Mother can keep birth a secret

[MamaMaiasaura]

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7109774.stm what do you think about this?

I saw a report on this a few days ago elsewhere - the mum wants the child to be adopted hence the need to ask her parents and the child's father if they agree with the adoption or if they would take the child themselves.
IIRC In the report I read, it said that the father was a work colleague who had a one night stand with her whilst 'on a break' from a long term relationship - he is now back with his long term partner.

A very difficult situation. My first thought was that the father should be informed. I do feel that it was not a good thing that this was brought before a court. This kind of thing should be sorted out outwith the public area.

There is a case in Germany at the moment, what do you think of this?

A woman took legal action against her ex partner (or rather, they had a long-term affair) to force him to have contact with their son. The father of the child is married and is not interested in the boy, now 8yo. He has promised his wife not to have anything to do with the woman or the child.

The mother started legal action when the boy was 2yo. The mother's case was sucessful but the father is still refusing to see his son. He has appealed, and the case is now to be heard before the Consitutional Court.

The tragic thing is that the mother has now lost interest and the boy is living in an orphanage.

I do not understand how these people can do this to a vulnerable little boy.

DrSpeck - that's really tragic.

inthegutter - unfortunately there are many instances where the parental rights of the father is -correctly IMO- dubious, more's the pity

What I do find telling is that social services broke the law by telling her parents ahead of any court decision. Described as 'a mistake'. Some bloody mistake. Just adds to the impression that SS are interfering busybodies who assume they are always right and can do as they like with other peoples' lives. I am sure that any SWs on MN are decent human beings who try to do a good job but ...

Just another way to take rights away from fathers. They should be ashamed of themselves

Looking at this I feel that this young woman has put the interests of the child first - she has put the child up for adoption, not an easy choice to make but the child is being offered a home with parent or parents that will want this baby.

It is her choice, the court has decided this. At anytime the father could have made contact with this person and it seems he is back in his previous relationship and has put his head in the sand - your telling me a work collegue hasn't noticed?!

Social service have taken this to court to "cover" their backs incase this case comes back on them in years to come and they are sued. There actions are not in the interst of the child but purley selfish as to not get into trouble at a later date.

A mother putting the interests of a child before anyone else and she is berated, I feel that is somehow unfair.

How do you know the father wouldn't want to raise the child? Or his family? How is it fair that this choice has been taken away?

Thing is, without a paternity test there is no way of knowing who the father is. This is true of all pregnancies - you are reliant on the word of the mother unless you have a DNA test.

God if the father was that bothered about his rights he could have hung around for nine months to see whether there were any results from the unprotected sex he had during a one-night stand. It doesn't sound to me as if he was that bothered yet everybody's up in arms on his behalf.

It's not an ideal situation but it's still better than everybody else except the mother, who lets remember created and grew the child in her body, having a veto over what happens to her baby.

Those of you who are up in arms, do you think it would be right for the father of the unborn child to force the mother to go through with a pregnancy rather than terminating? By allowing the mother the right to that decision, the father is also being deprived of his perceived rights as the father...

Lets face it males in this type of situation don't really have any control - perhaps this is really the issue.

Nature allows only woman to actually procreat and so there is an imbalance between the sexes.

Forcing a woman to name a father and be forced to tell him will in the future push woman to hide pg and then abandon their babies on doorsteps etc. Would you be up in arms then - back street abortions were a consequence of it being illegal. Problems don't go away they are just driven underground and then the consequences can be far worse.

Until mankind invents an incubatour to procreat outside of the womb instead of leaving the foetus inside the womb then leave a woman to choose what happens inside her own body.

if she had been in a relationship with a guy and had fallen pregnant but noty realised until after they had split then i would feel she should tell him. but it was a one night stand.

the whole point ( for both parties) is no strings fun. no one has a one night stand with the hopes of concieving.

i doubt the man in question WANTS to know. he is more than likely very happilty getting on with his life without giving this girl a second thought.

the child will be adopted and given a warm loving home by people who can show her the love and care she deserves.

elizabeth - for this first time ever....I AGREE lol

i think he should be given a right to decide, in this case he would not be persued for child support so thats not the arguement, but surely he has the right to decide if he wants to be a father?!

when i got pregnant with dd at 17yo i turned to dh (then dp) and asked him what he wanted to do, and told him whatever he wanted i was keeping this baby, but if he said then (right at the begining, not 9 months down the line) that he wanted nothing to do with us i would have walked out of his life and never bothered him again.

I made my decision but i gave him a choice

"but surely he has the right to decide if he wants to be a father?"

So, would he have the right to force the mother to have the baby if she wanted a termination because he wants to be a father?

agree with soupy and , again, for the first timne, with elizabetth

women have to have the ultimate say, or it is a slippery slope

I think the father has a right to know - in my opinion any time a dick and a vag meet without protection then a child is always going to be a possibility.

I think this is a horrible infringement of 'human' rights.

We bleat on and on about two parents being responsible - we can't just ignore that.

i think the father has the right to know whats to say he wouldnt want to raise the child himself

We are not sure what sort of a man hw was either, she might have had jolly good reasons for not telling

Or even better could have thought up the original " I don't know"

Does this have implications for mens rights to oppose abortions too?

Presumably the woman in question knows far better than us what kind of man has fathered her child.

the point here surely is that this is an unusual (but not unique situation).... the isue of the father being "told" has only arisen because the mother wants the baby to be adopted at birth. the adoption will remove her parental rights and vest them in the adoptive parents. the father has no legal parental rights until the child is born and he is named on the birth certificate / acquires parental responsibility by agreement with the mother / is granted it by a court. if the woman became pregnant after a one night stand and chose to keep the baby why should / would she be "ordered" to tell the man who she had slept with once if she did not want to..... if he found out about the baby and sought contact / parental responsibility or whatever that would be different, but that is not the situation here. i think in the corcs the decision is right and fair.

in the CIRCS obviously....

This:
The judge said the mother became pregnant when she was 19, and as she lived on her own, kept it secret from her divorced parents who she did not think would provide a good home for the baby.

Strikes me as very odd....I think there is much more to this then the eye meets, tbh.

Why should men not get any choices. If they don't want the pregnancy they can't force a termination yet they then have to pay for the child once it is born. If a woman wants a termination there is nothing he can do to stop it. Its not at all fair in my opinion.

Agree with you 3nomore, but fundamentally, she's an adult, no reason why her parents should be told.

Paula, simple fact of biology is women carry babies. Hence women decide whether or not to abort, or to have the baby adopted.