January 11, 2003

Men rightly vie for their custody rights

Stuart Millar, Letter to the Editor
THE WASHINGTON TIMES

I was awed by the naked truth exposed in the coverage of men demanding their citizenship rights not be abridged in the article "Men aim for equal custodial rights" (Metro, Wednesday). How ironic it is that lawyers and lawyer-legislators oppose such a notion when confronted with the idea of shared parenting. Yet, they callously condemn these same men for "not being supportive of their children" when addressing financial child-support proposals.

Children love, want and need two parents. The research is in, and the data is incontestable. In the short run, shared parenting may infringe on the profits that the state and some lawyers earn from refusing to budge from a winner-parent-loser-parent mentality. In the long run, however, the state will win because there won't be any sole-custody children to cycle through the criminal justice system, the welfare office or the divorce courts. Children from two-parent families rarely end up in their clutches.

Did I forget to mention the benefit to the lawyers? There isn't any, unless one considers self-evaluation a benefit.

STUART A. MILLER
Senior legislative analyst
American Fathers Coalition
Washington

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