Would it be anti-feminist to oppose mandatory paternity tests?

This is kind of a sticky subject for me, I'm honestly not sure how I feel about the idea of mandatory paternity tests. I'll try to explain my thoughts as best I can:

I support the current system of paternity tests being relatively cheap and widely available, and it seems to work pretty well. I'm not against a parent trying to get a paternity test done if that's their wish.

However, many MRAs seem to believe that this is not a good system and say that there's too much room for women to "abuse their power". Their issues from what I can gather are that women have parental certainty, they always know the baby is theirs, but men have paternity insecurity and can never be certain unless a test is done. They also say getting the test done right after the baby is born can help to detect any genetic issues from the bio dad, say, if the real father had a disease and passed it down to the child. This seems like a sketchy justification, I'm not familiar with new birth protocols but don't they do that sort of testing already, even before the baby is born? I admit I don't know much about that so I could be wrong.

The last thing they argue, which I find pretty offensive, is that the government should mandate paternity testing so a man can get the test done without having to confront his wife or gf and avoid an argument over him not trusting her. That just sounds so selfish to me, the government should mandate this test so a guy can dodge an argument? Especially when there's nothing stopping him from getting the test done already? It feels like a slap in the face to all women, that there should be a medical assumption that a woman was unfaithful and so every new child should be tested at birth, even though from what I've heard paternity fraud is very rare.

This is also the most difficult aspect for me personally, they say a woman shouldn't be angry or offended by a man asking for a paternity test because somehow it's not an accusation of unfaithfulness but just him getting his own parental assurance. On the one hand, I can sympathize with being uncertain since the child didn't exit the man's body, and being worried it's not yours if your wife or gf is acting suspicious. OTOH, I don't know how I'm not supposed to be offended if my husband were to ask for a test, because to me that would be accusing me of cheating and lying to him.

What are your thoughts on mandatory testing and MRA justifications? Are women like me being unreasonable? Is it anti-feminist not to support mandatory testing so men can have parental assurance?

Posted Jul 31, 2017, 2:29 PM UTC

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