Newsgroups: alt.child-support,soc.men,soc.women,misc.kids,alt.dads-rights
Subject: Re: Remote (Taxpayer) Wallets vs. the Ovarian Nurturer
From: sbishop@desire.wright.edu
Date: 15 Sep 92 19:01:02 EST
 <1992Sep13.064525.20969@cbnewsk.cb.att.com> <1992Sep15.140655.22950@news.nd.edu>
Organization: Wright State University 

In article <1992Sep15.140655.22950@news.nd.edu>, slarsen@schumann.helios.nd.edu (susan larsen) writes:
> In article <1992Sep13.064525.20969@cbnewsk.cb.att.com> noraa@cbnewsk.cb.att.com (aaron.l.hoffmeyer) writes:
>>Why not
>>acknowledge all the hard work I've done in my life to get to this
>>point, give me some credit for doing my homework, for graduating with a
>>3.85 GPA, for majoring in electrical engineering, and simply admit that
>>I am the better provider?  So, if I am the better provider, why not let
>>me have the kids?  I wouldn't want her child support money.  She barely
>>makes enough to provide for herself.  And that's the whole point.  Why
>>does she have the children if she can't provide for them?  If I wasn't
>>in the picture, YOU - all of YOU - would be paying for HER children.
>>
> 
> Just last week, the judge awarded custody of three children, one 
> in school, two pre-school, to a father.  I have known this couple 
> from the start of the marriage, and I knew the father some years 
> before he married.  To make a long story short, everyone who knows 
> these people are quite amazed that he received custody of the 
> children, since the wife has *always* made more money than him, 
> she has *always* had a secure job (as opposed to his lengthy 
> periods of unemployment), she has more education than him (high 
> school dropout versus her associates degree).  In fact, he was 
> more than prepared, mentally and emotionally, to *lose* custody 
> because he felt that his employment record would be held against 
> him.
> 
> However, he *always* changed the poopy diapers, he *always* kept 
> the house clean and meals on the table, and he would be the parent 
> that showed up with his children at the birthday parties, picnics
> and all the other kid functions we would sponsor.  Plus, even when 
> he was working (seasonally) he still performed the bulk of these 
> child and home chores.
> 
> It strikes me that there may be a consistency here, by the courts 
> favoring the "nurturing" parent over the "provider" parent, regard-
> less of the gender.  Actually, there is a certain capitalist logic 
> in this thinking:  in hiring someone to care for your children, what
> would you look for?  A resume that showed involvement with children, 
> of course.  This child-care resume may be what the court is looking 
> for, too, when it makes its custody decisions.  The court, in looking 
> at the divorcing couple, will set up each parent in the role 
> that they have been playing all along.  Why place people in *jobs* 
> that they may not be suited for, after all?  If the courts were to 
> start granting custody to the parents unproven as caretakers, wouldn't
> this be judicial social-engineering of the highest order?
> 

This sounds great to me, I am all in favor of the nurturing parent being
the one with the majority of the custody, as long as the visitations are
liberal.  What I really hate is the divorce cases where one or both of
the parents use the poor child as a whip to punish the other parent.  There's
a sad story in a recent magazine (McCalls, I think) about a woman who had
informal joint custody with her ex, then his new wife goaded him into filing
for full custody.  And the second wife was continuing to be very obstructive 
in the mother's visitations to her son.  Sounded like the only one who won 
in this case was the second wife, and even then she and her husband had to 
file bankrupcy due to the high costs of the court battle.  

Sigh, even Solomon would cringe over some of the battles people do over their
kids.

Sue B.

> Disclaimer:  I don't necessarily agree that this is the way things 
> *should* be, I'm just trying to add a new dimension to the discussion 
> by suggesting a line of logic explaining why the courts do what they 
> do.
> 
> Sue Larsen
> slarsen@berlin.helios.nd.edu
> 
Newsgroups: alt.child-support,soc.men,soc.women