Absent fathers to be made into scape goats

[ivykaty44]

absent fathers

as a single mother who has lived without maintenence for periods of time and at times struggled to make ends meet I still think it is awful to suggest making a group of people stigmatised.

there are good NoneResidentParents and there are useless NRP, it isn't just absent fathers but sometimes absent mothers. What sort of country do we live in thuogh where we would want to stigmatise a whole group of people.

Better to keep the CSA free and make it work rather than the clerical mess it is at the moment.

I think Xenias idea is a nice one in theory, but would it really be a punishment to stop contact for a parent who cares so little about contact?

My xp is MUCH more interested in contact now that he is financially contributing towards her, so I am beginning to think that a financial penalty may be more effective, for an agreed contact order being broken (rather like the contempt bit previously posted).

I agree that there needs to be parity for rps and nrps so that neither can mess the child about.

Aren't divorcing couples in Texas forced to attend state family counselling so that the dcs don't wind up getting too caught up in the parents split? I seem to recall a tv programme on it and how it seemed very focussed on removing the dcs from the divorce process between the parents and forcing the parents to accept that the chn had rights to a relationship with BOTH parents and that it was the parents responsibility to ensure the dcs were cared for financially and emotionally.

How about it Mr C?

See I'm not sure that I'd be after "punishment" as such for a NRP not turning up. I think I'd be more after ensuring that he doesn't do it again all the time. The problem with punishing a NRP with lack of contact for a bit, is that you are also punishing the child. And also reinforces the idea to feeble-minded NRPs, of family relations up as a sort of "us vs them" scenerio, rather than continually emphasising that this is about the welfare of your child. So I think that a fine, paid to the mother, would be an excellent disincentive. It would punish those fathers who hate their ex-partners more than they love their children, it would slightly inconvenience those who don't but they'd shrug philosophically and figure that at least it's going back to tehir child's home and it would go some way to compensating the RP who has been screwed around. Sounds like a good plan!

Fine is a good idea. Of course some people just lead totally chaotic lives and cannot even hold down a job and there are a whole raft of reasons many of those don't turn up (not that that makes it any easier for the child/other parent).

The only way my children's father when we divorced could inconvenience me given I paid him, I pay for the children alone and they live here was not to have the children at all. I am sure his reasons were much more complex than that but it is how some people react in a divorce. If I weren't a full time working mother of 5 and was a housewife who wanted the chidren with me 100% of the time then the husband in that situation might go for a residence order or 50/50 contact because again it might be what would hurt the hated other most. Thankfulyl most people aren't like this at all and most people I know relatively amicably work out something that works for them.

But why would any resident parent want to subject their child to the whims of an unreliable NRP who is clearly using the relationship with the child just as a means to play with the mother's mind? There are worse fates for a child than to go 'fatherless', and one is to have to have a relationship with a father who is just using you as a way of getting at your mother.

SAF the beauty of having the courts involved is that if you don't pay you get bailiffs knocking at your door, showing up at your place of employment, etc. This is why it's important to go through the courts for something as important as a divorce. You wouldn't get married in a field, with no witnesses, and not have it registered. I am baffled as to why you would get divorced without going through the courts. There is so much at stake financially and wrt your credit rating that it is worth the cost of the court adjudicated divorce, without even thinking of the future arrangements wrt children.

'Aren't divorcing couples in Texas forced to attend state family counselling so that the dcs don't wind up getting too caught up in the parents split? I seem to recall a tv programme on it and how it seemed very focussed on removing the dcs from the divorce process between the parents and forcing the parents to accept that the chn had rights to a relationship with BOTH parents and that it was the parents responsibility to ensure the dcs were cared for financially and emotionally.'

I did that in the US (though not in Texas) and so did my exH, and believe me it is a worthless exercise. No-one is forced to accept anything. For conscientious parents, the message of minimising the harmful effects of divorce hits home, and they tend to bend over backwards trying to appease the other parent no matter how outrageous their demands or behaviour may be for fear they might drag the children into the fray. For those with a sense of entitlement/personality disorder/axe to grind/vindictive nature, the silly programme has no effect whatsoever. They proceed regardless, fighting the ex-spouse by means of the children and the visitation arrangements.

I personally believe every divorce case involving children, custody and visitation should involve a very thorough psychological exam of both adult parties involved, and a history of any kind of abuse of either parent by the other should be taken very seriously indeed by the courts (obviously any abuse of the children too) because of reasons outlined in the Lundy Bancroft book 'Why Does he do That? Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men'. Damn the expense. The welfare of children is at stake and either the government cares or it does not.

I know there are risks, but I think it should be possible to come up with a set of questions that would identify men who are abusers and likely to completely ignore the 'welfare of the children' aspect of their lives, post divorce. It is possible for someone such as Bancroft to determine a set of characteristics that separate the controllnig and angry man from his peers and it should be possible to establish criteria for divorcing parents, to separate the sheep from the goats. The test I have in mind would be one where controlling personalities would be identified.

