Please or to access all these features

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Should Paternity testing be mandatory?

157 replies

mholz · 17/06/2018 01:00

Considering its Father's day, to cut stress on social welfare; should paternity testing be made mandatory to encourage fairness on Child support payments and to call out deadbeat dads.

OP posts:
CheeseWithCheeseOnTheSide · 20/06/2018 17:59

Any honest woman would not have a issue with this"

This honest woman would. I'll be damned if the kids get put through DNA paternity testing just because their parents relationship broke down >10 yrs down the line.. Ummy and daddy don't love one another, so we're going to assume mum's a gold digging slaaaag and get your parentage tested. Even if I didn't mind, the kids might and be within their rights to refuse consent.

SoddingUnicorns · 20/06/2018 17:57

@SardineReturns sorry I didn’t get that you were being ironic.

SardineReturns · 20/06/2018 17:46

Yes not my view, pointing out that men who think this way, whether they realise it or not, have the same mindset as men (societies) that advocate child marriage, FGM, virginity testing etc and also blame women for things like rape.

The mindeset is based in male insecurity and a basic hatred of women and girls.

Whatshallidonowpeople · 20/06/2018 17:19

Who's going to pay for it?

SoddingUnicorns · 20/06/2018 17:14

I hope it is, but given the influx of trolls/they who shall not be named on MN lately I’m never sure.

CheshireChat · 20/06/2018 17:12

I thought Sardine's post was sarcastic?! Surely it has to be.

SoddingUnicorns · 20/06/2018 17:06

Women and girls in general are corrupt and will in turn corrupt good men if given half a chance. Checks that apply across the board to women and girls to prove that they are "moral" are therefore perfectly reasonable

You’re actually serious aren't you? Who do you think you are? What right to you have to label all women? My children certainly don’t need DNA tests, and I’d be fucking furious if I was forced to have them in order to prove my own morals.

SardineReturns · 20/06/2018 17:04

Notsureaboutit

Because women are lying liars and need to be "checked"

A bit like virginity testing in other countires

Women and girls in general are corrupt and will in turn corrupt good men if given half a chance. Checks that apply across the board to women and girls to prove that they are "moral" are therefore perfectly reasonable.

CheshireChat · 20/06/2018 17:01

Notsureaboutit But why mandatory? Completely different as an option, but why make it mandatory? DP doesn't need one, DS used to be a mini mirror until fairly recently.

SardineReturns · 20/06/2018 16:59

This is a modern take on an old old story isn't it.

Where women are lying, immoral, craven bitches who are out to entrap helpless innocent men.

This is the attitude that results in FGM & child marriage in other parts of the world. The exact same thinking. Women LIE, all of them. How can I make sure it is mine.

The male obsession with paternity has absolutely been the driver for the obscene oppression of women all over the world for centuries.

What is interesting is that forcible pregnancy - rape - all that stuff - is usually blamed on the women as well. The punishment for "adultery" when it is rape is death for the victim in some countries...

All from the same source.

Some think this thread - the suggestion in it is neutral, a benevolent suggestion to a terrible problem.

In fact all it is about is male insecurity and their desire to control.

The biggest issue with child maintenance in the UK is that vast numbers of men dont' pay anything and we have stacks of children living in poverty as a result. Srangely, that's not seen as a problem.

BertieBotts · 20/06/2018 16:40

WTF? How on earth would it save money, you do realise paternity testing isn't free?

Notsureaboutit · 20/06/2018 16:36

I don’t know what impact it will have on paying child support but I do believe dna testing should be made manatory. My husband was conned by his ex-wife until a dna revealed the truth. As soon as a woman signs up for child support, a dna test should be automatically carried out. If the guy refuses because he is blindsighted by love, he should be given the option further down the road , should he become suspicious. Any honest woman would not have a issue with this and anyone who thinks a man should pay for a kid that isn’t his because she is unsure who the daddy is, is immoral. I know someone refused a dna test who pays child support for a kid he hasn’t seen since a baby and can’t get her details to summon her to court for a dna. Well, he is counting down the days until it falls out of the hands of the child support this year and you have the choice of sorting the payments yourself. He is getting a lawyer on standbye, this woman has no idea what’s going to hit her. Her facebook pictures show this kid is clearly not his.

SardineReturns · 20/06/2018 15:38

cheese with cheese excellent point!

SardineReturns · 20/06/2018 15:37

when the conversation is abut dead beat dads then it seems reaosnable

mums are usualyl fairly sure it's their baby...

this conversation is about dads

CheeseWithCheeseOnTheSide · 20/06/2018 13:17

Those in charge wouldn't allow it anyway... Imagine the number of illegitimate children of the top 1% suddenly having a claim of their wealth... I can think of one or two top royals who'd [allegedly] suddenly find themselves in a bit of a pickle!

LeighaJ · 20/06/2018 13:14

It's intrusive and implies the woman has been slutting about so much that she has no idea who the father of her baby is and that the father needs big brother to tell him whether or not he's the father. All under the guise of it being for their own good.

"they’re not paying because they’re arseholes "

Also ^this.

SoddingUnicorns · 20/06/2018 13:14

I find the term dead beat dads really sexists as it always refers to men

The majority of absent parents are men. So it’s realistic. Obviously not all absent parents are men, but the vast majority are.

Kursk · 20/06/2018 13:09

To make this idea work you would have to collect the DNA of every man, and for equality women.

I wouldn’t trust the government with a goldfish let alone that much data. For starters the country will become even more of a police state.

Vicky1990 · 20/06/2018 12:53

I find the term dead beat dads really sexists as it always refers to men, if you want to use that term then dead beat parent would be more accurate.
It must be devastating for a man to bring up and support a child only to find out that he is in fact not the child's father..

theycallmebabydriver · 20/06/2018 10:37

Apparently around 11% of children's fathers arn't who they believe

I'm trying to find the study but I remember watching a programme about human evolution a few years ago - it referenced a study that was done in a hospital (it was in the UK, Essex I think) where they took generic material from the babies and parents that were born there over a set period of time (presumably with consent from the parents!) and it found that 13% of the babies had a different father to the one that was tested. I think the study was originally set up to look at genetic diseases but threw this out as a side note and they cancelled the study as a result. Wish I could track it down.

SoddingUnicorns · 20/06/2018 10:19

Mandatory paternity testing works on the assumption that women are liars who can’t be trusted to be faithful in relationships or honest about who’s fathered their children

It’s frankly insulting to the majority of women to suggest this

This is how I feel about this.

ExFury · 20/06/2018 10:17

There’s no point in creating more liabilities for maintenance when CMS is utterly utterly shite.

mholz · 20/06/2018 10:03

Thank you everyone for your contributions. I have learn a lot by reading this thread.

OP posts:
CheshireChat · 17/06/2018 21:01

They had concerns fairly recently about the wrong baby being taken home at the Royal London Hospital, not to mention a whole host of other issues.

Not on topic, but I like how they introduced baby tags, but not one peep about improving care for the mothers (at least using their name rather than the bed number...).

I wouldn't want everyone's details to be stored by the government, I wouldn't actually mind penalties for women that have lied, though how on earth would you prevent them from significantly affecting the child I don't know.

Men pay higher tax because they earn more, women get more benefits and pay less tax because they earn less and are usually the RP. I thought this would've been fairly obvious.

Tessliketrees · 17/06/2018 20:59

My son recently had genetic testing done and we were told by the genetasist the figure is 11%. We had to be warned as it would come up in the test of dh wasnt the dad

I stand by my statement.

He may have meant "11% of the people I have tested..." but that would be the best he could do.

Swipe left for the next trending thread