Overdogs #4 Deadbeat Moms

“It’s so hard to know what to do when one wishes earnestly to do right.” - George Bernard Shaw

Once, there was a young couple whose marriage was seriously on the rocks. They argued and did hurtful things to each other. Wielding power over the other was becoming more important to each than nurturing those qualities of the relationship that led them to exchange vows in the first place.

Each came from a stable, two-parent home. They were college graduates with promising careers. Their young son and daughter, whom they both loved dearly, were showing signs of being stressed by the constant discord. If the young couple could resolve their differences, they had all the tools to become pretty decent parents. But coming together wasn’t happening, wasn’t apt to happen anytime soon.

What to do? Decisions had to be made, pronto. The wife was ready to end the union, but what about the kids? Should she rear the children in a home wracked by tension, dissension and anger? That was abhorrent to every maternal instinct in her body. She had long envisioned the perfect home for her perfect family. She simply could not justify exposing her children to this level of conflict.

Divorce. That was an action she had never considered to be a possibility in her life. She would never divorce - she’d known that since she was a little girl. Now, sadly, it was a viable option. Should she get a divorce and raise the kids as a single mother? She had successfully mapped her career and had attained all her professional goals so far. Being a single mother would seriously slow her fast-track rise in her company. Could she accept that and not resent her children? In her heart of hearts, she knew she could not.

So what about letting him have primary custody? He was a thoughtful, caring father. She knew he’d be the better parent, the more patient and less resentful. But vengeance colored her decision, her motives. She knew she could get custody if she chose. Her desire to punish him overcame her desire to do what she knew to be best for her kids. She decided to fight for guardianship.

Here’s where biology and the mother’s home-field advantage crash head-on into men’s rights and our inability to make public policy conform to current reality. As overdogs, men are on a playing field that is nowhere near level. That women in general are better nurturers and caregivers than are men is obvious, but what if the man is the better parent? What if the woman is not as good a person, an uncaring or unwilling mother?

In 2001 89.7% of single custodial parents were female and 10.3% were male. Do the math. In 89.7% of custodial situations, is the mother the better parent, the healthier influence on the child? No way, no how. Not in Betty Friedan’s most feminist dreams. So we’re damaging our kids because we’re too lazy to enact laws and create innovative policy that counteracts centuries of history, where maternal influence was on-going, nearly absolute and a given.

Well, it’s a new century, sports fans. It’s time for men, concerned women, lawmakers and judges to embrace fatherhood, embrace custodial rights for dads and to protect the rights of the children to be with the most capable parent, gender be damned. I know dozens of men who love and adore their kids, and show it, in ways that our fathers and grandfathers simply couldn’t.

Let’s let the 21^st century be the one where fathers finally give and get on an equal basis with mothers. Divorced men, fight for custody if you want it, and spend more time with your kids even if you don’t have primary custody. Judges, lawmakers and social workers, burn that 89.7% figure into your mind and resolve to help lower it. Mothers, if you know he deserves custody, let it be.

But as paternal custody increases, let’s keep a close eye on the under-publicized problem of deadbeat moms. Recent statistics from the U.S. Census Bureau show custodial fathers received only 55.1% of child support payments due. Mothers received 63.8% from the fathers. This, even though fathers’ payments due were 19% higher. Overall, custodial moms received 37% more child support than custodial dads, $2631 to $1910 annually.

So let’s give dads a hand. All kids deserve and need strong father figures. How else can we counteract all that estrogen they were exposed to in the womb?

"Nothing can be more absurd than the practice that prevails in our country of men and women not following the same pursuits with all their strengths and with one mind, for thus, the state instead of being whole is reduced to half." - Plato

It’s all about the kids, folks.