Why is it that guys think that they have a choice whether or not they take care of their children?

Question

I just saw a question posted under laws and ethics. It was a guy asking if he had to pay child support even though they weren't legally seperated. How is it that guys just think it's a choice and that their child is not their obligation. UGHHHHH so irritating!!! Women just do it regardless!!

Even if the money doesn't go directly to the child, it is still going to the child....he/she still has to eat, be clothed, have housing..etc...

Answer 1

OMG! I totally agree with you. My ex doesn't help out with anything. The other day we were talking a bit about it, and he always claims that he doesn't have money to give me cuz he can't even be financially responsible enough for himself, let alone my daughter. Hello?! Like I have a choice? Yeah, so meanwhile I can pay ALL of childcare costs each week, cuz he 'isn't responsible enough' to give me half so we are splitting it. It's the only thing I've ever asked from him. But regardless, he still damn well wants to come visit her! Totally not fair. Also, he can't give me any money, yet he has his own house, at least two vehicles, a cell phone with all the extras, and a nice tattoo with his kid's names and birthdates! Just to brag of course and make himself look good. So meanwhile I'm working full time, paying everything myself, and not able to buy extras like a CD I may want, or going out to eat once in awhile. Pisses me off to no end. Then he tells me he'd rather buy her 'things' instead of giving me money for childcare. Yeah, cuz 'things' aren't an ongoing expense, thank you, whereas I have to shell out $100 a week for child care. And the guy still doesn't know how to keep it in his pants...

Answer 2

For the women: I agree, in that, some men are horrible and think they shouldn't have to pay, when they should have to pay something.

For the men: I was a loan Underwriter(and would see approx 100 incomes/employments a day), and to see the amount that men have to pay, I don't see how they survive(they're usually getting cheap $1,000 loans for cheap cars because it's all they can afford). Women who get child support are usually applying for $30,000 car loans.

It almost seems that either the woman gets screwed(the guy doesn't pay anything), or the man gets screwed(he has to give her a mortgage payment--can you afford an extra mortgage payment?). If they didn't get divorced to begin with, everyone(including the child) would be financially better off.

MEN, don't have babies!!! You can be married for many years, she leaves you, and you still end up without your child, in the poorhouse, while she's banging some other guy, all because of her actions(of course, like anything else... it's going to be your fault).

Answer 3

I think the real question is why do men of that type get laid?

Please don’t think I am blaming this on the women, because I am not. I am the kind of man that would have taken care of the kids. But I don’t like kids, so I had a vasectomy at a young age to insure against such a situation.

I get asked this question all the time. I just answer, “I would not put myself in that situation”. It is that simple.

Anyway, my point is this. No matter how you look at it. The woman decides who gets to fertilize her. So why can’t the women “size up” the attitude of the “sperm source”?

Most of the sort of men, that do this stuff, has issues with themselves. Most of them say things that hint to their behavior. Most of them do the same thing over and over. Does not not stand to reason that if the guy is not paying child support for his other two kids, that he won’t for the third?

To answer your question. They don’t think they need to take care of their kids, because they have big egos. They think that such is “women’s work”. That type is easy to spot, and women should not have sex with them.

Answer 4

Women don't do it all of the time, either, unfortunately. It's just that when a woman doesn't care for her child, we're horrified - when a man doesn't care for his child, we say 'See, that's why women are so wonderful'.

Men and women in our society are raised to believe that caring for children is a woman's obligation (and joy). Just read through the questions here and you're overwhelmed by this gender stereotype, from both sides.

When men do care for their children, they are seen to be 'babysitting', most of the time. They're told that they're doing it wrong. They're viewed by other men as whipped losers. If separated from their child's mother, the mother will think that they are trying to 'control' them or steal their children away in order to avoid child support.

Society's messed up in what we're encouraging, and in what we're teaching our children.

Answer 5

Like someone else said, it's all about the relationship with the mother. When that ends, and particularly when it ends painfully, the children are part of the whole package, and get cut off too.

My father cut me off when I was 10, and my brother was 12. He never explained. He just stopped contact. He never paid a penny towards us either. I tried numerous times later on in my teens to get in touch, but he never wrote back. Finally, a couple of years ago, at the age of 30, I plucked up the courage to phone him. He said he would explain it all in a letter. The letter he wrote basically blamed our mother, and all the terrible hurt she put him through. It said nothing of us, and how we might have taken it. He still spoke as if I was 10 years old.

Some men just don't think about kids the way women do. A woman could not abandon her child. It is not in her nature. Some men are perfectly capable of switching off their emotions towards a child when they need to.

He'll get what's coming to him one day, just like all those other deadbeat fathers out there.

Answer 6

Yes some men do this. There are also women who view the father as just a paycheck and keep thier child away from them.

I am a single dad, I have my daughter 65% of the time and I still pay 15% to her mother. But if I rock the boat I stand to lose more. But I have my daughter and thats all I really need.

Just because there are deadbeat dads does not mean we all are. And there are deadbeat moms too.

Answer 7

In the male mind, the minute he stops loving the partner, the child becomes part of the package. He doesn't want to pay support because he doesn't want her to have anything of his anymore and 90% of men sincerely believe the money never goes to the child.

Answer 8

For the record, not all women "just do it regardless". I raised both my boys on my own and never received a cent. Luckliy I could get by because the only other option was to lock up their mom, and I wasbn't about to do that.

weeder

Answer 9

I think the answer is in your own question.

You right away assume that "taking care of the children" for a man = $$$. The courts do the same thing by saying that the only way a man should be allowed to care for his children is through $$$.

Kids need more than money and both parents should be given the opportunity to be more than a wallet.

Answer 10

Most men don't consider the child a human being itself but merely a possession belonging to the mother once the relationship ends--logic that is total crap to me.

The father of my daughter has barely paid his child support (I even bargained down w/him to $150/month) and now he's about to get a good job and owes my daughter tons of back pay--he actually asked me if I would consider dropping all the back pay he owes her and just let him start paying now. We are friends, but his request kind of shocked me. I don't feel right dropping his backpay b/c even if the man never pays in the next several years he will still owe it to my daughter once she turns 18 and who knows that money might really help her once she's that age....

Wow, didn't realize how angry I was about it until I just typed that...