Child Custody Rights For Fathers Explained

By: Paul Hockney
Submitted: 2009-03-06 14:03:41
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Unfortunately, approximately half of Americans children will be directly affected by a custody battle at some point in their lives.  Until recently child custody disputes favor the mother and in rare instances the father if the mother was deemed unfit however neither of these solutions seemed to be in the best interest of the child.

In an ideal world children would grow up with both their parents however this is not an ideal world and parents need to divorce for all types of reasons.  Abuse of the mother by the father is only one of the thousands of reasons couples could divorce.  However the majorities of judges seems to be men and are more lenient towards fathers, giving them liberal visitation rights putting the mother in an awkward if not dangerous position.

Today there is a growing group of “Mad Dads” who have gained steam through several Internet father's rights groups made up of concerned fathers, media savvy divorce lawyers, professional lobbyists and volunteer activists.

Many fathers’ rights groups and activists claimed that family courts often discourage unwed fathers or divorced fathers from playing a positive role, or any role for that matter, in their children's lives.  This contributes to the nationwide “crisis of fatherlessness”.

Courts have a pro-mother leaning where moms are granted custody nearly 85 percent of the time and because of the likelihood of losing custody and the expense of litigation scares many of the fathers away, hardly any of them ever fight for custody.

Family law is supposed to be a judge-by-judge, case-by-case style hearing however this is not always the case.  Custody is usually awarded to the primary caregiver and if dad is always at war and mom is a stay-at-home mom then she is the one that is going to most likely win custody of the child or children.

When fathers contests custody cases in which the mother has been granted custody, they must show their willingness to spend more than just “quality time” with the child or children.  They must make a commitment to raising the child rather than being a part-time “drop in” style parent.  For many working fathers this is a difficult commitment to make without relying on nannies or babysitters which is something the court frowns upon.

Several studies have shown that what is in the best interest of the child or children is joint custody in which they spend an equal amount of time with both parents however in some cases this can be devastating to a child who must sleep in a different bad every other night or continually be shuffled between two homes as they grow older and more recent full of their lifestyle.

There are many studies on both sides of the coin, some that say children who are raised by single mothers are more likely to grow up to become dangerous criminals such as become teenage murderers or rapists or commit suicide.  Other studies show that neither the sex nor the biological relationship to the parent has any significance to how the child will behave as an adult.  What these studies do say is that the stability of the emotional connection and the predictability of the caregiver is the key to a child's well-being.

Article source: Expert Articles