The debate over childsupport is always rather emotional. There are some very stale ideas about who gets custody of children even though the laws in many states are supposed to be gender neutral. There are plenty of men who can support and care for children without help from the mother. Still overwhelmingly this fact is ignored in favor of giving women custody and making men pay child support. It seems to me that courts need to pay more attention to which person can better take care of a child financially and utilize that information in making custody decisions. That would mean fewer fights over child support, better living conditions for children and less burden on society for children whose noncustodial parent either can't or will not pay their child support.
The current child support laws are wrong on so many counts.
1) How monthly support is determined, this seems to be a number just thrown up and not calculated.
2) Which parent the child should stay with, automaticaly the mother?
3) Putting a parent in jail for non-support, what does that do?
4) Visitation, only on weekends or evey other week, nothing but confusion for the child.
I could go on. Both parents should be held accountable for their irresponsible behavior. I am a child of divorce and know too many childern now adults that have been hurt by it, because the parents did not think of the child. Its so sad to know that childern are just commidites used to see how much money on parent can get from another.
Jail only makes things worse .
While jail time certainly needs to remain a consequence for men who fail to support their children, the child support laws are gender-biased in favor of women and are long overdue for radical reformation. The child suppport laws are punitive instead of compensatory; like they were intended to be. It kills me how the prevailing argument about exorbitant child support rewards is that a child should live the life of his father. Well...what does money afford a child that would have him living his father's lifestyle? Platinum diapers? Bentley strollers?
Dear Marc, you have become one of my favorite late night contributors, thus I followed you to this cite to get a glimpse of some of the things on which you speak at length. This discussion right here is a winner and I couldn't wait to respond.
As an African-American woman, I wholeheartedly agree with Jimi Izrael -- "the child support laws are disproportionately stacked against the interests of men" in general and African-American men in particular. Having practiced law for 17 years, I have had a chance to see and argue the ins and out of this issue at every level. As a womanist/feminist student of Dr. Elsa Barkley Brown and Professor Catharine MacKinnon, never did I imagine I would adopt this position on this issue. Early in my career, I only represented women in custody/support cases. But today, 4 out of 5 of my clients in family law cases are men. Forum not withstanding – injustice is injustice.
The first problem that the child support laws presents is couched within the well thought out child support guidelines is an understanding that a child is better off with money than a parent (usually a father). Fast forward to a child reaching the age of majority who's father may have sent a check but is not around -- we all know that is not a good look. Yes, unequivocally children require money. However, I have yet to witness a child reach the age of majority and declare "I do not really care that my father was not round, that check was right on time”. Not that paying child support chases a man away, but the bitter fight that attaches to it sometimes does. I have never heard a child say, I'm glad my father never took me to a basketball game or baseball game, but every other week I saw a garnishment check from his job. Much of what a father can do (but gets no credit for and therefore may not do) is reduced to paying what the court requires--no more and no less!!! This makes the end all be all “money” and not the child or the parents for that matter.
The second problem is the standard. Child support is not based on "the best interest of the child standard". That is the standard in a custody case. The support standard is a child should live the same way as he/she did when and if the parents were married. Theoretically that makes sense, but practically it's a nightmare. When the parents divorce or otherwise end a relationship it’s different for everyone. To suggest that it can be made whole financially for the child only is laudable, but not always possible. When the parents were together (if a relationship was in tact) there were fewer expenses. Two households is hard for many to juggle. Women do not have the luxury as custodial parents to opt out financially, but all have the option to sit down with the man they fathered a child with and deciding what works for their child minus the strangers. YES I KNOW NOT ALL BROTHERS WILL ACCEPT THE INVITATION AND FOR THEM IT IS WHAT IT IS. But Usually there is some form of communication possible and the parties should be aiming to share in rearing the child and allowing him/her to benefit more from the parties doing what families do together than being financially supplemented to live the way you once did or could have.
Third, the court does not assure that the child support is for the child. Most women receiving support overwhelmingly use the money properly. But some do not. The money is misused in a variety of ways in which I do not care to espouse. Should a woman be monitored in how she spends the money. No. But let's be honest it is what it is.
Fourth, there should be, but there is not any correlation between paying support and visitation. Women withhold children b/c they can without any impunity. Men don't pay and they are instant fugitives. In some cases women are not allowing visitation b/c there's no money being paid. Although I do not agree, I certainly understand the rationale. Other times, it is constructive kidnapping! Women are just deciding my child is better off without a father and the courts make that a separate issue just pay the fare!
