The recent announcement from the National Center for Health Statistics that the out-of-wedlock birth rate is at an all-time high is bad news for America’s children. It would be easier to understand, perhaps, if it were naive teenage mothers who were creating this trend. However, according to the new NCHS study, the trend–which is creating 1.5 million babies a year–is being driven by adult women, many of whom are in their 30s and 40s and are choosing single motherhood. They should know better.
The rates of the four major youth pathologies–teen pregnancy, teen drug abuse, school dropouts and juvenile crime–are tightly correlated with fatherlessness, often more so than with any other socioeconomic factor, including income and race. The research is clear that children need fathers, not simply as breadwinners, but also for the valuable parenting–and fathering–they provide.
For example, a long-term study of teen pregnancy rates was conducted in the United States and in New Zealand and published in the journal Child Development. The study concluded that a father’s absence greatly increases the risk of teen pregnancy. The researchers found that it mattered little whether the child was rich or poor, black or white, born to a teen mother or an adult mother, or raised by parents with functional or dysfunctional marriages. What mattered was dad.
There are various popular interpretations of the out-of-wedlock trend. One is to blame men who, we are told, routinely impregnate naïve, hapless women and then abandon them. However, given modern women’s birth control and reproductive options, when women have children outside of marriage, it’s usually because they want to.
Nevertheless, our society often goes to great lengths to see unwed mothers as victims. The highly-publicized Fadia Ward case provides a good example. Ward founded www.sorryassbabydaddies.com to publicly shame “deadbeat dads” and “take their manhood away.” She has appeared on ABC News Now, Black Entertainment Television, BBC Radio, Good Day Philadelphia, and many others, and has been portrayed as a heroine in numerous newspaper articles. Few have challenged her assertion that she bears no responsibility for her situation, even though she had four children by four different men by the age of 27.
Another explanation for the rise in single motherhood is that it’s a symbol of women’s increasing independence and empowerment. According to this view, it’s hard to find a good man, so women are justified in having kids on their own, and we should be happy that yesterday’s unfair stigma against out-of-wedlock births is gone.
Two of the leading proponents of this view are Rosanna Hertz, Ph.D., author of the new book Single by Chance, Mothers by Choice: How Women Are Choosing Parenthood Without Marriage and Creating the New American Family, and Peggy Drexler, Ph.D., who last year released Raising Boys Without Men: How Maverick Moms Are Creating the Next Generation of Exceptional Men.
Drexler portrays father-absent homes—particularly “single mother by choice” homes—as the best environments for raising boys. Hertz concludes that “intimacy between husbands and wives [is] obsolete as the critical familial bond.” For her, fathers aren’t necessary—in fact, “what men offer today is obsolete.”
Our children would beg to differ. Studies of children of divorce confirm their powerful desire to retain strong connections to their fathers. For example, an Arizona State University study of college-age children of divorce found that the overwhelming majority believed that after a divorce “living equal amounts of time with each parent is the best arrangement for children.”
Famed athlete Bo Jackson provided a heart-wrenching depiction of a child’s father hunger in his autobiography, the first chapter of which is devoted to the father he didn’t have. Jackson explained that as a child, when he wanted something, “I could beat on other kids and steal…[but] I couldn’t steal a father. I couldn’t steal a father’s hug when I needed one.”
There are some unwed mothers who really are victims. As a society we’re very aware of the ways some men misuse their power, particularly in the family. Now, however, it’s time to take a hard look at the ways some women misuse their power. Needlessly creating fatherless babies is one of them.
This column first appeared in the Washington Times (12/4/06).
Jeffery M. Leving is one of America’s most prominent family law attorneys. He is the author of the new HarperCollins book Divorce Wars: A Field Guide to the Winning Tactics, Preemptive Strikes, and Top Maneuvers When Divorce Gets Ugly. His website is www.dadsrights.com.
Glenn Sacks’ columns on men’s and fathers’ issues have appeared in dozens of America’s largest newspapers. Glenn can be reached via his website at www.GlennSacks.com or via email at Glenn@GlennSacks.com.
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roger said,
And in the end, it is the father that pays the financial dues (often ruining his life) and the child that pays the price for his mother’s strength and independence.
But for women, “it is all about me”.
December 11, 2006 at 5:32 pm
mirwalk said,
“I’m the new thing. I am what this country needs to be! I am the powerful woman and my children should try to act like me! Even my boys should become little versions of me! If they have to crush other people with the responsibilites then do it! They would be patriots!”
At least this is the rational they would give you.
