Also Antiseptic, there is nothing about so-called chid support laws that requires the money to go to the child. The mother can spend it on whatever she wants.

(The argument that the child support laws apply equally to both sexes still begs the question whether one parent should be forced to pay for another in the first place when the other is unwilling to be reasonable enough to do what is necessary to obtain the other's agreement.)

And the child is already guaranteed a basic standard of everything through social security law: income, medical care, education and so on. So it's not about a basic standard of living.

And the child support laws just require a certain percentage of the father's income. It's not as though they define certain minimum requirements for the child. They don't say that such and such a thing is necessary, or say why. And if the child already has these minimum things, the laws don't cut out, do they?

Therefore they are *not* about providing certain minimum requirements for the child, they are about taking part of the father's income and giving it to the mother, on a moral rationale left over from patriarchy which feminism has completely rejected, villified and abolished - but only so far as it applies to women.

People have been raising children for hundreds of thousands of years without compulsory child support. Why shouldn't women get child support the way they did before the dreaded patriarchy came along?

Jefferson,

The absolute fly in the ointment here is that, being human, a man is provided with a rather large outgrowth of brain tissue called the neo-cortex. that is, that he doesn't only rely on his basic drives to get him through the day, but a combination of thought processes that interact with each other.
If, as you so delicately put it, a woman is responsible for "the fact she has caused his sexual interest" then a man is also responsible for taking into account that the sexual act may produce a child which will need to be supported.
Since this act is not brought about merely by the woman, but as part of a partnership, it is incumbent on the male party to contribute to the care of the child.
It seems to be the case in our modern society that these things become skewed - that the interdependence in more traditional societies of each gender upon the other has been lost.

Pelican:"It seems like you've already decided what all women think and ignore the fact that most women agree that parenting should be a cooperative arrangement with shared responsibility. "

It seems that what most women want is someone else to pay for their choice to have children. All I've suggested is that if that is going to be the situation then the cost should be spread as broadly as possible.

Jefferson,given that copulation has a foreseeable consequence that is going to incur a long-term cost and given that both parties are aware of the potential outcome, then both parties have a responsibility to bear a proportional part of the long-term cost. They should also have a proprtional part of any long-term benefits and an equal part of any decision-making, with a few caveats.

Firstly, the male use of contraception is overt - it's impossible to pretend a condom is in use if it isn't, while female contraception is less obvious. If a woman doesn't take her Pill regularly there is no real way for the man to know, ditto for the use of diaphragms or IUDs. So it is possible for the woman to decide to become pregnant while pretending that she is using contraception, thus effectively defrauding the man.

Second, once conception has occurred, it is entirely the woman's decision to allow gestation to proceed. If she chooses to abort against his desire to have a child, then there is not a thing he can do about it. On the other hand, if he doesn't want a child, there is nothing that he can do to make her abort.

If either of those two situations obtain, there is no ethical strength to the view that the man should be liable. However, it becomes difficult to judge such cases, since contraception is not perfect, even with the best intent.

If they don't obtain, then the willing participation of both parties leads to the conclusion that both parties must share costs and responsibilities.I reject the idea that because a woman is attractive to a man she is responsible for his response.

hi RObert, a judge of the Family Court is bound by statute to consider the interest of a child over and above the secondary interest of a parent because the quality of a child's welfare should not be the subject of a primary dispute as to what level of support constitutes fair need, as was legislated two decades ago when the Court became clogged with vexatious applications from men with a perception of inherent privilege over women which impacted to the detriment of the welfare of children. Listen closely to males who claim grievance against the Family Court or the Child Support Agency and you'll more than often find an obsession with the minutiae of the circumstances and perceived obligations of the mother and very little about offspring, in stark contrast to the focus on the activities and achievements of children men who reconcile disputes equitably with women express. The Family Court can sense a male consumed with a morbid fear and loathing of women a mile off.

Hi Jefferson, equity achieved between the primary elements of community is the best it gets, imbalance is abysmal.

Poirot, you're very quick to dismiss biological drives in men as atavistic. This is feminist doctrinal orthodoxy, and I reject it as facile, self-serving rubbish

Women also have biological imperatives and emotionally driven desires. Is the urge to reproduce in childless women approaching middle life also something that should be simply dismissed as atavistic? Apparently our politicians don't think so or we'd not have the whole maternity leave thing. Do you really think that women are inherently more primitive than men, or could it be that biological drives are real, no matter how much "neo-cortex" we may have?

Antiseptic,

I believe you're being a tad sensitive here. My point - mainly to Jefferson - was that humans have recourse to a higher mode of thought and, therefore, are able to take things into consideration. Yes, I believe that the biological imperatives of both genders are real - Jefferson seems to believe that one of those genders can opt out of the equation on the basis of being mainly controlled by the more primitive drives. I was simply disagreeing.
And puhlease don't label me with feminist claptrap. I couldn't give a hoot about feminist agendas and the like - I'm more interested in investigating the organic nature and functional relationships within society as a whole.