(Untitled)

[myrmedon]

I found this article very interesting; it raises issues I'd never even thought of before. I'm not sure if I agree with what it's saying, though; give me feedback.

http://www.reason.com/0304/co.cy.aborting.shtml

Oh, it's about male reproductive choice and abortion.

Comments

[seiquosteve]

Abortion doesn't necessarily mean rape. It could just be that the couple didn't use birth control properly, or they did, and it failed. Or that birth control wasn't available.

Ideally, yes, this would all be worked out beforehand. But consider:
- If there's any dispute, the woman will very likely get custody of the child.
- If there's any dispute, the woman will have the final decision over whether or not to keep the child.
- If there's any dispute, the woman will have the ability to force the father to pay (financially) if she decides to have the child.
- There is some risk to the mother whether she decides to have an abortion or not.

The pregnancy could be totally unintentional, with nothing the couple could've done to prevent it. It could easily be a one-night stand sort of situation.

Now, there is the "Well, they should've considered the possibilities!" response. But if you're then going to advocate the woman being able to free herself of 99% of the results of that, how can you also insist that the man be punished for a decision which he has virtually no say in?

[myrmedon]

I'm not saying anything about rape; obviously the father has no say bc if the father is known he should be in jail. I'm saying that if the father wants to have the rights of a father, he should both have the responsibility of paying for or helping to raise the child as well as equal chance at custody. I know that courts are traditionally biased toward mothers, but that really ought to change. Perhaps the father should only have to pay the percentage of the costs associated with childraising that he has the child. If the father doesn't want to be a father, he should let his sex partner know that beforehand and make it legally binding so that there isn't sex under the false pretense of shared responsibility. You can't ignore the considerable endangerment of life and emotional pain associated with either pregnancy decision, though, so I think it isn't really right to let the father sign off his responsibilities painlessly after the fact.