just a thought...

[Emasculated1]

i was wondering, is it possible to change the federal laws regarding child support and child custody? i mean, we as americans have the right to address the government about grievances, why not this? SPARC and other organizations like it could easily do this. hell, i'd be happy to testify. i think 1. that if a woman lies on her welfare form as to the whereabouts of the father(as my oldest son's mother did) in order to recieve welfare benefits, then she should automatically be arrested for fraud once she "reveals" where the father is in order to get child support money, 2. that child support and child custody should be automatically determined once the child support order is put in. no man should be broke and have to try to get a lawyer just to get his parental rights when she didn't have to hire a lawyer to get money from him. 3. child support should be a 50/50 thing, not just based on what he makes. if i have to pay for my children, so should they. dollar for dollar, and if i pay the state, should should they. make them get a job and keep a job, have their wages garnished like i have, since they got welfare benefits in the first place. 4. take every child support case as case by case. if the father isn't a deadbeat, why treat him like one? as far as pay and custody, my case may be different from yours, so why treat both of us the same? make the case workers actually WORK and treat each case as individuals and act accordingly. i can't see any women's group argue these ideas, unless they are totally against the fathers (which alot of them are.) i know this seems naive, but i'm just asking. any thoughts?
My blood...My babies...My life.

[Brent]

Could you please pick another icon for your avatar?

I think that your use of the avatar I normally use will lead to some confusion.

[c_alexander]

In order to change the laws you have to first understand them. Also if we were only talking about a few laws gettign them changed would be easy. As it stadn you are not jsut talking about changing a few laws..it goes much deeper then that.

1. The federal government PAYS the states incentives for collecting CS
2. $500,000,000 comes out of social security for "incentives" and was included in partof Bill Clintons Welfare reform
3. There are other federal programs that "add" to these incentives and can pay up to 3 times the amountof money the state collects
4. The states are fundign their budgets with this money along child support that is never "claimed"

Imagine if you will a police officer that got paid to write tickets. The more tickets he wrote the more he got paid. Now imagine that there was no agency to verify his tickets were legitimate. Imagine that the higher the fine on the tickets the more money the police officer recieved. Now imagine the police officer was struggling for money....do you get where I am going with this? This is why judges are awarding custody to one parent and making the other pay CS instead of ordering joint custody. This is why so many states have strict cs arrears programs which go after the mythical "deadbeat dads".

To truly tackle this issue you must END once and for all any and all incentives. States should instead be rewarded for orderign shared parenting whenever possible and each parent should be responsible for support the child EQUALLY.

Krights radio recent sent out some e-mails regarding legislation that would cut these incentives by over 40%. I might suggestion checking out their site adn yahoo e-mail group for more info.

You MUST understand that the onyl way to bring about change in this situation is to hit the state governments in their wallets.

[MYSONSDAD]

http://www.clasp.org/publications/child_support_cuts.pdf

I had posted this on the CS board. This will give you an idea on what is going on.

Also educate yourself on your state statues. Knowledge is key. Keep up on changes.

[c_alexander]

I read that article and I must say that I DO NOT like the way this Vicki Turetsky presents it. It is obvious that she is biased in favor of these incentives. Whenver this topic is brought up there is alsways someone that raises the idea that if fathers where to have their kids 50% of the time and each parent where to support the children equally that these mothers would fall into financial ruin and have to rely on welfare.
This may be the case in some cases, typically familes that would be on welfare regardless, but not all. As a matter of fact in a MAJORITY of divorced familes this would NOT be the case.

Given the fact that women are given the same educational and employment opportunities as men why are men typically having to bear the brunt of the financial burden? Why do I pay CS to my ex wife that lives in a $300,000 house, while I live in a basement, drives a $20,000 new car, while I drive an old car, and makes almost double my income when I am perfectly capable of taking my daughter 50% of the time and supporting her when I have her?

I think the biggest fight is not goign to be changing the laws, but rather changing the attitudes of people and bringing the truth to light about these incentives and the entire CS system.

