From: regard@hpsdde.sdd.hp.com (Adrienne Regard)
Newsgroups: talk.abortion,soc.men,alt.dads-rights
Subject: Re: Biological Reasons for Male Choice
Date: 18 Dec 1992 16:59:27 -0800
Organization: Hewlett Packard, San Diego Division
NNTP-Posting-Host: hpsdde.sdd.hp.com

In article <1992Dec17.235628.4398@nsc.nsc.com> jrr@nsc.nsc.com (Jerry Roe) writes:
>In article <1gql3fINN4o9@hpsdde.sdd.hp.com> regard@hpsdde.sdd.hp.com (Adrienne Regard) writes:
>>
>...
>>
>>After all, it couldn't be true, could it, that keeping abortion legal
>>means FEWER men are 'stuck' with the bills, could it?
>>
>
>Pretty cynical, Adrienne.  I don't recall reading anybody on this group
>who made the point that they'd like someone to abort just so they then
>wouldn't have to pay any bills. 

You're kidding!  Then you haven't been reading much, have you?

Or is it rather the case that the man who doesn't want to get 'stuck' with
the bill (that was not my choice of terms -- I borrowed it from the male-
choicers, bub) STILL wants the woman to bear a child so it can grow up in
poverty, since he has his "choice" not to support it?

Which is it, Jerry?

I've been reading a whole bunch of articles about men who want a choice
not to be a parent.  There are three ways to accomplish that: 1. don't
make love to women.  That doesn't seem to be popular, and I can understand
why.  (2.) when you find your partner is pregnant, beg, plead, and hope
she will get an abortion.  Offer to pay for it.  This is the option the
goons of male-choice seem to think is a logical point of blackmail.  (3.)
Get out of paying for the existing child.  This is the legal change male-
choicers would like to see happen.  With the resulting fall out:  (a) either
a child is born and it doesn't receive financial support from him or (b)
a child is not born.

You contend that people haven't supported position 3b.  Well, I've seen it,
but you probably don't read every article here that I do.  But even so, 
you are then contending that people support 3a, which in all practicality,
and observing the situation in the United States, seems to me to be almost
worse than 3b.


> The argument always has been, and
>always will be, that if women insist on controlling the strings when
>it comes to the decision of whether to bear or abort the child, that
>men also should have some decision-making power. 

Hmmm.  It's a power game, huh?

>you want to have a child and the man doesn't, then YOU ARE MAKING YOUR
>OWN UNILATERAL DECISION and should not insist that someone else support
>you financially in that decision.

>Why this
>is such a mystery to so many women is beyond me, and I'll repeat what
>I've said here numerous times before:  if you (meaning women in general)
>want equal treatment in society's and the law's eyes, then stop insisting
>on special treatment when it fits your personal agenda.

Oh, it's not a mystery.  We all understand that you figure equal 'choice'
WRT pocketbooks is valid, even though there is no equitability WRT biology.
Trust me, we (meaning women in general) can't quite understand how men
fail to understand the biological DIFFERENCES that confer different biological
CHOICES upon the two parties involved.  True, not all men fail to understand
this difference, but some of you are really thickheaded.  

Some of us (meaning women in general) are also quite puzzled that you can't
seem to understand that the responsibility is conferred upon the parentS
by social expecations once a child EXISTS.  And that the responsibility is
due to the CHILD, not to the mother.  But, I suppose the myth of the nasty
scheming woman screwing some fellow to a financial post has more rhetorical
value.

I even know some MEN who are puzzled by your lack of understanding that
this kind of legal change would be a step AWAY from them gaining full
father's rights.  There are plenty of men on this planet who would prefer
to strengthen their bonds to their children, not weaken them.

>And let's please not belabor the old saw about "if you didn't want kids,
>you should have kept it in your pants".


Yes, let's not.  You really didn't need to bring it up, now did you?

Adrienne Regard