December 11, 2006 at 6:11 pm
amfortas said,
The bigger the Lie the more it is believed. She is one of a tide of malicious misandric destroyers who are not challenged by the complaisant media. She has learned at the feet of a prior host of blood-sucking monsters who made outrageous claims and found no one to take them publicly to task. She and they twist words, kill them in an Orwellian fashion, create false illusory perfections without men, (exceptional or otherwise!) promotes Meism and Narcissism, and the stupified female public smiles in quiet victimhood enjoyment and buys her books. Mothers betray and condemn sons (exceptional or otherwise) with Ms Drexler PhD’s blessing, raising men with holes in their souls.
But the dark forces of society will overcome her and wipe the smile from what human face she can retain. The State is already replacing fathers, and mothers will be next. Just look at PM Blah’s UK. The new refrain, copied from the early femonazis, will be - “A Child needs a Family like a Fish needs a Bicycle”.
It will be too late to argue then. First they came for fathers and I said nothing…..
When the State takes the children and casts mothers in the same bad light as fathers, there will be no protest allowed.
The Princess of Lies rides
over barren lands.
Long hair down her back.
Across her breast,
Over her steed’s flank.
Hooves on skulls.
The children gabble and cry.
No words
describe
their pain.
They were
forbidden.
December 11, 2006 at 6:47 pm
bombbombbombbomb said,
This goes along with another article about prosecuting false allegations. I suggest that this is not done because it it just or is progress for men, but an indication that “there must be more state control.”
December 11, 2006 at 6:59 pm
wls1 said,
It looks to me like some interests are stepping up, campaigning and skewing government and public opinion to serve their purposes, while the rest are sitting on the sidelines, doing nothing except maybe spinning conspiratorial yarns.
December 11, 2006 at 8:04 pm
bombbombbombbomb said,
It looks to me like some interests are stepping up, campaigning and skewing government and public opinion to serve their purposes, while the rest are sitting on the sidelines, doing nothing except maybe spinning conspiratorial yarns.”
A good spin in and of itself. Dictionary.com has a definition for “State” if that will help.
December 11, 2006 at 8:16 pm
wls1 said,
December 11, 2006 at 8:31 pm
bombbombbombbomb said,
December 11, 2006 at 8:57 pm
amfortas said,
A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle. Nod. Larf. Agree. Done deal now.
A child needs a family like a fish needs a bicycle. Coming soon to a State near you.
December 11, 2006 at 9:04 pm
wheresmy40 said,
December 11, 2006 at 9:15 pm
amfortas said,
December 11, 2006 at 9:19 pm
bombbombbombbomb said,
Quote fromm an appeals court decision:
”
Although parents have a right to privacy in matters related to child-rearing and family relationships, this right is not absolute, and the family is subject to regulation in the public interest. People v. Shepard, 983 P.2d 1 (Colo. 1999). The state has a public interest in mitigating the potential harm to children caused by the dissolution of marriage. Section 14-10-104.5, C.R.S. 2002. Thus, a parent has no privacy interest in the process by which child support obligations are determined because support levels are not purely private determinations, but serve a public function and are subject to court approval. See Ga. Dep’t of Human Res. v. Sweat, 580 S.E.2d 206 (Ga. 2003); cf. Linda D. v. Fritz C., 38 Wash. App. 288, 687 P.2d 223 (1984) (right to privacy does not encompass right of parent to avoid child support obligation because mother did not successfully use contraception).”
December 11, 2006 at 9:30 pm
mruffolo said,
Feminists run the American family, workplace, media, academics, law enforcement, and courts. The United States government follows a feminist-centered social policy.
Feminism is selfish; she says, “I can do it without a man.” She claims men are bad, but women are good.
If we want change, then stop feminism.
December 12, 2006 at 12:23 am
Roger Knight said,
Please see http://www.antipeonage.0catch.com/justicefiles.htm for a listing of pages where I list county employees by name, including judges and commissioners, and the -9- judgments they have under their names resulting from domestic relations cases.
Once you see that, the mystery of motive is solved.
Damage to our society?
Since when did Milo Minderbinders ever give a damn about that?
December 12, 2006 at 3:09 am
wls1 said,
Delisionally regarding the problems we observe as manifestations of an imagined socialist plot distracts from taking actions based on the real causes that stand to solve them.
December 13, 2006 at 2:16 am
Roger Knight said,
There, fixed it. wls1, aren’t you glad we the pajamahadeen are there to correct those inadvertant mistakes!
December 13, 2006 at 10:02 am