From: sga@cray.com (Steven G. Anderson)
Subject: Re: FEMINISTS ARE UGLY!
Reply-To: sga@cray.com
Organization: Cray Research, Inc.
Date: 4 Jan 93 15:57:01 CST

In article 13699@walter.cray.com, jsw@cray.com (Jon S. Wood) writes:
>In article 6405@desire.wright.edu, sbishop@desire.wright.edu () writes:
>>
>  The MAIN reason for child support is
>>to try to approximate that the child does not suffer a huge change (for the
>>worse) in lifestyle due to the divorce.  THis means if the child was 
>>provided a certain standard of living before the divorce, it should not
>>then be dumped into total poverty after the divorce.  Evidently you really
>>don't understand the logic behind child-support payments.
>>Perhaps you should read about the recent court case where the millionaire
>>father was forced to pay the court ordered HUGE amounts of child support,
>>even though the mother had a very nice income, because the court said that
>>the money had been provided the child before the divorce, it must still be
>>provided after the divorce.
>>Please note: I do think the child was living a totally ridiculous lifestyle..
>>
>>Sue
>
> Why should kids be sheltered from Mommy's choices? Why should they be
>sheltered from reality? 
> If the economic well being of children was the state's BIGGEST concern, 
>why in heaven is the state awarding custody to a gender overwhelmingly
>when many of the men make more money? Why does it cost men far more to
>retain their children than do women? 
> When homes are handed over to women, custody is awarded de facto to women
>and child support awards are written to continue the children's living
>standard as if the parents had not divorced, I don't believe for a millesec.
>that feminists are nearly as interested in children than they are 
>at retribution for past evil deeds by men. This rewriting of world history
>and anthropology by American Feministas is a joke. The feminist is
>only interested in perpetuating a family court system that has 
>systematically transfered the greatest amount of wealth from one group
>to another our society hasn't seen since the rise and fall of the 
>third Riech. This transfer of wealth has not guarenteed the living
>standards of children, it has only weakened their chances of success
>and emotional well being. Our schools are filled with emotionally
>crippled children. You know some of them. 

Sue:

What Jon is saying is that child-support has become de facto alimony.  Sometime
in the 70's, alimony became politically uncorrect because it implied that the
"poor" woman was helpless.  This was replaced by "spousal maintenance" which is
of limited duration to help the "poor, helpless" woman to become self sufficient.
At that time when most women had no job skills, it was a good idea.  In the 90's
its time for "spousal maintenance" to end as well.  Child custody decisions
however still assume a 1950's family model which really ticks off men.  During the
80's, due to a failed economic theory, things got tough for everbody (except
Republican cronies) and it was/is hard for almost everybody to make ends meet.
So feminists, greedy lawyers, and the far right decided that we can't have women and
children living in poverty, so men should start paying alimony again.  Only the
feminists didn't like this idea since it sounded like they were just "poor, helpless"
women.  So they starting jacking up the child support amounts.  Men got ticked and
stopped paying.  Now the men are the bad folks and "don't care about their poor,
helpless" kids while mom lives high.  This standard of living argument is just a
smokescreen to hide behind.  Why should only the man suffer in the divorce?  What
about protecting his standard of living?

There is a judge here in Minneapolis that both Jon and I know all too well.  She
has stated publically that she biases divorce settlements in favor of the woman to
"right past inequities against all women".  This is legally and morally wrong!  A
referee working for her gave me custody of my son, but my ex-wife got half my income
initially.  Where was the concern for the standard of living for my son?  The standard
of living argument only applies to the woman, it doesn't apply to the kids.

Over the weekend my wife, totally on her own, calculated what she thought the maximum child support support should be for one child.  She came up with $400/month and that
was assuming that the noncustodial parent paid all of the child's basic expenses.  It
did not include daycare costs for younger children.  I was surprised, because that is
the same amount I have been saying should be the cap on child support for a long
time now.  Why was she figuring this?  Because we wanted to know what we should
ask for if we go back to court to reduce visitation and terminate alimony early.

Steve Anderson			147 more days of indentured servitude!
Cray Research, Inc
Eagan MN