[Emasculated1]

but, that's my point...
the image of fathers is either a toothless, shirtless, shoeless, thug or crackhead living with some woman and ducking cs, or some superrich man with a younger bimbo stuck to his arm, a benz in the drive, and ducking cs.. i am not near those images, yet i am in that boat. to me, it seems like the father is a walking atm that's good enough to pay but should have 0 to do with the child. remember 1-800-support? all those women with their kids in the background, talking about the deadbeat that didn't pay and these people went and found him and got the money? where's ours with the father holding his child, speaking on the evil-as-hell woman that kept the kids from dad and 1-800-get-kids got her ass? it is our image that is part of the problem. i do believe that there are deadbeats out there. hell, my girlfriend was married to one. but him and i are two different people. i'm going broke over here, and i'm still nowhere close to having my boys. but, to let mainstream america tell it, every man that has bore kids and couldn't work it out with the mother is/was/will be a deadbeat. we have to change that perception. and that is where SPARC and organizations like them have to step up. if NOW wants to defend the woman, fine. but, for every deadbeat dad story they bring, they got several women that are screwing the father over royally and draping themselves in the single mother flag. it's way past time the father gets his say. like i said, i will gladly be the face and the spokesman for it. i know i'm not the only one going through this, and i wouldn't do it to further myself. i want the playing field leveled, even if some woman's feelings get hurt and some women come out if it looking like pure evil. in the end, all any real father wants is the chance to give his children the best that he has. he wants his kids, and it's high time the world knew it.
My blood...My babies...My life.

[daddymccoy21]

I totally agree with you. Most of the time, fathers are forced to pay support payemtns, simply because the mohter refuses to work. these women KNOW that they can get away with not working - so why not do it?

I had time taken away from me (an concurrently was given a higher support payment) when my ex quit her job. She came into court and told the judge, "He has to work! I dont! Take away the time he has during business hours becuase he cant be with the kids anyways."

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Fathers can win custody too
http://www.familylawsecrets.com
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[Bolivar]

Federal incentives exist to make children fatherless
Phyllis Schlafly


May 9, 2005

[font size=+2]Why has Congress appropriated taxpayer money to give perverse incentives that break up families and deprive children of their fathers? [/font]The built-in financial incentives in the current child-support system have expanded the tragedy of fatherless children from the welfare class to millions of non-welfare divorced couples.

Americans have finally realized that providing generous welfare through Aid to Families with Dependent Children was counterproductive because the father had to disappear in order for the mother to receive taxpayer-paid benefits. Fathers left home, illegitimacy rose in alarming numbers and children were worse off.

AFDC provided a taxpayer-paid financial incentive to reward girls with their own monthly check, food stamps, health care and housing if they had illegitimate babies. "She doesn't need me, she's got welfare" became the mantra.

Congress tried to reform the out-of-control welfare system by a series of child-support laws passed in 1975, 1984, 1988, 1996 (the famous Republican welfare reform), and 1999.

Unfortunately, these laws morphed the welfare system into a massive middle-class child-support system that deprives millions of children of fathers who never abandoned them.

As former President Ronald Reagan often said, "The most terrifying words in the English language are: "I'm from the government and I'm here to help you."

People think that child-support enforcement benefits children, but it doesn't. When welfare agencies collect child support, the money actually goes to the government to reimburse it for welfare payments already given to mothers, supposedly to reduce the federal budget (which, of course, is never reduced).

In 1984, Congress passed the Child Support Enforcement Amendment. It required states to adopt voluntary guidelines for child-support payments.

In 1988, Congress passed the Family Support Act, which made the guidelines mandatory - along with criminal enforcement - and gave states less than one year to comply. The majority of states quickly adopted the model guidelines conveniently already written by a Department of Health and Human Services consultant who was president of what was shortly to become one of the nation's largest private collection companies, which makes its profits on the onerous guidelines that create arrearages.

The 1988 law extended the guidelines to ALL child-support orders, even though the big majority of those families never had to interact with government in order to pay or receive child support. This massive expansion of federal control over private lives uses a Federal Case Registry to exercise surveillance over 19 million citizens whether or not they are behind in child-support payments.

The states collect the child-support money and deposit it in a state fund, but the federal government pays most of the administrative costs and, therefore, dictates the way the system operates through mandates and financial incentives. The federal government pays 66 percent of the states' administrative overhead costs, 80 percent of computer and technology-enhancement costs, and 90 percent of DNA testing for paternity.

In addition, the states share in a nearly $500 million incentive reward pool based on whatever the state collects. The states can get a waiver to spend this bonus money anyway they choose.

