Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!usc!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!aero-c!nadel From: Rich.Berlin@eng.sun.com (Rich Berlin) Newsgroups: soc.feminism Subject: Re: birth control failure? Message-ID: <14980@exodus.Eng.Sun.COM> Date: 12 Jun 91 04:41:43 GMT Sender: news@eng.sun.com Reply-To: Rich.Berlin@eng.sun.com Organization: Sun Microsystems Lines: 137 Approved: nadel@aerospace.aero.org Status: R Originator: nadel@aerospace.aero.org jan@oas.olivetti.COM (Jan Parcel) writes: > In article <14904@exodus.Eng.Sun.COM> Rich.Berlin@eng.sun.COM writes: > > > >You make it sound as though supporting a child is the man's > >"punishment for having sex" the same way pregnancy is the woman's: > > Actually, it is, in a way. I have posted before that I don't agree > with the current system, but a woman does have to deal with > *something* traumatic no matter what, if there is a pregnancy. I > don't think it is safe to let the men of the hook entirely, and then > give them the power to opt out as if it was nothing or to require > joint custody. Either I would like to see the default stay the same > except for allowing the man to take custody if the woman gives it up, > and default to joint custody if she keeps it, or, if we took Hillel's > proposal, I would like to give the woman the option of not notifying > the father. (Under either mine or his proposal, I would want a > pre-coital contract to override the default.) Pregnancy is a direct *consequence* of sex. The view that it is a "punishment" is a misogynistic attitude; the stereotypic attitude appears to me to be that it's not acceptable to end the pregnancy, we have to force women to carry their unwanted babies to term and face giving up a live baby or raising it under difficult conditions. (I chose to paraphrase Genesis in the hope of capturing the harshness of this attitude but I don't think the gesture succeeded.) Analogously, it appears to me, the "punishment" mentality towards the father says that it's not enough for a man who doesn't want the child to bear the direct consequences, we have to insist on the most unfavorable possible outcome. Is that really necessary?? The way you express it--you think it's not "safe" to let the men off--could that be a hint at a basic fear underlying this whole thread? Men, if left to their own devices, will thoughtlessly traumatize every woman in their paths. And women, left to their own devices, will trap and enslave any man foolish enough. You don't trust me to do right by you, and I don't trust you to do right by me: the "mutually assured destruction" doctrine that defines the male-female cold war. Anybody know how to win a cold war? And of course, you're rightly speaking as the one in power--"letting men off the hook," and "giving them the power to opt out." One woman passed along to me (with reservations) the idea that women's control of the reproduction of the species is "one of the few areas in which women have had any power at all, and giving it up puts them at the mercy of an otherwise male-dominated culture." I wonder how many people will write me off as crazy when I say that this is mistaking cause and effect--that the male power structure is at its core a *response* to women holding the only power that is truly important? ------------------- > >Do most women share Lisa's view of men as irresponsible? (I find it > >insulting that someone would even think I'd abandon a woman who had an > >accidental pregnancy to which I "contributed.") > > This discussion only refers to irresponsible people. Responsible > people don't need the laws to tell them what to do. Hillel's proposal > would be as unnecessary as the current system if *everyone* was > responsible. I agree 100%. But it appered to me that Lisa's view was that most men are irresponsible. What I quoted was: > >farmerl@handel.cs.colostate.EDU (lisa ann farmer) writes: > >> How Convenient! If the male ignores the fact that he has impregnated > >> a female he will therefore have no obligation to the child. By this > >> system I can imagine very few males (except those prepared and wanting > >> parenthood) to accept responsibilty. I don't buy it and I won't vote > >> for it. Am I misreading something here? --------------- > >Nevertheless, how many women define "irresponsible" the way Lisa seems > >to, i.e. "he doesn't want to pay to support a child that he didn't > >want but I *did*?" Remember, the man's obligation to the child comes > >into play only if the woman decides not only to carry to term, but to > >*keep* and *raise* the child as well. > > You make it sound like carrying a child for 9 months, with all the > kicking, etc, and signs of life, will still make giving up the child > the more passive decision. I don't mean to minimize the experience of pregnancy. I was just trying to point out that there are some constitutional grounds for the laws on pregnancy we have now (and I'm sure many of us pray that the Supreme Court will continue to see it that way) but the issue of child custody is not part of that law. I firmly believe that what goes on inside the woman's body is hers alone to determine, but nobody has explained to me why the child custody decision is also hers alone to determine, since there is now a living child that belongs to *two* people. It is the asymmetry in this law that disturbs me, and the only grounds I've heard offered is that the experience of pregnancy somehow gives the woman more control over her child's destiny than the father has, to the extreme that it gives the woman some control over the destiny of the father as well as the child. > Back to the adoption bit. I admire women who can give up a child for > adoption, but I suspect they're rare. > > [They are. One source noted that 3 percent of unwed mothers in the US > actually give up their child at birth. cf. _Abortion: The Clash of > Absolutes_ by Laurence H. Tribe. --CTM] > > I could no more do that than donate my heart at childbirth. Some > women who *did* give up children in the 40's and 50's have said they > never recovered. My kids told me they feel the same way the other day > when we were discussing "what to do if". I think some of the > stereotyping of men as irresponsible may come from a sort of > flabbergasted inability to understand some very loud men who make it > sound like this should be easy. And I'm one of them. Ouch. My apologies; I didn't mean to imply that it was or should be easy. I know otherwise: I had a roomate in college who laughed and described it as "very Jewish" when, in the throes of believing I was party to a contraceptive failure, I told him I didn't think I'd be able to bear the thought of someone else raising my child. (It was a false alarm, but a remarkable learning experience. :-)) So no, I don't believe it would be easy to give up a child. I do think I could force myself to do so if I believed it would be in the child's best interests, but it would hurt like hell and I'd need a lot of support to get through it without emotional scars. I don't know how many men really think it should be easy to give up a child; I prefer to believe that most of us just think no matter how hard it is to give the child up, keeping it would be much, much harder! I suspect the experience of pregnancy *does* have something to do with the difference in this perception. -- Rich