[miker64]

The mother being treated/expected to be more of a parent does not start at divorce. That's simply the continuation of a societal expectation that women will do the 'mothering.'

Because that social expectation is there, it is far more often true that in a hetro marriage the wife will be the one who gives up their career path to take care of a child. Thus the court systems has standardized on an expectation that the mother will need spousal support, and child support in a divorce, because she is the one who'll need to retool and rejoin the workforce, while still _doing_ the parenting she did while in the marriage.

None of this happens in a vacuum.

[stickyricky]

> Because that social expectation is there [...]

The court should temper society's vices not empower them.

[miker64]

What does that look like in this situation? I agree, in theory, but _how_ is it applied to a divorce? How does it apply to the financial power imbalance of 'breadwinner' and 'active parent?'

I'm also curious, what is the 'vice' in this statement?

[stickyricky]

The "vice" is society's expectations for women. The court can empower that vice by giving women preferential custodial rights. Or it can temper that vice by analyzing the attributes of a specific relationship and recognizing custodial rights accordingly.

[pizza234]

While courts have an orientation based on social expectations, they definitely do "analyze the attributes of a specific relationship and recognize custodial rights accordingly".

IANAL, but I do have familiarity with the subject, and if you read a common law book, you'll see how the courts think.

Now, to be fair, in a way, we could say that courts don't give precedence to a parent based on the sex (this is made explicit in the law of a certain country I've examined)... but they could give it based on the hair count :-)

But again, courts definitely take into account many factor in the cases.

[vkou]

The court should rule with a bias in favour of the person who had to sacrifice their career to care for the children, regardless of their gender.

[giantg2]

What if that's both? What if it's neither? What if is the higher earner that sacrificed an even higher position - do you make the lower earner pay them?

There are other factors involved too.

[vkou]

> What if that's both? What if it's neither?

Then the court doesn't need to show a particular bias towards either party on this subject. As you have very astutely pointed out, there exist other circumstances which may compel a court to apply a bias one way or another. That's what courts are for.

> What if is the higher earner that sacrificed an even higher position - do you make the lower earner pay them?

If a decade of childcare materially and demonstrably damaged their future career, they should take that into account. If not, no.

Please pay attention to the words I'm using - 'bias'. This means putting some weight on the scales, not dropping a bag of bricks on one of them.

[SiempreViernes]

> If a decade of childcare materially and demonstrably damaged their future career, they should take that into account. If not, no.

They are a parent by their own actions, why should they be moated from the duty of parenting in the case of a divorce?

[vkou]

Please think about what you are saying for a minute.

You are saying that if one of the parents sacrifices their future to care for the child, and the other does not, during a divorce, the latter does not owe the former anything.

The better question is - why do you want to moat the latter parent moated from the duty of parenting so much?

Or, if parenting is too complicated, here's a simple example.

Bill marries Jill. Bill works, buys their food, pays their rent, pays their bills, does the housework, and pays Jill's way through medical school. Bill and Jill have no assets, because all the money went into Jill's education.

Jill graduates, becomes a doctor, starts making mountains of money, meets a pretty intern, and divorces Bill.

Does Jill owe Bill anything?

It's the same situation as with childcare. Bill put more into maintaining the marriage/child than Jill did. Jill benefited/was harmed less during the marriage. Bill deserves compensation after the fact.

Had the fruits of his labours gone into a savings account, he'd receive at least half of it on divorce. Instead, they went into developing Jill's earnings potential - so he's entitled to a share of it. Likewise, if instead of paying with money, he paid with childcare that was damaging to his career.

[mlang23]

This assumes that everyone caring for children is automatically "sacrificing their career". That is not true. There are still women who are not really interested in persuing a career they'd need to sacrifice to care for a child. So simply observing the "career status" of both parties is definitely not enough for a fair ruling.

[vkou]

Fortunately, we have... courts that can differentiate between the two.

[pizza234]

Courts do take that into account - parental time is actually a very important factor.

[zepto]

True, but once in place, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy and an in-built part of sexism.

[miker64]

Sure, but the 'fix,' if there is one, likely needs to start with the social pressures on women to give up their lives to parent, with more equitable parenting expectations overall, and let that bubble up to the court baselines.

[xenihn]

No, the courts should impose their will on society in situations where equality needs to be enforced. Just imagine if the process you're describing had been used to stop segregation in the United States.

[miker64]

but the courts enforcing desegregation did work at the societal pressure level.

What I'm saying is that denying the fact that a partner gave up career growth to parent does not change that they did, and does not stop the pressure upon women to do so. It should not be tied to gender, it should be tied to who gave up paying work to do the child rearing labor.

