Also On The Agenda

Joe Doakes from Como Park is also watching the legislature:

Have you seen this?

Present law presumes parents will share Legal custody (decision-making about school, health, religion, etc.) but has no presumption on sharing Physical custody (where the child actually lives). Present law says the court does whatever it decides is in “the best interests of the child” which, in practical terms, infrequently results in shared physical custody.

Very true.  Courts are under the impression that if a couple can’t get along well enough to stay married, they certainly can’t decide on something like custody.

It’s not entirely wrong – but on the other hand, the divorce process itself – especially the “winner take all” nature of the custody system, which adds a huge extra dollop of stress to an awful time in everyone’s life.

The fact is, every couple can choose joint custody; they just need to bury their differences long enough to reach an agreement on the kids’ future that’ll convince a judge that they’re acting in the kids’ best interests.

But most parents don’t do that.  Partly because of their own emotions; partly because stress and strife means billable hours for lawyers.

And those lawyers spot a threat:

Instead, one parent gets “possession” of the kid and the other parent visits occasionally. Statistically, it seems to result in physical custody awarded to women most of the time, leading to single-mother families and absent fathers.

This law would attempt to change that by creating a rebuttable presumption that divorcing parents should share their children’s lives about equally, with obvious exceptions for abusive situations.

Feminists, including the National Organization of Women, oppose these laws for some obvious reasons – a single-mother society is a feminized society – and some less obvious; child support has become the new alimony, and the industry that’s grown around it supports not a few non-profit industries.

The public policy rationale for the proposal starts in Section 7 at line 7.1.

Considering that this law might help men, the Star Trib’s take was amazingly supportive.

There is mounting opposition from divorce lawyers, battered women’s advocates and Democrats.

Joe Doakes

Como Park

This comes up every few years. It’s opposed by a range of interests – feminist DFLers and fundie evangelicals.

But the plague of single parenthood – meaning children who grow up with only one parent – is exacerbating all of our society’s pathologies (boys who grow up without fathers have a hard time processing anger; girls without fathers have vastly higher tendencies toward teen pregnancy and depression) and causing some new ones.  Teachers report a plague of children who never, ever get outdoors; single mothers, with a higher tendency toward fear of what’s going on around them on top of their normal female risk-averseness, are more likely to keep their kids indoors rather than letting them outside to play. And it’s causing all sorts of problems.  And single parents are just plain overworked; anyone who’s ever played basketball knows it’s easier to play one-on-one than zone.

(No, not every single parent every time. It’s a statistic,not an individual indictment).

This bill does need to pass.