However, most of the child support owed by welfare-class fathers is uncollectable. Most of them are either unemployed or have annual incomes less than $10,000.

So, in order to cash in on federal bonus money, build their bureaucracies and brag about successful child-support enforcement, the states began bringing into the government system middle-class fathers with jobs who were never (and probably would never be) on welfare. These non-welfare families have grown to represent 83 percent of child-support cases and 92 percent of the money collected, creating a windfall of federal money flowing to the states.

The federal incentives drive the system. The more divorces, and the higher the child-support guidelines are set and enforced (no matter how unreasonable), the more money state bureaucracies collect from the federal government.

Follow the money. The less time that noncustodial parents (usually fathers) are permitted to be with their children, the more child support they are required pay into the state fund, and the higher the federal bonus to the states for collecting the money.

States have powerful incentives to separate fathers from their children, to give near-total custody to mothers, to maintain the fathers' high-level support obligations even if their income is drastically reduced and to hang onto the father's payments as long as possible before paying them out to the mothers. The General Accounting Office reported that in 2002 that states were holding $657 million in undistributed child support.

Fatherless boys are 63 percent more likely to run away and 37 percent more likely to abuse drugs. Fatherless girls are twice as likely to get pregnant and 53 percent more likely to commit suicide. Fatherless boys and girls are twice as likely to drop out of high school and twice as likely to end up in jail.

We can no longer ignore how taxpayer money is providing incentive for divorce and creating fatherless children. Nor can we ignore the government's complicity in the predictable social costs that result from more than 17 million children growing up without fathers.

[Bolivar]

A conglomerate of views I have accumulate over the years.   Long,,, I know.  


The "American way of divorce" (mother gets "custody"; father gets "visitation" and financial child support obligation) is based on outmoded, erroneous, and damaging concepts concerning men's and women's parenting roles, abilities, and parent-child relationships. As such, it serves primarily to prolong and intensify the suffering and thereby to inflict great emotional harm on our children.

Why is a father who gets up and goes to work every day in order to provide his children with a decent standard of living seen by the courts as less nurturing than the parent who stays home, enjoying the fruits of that labor?

I see both acts as at least equally caretaking.

Can you imagine what it feels like to go from a dad accustomed to seeing his kids every day and being an integral part of their lives, to overnight being lucky if he is allowed to see them even one day out of the week.  Overnight we become a second-class citizen--i.e., a "visitor" in our child's life.

Under current law, the courts only award shared custody when both parents cooperate, thus an incentive is made to the mother to fabricate high conflict divorce for the purpose of 'winning' more custody and thus more money (child support).

Adding to the father's problem is the federal child support enforcement program, which is not for the children of course. The incentive in the Child Support System is the billions of dollars that Congress spends each year to keep people interested.    

States receive "incentive funds" in proportion to the amount of child support collected.  In order to maximize the amount of funds they receive, states enrolled as many Parents(usually men) as they can.  No longer does one Parent pay the other Parent directly for Child Support.  All payments are made through the state, all payments are counted as "collections."  

So,,, States child support enforcement program receives additional funding in proportion to the amount of child support paid(collected).  Therefore, an increase in the amount ordered will increase the amount taxpayers provide to the federal governments Division of Child Support Enforcement, which inturns increases the States dole.

Everybody in government understands the scheme. It's pork. It's a brand of corruption older government itself. A prospective enemy was demonized ("dads", Deadbeat Dads) and people were called to arms against them; pledging their money and loyalty to the cause.

By States making one parent the Custodial Parent(usually mom) and the other NON-Custodial Parent(usually dad) they maximizes amount of child support can be collected.  Shared Parenting does NOT help the state profit.

Mentioned before, arbitrarily high (profitable) child support is also a strong incentive to push for sole custody by mothers knowing it will be far easier for them to be awarded sole custody, and their financial status remaining the same.

The system rewards the mom for removing the children from their father's by awarding often times superfluous levels of support and alimony, as well as the retention of the home and in many cases, their own legal fees being paid by the husband/father.  

A fundamental point which is rarely ever talked about is "What roll should the Government play in regulating the family?".  The Government does not look at the intact family to decide how things are going in their home, (unless it's so bad that neglect is present), tell each parent how much time they get with the children, tell one parent how much they must give the other parent, putting them in jail if they do not comply.   Nor would we dare.  It's a double standard and a clear violation of our civil rights. You don't even have to disagree with CS to see it's true.

