Single Dads

Today, life gave way to stunning shock for me as Britney Spears managed to somehow completely lose the right and ability to see her children, ages 1 and 2.  Typically this is the kind of story that I could care less about, but for some reason this one hit a chord.  From the AP wire (via Yahoo):

Britney Spears can’t even visit her children now. The troubled pop star may not see 2-year-old Sean Preston and 1-year-old Jayden James who are in the custody of Spears’ ex-husband, Kevin Federline until she complies with a court order, Superior Court Commissioner Scott Gordon ruled.

The order, dated Wednesday, does not spell out what directives Spears defied. A hearing in the matter was scheduled for Oct. 26.

Now, I’m no big fan of Britney Spears (really, I’m not) but I’d sure love to know what she did to warrant that kind of situation.  A male friend who I’ll call Hank long ago told me that the only way in this country for a father to get custody of his children is for the mother to be a

But here’s a shocking admission: I believe that courts have far too much power over private lives anyway.

drug addict.  Hank eventually got custody of his child, but in fact, his child’s mother DID have to be a drug addict for it to happen - it only cost him $50,000 and a declaration of bankruptcy - and sadly nothing that I’ve seen in the last few years would that his declaration was untrue.

But here’s a shocking admission: I believe that courts have far too much power over private lives anyway.  The anarchist in me thinks that hey, we already have enough laws and enough incursions on privacy.  Leave most families alone.

On the other hand, if you are a completely incompetent parent, perhaps you SHOULDN’T be around your kids at all.

But another fact is that I’ve never seen a completely incompetent parent.  Never.  I’m sure that they exist; I just haven’t met one that set the parental bar that low.  Perhaps that’s a factor of the people that I know, but I can’t be certain.  I know some pretty odd people.

So, in the end,  I feel kind of bad for Ms. Federline-Spears; I feel badly for her kids, and I feel badly about the system in general.  The legal system: in matters considering your children, avoid it like some parents avoid giving their children vaccinations.