'I know there are risks, but I think it should be possible to come up with a set of questions that would identify men who are abusers and likely to completely ignore the 'welfare of the children' aspect of their lives, post divorce. It is possible for someone such as Bancroft to determine a set of characteristics that separate the controllnig and angry man from his peers and it should be possible to establish criteria for divorcing parents, to separate the sheep from the goats. The test I have in mind would be one where controlling personalities would be identified.'

Is it only men who are abusive and controlling?
Because that seems to be the theme.

Are Lundy Bancroft's theories recognized by the courts in the UK so they could be used?

I don't think all divorces should go to court, and if parents aren't married I assume they'd have to go to court as well?

If thinks can be sorted amicably, which I'm my experience is most of the time, why would they need to goto court?

It isn't only men who are abusive and controlling.

But society doesn't recognise it when men are abusive and controlling because that's seen as the natural order.

When women are abusive and controlling, the state actually sometimes notices.

Although thinking about it, the state very rarely notices it, in either parent, mother or father.

State institutions are appalling bad at recognising disparity in power relations, in all relationships - men/ women, adult/ children, employer/ employee, rich/ poor ... it has a vested interest, naturally, in denying that a disparity of power has an impact on human relations.

So it only recognises the abuse of power, when that abuse becomes physically violent (and even then, only when it becomes so bad that people are recognisably injured by that physical violence). People can misuse power for years without physical violence, without the state concerning itself with it. And there's an argument about whether the state should concern itself with it - is emotional abuse of adults and children the job of the state to police? There is no doubt that it harms children long term psychologically and emotionally -but is it the state's business? As long as those people are not committing crimes and paying their taxes, should the state prevent them from committing or being the victims of emotional abuse? (I don't know the answer to that btw, am just throwing it out there.)

Truck - my brother and his ex weren't married and their separation and child residency etc. had to be sorted out through the courts, yes.

I think MA idea was that all divorcing couples with children should go to court.

So my point was, and not married couples as well?

1. How would the courts cope?
2. Not all separations are hostile.

What about a mediation session when you have children setting out who plans to work full-time or part-time and what the childcare and housework arrangements will be.

And what the arrangements will be when you split.

I think it comes as a huge shock to men(z) that if they work full-time and their partner stays at home that this means they'll see a lot less of their children when they split-up.

Yes I think that's a very good point SaF.

It taps into that thing which I always find so irritating about David Cameron and his ilk - the "broken families" broken record.

The state only notices "broken families", once the parents have split up. They don't notice them, when the parents live together. Emotional abuse, bullying, low level violence, disrespect and ever-present fear in a household, isn't the state's concern unless the violence becomes visible and noticeable. As long as the parents live together, it's all rosy in the garden.

And some families which DC would characterise as "broken" families are not broken at all - they are very happy and functional and have broken a circle of abuse and neglect by splitting up and re-constructing their families. This idea that divorced families are necessarily less functional, is such bollocks. Quite often the divorced families are more functional than they would have been, had the parents stayed together. So yes, I do think you are onto something with the different standards of parenting required for single versus partnered parents.

That's should be 'non-married couples'

Maybe people should do this before tehy marry Truck.

I think a lot of people just fall into habits without realisng the long term implications of them.

Or before they have children, I should say

Most people would accept that if you have to go to court in a sense you've failed, particularly with contact issues and the less courts are involved the better arrangements are. However sometimes there is no choice.

It also helps where laws and rules are clear. For all their faults for the average earning couple the CSA rules of 15% net income one child 20% 2, 25% 3 or more at least are fairly simple for most employees. For contact tehre is no state norm, no indication of what is fair except a rather okld fashioned women don 't work concept which isn't true which has suggested men aer perfectly happy to see their chidlren every other weekend which is grossly unfair on non resident parent men where both parents work.

'i don't know that courts or mediation could ever sort out that basic acrimony though. there's so much point scoring and power games at play. the majority of women i know who are single mum's have been dragged through hell by their ex's using anything they can to get back at her or still have control over her life ie. access and money.'

I would be willing to bet money that these people could be identified trough a battery of interviews and tests.

If courts are not to be involved then some other means of enforcing agreements needs to be found, something with teeth, to make the rules clear and to be able to go after people who contravene them -- serial litigants, deadbeats, people motivated by hostility to the ex spouse and who couldn't care less about the children, etc.

I think 50-50 is more about the alleged rights of parents than the best interests of children or any sort of idea that one permanent residence that the children call home is important to children.

Perhaps everyone should have personality tests to test suitability?

All sounds a bit 'Brave New World'

We do near enough 50-50 it's what the children wanted.