"I'd like to know what law is it that says that a woman is a better parent, simply by virtue of her sex"
About this Quote
The line challenges the presumption embedded in family law that motherhood confers automatic superiority in custody disputes. It objects to a shortcut of reasoning: if the issue is who can best care for a child, why would sex settle the matter in advance? The force of the question exposes how a legal system can smuggle cultural stereotypes into supposedly neutral decisions.
Robert Benton put this idea at the center of Kramer vs. Kramer, his 1979 film about a father and son forging a bond after the mother leaves and later returns to seek custody. At the time, courts were moving away from the old tender years doctrine, which favored mothers for young children, toward the best interests of the child standard. Yet the cultural reflex to equate mother with caregiver still dominated. The courtroom scene that this sentiment echoes turns a personal crisis into a critique of institutional habit, asking judges and audiences to look at what parenting actually requires: presence, patience, sacrifice, and daily competence, none of which are guaranteed by biology alone.
The question does not denigrate mothers. Bentons story gives Joanna Kramer complexity and sympathy; it recognizes the constraints and expectations that push women into roles they may not have chosen. But it refuses to make sex a trump card. In doing so, it underscores how gendered assumptions harm everyone. Fathers are discounted no matter how devoted, mothers are burdened with impossible standards, and the childs needs risk being submerged beneath assumptions about what a family should look like.
The argument anticipates contemporary family law, which increasingly evaluates caregiving history, stability, and the capacity to meet a childs needs rather than leaning on categorical preferences. It also resonates beyond divorce court, speaking to workplaces, communities, and policies that still treat caretaking as female by default. Benton asks for evidence over stereotype, and for a vision of parenthood grounded in what people do for children, not who they are.
Robert Benton put this idea at the center of Kramer vs. Kramer, his 1979 film about a father and son forging a bond after the mother leaves and later returns to seek custody. At the time, courts were moving away from the old tender years doctrine, which favored mothers for young children, toward the best interests of the child standard. Yet the cultural reflex to equate mother with caregiver still dominated. The courtroom scene that this sentiment echoes turns a personal crisis into a critique of institutional habit, asking judges and audiences to look at what parenting actually requires: presence, patience, sacrifice, and daily competence, none of which are guaranteed by biology alone.
The question does not denigrate mothers. Bentons story gives Joanna Kramer complexity and sympathy; it recognizes the constraints and expectations that push women into roles they may not have chosen. But it refuses to make sex a trump card. In doing so, it underscores how gendered assumptions harm everyone. Fathers are discounted no matter how devoted, mothers are burdened with impossible standards, and the childs needs risk being submerged beneath assumptions about what a family should look like.
The argument anticipates contemporary family law, which increasingly evaluates caregiving history, stability, and the capacity to meet a childs needs rather than leaning on categorical preferences. It also resonates beyond divorce court, speaking to workplaces, communities, and policies that still treat caretaking as female by default. Benton asks for evidence over stereotype, and for a vision of parenthood grounded in what people do for children, not who they are.
Quote Details
| Topic | Parenting |
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