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Parenting
MrsGoodkat
member
Unwanted pregnancy and child support
MrsGoodkat
member
in Parenting
For a little Monday morning discussion. What are your thoughts on this? A woman gets pregnant unexpectedly. The father of the baby wants her to terminate or place the baby for adoption. The mother wants to keep the baby. Do you personally think the father should be required to still pay child support if he makes clear from the beginning he does not want the child?
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Re: Unwanted pregnancy and child support
What about him changing his mind? Oh yeah honey, lets have a baby. Oh wait, nevermind, I didn't really mean it.
A man cannot be "tricked" into impregnating a woman. He can be lulled into a false sense of security by choosing to believe her when she says she's on BC and not taking personal responsibility by wearing a condom. I believe it is deplorable for a woman to lie about being on BC, but a man always has the choice to take the responsibility for preventing pregnancy into his own hands by not having sex or wearing a condom.
But if there is an exception made for men who don't want kids, don't you think there might be some guys who will lie? Then it is her word against his.
I agree a million times over.
Any time a man has sex there is some chance a pregnancy will be the result. Every man knows this. If he is not willing to take responsibility for the act of having sex, he should abstain from sexual activities that can result in pregnancy.
I agree it is not clear cut.
Fine, take her to court. Charge her with fraud. Baby still needs to eat. He can choose not to stick his peen in her vagina. I think this should be part of sex education. BC fails sometimes. It's safer sex, not safe sex. Just because you use condoms, BCPs, pull and pray whatever, there is an inherent failure rate. Even if everyone is on the up and up, does everything right, a pregnancy can happen. A man should not be able to say, "but, but, I wore a condom!" (insert whiny voice) and get out of his responsibility to the result of his actions. If he was raped or he can prove his sperm was stolen, then no he shouldn't have to pay for the child.
this
He made the "decision" by choosing to have sex. Sex sometimes equals baby. As far as the legal abortion question goes, as far as the law is concerned, it's not a baby until a certain number of weeks depending on the state. Still part of the woman's body so her body, her decision entirely. Once the baby is born, he has parental rights.
Guess what? Life isn't fair. You don't want a baby, don't have sex. Problem solved!
This.
I can't believe I'm "this"-ing both Brandi Bee and KC at the same time.
Not necessarily. There are some fathers that sign away rights but judges still order them to pay child support.
I believe they have legal contracts to address situations like this as long as both parties agree and one party abdicates parental rights. But it's always wise to check statutes and precedents in the state the baby is raised in.
Sperm donors sign away their rights. In the case of consensual sex, how can someone prove that he "made it clear" from the beginning that he didn't want a baby? It's he said/she said.
That's why the courts don't care about that. All that matters is the baby's best interest.
The medical burden is on the woman, whether she chooses abortion or chooses to carry the child. No other person should be able to tell her what she can and cannot do with her own body. It sucks for the dude but he chose to have sex, as did the woman. If the man had to carry the baby or have an abortion then the situation would be reversed, but since, biologically, his only contribution is one night of fun, then he gets the short end of the stick in this situation.
I am looking at this from purely a biological/medical perspective at this point..
ETA: I do agree that, in an ideal world, a man should have more of a say but it's not an ideal world and if he chooses to engage in intercourse with a woman he needs to be aware that a child he would have to support may be a possible outcome. There is no way to be "fair" in this situation to either of the adults involved. The child comes first.
I can't get the ticker to work, but I have two sons:
Baby RJ, born 1/25/2014
Formerly Twilightmv
Why? Part of accepting responsibility for the woman may be deciding to have an abortion. I don't know from experience, but I imagine that is in no way an easy way out physically or mentally. A woman has do deal with the consequences no matter what her decision is. A man gets to just go on with his life as if nothing happened?
No. Only if both parties agree and the parent that doesn't pay signs away rights. If the father wants to pursue child support, it's his right as well.
Agreed. Either way the woman has a medical and emotional consequence for her actions. Even if she chooses abortion she has to carry that decision with her for the rest of her life, even if she is okay with it.
This is kind of where I am. Yes, having a baby is a possible consequence of having sex. At the same time, one of the possible consequences of having sex with someone who tells you from the beginning he has no interest in being responsible for a baby is that you might have to raise a baby by yourself. If you can accept that and are in a financial/emotional state to deal with it, then go ahead and DTD. Ideally, both parties should have that conversation beforehand, so if there is a surprise pregnancy they already know what his level of involvement is going to be.
I realize that is not always realistic. I think if they don't discuss the possibility of pregnancy beforehand and she ends up pregnant, then he should have to pay. At that point, it's about what the child needs.
Here's the situation I heard about this weekend that spawned my questions.
40-year-old single man has a job where he travels most of the time and makes good money. He uses a big chunk of his money to pay for round-the-clock care for his parents and disabled brother. He lives very minimally himself so that he is able to do this. Man never wants to get married or have kids and has had a vasectomy. He begins seeing a girl who lives in one of the cities he flies to often for business. They have a sexual relationship for about 3 months. She finds out she's pregnant. A paternity test proves the baby is, in fact, his. She chooses to keep the baby and a judge orders him to pay a huge amount of child support based on his income, thereby affecting his ability to afford the same level care for his parents and disabled brother that he had been doing. He's been trying to get the amount reduced but has been unsuccessful so far.
It's hard for me to be so cut and dry. He did have a vasectomy but because it failed he now has to pay all this money in child support for a child he tried to prevent having. Is it realistic to expect a man to abstain from sex for his whole life just because he might get someone pregnant? We hardly expect our teenagers to abstain from sex until they're out of high school, nevermind financially stable enough to provide for an unplanned child.
It's a sh!t situation for sure. Maybe he could go after the doc that did his vasectomy. Was he following medical orders? Getting in for regular sperm counts to make sure nothing had grown back? Did he use condoms as a back up? No matter what the circumstances he still took the risk. I assume his doctor informed him of the failure potential of a vasectomy.
You don't have to abstain from "sex" to avoid pregnancy though. There are many things he could be doing with partners to enjoy sex acts while not actually engaging sex that can result in a pregnancy. And I do expect to fully inform my teenager of the consequences that "she" will have to potentially deal with should she choose to have sex. That includes unwanted pregnancy and STDs. She can make the decision to abstain or take the risk while fully informed of what could happen and how it could affect her life. Same goes for any boys I may have in the future.
Did he really? Vasectomies are not full proof. They have a failure rate too. Sometimes they self-reverse.
We don't know if there was a second form, if the girl said she was on BC or anything.
I think the point was it wasn't a measly child support amount. It was enough to where his parents' and brother's care was taking a hit. He's not trying to get out of paying child support, he's trying to get the amount reduced. The mother isn't currently working.
In the eyes of the law, whether he wanted children or not is irrelevant. If he was so concerned about not having a baby, he should have been using back up BC such as condoms as well as asking this woman to use her own BC. He should have been going to the urologist regularly for sperm count checks because I'm sure he was informed that failure is a possibility albeit a remote one. Or he could have abstained. I feel bad for him, but not bad enough to say he should get to ignore his responsibilities. Even though I feel bad for him, I have a hard time believing that someone that takes such good care of his family would really want to ignore the needs of his child whether he wanted this child or not.
Apparently not as there is a baby now. *no sarcasm*
Team....Brandi....Bee?
::head explodes::
How exactly is carrying the pregnancy, giving birth, paying for at least half of the child's care, and raising the child by herself not "accepting the potential outcomes?"