KILLING FATHERS - PART I

By Tim Rohr

At the root of any successful society is the healthy, intact family. This is not a religious principle. It's a biological one. 

Since it takes a man and a woman to reproduce a child, and it takes that child the better part of two decades to become self-sufficient and in turn produce the next generation, the family unit, in terms of primal biological survival, has always been at least a two decade commitment which is renewed with the birth of every child. 

And in days gone by a couple produced many children, making the commitment usually "till death do we part" even before anyone ever thought of those words. 

But that was before government got involved. 

A recent article in Epoch Times has once again set out what has been set out so many times before: 1) America is in trouble; 2) it's in trouble because of the breakdown of the family; and 3) the breakdown of the family is due to "fatherlessness." 

Unfortunately, the article does not go much beyond simply reporting otherwise already well-known facts:

• one in four U.S. children are living in fatherless homes
• 63 percent of youth suicides occur in fatherless homes
• 85 percent of children in fatherless homes have behavioral disorders.
• fatherless kids are 20 times more likely to be incarcerated

The Epoch Times is not known for being mainstream, so here's hoping that one day its writers will go beyond reporting useless proposals like this:

"The AFPI (America First Policy Institute) is calling on officials and community leaders to support a pro-fatherhood campaign that would share the joys of fatherhood. 'Amplification from athletes, celebrities, musicians, actors, and national role models can push the importance of fatherhood to the forefront of public consciousness,' it said."

The article goes on to suggest that new legislation from Republican lawmakers holds promise:

A number of Republican lawmakers have been active in introducing pro-family legislation in the last couple of years. Notably, Sen. Marco Rubio (Fla.) has introduced seven bills that seek to help young families, focusing mostly on pregnant women and new moms.

With many families now having two income providers, parenting is often burdened by busy agendas. “Laws in our country should work to chart a new course and help parents balance child-rearing, work, and other priorities throughout day-to-day life,” Rubio wrote earlier this year.

Talk about the blind leading the blind. One thing we don't need is for more stupid policies from stupid government people. What we need is for smart government people to get rid of stupid policies instituted by stupid government people which incentivize the destruction of families and fatherlessness in particular. 

Destructive Policy No. 1: NO FAULT DIVORCE

To illustrate, imagine this. You hire a contractor to fix your roof. Said contractor requires 50% up front. You pay him. He starts the work and then quits half way through. No reason. He's just tired of the job. Sure you only paid him 50% but your roof is open and rain is coming. And then he sues you for the other 50% because he doesn't like you anymore. 

That's no-fault divorce. Marriage is a legal contract. Imagine a society in which any other kind of contract is legally treated as marriage is: where the other party can just quit for no reason and with no consequence. 

In fact, not only no consequence, but the quitter has got the law on his side to take you for everything you have. Such a society would be considered lawless. In fact, it wouldn't be a society for long. But that's exactly what no-fault divorce law has done and is doing to society's most important contract. 

There is a lot more legislative idiocy, but for now, I'll just address one more, which, after no-fault divorce, is probably the second most destructive policy.

Destructive Policy No. 2: CHILD SUPPORT

In short (though I'll have much more to say in future posts), child support laws functionally incentivize a parent, usually the mother, to either take the children and abandon the father, or otherwise get rid of the father - usually through false abuse allegations. 

The mother, even before anything can be proven, is immediately awarded child support from the father, the enforcement of which is under pain of prison. What a deal...for mom anyway. 

The mother, upon receiving the coerced money from the father, is not held accountable in anyway for how she spends the money. Again, what a deal...for mom. 

The father at this point 1) has been abandoned by his wife; 2) has lost his children through functional - but legal - kidnapping; 3) has been presumed guilty (because he is immediately forced to pay child support) until proven innocent (if he ever gets a chance to prove it); and, 4) especially if he has been abandoned, has been left with all the usual family expenses - the mortgage, utilities, family health insurance, tuition, etc. - but now has the added burden of spending tens of thousands of dollars in family court to defend himself in a legal world where Dad is a "deadbeat" and is guilty of whatever his wife accuses him of until proven innocent - if ever. 

As Stephen Baskerville writes in TAKEN INTO CUSTODY, our child support laws enable:

"...a mother (to) simply escape the uncertainties, vicissitudes, and compromises inherent to life shared with a working husband by divorcing, whereupon she acquires the police as a private collection agency who will force him, at gunpoint if necessary, to pay her the family income that she then controls alone."

 TO BE CONTINUED