Since People Don’t Seem To Understand What “Men’s Reproductive Rights” Means,

Since people don’t seem to understand what “Men’s Reproductive Rights” means,

I will explain it in a way using popular characters. 

This is Nancy Hicks Gribble from popular animated show King of the Hill. One of the biggest controversies and stories about her is that throughout her marriage, she spent 14 years of it cheating on her husband , Dale Gribble 

with muscle bound Native American masseur, John Redcorn. 

During one of their frequent…encounters, Nancy becomes pregnant and has a son, Joseph Gribble. 

Now obviously Joseph isn’t Dale’s biological son, but Dale is not smart enough and too trusting of his wife to question it (he has even caught them in bed together and incorrectly assumed his wife was just getting a massage). It is obvious to John Redcorn however. So what does this have to do with men’s rights? Well since Nancy kept the continued affair a secret, Dale has been taking care of Joseph, another man’s son, with the false assumption that it is his own. John Redcorn, who desperately wants to be a part of Joseph’s life, is unable to do so properly because the son believes that Dale is his father and Nancy refuses to be truthful. So one father is being tricked/forced to take care of a child that isn’t his, while another man is being refused his right to parenthood. 

Need another example? 

This is Lana Kane from the television show Archer.

Lana had a beautiful baby girl through artificial insemination.

However it came with some issues. She stole the sperm from soon-to-be father Sterling Archer 

 while he was having a cancer scare. Throughout the series, Archer has made it clear that he isn’t ready for a baby yet, so his stance on this would probably be clear. She then impregnated herself without telling him or getting his permission, got him to drown and then revive to save her because she was pregnant, then only after the baby was born, did she tell him it was his baby. Not soon after, she demanded that he “man up” and “take responsibility” for the care of the child, while she simultaneously refusing him any and all parental rights when he shows interest in the baby’s future, even stating that she would rather lose the baby than have Archer raise her. Comments on Archer’s wording of watching the baby as “babysitting” was met with similar responses as Lana’s of “It’s your baby, take responsibility” and “if you are the father, it is just parenting”. This all with him not getting a say in the baby’s creation and again, having no parental rights. 

This is yet another problem that men face. At any time, a woman can either get pregnant through consensual intercourse and leave, steal a man’s sperm, or even rape him, and have complete decision on whether the child is born, and almost always gets custody of the child. At any time, the woman can come back into the man’s life and reveal that the man has a child (one that he didn’t ask for or plan for), and immediately demand the man pay back child support. The mother typically gets it. Men who would like to be a part of their baby’s life, no matter the cause of the pregnancy, can easily be refused that right due to court biases favoring women. 

How about another?

This is Deborah Gallagher from the television show Shameless. 

Deborah is pretty desperate for a relationship. blame it on teenage hormones, blame it on her family’s influence, but she makes some bad decisions because of it. Deborah befriended fellow high school student Derek Delgado. 

They get into a relationship, and Deborah encourages him to have intercourse with her. When he brings up the need for a condom, she stresses that it isn’t needed because she is on the pill. It turns out that she lied about being on birth control pills, actually wanting to trap Derek into a relationship by getting pregnant and starting a family. Derek, shocked by the thought of having a baby, and concerned with the future that he had hoped for, moves out of the state to think and get away from Debby. Debby has also done something similar with a former boyfriend, Matt Baker, who she had originally lied to about her age and eventually raped while he was passed out drunk at a party. Her desperation for a relationship would have probably led to a similar scenario, if it wasn’t almost certain that Matt would have gone to jail for Statutory Rape (a different issue men face)

Derek’s story is actually similar to many men’s. He was clearly not ready for a baby, but was tricked into it. He had a whole life planned worked out, but the baby changed that drastically. The common response is “he should have thought about that before having sex”, which is not the same response a woman would normally get. Consent to sex is only consent to a baby for a man. Debby was ready for a baby, and he was not. But who cares about what he thinks, right? So now he must either halt or even cancel his life plans and dreams to take care of the baby, or leave the baby behind and deal with the guilt of his biological child growing up without him because he wasn’t ready. 

You cannot keep shouting “my body, my decision” when it comes to a baby. A baby is more than 9 months. It is a life changing decision that could cost tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands of dollars. It is a decision that takes years of dedication, potentially the rest of your life. Men should also get a choice and a say, but often don’t. not when they are raped, not when they are tricked, not when they are not ready for a baby, not when they have other plans in life, not when they want to be a part of the child’s life, nothing. That should be a problem. That should be considered an inequality.