From: matt@smoke.brl.mil (Matthew Rosenblatt)
Newsgroups: misc.legal
Subject: Re: Pre-Sex Contract
Summary: The child's right to support is based on blood ties to his father.
Keywords: Guilty; Studs'n'Sluts
Date: 29 Dec 92 15:54:12 GMT
Organization: U.S. Army Ballistic Research Lab, APG MD.

In article <1992Dec25.073354.5806@rotag.mi.org> kevin@rotag.mi.org 
(Kevin Darcy) writes:

>Okay, so you admit that all this "ENVY and RESENTMENT" bullshit neither
>adds to nor subtracts from the justification for paternity child support,
>and what really matters is whether the way it works now is the way it's 
>"supposed" [sic] to work, according to some no doubt marvellously quaint
>Natural Law line of reasoning, right?   [Kevin Darcy]

Right.

>In article <19491@smoke.brl.mil> matt@smoke.brl.mil (Matthew Rosenblatt) 
>writes:

>>There's gotta be a better reason for taking from A and giving to B
>>-- which is what redistributionist government policies do -- than
>>the mere fact that A has more than B and B therefore ENVIES and
>>RESENTS A.  If there is no better reason, we should let A alone
>>to keep what he has, and tell B to be content with what *he* has.
>>[Matt Rosenblatt]

>Sounds good to me. How do you justify the current redistributionist
>government policies implicit in paternity child support? What underpins
>the current system besides the "ENVY and RESENTMENT" [sic] by women of 
>men, because the maternal instinct is, according to the Conventional Wisdom,
>stronger and less controllable than the paternal instinct, or their "ENVY
>and RESENTMENT" [sic] of men's statistically-higher rates of income (a
>disparity I assume you would defend as part of "Male Privilege" [sic])?
>[Kevin Darcy]

What underpins the current policy of paternity child support?  Why,
Status Law!  Status Law based on the same "Natural Law line of reasoning"
that Mr. Darcy characterizes above as "marvellously quaint."  The child
need not harbor any ENVY or RESENTMENT at all towards his father --
indeed, he starts out as a baby incapable of these sentiments -- and
it makes no difference whether his mother ENVIES or RESENTS the father's
income or not.  The child has a right to support, a right grounded in
his blood ties to his father.  Blood ties are the reason for taking
the father's resources and re-allocating them to the child who is his
own flesh and blood, and that's a much better reason than any ENVY 
or RESENTMENT.

Again:  The policy of making fathers support their children is well known.
It's not something that society sneaks up on a man and pulls on him 
without warning.  A man knows that if he engages in sexual intercourse,
there is a risk that he will conceive a child and that once that happens,
there will be nothing he can do to keep from forced fatherhood if his
girl-friend wants to bear that child.  For some men, this knowledge is
enough to deter them from expressing their sexuality in this way, and
that is all to the good, because man ought not to be having sex except
with a woman to whom he has made a commitment that he will support her
and any children they may bring into the world; that is, except with
a woman he has married.

Other men are not deterred and are willing to take the risk that they
will become fathers and be held to the responsibilities of fatherhood.
It ill befits a man who has chosen to take this risk to cavil when he
is later called to meet those responsibilities.

					-- Matt Rosenblatt
                                        (matt@amsaa.brl.mil)

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