court. I had decided to go after full custody of my daughter. I filed for emergency custody and had custody of my daughter within a week of leaving my ex-wife.

I really had underestimated what I was in for. My custody battle lasted 3 and a half years in the Family Court System.

A large number of children are ordered to see a child psychologist when divorce is filed. Counselors and psychologists are encouraged by our system to give bad reports against a father. Fathers are automatically presumed capable of abuse before any mother.

I personally was made out to be just short of a rapist/serial killer/child molesting/psycho by my ex-wife. The State of Ohio immediately looked down upon me and took her side, simply by her allegations. I wasn't battling against just my ex-wife. I was battling against the Court System's natural bias against fathers, and the idea that if the mother says it, it must be true. I was struggling to prove myself innocent, even though there was absolutely no truth to the allegations.

I dealt with lawyers telling me that father's aren't the best parent, I dealt with judges saying the same thing, I dealt with an inept Child Cervices program telling me that I was using my daughter to hurt my ex-wife, simply because I wanted custody of her.

I got do deal with things like Child Services agents that would call her ahead of time, arrange a time to come to her house and view her parental skills. The ex-wife could manage to make herself look golden in that time. Meanwhile, they just dropped by my house anytime they wanted, unannounced.

Finally, after 3 and a half years my custody battle came to an end. Why you ask? Did the court system and child services investigate to prove who the better parent was? Did they spend hours upon hours with each parent to find the truth in who my daughter belonged with?

No. What it came down to is that my ex-wife wanted to re-marry. My lawyer was smart enough to write in the legal documentation that divorce wasn't granted until custody was decided. I didn't plan on giving up my crusade for custody of my daughter so that my ex-wife could get re-married. She finally folded and signed custody over to me.

I went from a rapist/serial killer/child molesting/psycho to a suitable father within the time it took for her to sign her name on a piece of paper. The courts didn't question it once, child services never piped up and said anything. It was just okay because she signed over custodial rights. I spent a lot of time, and money, to prove that I was the better parent and to defend myself against all the false allegations she made. It was all a moot point, she signed over custody, they didn't care if I was the better parent, they didn't care if I was a rapist/serial killer/child molesting/psycho, she signed the piece of paper.

I did it though, I beat the odds.

An Ohio study published in Family Advocate found that fathers seeking sole custody obtain it in less than 10% of cases, and a Utah study conducted over 23 years found similar results. According to the 2000 Census Bureau report, mothers comprise 85% of all custodial parents.

In an era when a person's actions are blamed on the lack of a father figure in a child's life, the Family Court system is doing just about everything it can to force a father away from his child.

The presence (or absence) of a father in a child's life is one of the largest factors in predicting whether a child will graduate high school, attend college, become involved in crime or drugs, or get pregnant before age 18. The greatest and least recognized force behind America's epidemic of fatherlessness is the way courts allow custodial mothers to drive fathers out of their children's lives.

This is an important issue to me in the upcoming election. Once you live something it kind of has this way of sticking with you, and you want to hear what the candidates have to say.

When John McCain was questioned about Father's Rights, this was his response:

"I'm sorry to disappoint you, I am not going to overturn divorce court decisions. That's why we have courts and that's why people go to court and get a divorce. If I as President of the United States said this decision has to be overturned without the proper appeals process then I would be disturbing our entire system of government... But for me to stand here before all these people and say that I'm going declare divorces invalid because someone feels that they weren't treated fairly in court, we are getting into a, uh, uh, tar baby of enormous proportions."

Wait. What? "Tar baby of enormous proportions". Who the hell says something like that and doesn't expect to offend someone. He later apologized for this statement. Well. Not the entire statement which basically amounts to "I am sorry our Family court system is all Asshole Fuckfaced up, get bent". He apologized because he said "Tar baby".

Barack Obama has introduced legislation to give men the chance to do the right thing, making it easier to be a responsible father.

Congress can make it easier for those who make that responsible choice—and make it harder for those who avoid it. This legislation will provide support for fathers who are trying to do the right thing in making child-support payments by providing them with job training and job opportunities......

Great. I am happy that he is making it easier for men to pay child support that they should be paying anyway. But what about us guys that have full custody and have mothers that don't pay child support? What about my rights as a father in Family Court? This bill is falling under great criticism amongst Father's Rights Advocates.

Finally we can't forget Hillary Clinton

Hillary will restore funding for child support enforcement to make sure that fathers do their part to support their children. But she will also reward responsible fatherhood by ensuring that every dollar of child support payments directly benefits children and expanding the EITC to give fathers more economic opportunities to do right by their kids.

Once again, more talk of making it easier to for the man to pay child support, but nothing of a Father's Rights in the Family Court system. Hillary also has some skeletons in her family tree when it comes to late child support payments.

What about Single Fathers who want to raise their child and be a part of their life? There are 2.5 million of us. 740,000 of us go without Child Support. The issue of Father's Rights in a biased court system seems to go undetected.

As a single father, I worry daily that my right as a single father may be taken away from me. That if the ex-wife decides that at some point she wants custody back, she can simply point a finger and make a false allegation, and Ohio's Court system will back her, just because she is "the better parent" according to their archaic views. I honestly think I would be back at square one.

This subject is extremely hard to research. Much like any other topic, it has it's extremists. Exploiting sexism, race and all the other things that really don't matter. I read such wonderful things as Hillary Clinton being in office would abominate any chances of Father's Rights because she is a woman. I also read such wonderful things as Barack Obama being being a black male will affect Father's rights. The subject is extremely heated, and with any heated subject, the morons seem to be the loudest.

I have personally lived this subject, and unfortunately I will tell you that at least in Ohio, a father who is going after full custody of his child is fighting an up hill battle, long before the first court date. It took me almost a month just to find a lawyer that would take the case and fight it rather than just attempt to get my child support payments as low as possible and accept defeat before I started.

I cringe when I hear of another deadbeat parent avoiding responsibility, especially when it's a father. This does absolutely nothing for the cause of father's who actually want to be a part of their child's life. I just wish that mentality that all men are incapable of taking care of children wouldn't carry over into a court system that should be unbiased, that should be concerned about what is in the best interest of the child, not about whether the custodial parent has a penis or not.

Family Courts in every state need an overhaul. The archaic thought process of the court system is outdated. We have a failing child support program on our hands, we have thousands of single parents going without justified child support payments because Family Courts and Child Services can't do their job correctly. I am sure there are many single mothers that can add their own horror story to this topic. Something definitely needs to be done to enhance this process, it's not going to get better on it's own.

DevilsReject has watched Finding Nemo approximately 1,562.75 times with his daughter and is looking forward to the next 1,562.75 times

web address: http://suicidegirls.com/news/politics/23040/