Saturday, April 19, 2008

Child custody is not a ball game.

Glenn Sacks said: "in child custody cases the baby is like the football in a football game—whoever has possession is in control."

And I commented:

If this is the case, and it very certainly is, then the rules of the game need fundamental change. In fact, the game needs to be called off completely. The quickest way to do that is to preserve possession by both sides in the game. What's the point in playing ball if taking it from the other side is against the rules?

"The best interests of the child" doctrine is based on out of date, bad pseudo-Freudian "science". It is a simple-minded ideology which seeks to preserve the child's relationship with one, and only one, parent. Pretty much all the malignancies of child custody develop from this one cancerous idea. When there are suitable penalties for attempts to obstruct or disrupt the relationship between a child and either willing, adequate parent, then and only then will we see excrescences like the above receding into an embarrassing history.