Should Massachusetts investigate overhauling its custody laws?
From the Boston Globe:
Several times, a bill calling for what is known as “shared parenting’’ — which would create a legal presumption for joint custody — has been introduced in the Legislature, and failed.
The debate has often been passionate, as divorce proceedings can be, and it has sometimes turned ugly. Some proponents of the bill, who claim that the family court system is biased against fathers, have launched ad hominem attacks against opponents. Unsurprisingly, this hasn’t created a receptiveness to compromise.
But the Legislature has recently provided a model for compromise on deeply felt issues: the task force on alimony, which met for more than a year, and resulted in the passage last fall of a sweeping overhaul of state alimony laws. The state can – and should – follow the same approach to modifying custody laws by bringing together responsible advocates on both sides. It’s time to break the contentious impasse on an issue that’s already painful enough for every party involved.
There’s something about vigorous, fact-based investigation of proposed legislation that just stirs the old-fashioned Democrat in me. Not spin or positioning or phony electoral horse-race framing, just sober-minded legislators doing thorough and careful work to determine whether a proposed law truly serves the public interest. Yeah, that’s an oversimplification, but allow me my momentary Frank Capra reverie.
I don’t know enough about Massachusetts law or policy to say whether this law would be a big win for fathers in the Bay State, or whether it’d be a nightmare of potential misuse. But that’s where I stand with this editorial: I don’t have to know. Appoint a task force, and they’ll find out. Mmmmm, the sweet taste of properly-conducted due process…
Photo— SqueakyMarmot/Flickr
About Noah Brand
I’m not sure why this should even be a controversy. What could possibly be wrong with the default of shared parenting unless there is some reason why one parent is not suited circumstantially or otherwise. So, leave the judge with some discretion but neither parent should be assumed to be the default.
Why isn’t it the norm to be shared parenting?
Feminists have opposed it from the start, because it would decrease child support payments to mothers.
The vast majority of feminists would prefer a gender neutral approach to custody and alimony. Fathers paying mothers is certainly the status quo, but feminists are by definition against the status quo.
However this rarely comes up in feminist discussions without a guy saying something. When asked directly feminists will give support to the idea, but normally it seems that female feminists prefer to focus on other things, and give this “male” issue little though. Especially with the various attacks on abortion and even contraception coming from republicans lately.
“The vast majority of feminists would prefer a gender neutral approach to custody and alimony. Fathers paying mothers is certainly the status quo, but feminists are by definition against the status quo.”
This statement is completely wrong. NOW which is one of the largest groups representing feminists opposes a gender neutral approach to determining custody.
Who knows. Sometimes the obvious isn’t so obvious.
Depends on who is on the task force, if its a task force made up of gender ideologues and feminist “experts”, don’t expect any sort honest or thorough due process. Given the geographic location, I have my doubts for american fathers getting a fair shake here …
edit – I should have said fathers *and children getting a fair shake.
This article seems to be grudgingly sympathetic to fathers at best. Acting as if the ad hominem attacks are only going one way and that the only problem is, fathers rights advocates trying to deprive judges of the discretion to determine the best interests of the child. I think we’ve seen more than enough cases where the “best interests” of the child has been the last thing on minds of some judges.
If folks want to find common ground with fathers rights activists (and I truly think that part of the problem people have with them is because of the word “rights”) then just like those FRA they will have to quit this business of starting off labeling them as the opposition.
Father rights groups launched ad homs … funny because FRGs have long been branded a covert lobby group for child abusers by those that oppose the idea of fathers having rights.
I find the ‘controversy’ surrounding this highly absurd.
If there’s father-bias in the courts as some of those opposed to shared custody initiatives attest, then shared custody will end it. If there is no mother-bias in the courts as those opposed to shared custody initiatives attest (ie. court decisions are neutral) then shared custody will only enshrine in law existing practices.
The only way shared custody will change anything is if there is already mother-bias in the courts. Since those opposed to shared custody say there isn’t, why do they oppose it?
It’s like watching two people argue over the temperature of a bath. The first person expects the second to bathe in it but the second is saying it’s too hot to stand. He wants to cool it down by adding luke-warm water, but the first insists it’s not hot, it’s actually luke warm already and is violently opposed to ‘changing’ the temperature by adding luke warm water.
Well if it *is* already luke warm, then adding more luke warm water won’t actually change the temperature!
Typhoon uncensored…..Very well said!
The current system dates back to the 50′s when mom stayed home and was the primary caregiver, probably the 75% one, while dad made a family living. When they divorced it was meant to provide a living situation, as well as an intended discouragement for divorcing in the first place.
Admire women entered the workplace the assumed the previous situation still existed, and mom now had her income and dad only a portion, and they still felt sorry for the poor left women, but in reality now their was no one rely taking care of the kids.
Add to that the acrimonious state of the exes relationship in many cases, and the kids now picking loyalties, and in most cases they picked mom, which pleased her for her own vindication yet the kids never got to see what dad was really like as he was now out of a probably toxic relationship. The courts should have mandated shared custody for both economic fairness and a way to have the kids see their parents as people. I guarantee that if one person wasn’t holding up their end of half time, with the reduction in child support the would be back in front of the judge in a heartbeat. If it continued then there could be sanctions until the situation was resolved, and that would be in the best interest of the children. But as it is now that is not the case. Basically the feminists want to eat their cake then have it too.
Yes, typhon_uncensored! couldn’t agree more – took the words from my mouth!