Dads
Several hours ago I watched a small kid wearing a football uniform walking with his dad. He had just left Pee Wee football practice and they were walking in the rain. Everyone was huddling under the NW 1st Avenue & 14th street bridge or ducking into overhangs to escape the rain. Not this kid. He was smiling at his dad, looking up into the rain. His dad had a firm arm around his son’s shoulder as they walked past 14th Street drunks, corner crack dealers and kids who watched him with a longing for a chance to walk in the rain with a man they could call dad.
I always feel uncomfortable when I am outside having fun with my own children and I see kids looking out of the window. I know that sometimes they are the ones who’s father is not there or is only evident by the name on a child support check. I often wonder if that child had a choice would he/she prefer the dad over the check? And why should the child have to make a choice like that in the first place?
Well a friend tried to file with the court to pay child support for his son after he and his girlfriend broke up. When he went down to West Flagler street the first time a lady at the counter recommended that he wait until the girlfriend files against him. A few days later he went back and they took his paperwork but then they never called. He went back after a month and filed the same paperwork again. Eventually he got a hearig with a “Master” but they have never contacted him about paying child support. He noted that not once did the “Master” – a pseudo judge ask the mother if she ensured that the father had regular contact with the child.
We have talked many times about this. He has not heard from the court. He continues to send money to the mother and tries his best to stay on good terms with her so that he can see his son. He is convinced that the weight of the court is skewed towards helping the mother pimp her children for funds. In the process the father who should be an equal partner in the raising of the child is alienated, humiliated and driven away from the child. To make matters worse the father is seen as a funding source for the mother and not a source of support for the child. Why does the court use it’s weight to devalue the father unless it has a underlying financial incentive?
And that does not take into consideration the cornerstone of judicial fairness which is Equal Opportunity Under the Law. If the State represents the mother and sets itself up as a functionary body to collect funds for the mother then in essence it is using overbearing judicial force against the father. If this same judical force was brought to bear upon the father child relationship then perhaps the well being of all these “fatherless” children could be enhanced in a more meaningful way.
*9/704/13*
