conuly | Every once in a while I read comments to an advice column or AmITheAsshole

and I discover, shockingly, that there are many people who have a totally contrary opinion to mine on this particular issue I'm about to share my opinion on. It just blows me away that in this day and age, people can be so very wrong, not to mention utterly lacking in empathy and compassion.

So here it is:

If you discover that your walking, talking, school-aged child with whom you have a real relationship is actually the product of infidelity, there are no take-backs on your relationship with your child. If you divorce your wife and then proceed to divorce your child as well, then you are a bad person and a bad parent and you should feel bad. And if you know that your SO did this to their own child, or thinks it is okay, then you probably shouldn't marry them or have a child with them, because they are terrible.

Any child old enough to call you Daddy is your child. (And by the way? If you have multiple children but only cut off contact with the one that isn't 'really' yours, that child's siblings will be fully justified when they go no-contact in adulthood. Which they will, because you are a bad father. You cannot be a good father to them if you're deliberately hurting their brother or sister because you're pissy at your ex.)

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

james

Right on.

From:

gatheringrivers

Totally with you on this!

From:

thornsilver

That seems obvious, and yet I don't doubt that a lot of people are those kinds of assholes.

From:

conuly

SO MANY PEOPLE, and when you tell them that they're assholes they mob downvote you. Because they're assholes.

From:

conuly

Also, this is probably not a surprise, but they're all huge MRAs and MGTOWs etc.

From:

dark_phoenix54

I agree with you. The relationship with the child is separate from the relationship with the mother. He should not be punished for the mother's screw up.

From:

conuly

Like, I understand if it's a little baby and you just don't want to even start that relationship - though, again, if this little baby has older siblings with whom you wish to stay in contact, you need to remember that nobody likes it when their parents play favorites. But I really don't know what sort of terrible person looks at a five year old and decides to nope out of their life like that. Or a nine year old, or a thirteen year old. Seriously, who does that? And why would anybody want a relationship with somebody whose bonds to others are so fickle?

From:

siderea

So, the thing that this phenomenon illustrates to me is how little an awful lot of parents love their children.

Years ago, I knew a guy who was going through a divorce with a 6yo kid. He wanted full custody, since he was the primary caregiver, but was compromising on 50/50 custody. MA mandates a "parenting for people divorcing with children" class, so he took it. He came back from it shook: he told me all the other men in the class were talking about how much they resented having to have a whole weekend a month with their kids. No question of paternity, even – their own kids! They didn't want to have to even spend a weekend a month with them. He told me he had no idea so many other men didn't like being fathers; he was beyond horrified.

From:

conuly

JFC, those assholes.

From:

wpadmirer

Man, do I ever agree with you on that. The child is not the one who was not faithful. Punishing the child for the sins of the parent means you're an asshole.

From:

conuly

Pity it's such cold consolation to the child that their daddy was always an asshole and they're better off without him.

From:

mama_kestrel

I fired a few clients for pursuing that sort of vindictiveness. They would do what they would, but I wasn't going to facilitate it. Let them find another attorney. Conversely, I had a client who had never formally adopted his step-daughter, but said that he was the only daddy she'd ever known and insisted support and visitation be written into the divorce settlement. I had a lot of respect for him.

From:

conuly

Good for you, and good for that client as well.

From:

readerjane

Affirmative.

From:

dine

totally in agreement on this! you are their parent - discovering years later that genetics don't match doesn't change that reality

From:

conuly

I just don't even know how people can function like that, deciding to love a child today but not tomorrow. What's next, they'll stop loving their poodle if they find out he's really a poodle mix?

From:

sara

My oldest has largely ceased to have a relationship with their father after turning 18, partially because he used to speculate aloud that Eldest was not his biological child (laughably not the case; I mean, at this point I wish that were the case, but the genetic relationship is painfully obvious to anyone with eyes and also anyone who's ever met me).

People who do not treat their children as their children are unlikely in the long run to find that those children want them for parents.

From:

conuly

It sucks that your kid couldn't have a real father to really be there for them, but it's that man's loss, not your kid's.

From:

sara

Oh, I think so.

From:

pauamma

Is this about the one referred to in https://twitter.com/CZEdwards/status/1426285413430218754? Or is there *another* similar one?

From:

conuly

It pops up in variations on AITA often enough, but this time I'm talking about comments to an advice column I read: https://www.mercurynews.com/2021/08/12/dear-abby-my-fiance-is-keeping-our-baby-a-secret/

Not the comments here, I think they were at uexpress, but who knows? God, I hope that letter's fake - I can't figure out of Fiance cut his son out of his life or not and it's bugging me.

From:

pauamma

*nod* The one you linked to is concerning as well, but as the columnist pointed out, "once burned twice shy" may be a contributing factor. But that won't be much comfort to the child or the mother if he doesn't come around soon, I fear.

From:

rmc28

Hard agree.

From:

sabotabby

That's horrifying. It stems from a belief that children are property. My biological father absolutely had that attitude and was happy to replace me with a new family (I wasn't the product of infidelity; he just viewed me as an extension of my mother).

From:

crystalpyramid

Wow, people are the worst.

(We did argue with our sister about whether our ex-stepbrother was permanently family or not after my dad cheated on his mom and they got divorced, but in our defense we didn't really like him much and we'd all been school-age when my dad remarried.)

From:

conuly

Stepsiblings are different from stepkids, I think, especially in cases like yours where you weren't raised together from your very earliest memories and have no other reason to stay loyal to each other.

From:

jessie_c

From:

agoodwinsmith

Agree.

From:

calimac

Situations like this - not involving infidelity, but stepchildren - come up often in the advice columns I read, both from the parent and from the (now adult) children, and the advice is always that if there had been a good relationship, maintain it. To be fair, a lot of the letters are asking for advice on how to maintain that relationship over barriers against it. (e.g. adult child's mother insists that child cut off relations with mother's loathed ex-husband, but ex-husband had been a good stepfather whom adult child loves)

From:

silveradept

That is the kind of behavior that says someone is unfit to be a parent in the first place. You love your children and you keep them out of whatever issues you have with the parent, if you can.

From:

bitterlawngnome

With you on this one.

From:

dragonyphoenix

My cousin's ex-husband used to complain about sending her alimony after she had a third child from a different relationship. He didn't want any of "his" money taking care of her son.

From:

andrewducker

Jesus Christ Yes. If it turns out that Sophia or Gideon was the product of infidelity I will be saddened and upset about the way that Jane has behaved. But they are *my children* and I will not stop treating them that way. I cannot imagine how awful it would feel to do so!

From:

gwydion

Absolutely!

From:

larryhammer

Argh -- I -- grrrr! -- that ----

As an adoptive parent (and adopting had always been on the table for me, even before I met Janni) I cannot comprehend that attitude. It infuriates me. Love is love is love, and being a caretaker matters SO MUCH MORE than sharing genes. Your child is your child, no matter who the bio parents are.