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Can see their point
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this post was submitted on 13 Oct 2025
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Witches VS Patriarchy
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To me, single mother/father isn't negative. It's simply a way to explain their situation; that they are raising a child by themselves and for whatever reason they don't have a partner.
Honestly the first time I've heard someone think of it in a negative way. Mostly I hear people say single mother/father with sincere respect as they know raising a kid is difficult, and can't imagine doing it by themselves.
*Quick edit to affirm the fact that single fathers are relatively rare as we live in a patriarchy.
one of my mother's more unhinged rant topics was women intentionally keeping children away from their fathers as revenge for him breaking up with her and that if they don't have the maturity to get married and stay married then they shouldn't have children etc etc. She also talked mad shit about people who take government assistance to care for their children when my disabled sister has always been on as many benefits as my mother could get approved (she had good reasons though, unlike those lazy "other" people... 🤔)
ime I have seen mothers use their child coercively but it's not usually by keeping them from the father, at least not successfully. It turns out family court actually favors fathers if they bother to pursue custody, which few do without a strong reason, either good or bad. It's usually been women using the children to coerce family, friends, or a new partner into staying by getting them to bond with the child then being able to actually remove the child from them since they have no legal rights to the child. And I think the only reason I haven't seen fathers do it more is because, as stated previously, many don't pursue custody due to either internal or external expectations that childcare is the mother's job.
I was raised by a single father. He definitely "took us" from my mother with spite in his heart. Pretty rare yes. I think I was 8 years old when I heard him call her a whore the first time.
He got arrested when I was a teen for, being a shitty parent. Such a shitty parent, he got a ten year sentence, served 8. Should have been longer.
He fought "so hard for his kids" and then just completely dropped the ball. We had like 3 good years before it all turned to shit.
My mom's dying this week. I .. don't know what I feel about it, but the wrong parent is suffering. I hated my mom for a long time in my youth because to me at the time, I couldn't understand why she couldn't be the superhero single mom you'd hear about all the time. She knew the bad stuff that was happening to us with our father, and yet claimed, she was powerless to help us.
Anyhoo, men who fight for custody usually get it, and it was very easy for my father (adopted step father technically) to spin my mother as crazy and unfit. Divorced 1993.
Damn, I'm sorry you have such a negative experience on the topic. It's really awful to have a batshit insane mother, isn't it? My parents were also a bit fucky, and it's something I think I'll have to deal with for a long time still.
I suppose the mother coercing people is perhaps more of a stress response and navigating the fear of raising a child by themselves. Like indirectly asking for help.
I certainly agree that the courts favour the fathers, as they are basically the hub of anything patriarchal.
oh, no. The women I'm remembering were straight up abusive. One of them was too high to properly bond with the older male child when he was born so she really only wanted the younger girl but she refused to give up custody of him because she could get money out of the grandmother in exchange for being allowed to see him. Kid was like ten showing up to my friend's mom's house with handprint bruises talking about beating hookers and they couldn't get CPS to remove the kid. Fucking sad. I don't talk to that friend anymore for unrelated reasons but last I heard her sister had at least gotten back with the kid's dad and was at least treating my friend's nephew better in front of his biodad.
also idgaf if it is a stress response. It really damages the kids to not have consistent caregivers and to be constantly told that people who were positive influences in their life were actually bad. It's gonna fuck up their ability to set healthy boundaries for the rest of their life. If they can't "ask for help" without fucking a kid up for life then they are an unfit parent. Those women were just uniquely awful people whose kids might have had a better life if mom taking the kids in the break up wasn't the societal default.
Even the idea of "raising a child by themselves" is variable. Separated parents often collaborate very well in raising children "together".
The term "single mother" (or single father) doesn't even really indicate custody. It's a hangup on not being in committed a relationship.