Forced Into Fatherhood?

Faith and Family ^ | 5/27/2010 | Danielle Bean

[markomalley]

How much say should a man have in the decision to become a parent?

For Catholics, the answer is easy: A man who doesn’t want to be a parent should not be having sex. That’s where the “freedom of choice” comes in. But the immorality of our secular, pro-abortion culture makes the question significantly more complicated than that.

This month, Elle magazine publishes a story about Greg Bruell, a man who made a pact with his girlfriend that if she became pregnant, she would have an abortion. She had already done that once, but when she became pregnant a second time, she refused to have an abortion. She kept the baby and sought child support.

Infuriated about the “miserable betrayal,” Bruell told Hedrick it was over between them, for good. He believed she’d deliberately gotten pregnant. Then, two months later, as he was leaving a session with his personal trainer, he was served with a lawsuit demanding child support for his unborn child. That’s when Bruell called Mel Feit, a founder of the National Center for Men (NCM), and volunteered to become the next poster boy for male reproductive rights ...

Feit’s list of grievances range from sexist social standards—why should men still be expected to foot the bill on dates? Why is crying or showing weakness verboten for them?—to what he considers discrimination enforced by the state: men’s lack of reproductive rights combined with unfair child support laws. “Reproductive choice isn’t a fundamental right if it’s only limited to people who have internal reproductive systems,” Feit says. “If it only applies to women, it’s a limited right and that weakens it.” In his view, Planned Parenthood’s motto—“Every child a wanted child”—should apply to both people who make the baby.

Undoubtedly, an argument in favor of paternal “freedom of choice” puts abortion proponents in a tricky spot. For example, the article highlights the work of Dalton Conley, the dean of social sciences at New York University, who in his zeal for fathers’ rights dares to argue that “If a father is willing to legally commit to raising a child with no help from the mother, he should be able to obtain an injunction against the abortion of the fetus he helped create.”

Wow. I would guess that most advocates of “reproductive rights” would have difficulty embracing that idea.

If you read the whole sad story, you will find that ultimately Bruell dropped his lawsuit against his girlfriend. He appears to love his family and didn’t have it in him to pursue litigation against them to make a political point.

Let’s pray that human emotion and natural attachment might always score such a quiet victory over attempted perversion of the family unit.

[netmilsmom]

>>I never had a chance to think about ‘what I plan’. It was all taken out of my hands and controlled by the state.<<

We all have choices to make.
Did you choose a woman in which to plant your seed?

Sure did.

Did you know that by doing that she could get pregnant and then you would be expected to support that child?

Hope so.

I’m sorry you picked badly, but you will be supporting that child for 20 years whether you live with the mother or not.

And it’s just 20 years, not forever.

Here is something to make you feel better though. I have two sisters. Both of them were manipulative b!tches with ex-husbands. The guys paid their cash and basically did their time. Right now, out of five kids, one speaks with her mother. All of them love their dads.

What goes around comes around, my FRiend. She may win now, but you will win later.

[240B]

Thank you very much. That is encouraging.
I am over 40 now so 20 years equates to the rest of my functional life.

But, we shall see. thanks again

[netmilsmom]

>>I am over 40 now so 20 years equates to the rest of my functional life.<<

Not really. You can’t even go on SS until 70.

Seriously, I ran a Psych office in Ohio. My boss got RAPED by his ex. Had to pay 4000.00 a month in child support when (I did his books) he made 3700.00 a month. He was despondent when he got the ruling.

I looked at him and said, “It’s not forever.” and it wasn’t.
I also said, “Your children will love you FOR ever.” They do. Sometimes we are dealt really bad cards, but would you really give up your child for some cash? If you had the choice, would you walk away from your kid? No, I know you wouldn’t.

Someday, she’ll get hers. You may not see it, you may not be there, but understand, Karma is a bite to someone who thinks she is right, when she is just a b!tch.

[SmokingJoe]

Wow, careful, that sounds like the argument the pro-aborts use.

Big difference.
I am arguing against a guy trying to force a woman to have an abortion just because he happened to have sex with her one night without using protection.
Going by that thinking the woman should have the power to get him castrated for not using enough protection and knocking her up.
No one should be able to order any operation carried out on someonone else’s body, unless the person is incapacitated or has lost use of their mental faculties.

[firebrand]

You're supposed to say bon-bons.

No one seems to be addressing the problem that if a man can legally oblige a woman to have his child, he is also off the hook if he says he doesn't want it. You can't have it both ways.

Ardent pro-lifers take note: If you think more babies would be saved if men had this right, you are very much mistaken. More women would have abortions, and if they didn't, both mother and child would suffer.

It takes two. What is so hard to understand about that?

[BenKenobi]

If the issue is marraige, than why is abstinence only ok if you are 15?

You don’t want to have kids, don’t get married. If you don’t trust the wife, don’t get married to her. How hard is this? If you do get married, and she pulls this stunt, man up and move on.

You chose her, nobody forced you to get married to her.

If men were men and manned up you’d not see this.

[jackspyder]

don’t you mean the Bible?