Wow.

Just, wow.

Here's a leap in logic for you. Because women have a choice in whether or not to give birth to a child, the man should have a choice in whether or not to pay child support.

A lawsuit is being filed in Detroit, apparently, on behalf of the men's rights movement, making this argument. They're calling it "Roe v. Wade for men."

I'd call it "Responsibility vs. Financial Evasion for men."

Apparently, Mr. Matt Dubay, a 25-year-old computer technician from Saginaw, would like the Michigan child support law declared unconstitutional.

Dubay told her he didn't want to be a father. He claims the woman he was dating assured him she couldn't get pregnant, due to contraceptives she was taking and other physical issues.

There is now incontrovertible evidence that this was inaccurate, and Mr. Dubay now finds himself ordered to support his eight-month-old daughter.

"It's just not fair," he tells the Detroit News. "She has options in this. As a man, I have no options and am forced to live with her choices. I was up front. I was clear that I didn't want to be a father and she reassured me that she was incapable of getting pregnant."

OK, Matt? Matt? Let's just take your story that she said she was on contraceptives and physically unable to get pregnant.

First of all, in the words of jury instructions read in courtrooms everyday, "All human activity involves some risk." And the activity which you engaged in which has gotten us to this point in time is no exception. Contraceptives occasionally fail. The human body repairs itself. People are inaccurate about the medications they are taking or their state.

The good news is, there are things you can do to reduce your risk, which (while the Detroit News did not, thankfully, go into specifics) it appears you may not have done. So, if everything you say is true about what your girlfriend told you, you still might have been able to reduce the amount of risk. So, simply stating that "As a man, I have no options and am forced to live with her choices" is a gross oversimplification. As a man, you had options to understand the nature of the risks and not assume that her word was the be-all, end-all. You made a choice not to. You are forced to live with choices both of you made.

And, by the way, if your logic prevails, your child will be forced to live by the choice you are making not to support her. So, if we assume that the mother was a lying, conniving person, and as a result, you get a pass at support, the child (who did not choose either of you) will suffer.

So, really, Matt, the only one who does not have options and never has had options is the child you would like to get out of supporting.

(PS: The mother is raising the child, so it's not like she's exactly getting off with no responsibility.)

All right, let's leave Mr. Dubay's case alone for a moment and just think about what the consequences it would have if we adopted his position.

This should not take long, but let's spell it out. Essentially, you would be telling women that a man could threaten them that, if they chose to give birth to a child, they would be left to raise them completely on their own.

And most everyone agrees that, as a matter of policy, we would prefer women to give birth. As Bill Clinton said, "Abortions should be safe, legal and rare." You make them rare by creating an environment where a few things happen:

(1) Fewer unplanned pregnancies. That means you educate people on how to reduce the risk of the risky activity described above. (It doesn't mean you tell high school students to stop thinking about sex.)

(2) You ensure a system of adoption that will make a woman feel that, if she wishes to carry a child to term but give it up for adoption, the child will be raised in a nuturing and appropriate environment.

(3) You ensure that the woman feels she can make a go of it for herself and her child, should she choose to carry it to term and keep the child.

What the Matt Dubays of the world are proposing manifestly does not help us get to #3. Rather, it's giving every guy the right to say, "You wanna have the kid, witch? Then you pay for it!"

Of course, this all may be academic in that, soon, women may not be able to make that choice.

PS: In writing this post, I have assumed that Mr. Dubay did not take certain protective measures. If I am wrong, and he did everything a "reasonably prudent person" should do, I apologize, although even when you do all of that, you may still find yourself in a situation where you receive a surprise nine months later. However, even if he's completely innocent (which I doubt), the precedent his case would set for non-innocents would be horrible.