While society has finally acknowledged that women are more than "baby machines" and are deserving of equal economic opportunity (whether or not they are earning money), it refuses to recognize that men are more than "working machines" and are concomitantly deserving of equal domestic/parenting opportunity (whether or not they are doing much, or as much, child care).

Women can hold important and stressful jobs, and men can render loving and nurturing care to babies, and these tasks can be accomplished before, within, or after marriage, as circumstances permit.  

 Fathers need and want to parent (not visit) their children, just as mothers do.  Children need and want nurturing, not visiting, from both their parents.

As men, we face an uphill battle in society and in the courts during the divorce process – especially if we have kids and want to stay in their lives. The stereotype of the 'deadbeat dad' and the dad that just walks away from his family leaving his kids fatherless is, sadly, how most people see us.

The reality is that the majority of men are not like this.  While some men do 'walk away' from their families, they do so out of sheer frustration and a sense of utter defeat at being basically ripped from their children's lives and awarded no parental rights at all, in the hands of the courts.  As for the remaining, almost all are forced away from their kids by spiteful ex-wife's.

Sadly the 'walk away' problem has been viewed as dads being neglectful of his responsibility, which is making money for the family.    The wrath of politicians and the intellectuals has been directed at the biological father's dereliction of his economic duties to the child he has sired. A new bogeyman was invented in our urban mythology: the Deadbeat Dad.

Many 'walk away' now labeled "dead beat dads" objected to there plight through the only means they had available (they stop paying). That prompted the "so call" need for support enforcement, which actually didn't work either. Fathers became so frustrated with the system that they disappeared, or willingly faced prosecution. Only then did the courts pull their heads out of their**'s and recognize that keeping fathers involved was the best way to ensure support was continued.

On that note I argue, stop telling us that 4 days a month is sufficient to being a Dad and kids get the support they need. This is not enough time to be a real dad, it is more like a visit to grammas.


1) Child support has nothing to do with supporting children.

2)  If someone is forcefully removed from a family, the family cannot morally expect that person to motivated and continue to support their goals and desires.

3) For every child there are two people who made a decision that led to the child's being. Holding one to a different standard than the other is morally corrupt and offensive to logic.

The adversarial construct of the system is the problem. Money (and/or control, often combined with revenge) is the driving factor. In today's society in the US, a divorce between two people includes divorce of the children and one of the parents in most cases.

Therein, in my opinion, lies the basic problem.


Now add the stereotyping of men and women rolls, the Family Court system becomes heavily stacked against men. It favors women. Feel free to argue this point (and most women will), but it is a fact for almost every man that has gotten a divorce. From excessive alimony, to the back-door alimony of income-based child support, to the presumption (most times expressly forbidden by law) that the mother is the more fit parent.  It's all in favor of the mother.

In divorce dads human right to actively parent their child is stolen from him--most often without any evidence that he did anything wrong and is told that this decision is in the child's best interest. Their money is stolen repeatedly, for the next 20 years as ex-wife support and child support.(anything above what is required to raise the child is tax free alimony)

Unfortunately society's still views of dads as incompetent in raising children and only plays a small roll in there development.

For instance---
* A dad, who pays his Child Support, but has Zero interactions with the children is OK.
* A dad, who does not pay his Child Support, but loves and is constantly active with the children is BAD.

[em]Judges appear to believe cash replaces a loving father –[/em] Sad but true, but a lot of people make tons of money off the child support industry at the expense of the estranged dad.
 
[em]Although child support is calculated for both parents –[/em]  only one parent is required to produce it - This highlights the hypocrisy, inequities, and lack of accountability for child support in the divorce industry.

Men are not genetically predisposed to abandon their children, nor do they refuse to pay child support specifically in order to hurt their children.
 
Custody cases are not about the "best interest of the children". They are about winning, with the looser being striped of their involvement with their child. Forever providing the so-called winning parent with malevolent control over the losing party, via access to the children and ability to have the other party incarcerated.

The children should not suffer the loss of a parent because an adult relationship fails. Children have a right to loving relationships with both of their parents. The courts must refrain from vilifying one parent while placing blind faith in the other. The right to raise a child should be constitutionally protected. The courts should not so invasively determine that a child should be stripped of one of their parents.