And finally, while this does not directly address the issues of the child support laws, I address Jimi's last point, Sisters and Accountability -- we have to do better. We have a choice of with whom we have child – in most instances. How does it work that a man is wonderful when you’re together, but only worthy of supervised visitation and a check once the relationship is over? IN MY EXPERIENCE (professional and personal) most of the women seeking support and/or custody have unresolved issues with the relationship and how or the fact that the relationship ended and not what a man is or is not doing for his child. Like clock work, a new relationship runs a sister into court for support at record speed. That does not connote a major change in one's financial position. What is it about knowing for a fact that a man has moved on that makes a child more deserving? I have witnessed women get $20 (not a typo) twenty dollars a month and I have seen women get $20,000 (again not a typo) twenty thousand dollars a month and adopt the same posture leading to me to believe, it’s not just about a man being responsible. And if he is, when did we notice that. Usually doesn't happen overnight. I dare to say, we have an idea with whom we are dealing. But only accept same after the fact. Along with that, we do not see the errors of our ways. Instead, we attach to what we believe is favorable to women and miss an opportunity to properly use one of our best forums.
Dissension is ruinous for our children. The argument, taking them to court to testify on financial issues or the lack of payments (it happens). Having your sons miss school to come to court and see his father get arrested for failure to pay child support even when you know he just lost his job and is giving you what he has. But in child support/custody case everybody thinks they are right. So right, that they allow a multitude of strangers (Judge, plaintiff's attorney and defendant's attorney) using flawed laws to decide what's best for the child which GOD gifted them.
P.S. I was a single mother of 3 before I married my husband. I was tempted on many occasions to go to court but could never rectify having a stranger to tell me and a grown man what to do. So I simply asked my children’s father to tell me what he was able to do and be true to his word. I kept that “right of first refusal to do right by his children” on the table and he honored his word even when we did not have one word to say to one another.
Sak Pase? And Greetings Marc:
Thank you so much for discussing this issue. I agree with you that there is structured racism that blocks or prevent black men from gainful employment so they can earn decent wages to care for themselves and their families. And putting them behind bars or locking them up for unpaid child support does not help the situation in my view unless they had the money to pay but refused to do so. Otherwise, the state should employ them someway somehow and garnish those wages.
Secondly, you left out some very important and relevant issues in your discussion of this issue. Firstly, these children are not created in a vacuum. They were conceived and reared in a specific context and environment that is gendered and often allows the men more social benefits. This sexism often displays itself in the form of who is the one most responsible for the child (ren)'s care on a daily basis from pregnancy to birth. And who is left with the cookie once it's out of the bag sort to speak. I know first hand the results of a mother leaving her babies. I was just one year old when my took the streets. Still, as a single mother of 4 now I know the pains of trying hard to love my children alone all day 24/7 even though they were not products of artificial insemination. And they were in fact conceived the biblical way.
Now, you and I know perfectly well from reading academic studies that most marriages end for some simple reasons, money difficulties or issues and sexual infidelity and domestic abuse. Most of these women who are left with the children are alone even after they may have suffered serious abuse, emotional, physical, sexual and or otherwise. The lines of communication were broken down and often divorce or separation is a refuge for these women. In addition, they are often left in poverty as I have seen in court from going for various issues. And they have to raise the children because the court knows as we do that most of these dads who often abused the mothers are not fit and have not been encouraged to be nurturers and to care for their parents. They do what my father did, he beat my mom to a pulp and committed other untold atrocities against her and forced her to leave her kids behind and got his relatives to take care of them. Now that's the Haitian way. But in the U.S. traditionally, the men often re-marry and those who acquire full custody get another wife or partner to mother their children. And sometimes that starts another cycle of abuse. So, I am all for partial custody when the situation is conducive to it.
Now, I have not even begun to address the fact that child support is not even adequate in most cases and could only probably pay for utilities if that. And the fact that even after "Claudine" and all the advocacy for welfare mothers and so forth black females and others from various races have to repudiate and reject their baby daddies so that the state can enter into a partnership with them that often starts another cycle of systemic abuse.
Lastly, let's get it right my brother, some of these men don't need to be anywhere near the mama or the babies because they probably committed some serious crime (sex addicts for instance can and often go on to become sexual predators against their children) and those who physically abused the mother or doused her in emotional and psychological abuse use visitations and the courts to continue to perpetrate that same abuse.
You know, I decided to respond to this post because of the lengthy comments by the lawyer sista. She sounds just like every woman lawyer I have ever known. (and boy, I have had to deal with an unusual number due to my personal herstory as a end generation transnational Haitian female who is also dark, from a working class background and outspoken etc...) These women are so willing to throw the book at another woman so they can get paid or laid. (Please forgive me I am not trying to imply that she fits the bill) but whenever I have gone to court for domestic violence related issues a black woman lawyer was always there to read me the riot act. And oh, I probably would not qualifty to receive child support due to my babies' daddy's immigration status. But the system is always there to judge our choice to birth poor black babies and to give it up to poor black (illegal immigrant) men.
Best regards,
Ultracet pregnancy. Ultracet.
