On behalf of The Marks Law Firm, L.L.C. posted in Child Custody on Friday, April 8, 2011
Our last blog post presented an interesting Huffington Post column in which the writer argues that the American Family Court system is often rigged against fathers during child custody battles. The columnist asserts that old gender stereotypes which cast a child’s mother as an inherently better parent than their father continue to exert undue influence during modern child custody cases.
The columnist cites numerous instances in which capable fathers who desired a major role in their children’s lives were spurned during the custody process and ended up settling for extremely limited visitation rights.
He claims that it is disproportionally simple for a mother to question her ex-husband’s parenting abilities and convince a judge to severely limit the amount of influence he has over his children’s lives. In contrast, he states that women are far less pressured by the court system to defend their own parenting record.
The columnist openly admits that his assertions do not represent a blanket truth. In other words, not all men are good parents who have been slighted by prejudiced Family Court custody decisions.
However, he fervently insists that a bias against fathers’ custody rights does exist within the American family court system, and that it manifests itself in far too many custody cases. This bias-asserts the author-often ends up harming the children above all else.
Do you agree with this Huffington Post writer? Do you believe that fathers must fight significantly harder than their ex-wives to protect their custody and visitation rights? Have you experienced a similar situation during your own divorce? If so, did you have an experienced family law attorney advocating for your rights?
Source: Huffington Post, “The ‘Y’ Factor: Gender bias, Child Custody and the Great Parenting Myth.” David T. Pisarra, 28 March 2011