"This isn't a male agenda. The law says
there's no such thing as father's rights. I would beg to differ.
I would say there's mother's rights, children's rights, and father's
rights. But once you have that argument you have a parity and
equality of rights. And one party's rights cannot be dominant
over anothers' - it just can't be - then you don't get rights,
then you don't get equality, then you don't get justice - you
get injustice.
Bob Geldof - Father's Day Blues - the Trevor MacDonald Tonight
programme 17 June 2002. (SPIG)
Excerpts from:
Dad's in charge: Ranks of fathers with custody of their children
increase
Sally Kalson, Post-Gazette
Staff Writer March 16, 1998
There's no question that men and women in general have different
parenting styles, said Wade F. Horn, a clinical child psychologist
and president of the National Fatherhood Initiative in Gaithersburg,
Md.
"Men and women bring different things to the parenting equation,
and neither is more important than the other," Horn said.
Underlying it all is a gradual shift in attitudes about men's
and women's roles, according to James Levine, director of The
Fatherhood Project at The Family and Work Institute in New York
City.
"As more men come forward and say they want to be the custodial
parent, more courts -- not many, but more -- are deciding that
way," Levine said. "It's an evolution, not a revolution."
Often, though, the public's image of single fathers doesn't include
these day-to-day matters. Instead, it focuses on an unfair stereotype
of the bitter man who wrested his children away from their mother
in an acrimonious divorce.
Divorcing men hear horror stories about fathers who don't get
to see their children any more, often because of child support
disputes. So some have become more aggressive in seeking custody
out of fear that, without it, they'll be reduced to visitors in
their children's lives.
"People think that if a father has custody it's because there
was a big battle," Sims said. "That happens, but most
people can't afford it. My story isn't that unusual. We are not
all angry dads. Most of us just want to be involved with our children."