This week's "virtual visitation" ruling by a Massachusetts court points to
a new and dangerous trend in family law--judges permitting mothers to move
their children hundreds or thousands of miles away from their fathers, and
justifying the separation by ordering Internet video conferencing as a
purported substitute for a father's time with his children.
In her ruling, Judge E. Chouteau Merrill awarded a Boston-area woman sole
custody of her three small children, and gave her permission to move the
children 225 miles away. Merrill granted two weekend visits a month to
Paul, the ex-husband and father of the couple's five year-old son and twin
two year-old daughters. The children will be moved to Long Island, New
York.
Merrill explained that the computer conferences are relatively cheap and
will allow Paul to read to his children and help them with their homework.
According to Tom Harrison, publisher of Lawyers Weekly USA, virtual
visitation is the "cutting edge of divorce law" and will "become accepted
and possibly even commonplace over the next few years."
Hundreds of thousands of divorced dads like Paul are victims of "Move Away
Moms" who either do not value their children's relationships with their
fathers, place their own needs above those of their children, or use
geography as a method of driving fathers out of their children's lives. The
misplaced use of virtual visitation as a rationalization for the troubled
consciences of both move away moms and family court judges will exacerbate
the problem.
In one highly publicized case, a self-deluded mother said that virtual
visitation allowed her to "feel more comfortable that I'm not destroying my
son's relationship with his father" by deciding to move away. It seems
unlikely that, were the situations reversed, she would be happy with
biweekly virtual visitations.
Even if one accepts the Merrill ruling's dubious rationale, virtual
visitation opens up endless opportunities for interference by custodial
parents. Today many divorced dads endure the heartache of being told that
they cannot see their children because they always have "dentist
appointments" or "birthday parties to attend" during their scheduled
visitation times. In the era of virtual visitation, there will be an
inordinately large number of technical problems with custodial parents' web
cameras, and the repair shops will be operating at an unusually slow pace.
However, it is doubtful that many judges will be willing to hold a mother
in contempt of court for not fixing her computer.
In addition, for Paul (and other fathers of young children), the video
conferencing will be almost impossible to do without the presence and
assistance of Paul's ex-wife. No doubt he does not want to share what few
precious moments he has with his children with the woman who took them so
far away from him.
Because Massachusetts noncustodial parents with past-due child support
are assessed interest at 12% annually, as well as penalties at 6% annually,
arrearages mount rapidly. And even if Paul does move to New York, there is
no guarantee that his ex-wife will let him see his children, and getting
courts to enforce visitation rights is often difficult.
As one divorced dad noted:
"No--in a jail cell you can stick your arm out between the bars and hold
your child's hand. A 'virtual dad' can't even do that."
Glenn Sacks writes about gender issues from the male perspective.
His columns have appeared in
the Chicago Tribune,
the Los Angeles Times,
Newsday,
the Houston Chronicle,
the San Francisco Chronicle,
the Philadelphia Inquirer,
the San Diego Union-Tribune,
the St. Louis Post-Dispatch,
the Los Angeles Daily News,
the Washington Times
and others.
He invites readers to visit his website at
www.GlennSacks.com.
Dianna Thompson is director of the
Second Wives Crusade
and executive director of the
American Coalition for Fathers and Children.