Spousal and child support _are_ where divorce courts are influencing equity, by having the parent who's career was not impacted by parental duties provide monetary support to the parent who was.

[zepto]

“Spousal and child support _are_ where divorce courts are influencing equity, by having the parent who's career was not impacted by parental duties provide monetary support to the parent who was.“

This is quite clearly not true because of maternal preference, which is openly acknowledged by the courts.

They are not in fact basing their decision on who’s career was not impacted.

They are making the decision based on the sex of the parents, and simply recapitulating traditional gender role assumptions.

I’m not making a case that it shouldn’t be this way.

My point is that we shouldn’t gaslight ourselves about what is going on.

[zepto]

That becomes somewhat circular. It is impossible to reduce the social pressures on women to parent without simultaneously reducing the social pressures on men not to parent.

Clearly in this case, the man wanted to parent. The thing stopping him was the power of the court’s decision.

In the presence of a legal framework like this the only reasonable choice for a man is to assume he is expected not to parent, since that is what the courts will enforce.

The legislature acts to change other kinds of discriminatory legal framework, and this is no different.

[miker64]

A question I have here, is _was_ he parenting before the divorce? The court has only the testimony and financial state of the two people on which to go with. If he was the one making the money, and she was home with the child, what does that say about _who_ was doing what work?

And yes, it would be good for there to be more pressure on men to parent, and on there being more acceptable models of parenting partnerships than breadwinner and child rearer.

I don't like the idea of court standards being tied to gender (or gendered roles), but it does have to take into account who was doing what work and how to ensure the safety of children while the parents disentangle their marital and financial bonds.

[zepto]

Ok, so you think he might be lying.

That’s always possible, but it seems irrelevant to the argument.

[tathougies]

> That's simply the continuation of a societal expectation that women will do the 'mothering.'

You are ignoring biological reality. The reason why this happens in 'hetero' couples is that the woman has an obvious physical relationship with the child. This doesn't happen in gay male couples because neither of the fathers can have this relationship. In lesbian couples, it's common for the non-bio mother to not only feel alienated, and even to do less childcare than the biological one (https://www.thespermbankofca.org/sites/default/files/1998_Ch...). Lesbian adoptive couples are more likely to share childcare equally, just like gay male ones of any kind, or heterosexual adoptive families.

My wife and I used to be really into this idea of parental equality in all things until we had a baby biologically. Now I obviously love my daughter, but there are some things only a mother can do, like nurse her, and this forms a special bond between mother and child. The fact of the matter is that men have to work harder to get that close of a relationship with their child that the mother is predisposed to. However, even then, the most devoted father would likely still see their child want to nurse when they get hurt or feel scared, until the child reaches 2-3 years of age. This is normal. Nursing is meant to do this, and although it's a physical act, it has real emotional consequence in both mother and child. My heart breaks hearing my daughter cry, but my nipples do not leak milk. It's not even that I couldn't calm her when she's mad, but the fact is that it would take significantly longer. Meanwhile, the child will be screaming and upset, and I should be willing to do this in the name of equality? On the other hand, handing her off to nurse with mom calms her instantly, as nature dictates.

To me it seems cruel to force my view of equality on the child by forcing them to remain terrified, frightened, anxious, and sad all because I want to feel as important as their mother, even while mom is right there. Is this unequal? Certainly. But it is the only humane decision in our opinions.

That is not to say we should think less of paternal love or the paternal relationship (especially since research shows that dads play a very important role in socializing their children into larger society), but rather that we should not see the inequality between mom and dad especially with young children and attribute it to some nefarious social force, instead of millenia of biological reality.

[miker64]

I'm in a hetro marriage, my kids come to me for 'mothering,' in about equal measure as they do to my wife.

And they did that when they were infants as well. My wife did not do well without a solid nights sleep, and I was used to oncall work, all night nursing was me. This was equitable, as well as playing to our strengths and weaknesses.

There is no reason to have iron rules of we must each do every parenting action in equal amounts, but to find equitable split of the work that needs to be done.

[tathougies]

That's great, but sharing my experience was not a call for others to add their own experience or to critique mine. If you want to share, please share on the top-level comment.

[miker64]

You commented on my comment, using your experience to support a claim that societal pressure about who parents (and how) is biologically driven.

I countered with my own experience that it is not.

Ancedata all around.

I'm glad your system works for your family. Similarly, I'm glad ours works for our family. But from both stories we can see that what you claim as a biological fact is not so clear.

[giantg2]

The standardization that you mention is the problem. The court is supposed to evaluate each case separately, not on a misguided one-size-fits-all policy.