CRISIS: "Absent Deadbeat Dads!"

Massachusetts 2008, the world’s best place to raise a “family?”  ...or are we still committed to teaching those pesky “Absent Deadbeat Dads” a lesson in fatherhood?  Or are 1980s terms (championed by the likes of the outdated Weld administration) like “Absentee Father” and "Deadbeat Dads" an oversimplification to a more complex paradimg? 

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According to State and National statistics, "fatherlessness" is on the rise.  The United States, the richest nation and arguably the epitome of Western civilization, has roughly 24 million children-or 34 percent of all children in the U.S.-living in homes in which the father is not present. This is the highest percentage of fatherless families in any country in the world. The number of single mothers raising children has tripled since 1960, a heartbreaking statistic when coupled with the fact that children are five times more likely to be living in poverty when the father is absent. Just one of the symptoms of the crisis of fatherlessness is the growing violence in city neighborhoods...

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Children from fatherless homes are:

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.• 15.3 times more likely to have behavioral disorders.  85% of all children that exhibit behavioral disorders come from fatherless homes
• 4.6 times more likely to commit suicide.  63% of youth suicides are from fatherless homes.
• 6.6 times more likely to become teenaged mothers
• 24.3 times more likely to run away.  90% of all homeless and runaway children are from fatherless homes.
• 6.3 times more likely to be in a state-operated institutions.  • 10.8 times more likely to commit rape.  80% of rapist motivated by displaced anger come from fatherless homes.
• 6.6 times more likely to drop out of school.  71% of all high school dropouts come from fatherless homes.
• 15.3 times more likely to end up in prison while a teenager.  85% of all youths sitting in prisons grew up in a fatherless home.
• 73% of adolescent murderers come from mother only homes

Daughters who live in mother only homes are 92% more likely to divorce

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(U.S. D.H.H.S., Bureau of the Census, Center for Disease Control, National Principals Assoc.)

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-85% of Massachusetts Voters Recently Voted For Shared Parenting

-In 2003, 20,952 entries for divorce were filed in Massachusetts courts!

-In Massachusetts over 40,000 restraining orders are issued each year!  This is 33 times more than in Virginia with a similar population 

-This has become a HUGE profit making endeavor for lawyers and many others.  It is all driven by the greed and desire for power of special interest groups like lawyers and radical feminists who push one way laws.

-Allegations of family violence are the weapon-of-choice in divorce strategies.  Lawyers, and paralegals in women's shelters, call them "The Silver Bullet".  False abuse allegations work effectively in removing men from their families without due process.  The impact that the removal of fathers has on our children is horrific.

-Massachusetts has the HIGHEST child support in the entire U.S. at about 40% of after tax income.  It is often several times the cost of raising the children.  High “child support” causes federal kickbacks that fund courts and snowballs this monster further.

-Most fathers are loving and care deeply for their children and the vast majority pay child support as ordered, even though it is often onerous and places them in poverty.

-“There is a fundamental liberty right guaranteed to both parents by the 14th Amendment. This is the right to the care, custody, and nurture of their children. According to the Supreme Court of the United States: “Absent a Compelling State Interest of harm or potential harm to the child, the State may not intervene in the privacy of family life.””

(Fathers Unite)

Press play below for HN's official response to the current epidemic of "fatherlessness" in spite of what has been deemed fair and equitable “family court” practices (as self-assessed by the family courts who have turned fatherlessness into a rapidly growing industry-  no conflict in interest there).  After all, don't we go all out to make it possible for “Absent Deadbeat Dads” (a sweeping generalized term that does little to connect fathers and children) to become dedicated fathers?  How could they possibly screw up?  Haven't court judgments effecting a child's right to a father been historically fair?  Is it really so simple to assume that so many fathers are inherently bad parents?  Or is there a much larger problem behind the current epidemic?  We've acknowledged the difficulties of being a single mother, but have we even begun to look at the need of more support for single fathers?  After all, it's 2008 and our society professes the ideal that both parents are expected to shoulder the responsibilities of parenting equally...  What has Massachusetts done to help single fathers?  Even in today's modern age, such sentiments leave some dads open to attacks and ridicule, especially from those hanging on dearly to the many blatant double standards that literally leave fathers out in the cold. 

Dedicated to every frustrated father (myself included) who has ever become discouraged with the DOR and the "family courts" in Massachusetts - just 2 of the many negative draconian factors stacked against responsible fatherhood.  Massachusetts needs to take a serious look at the economics of the systematic disenfranchisement of willing dads.  Other states and other countries have much more equitable parenting laws that benefit all children.  In the meantime, sometimes all a Massachusetts guy who just simply wants to be a Massachusetts dad can do is shrug...

Sometimes homeless single fathers are forced to live with goats: