Who's your daddy?

Whenever the term "single parent" comes to mind many of us automatically assume it means a household run by a woman, a mother. And yes, in Israel – as in many countries around the world, the person heading the single-parent-household is, in many cases, a woman, but many of them are headed by fathers.

In Israel, for example, there are 4,500 single-parent-household headed by fathers, these households, unlike the mother-run counterparts, are plagued by insensitivity and lack of awareness at best and discrimination at worst, of society and the governing bureaus which run it.

When mothers petition to have their children removed from their fathers' custody on grounds of violent behavior, mental defect or just an overall negative attitude, we all feel for them; and most of us would like to see the courts remove the untoward father from the presence of his vulnerable children.

But when the shoe is on the other foot – when it is the father who claims the mother is abusive, indifferent or mentally impaired, and wants the court to give him sole custody of his children, then what? He is put through the proverbial ringer and is usually forced to hire a roomful of lawyers to prove his case, and worse – he has to prove that does not prove him to be an unfit father.

Against the odds

In most cases, the odds are against the father. Even if the court agrees the mother in unfit, it is more likely to issue an order awarding temporary custody of the children to the state, rather than award it to their father – regardless of how willing and able as he may be. We as a society – the welfare

establishment, the courts, the police and the general public, deem it inconceivable that a mother could be abusive or just walk away from her children; and even in the rare occasion when we finally agree that the mother is unfit, it is inconceivable to us that a father could handle raising children on his own.

In my capacity as a social worker I've come across many fathers who were discriminated against in that way, for nothing by the system's prejudice, stereotypical views. Yes, the reality we live in often sees fathers who are less than the ideal parent; and yes, our innate gender perception leads us to believe that the mother, by nature, is the best parent, but in reality, there are many fathers who would make wonderful parents.

Unfortunately, not only are we unable to recognize the difficulties they encounter, but we throw additional obstacles in their way, encouraging, whether beknown to us or not, a situation in which the children are the ones punished – and twice at that: Once by losing the presence of the mother, and the second time by being devoided of their father. The fathers suffer a dual loss as well, that of their partner in parenting and their children. And for that, we – both the welfare establishment and the public – are to blame.

We have to be able to break away from the stereotype. We have to be able to asses a father's parental competence on a case by case basis; and just like a man is innocent until proven guilty, we must think twice, thrice, before removing children from their parents' custody and thrice more before questioning a parent's competence – especially if their parenting partner had been deemed an unfit parent.

The welfare establishment and the public as a whole have to understand the effect traditional gender perception has, not only when in comes to discrimination against women. When it comes to making custodial decisions we all must start seeing men, fathers, as having equal rights, equal capabilities to raise their children.

Advah Dror is a social worker