Thursday, March 09, 2006

Abortion rights for men

"The National Center for Men has prepared a lawsuit — nicknamed Roe v. Wade for Men — to be filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Michigan on behalf of a 25-year-old computer programmer ordered to pay child support for his ex-girlfriend's daughter. The suit addresses the issue of male reproductive rights, contending that lack of such rights violates the U.S. Constitution's equal protection clause.

"The gist of the argument: If a pregnant woman can choose among abortion, adoption or raising a child, a man involved in an unintended pregnancy should have the choice of declining the financial responsibilities of fatherhood."


I so hope this goes through. I see no reason why it shouldn't, after all isn't that what women want? EQUAL RIGHTS? If you have the "right" to just walk away from your parental rights then shouldn't we get the same option?


Someone expands the arguement more here

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Shea's right, but then we also have the scenario of a guy (like the one filing the lawsuit) who made it VERY clear to his girlfriend that he didn't want kids, and yet is paying $500 in child support each month. Clearly, this is a debate we need to have.

Anonymous said...

Shea's example yes...the man should pay support and pay it hard. As for Jimmy's post and the lawsuite...I think a man has the right to choose on parenthood or not.
But If he clearly stated he didn't want a child...and then stuck his unprotected dick in her...who does he have to blame but himself? Now if she snuck his sperm and manipulated a pregnancy...then she'd be the one with the responsibility.

Jimmy said...

the point is, if a woman has the "right" to shed her responsibilities REGARDLESS of how responsible or irresponsible she is why can't a man? i mean, the "well she was dumb enough to have unprotected sex" arguement doesn't exactly work if you're going to try and force a woman to carry the baby, so why should it work against a man?

and Shea's point wasn't really a good one since the man stuck around for 15 years of marriage, that already established some groundwork for being able to make him pay. if you don't want to be a dad you bail IMMEDIATELY not 15 years later if you expect to get away with it.

Anonymous said...

Hey, hey, hey now...Where does it say that this guy had unprotected sex? We're getting uncomfortably (for me) close to the argument that if someone's facing an unplanned pregnancy, he or she must have done something to deserve it. That's not a fair argument when the person in question is a woman, and it's not fair when it's a guy, either. IMO, how the couple got pregnant is pretty much irrelevant once the cat's out of the bag. That line of thought allows us to spend so much time judging the people involved that we never get into figuring out a solution, and that's just not good enough. If you've ever known anyone who's had to face this situation, y uknow it's incredibky difficult and painful, and doesn't always fit into a neat little soundbite.