No, no, not the American father’s rights movement: as far as I can tell, they’re still mostly focused on blaming all problems on their ex-wives and seeking creative new ways to avoid paying child support.
For all I know the British “father’s lobby” does all that, too, but they also campaign for useful changes:
The charter is published by the campaigning charity Fathers Direct on the first anniversary of the Government’s work-life balance reforms. It calls for paternity leave to be paid at 90 per cent of men’s earnings, instead of the current flat rate of £100 a week. It also demands that all parents have the right to flexible working, unless an employer can demonstrate that it would damage the business. […]
These moves come after a growing recognition, highlighted last year by Julie Mellor, chairwoman of the Equal Opportunities Commission, that more action is needed to make sure that men achieve a work-life balance.
Duncan Fisher, director of Fathers Direct, called on ministers to capitalise on this support: “The Government’s goal should be to give mothers and fathers better opportunities to raise their children and to achieve success at work.”
I really loved the proposal for a presumptive right to flexible work hours, with the burden placed on the employer to prove that they can’t offer flexible hours. The willingness to stand up to business is what makes it clear this isn’t taking place in the USA; business interests are such a sacred cow here.
But it’s necessary to stand up to business if we’re going to switch over from a “father knows best” economy (in which employers assume that all workers have a wife at home, and thus have no family obligations) to a family-friendly economy, which recognizes that all workers may have family responsibilities that employers will have to allow for..
That’s great. I’ve always wondered why the U.S. movement is so visibly self-centered and not focused on making changes that would actually benefit families.
I’m glad to hear about this.
Whodathunk that father’s rights people might think of ways to benefit all parents? It’s unAmerican, I say!
(quick typo note by the way, you wrote business interests are such a sacred cow ihere. My guess is you were writing “a sacred cow in America” and changed it and didn’t completely erase “in”.
My thesis has a lot of formal number theory in it, and I’m used to checking it to make sure there are exactly as many right parentheses as left parentheses, so I’m a little hypersensitive to typos right now)
Typo corrected (and you’re right about how it came to be, by the way). Thanks!
Hi
Tom from Fathers Direct in the UK here – nice to see you spotted this.
Feel free to visit our website – http://www.fathersdirect.com – for loads of other useful ideas and news!
In February, my wife left me after lying that she was going to a friend’s house. She actually left for Bermuda as she entered her third trimester. She gave birth in Bermuda. her family went to Bermuda Immigration and said that although I never ever tried to harm her, they are afraid that someday I might and I was placed on the Immigration Stop List there. My daughters, twin girls, were born April 8. I have never been allowed to see them. I am nearly bankrupt from paying a lawyer I never met to represent me in Bermuda.
I have never even gotten a speeding ticket and I am being treated like a common criminal…no wait…criminals still have parental rights. I waited 46 years to be a father and now I have nothing but heartache. The US State Department won’t help because the children aren’t US Citizens.
These babies are the result of using donor eggs through in-vitro fertilization, because my wife is unfertile.
My wife was raised without her father because her mother pulled nearly the same exact thing and she only met her dad when she was 24 years of age.
Is there anything that can be done? Can any organization help me to get the press interested? I have written to many members of the press and never received a response. I am open to any and all suggestions.
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