Politicians showing how sympathetic they are to the problems of a "Single Parent Home" create programs to deal with these difficulties.  The focus of all these undertakings has been upon improving the problems that flow from fatherlessness(Single Parent Home) and have NOT looked at WHY the desertion occurs.  What causes a "father" to abandoned the family?. The focus has tended to be on the economic (ir)responsibilities of the "father" after the man has been precluded from or peeled away from the role of social father.

Of interest is the fact that, if 100% of the Deadbeat Dads fully carry out 100% of their financial responsibilities, the problem of fatherlessness is not addressed at all. Only the financial burdens of the mother are lessened. The family is still separated. The child is still fatherless.

Currently, I see my son four days a month. That is 26 days he goes without his father. 26 days with no kisses no hugs, no guidance, no nurturing, and no bedtime stories from his father that lives 10 miles down the road. I am stripped of any decision making with regard to his schooling or medical care. I am constantly barred from even speaking to him. All for the crime of a failed marriage.

My wife filed for divorce. For this I am condemned. I have been stripped of the right held most precious to me. The right to raise my son. Unfortunately, I am not the only one who must bear this cruel sentence. My son has been denied his father, not to mention the whole maternal side of his family. These sentences were handed out based on outrageous, manufactured claims, with no facts or evidence required. The ruling has been applied in a manner designed to fit the fancy of the judge rather than any standard of law.

I am an outstanding father dedicated to my son. Four days a month is not enough time to be an active involved parent. I need more time. My son needs more time. He deserves to be nurtured by his irreplaceable Father.

Lets stop the discrimination by presuming that both parents are entitled to equal parenting rights and responsibilities when entering a divorce or legal separation.

I still struggle against huge odds to be able to be a part of my son's life. It is an uphill, tough, grueling struggle that takes its financial and emotional toll on me and my friends and family on a daily basis. It is also a struggle that I will never succumb to, for any reason.

This is my son I'm talking about. My child. My flesh and blood, and the absolute love of my life.

[Emasculated1]

ok, so where do i fit in?

i admit fully that at the time i fathered my sons with these women i had no intention to be with them. i told them so. my father walked out on me when i was 12, and i vowed that i would never do the same thing. my sons don't carry my last name, i wasn't included on the birth certificates, and my sons don't even know my side of their family. i have, since the moment of their birth, tried to be the best father i could be. i stopped drinking, have worked long before they were born, and was willing to do anything to raise them right. but, i wasn't allowed to. if i wasn't being seduced by one mother, i was ignored by the other. i have had my soul crushed because of all this, and yet i press on. my hatred of women grew, only because every woman i talked to spoke of working and paying cs, but never of fighting for what is mine. it all seemed to favor the mothers, no matter how i sliced it. i didn't know about the incentives that the states get to break someone like me, and i thank you all for the info, but it doesn't make me feel any better. i want my sons more than i want to live, and without them i'm not really living anyway. i hear all the divorce horror stories, and i cringe. but my situation is different. i never married these women, and i never will. i contemplated it, just to be near my sons, but i knew to be a slave to the state was one thing, a slave to their mothers something else. my youngest son calls another man daddy, and it breaks my heart when he said it. this isn't life. this isn't what i wanted my family life to be like. i have no hope except what my girlfriend and her kids give me. when i asked the initial question, i did it to voice what has been in my heart for 5 years now. when do i get a break? when is it my time to finally get to be the father i know i can be? i filled out an income form for my lawyer today, and it was the most depressing thing i had ever seen. i had done one years ago, and the states ignored it. this time, my lawyer helped me. i have nothing. if i died today, i don't even have enough money to bury myself. and all i keep seeing in my head is these women enjoying both my money and my kids. grinning at me with hate in their eyes, my sons calling some other men daddy. that's my title! and i come here, and i know i'm not alone. yeah, this is a real pity party, but i can't vent to my girl. she doesn't understand. no one in my family does.  i swallow the pain of not being the father i want to be, swallow the fact that i can't even afford to take care  of myself, and i smile to hide the tears in my heart. should i hate these women? the state of kansas and missouri? the federal government? NOW? any woman i see? are they all the enemies? i don't know and i don't have answers. maybe some of you do. i guess in the end, what i am asking for is hope. can anyone here give me a glimmer of hope? tell me it'll be ok? tell me i'll get my babies soon? or just a prayer?
My blood...My babies...My life.