What were you saying?

Any number of bloggers, Atrios probably most prominent among them, are of the opinion that, between South Dakota's new prohibition on abortion, technological advances in establishing paternity, and social progress in writing child support legislation, a lot of men are likely to find themselves writing unexpected checks every month.

My initial take on this was that we'll see legislation protecting men from both having to submit samples for DNA testing and from paying child support if they can show somehow that they were misled into thinking pregnancy was not possible. I figured we'd see draft legislation on the table parallel with the lawsuits that will be challnging the South Dakota law, because that's just the way these things go.

But damn, i didn't expect this:

Contending that women have more options than they do in the event of an unintended pregnancy, men's rights activists are mounting a long shot legal campaign aimed at giving them the chance to opt out of financial responsibility for raising a child.

The National Center for Men has prepared a lawsuit — nicknamed
Roe v. Wade for Men — to be filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Michigan on behalf of a 25-year-old computer programmer ordered to pay child support for his ex-girlfriend's daughter. The suit addresses the issue of male reproductive rights, contending that lack of such rights violates the U.S. Constitution's equal protection clause.

Now, granted, this is an AP article, and doesn't go into great detail about anything, but some of the quotes that accompany it are, um, intriguing. Especially this one:

The president of the National Organization for Women, Kim Gandy, acknowledged that disputes over unintended pregnancies can be complex and bitter.

"None of these are easy questions," said Gandy, a former prosecutor. "But most courts say it's not about what he did or didn't do or what she did or didn't do. It's about the rights of the child."

i have a feeling that, regardless of whatever context Ms. Gandy was in fact speaking in, we're going to hear that quote thrown at us a lot, minus the context.