You are NOT the father – said as a lying taunt
As readers of my blog know, I watch the Maury show. I was struck recently by a reason men give for doubting their paternity that doesn’t come up frequently but has come up enough to be troubling. Mothers are on the program insisting that there is no other possible father for a child or children. They are extremely distressed that the man in question has been denying paternity and often ignoring what she insists is his child or children.
In the cases I’m referring to, DNA evidence conclusively proved the man was the biological father.
Then we come to the man’s reason for denying paternity. The woman taunted, “You are NOT the father.†She later retracted this statement saying it had only been made in a fit of anger.
However, it is an extremely dangerous taunt to hurl. It strikes at a core vulnerability specific to men: that not being burdened with the physical costs of carrying and giving birth, they are not blessed with the certainty that accompanies those costs (barring the occasional hospital mix-up).
Mothers who say, “You are NOT the father†knowing they are lying are not just fibbing. They are planting a seed – a devastatingly bad seed that will almost inevitably flower into suspicion, anger, mistrust toward themselves as well as, what is even worse, possible neglect by the father of his child. They are harming the father, they are harming themselves, and they are harming their children.
It ought to stop. Routine DNA testing of all babies born will stop it.
