PROBLEMS WITH 50-50 CUSTODY

"Your goal is legitimate and right and just. You need to demonstrate your clout to the politicians." . . . . . . Phyllis Schlafly, 12/11/05, on PEP-Talk radio

 

A Reader Writes:

 

“An objection that will often be raised to equal custody is that it would be too disruptive to the children's schooling to have them shift back and forth between two homes every week or every two weeks. Here is a way to give the parents 50-50 equal time with the children without changing where they live during the school week:
 

“Under Texas' and most other states' Standard Possession Orders the non-custodial parent has the child on the 1st, 3rd, and 5th weekends plus one weeknight overnight. The custodial parent has the 2nd and 4th weekends plus the other weeknights. This gives the custodial parent possession of the child about 70% of the time, and the non-custodial parent about 30%.
 

“By simply changing the non-custodial parent's weekends to the 1st, 2nd, and 4th instead of 1st, 3rd, and 5th, you increase their possession time to 50%. The reason this makes a difference is that very few months have 5 weekends, but all months have 4 weekends. By giving the rare 5th weekend to the CP instead of the NCP, you give the NCP 3 weekends every month. The CP still has the child 4 of 5 weeknights as before, but only one weekend a month, except when the month has 5 weekends, in which case it is 2 weekends. What are your thoughts?”

 

PEP Responds:

 

‘Before dealing directly with your question, let’s do a little clear thinking about objections to Equal Parental Responsibility on the basis of stability.

 

‘First, if stability is the paramount value, then our leaders should repeal the U.S. Constitution’s Bill of Rights and subsequent amendments, which the United States Supreme Court has said for more than 80 years provide various safeguards for parents’ rights to raise their children with an absolute minimum of state interference.

 

‘Second, if stability is the paramount value, then our leaders should outlaw divorce except under the most extreme circumstances. 

 

‘Third, if stability is the paramount value, then our leaders should eliminate any form of visitation between NCP and child.

 

‘Fourth, if stability is the paramount value, then our leaders should get rid of the Standard Possession Schedule (SPS) and immediately replace it with a 50-50 schedule of alternating weeks (Equal Parental Responsibility).   Under SPS, there are 4-6 changes of custody in the normal two-week period.  Under Equal Parental Responsibility, there are two.

 

‘Fifth, stability … of what?  Why isn’t this question ever asked?  Why don’t our leaders state the obvious that a stable relationship with each parent exceeds by orders of magnitude the importance to any child of any other kind of stability, such as a single bedroom at mom’s instead of one bedroom at mom’s and one at dad’s.  But … wait a minute … that’s exactly what 80-90% of all children of divorces involving fit parents have anyway, isn’t it?  A bedroom at each parent’s place.  And our leaders don’t seem troubled by that.  There’s no movement afoot to get rid of all those destabilizing beds at the NCP’s place, is there?

 

Hmmmm …

 

‘If it’s not true that the stability that matters most is the stability of the parent-child relationship between each parent and the child, then it’s high time for our nation to intervene on behalf of all military brats … along with anyone who works for IBM (I’ve Been Moved).  (I know whereof I speak, because I was someone who moved not less than once every 1-1/2 years while I grew up in a military family.)

 

‘Finally, if stability is the paramount value, then our leaders should insist that all youngsters be home-schooled.  By sending children to public school, we start with 10 changes of custody (so to speak) per week.  Different rules.  Different rule makers.  Different routines.  Sound familiar?   Particularly when we couple this with the evidence that home-schooled kids do better on standardized tests than public schooled kids, our leaders will no doubt rush to install this obvious change …  Won’t they?

 

‘Naturally, none of these things are in the cards.  Why?  Because as everyone knows stability isn’t the paramount value … not by a country mile.  But I step through these responses to the stability argument to show an example of the disingenuousness that unfortunately seems to all-too-often characterize the debate about child custody.

 

‘Now, for a direct response to your question.

 

‘Truth be told, there are any number of ways to do Equal Parental Responsibility.  PEP’s approach (when the time comes) will be to offer the powers-that-be two or three default options that a court may impose if a set of parents can't come up with their own equal possession schedule.  In a presumptive 50-50 custody regime, however, I think it’ll be rare that a court will have to impose a default option.  Why?

 

‘If two children have a set of chores to do and can't seem to agree on how they'll split the duties, it's amazing how cooperative they often become if mom or dad tells them s/he'll just rotate the duties blindly equally if the two kids can't come up with their own solution.

 

‘Hmmmm…

 

‘Why don’t most fit parents agree to 50-50 custody on their own, according to a schedule they craft for themselves?  Because the statutes PEP is challenging incentivize the Custodial Parent to be unfair.  This is an unpleasant statement.  But a true one.  And if our leaders are too afraid to engage in straight talk about the subject, it’s up to us.  As Confucius said, “If you want to help heal society, start by calling things by their proper names.”

 

‘Thanks for writing, and for the great love you have for your kids and the society we’ll pass onto them oh-so-soon.  Let’s not pass it on with this mess intact.’