I apologize in advance; I cannot limit myself to just one answer, but I will start off with the “top” idea and then share others.
Courts could make custody disputes fairer by exercising restraint. Too often, judges overreach—micromanaging parenting, rewarding hostility, favoring mothers, or treating custody as a contest. A “less is more” approach—narrow orders, real respect for both parents, careful fact-finding, and refusal to reward bullying—would better serve children and ensure fairness for mothers and fathers alike.
The Problem with Overreaching Custody Orders
The court system is designed to protect children and to subserve their best interest through the orders courts issue in child custody disputes, but they often overshoot. Judges may attempt to “script” family life with detailed orders aimed at creating an ideal arrangement. That’s not how individual people or families work. Rigid routines and policies imposed by judicial fiat are too often tone deaf and unenforceable. Overly invasive, restrictive, and burdensome orders also create recurring opportunities for conflict and noncompliance.
Less Is More: Narrow, Surgical Custody Orders
The most effective custody orders do no more than necessary to safeguard a child’s welfare. Courts must resist the urge to micromanage or impose “social engineering” solutions that look tidy on paper but collapse in practice. Restraint respects parental rights and reinforces the principle that the law should intervene only when truly necessary.
Stop Treating Custody as a Zero-Sum Game
Too many custody cases are treated as competitions. But unless a parent is clearly unfit, children deserve the care and influence of both parents, and as much of that care and influence as possible. The “best parent” is both parents. Children do and feel best when they maintain strong relationships with both their fit mother and father. Courts that treat custody as a prize to be awarded miss the bigger picture: kids need and want both parents to become whole, resilient adults.
End the “Second-Class Father” Mentality
One of the ugliest injustices in custody law is the subtle but very real presumption that mothers are the “real” parents and fathers are secondary. Courts deny this, but the rulings often tell a different story. To be blunt: treating fathers as optional is not just unfair to men—it cripples children.
“He Works Outside the Home” — As if Providing Is a Crime
One of the laziest rationalizations for cutting down fathers is the fact that Dad works or spends more hours at work than does Mom. Think about that for a moment. The very thing that allows a family to survive—the father’s willingness to sacrifice time at home in order to provide food, shelter, and stability—is twisted into an accusation of neglect. It’s perverse. A man’s labor in the world is not absence, it is presence in a different form: it’s the mortgage being paid, the groceries on the table, the school clothes in the drawer. To punish a father for that is to punish responsibility and very palpable care itself.
“Children Bond More with Mom” — Natural, But Not Permanent
Yes, when children are small, especially if Mom is the stay-at-home caregiver, they may be or appear to be more attached to her. That’s not Dad’s fault; it’s a natural byproduct of circumstance. But here’s the truth: a father’s influence and contributions to a child’s development are irreplaceable. As children grow and mature, the father’s role becomes more pronounced. Adolescents especially look to their fathers for guidance, boundaries, and example. When Dad is cut out during the early years, that foundation is missing forever. What courts call a “stronger bond with Mom” is often just a temporary phase. To turn it into a justification for sidelining fathers is shortsighted and destructive.
Men and Women Bring Different Gifts—and Children Need Both
Pretending men and women parent the same way is dishonest. They don’t, and that’s exactly why children need both. Mothers often provide nurturing, empathy, and relational grounding. Fathers often provide structure, discipline, and challenge. Boys and girls alike learn what it means to be whole by watching and internalizing how men and women approach life differently. Cut fathers out, and you don’t just shortchange Dad—you deform the child’s growth. Half the blueprint for becoming a balanced adult is missing.
Other “Virtues Turned into Vices”
Courts lean on other excuses that collapse under scrutiny:
· “Dad is too strict.” Boundaries and high expectations are not cruelty—they’re the scaffolding of character. And even if Dad is a stricter disciplinarian than Mom is, that’s not a failing on Dad’s part, it’s a reasonable difference in parenting style.
· “Dad isn’t as emotional.” Again, different styles aren’t deficiencies. Fathers often model a type of emotional self-control, a resilience, and ways of solving problems that are analytical and that balance maternal expressiveness.
· “Dad doesn’t handle the little routines as well as Mom.” Maybe not—but children need more than snack prep and bedtime stories. They need the example of a father investing in their lives, teaching them how to navigate the world outside the home. To treat parental fitness as a zero-sum game cheats children.
In each of these examples, courts twist what is in fact a parental strength into an excuse for exclusion. It’s lazy, short-sighted, biased thinking, and the cost is borne by the children.
The Cost of Bias
When courts marginalize fathers, they rob children of half their inheritance: the steadying, balancing force that only an engaged father can bring. The result is predictable; children grow up missing pieces of themselves. They are less secure, less balanced, less whole. Nothing can restore what a poorly crafted/enforced court order denied in childhood.
The Bottom Line
Every child deserves the love, example, and guidance of both fit parents. To presume mothers are the default and fathers are expendable is prejudice perversely presented as sound policy. Courts must do better. Fairness requires recognizing fathers not as visitors, not as paychecks, and not as “backup parents” but as full and essential parents. Anything less cheats children.
Don’t Reward the Bully Parent
In some cases, one parent litigates relentlessly, lying and cheating and demanding the other’s marginalization. Courts sometimes appease this parent simply to quiet the case and prevent future litigation. The result? The innocent parent is punished, and children lose meaningful access to a loving parent. Worse, it sets a precedent that bullying and dirty tricks work. Fairness requires judges to resist this temptation and to reward cooperation and good faith, not belligerence and gamesmanship.
Accept That Parental Conflict Is Normal
Married parents argue. Expecting divorced parents never to disagree is unrealistic. Courts often overstate the harm of interparental conflict, not out of concern for children, but out of frustration with post-divorce disputes clogging the docket. Unless such conflict is clearly harming children, courts should stay out of it. Intervening in every disagreement imposes unnatural standards, encourages resorting to the courts, and creates orders no one can realistically follow. Sometimes the best decision is to “stand there” instead of “do something.”
Fairness Requires Careful Fact-Finding
At the most basic level, fairness demands that judges seriously engage with the evidence. Too many custody rulings rest on superficial impressions or expedience disguised as analysis. A child’s best interest cannot be best served by shortcuts. Judges must carefully weigh testimony, review exhibits, and tie their findings directly to statutory factors. A vague gesture toward the “best interest of the child” is not enough. Fair custody rulings require real, honest reasoning grounded in the record.
What Real Fairness Would Look Like
A fair custody system would:
- Respect that children need both parents.
- Impose restrictions only when truly necessary.
- Avoid gender bias and lifestyle assumptions.
- Refuse to reward hostile, bad-faith litigation.
- Accept that interparental conflict is normal unless it clearly harms children.
- Carefully review the evidence and explain rulings in cogent detail.
Restraint Is the Path to Fairness
The most significant change courts could make is philosophical, not legal: embracing restraint. Judges who recognize that “less is more” would issue orders that protect children without overreaching, respect both parents equally, respect the rights of parents—not the state—to rear their children, and refuse to mistake judicial power for parental reality. That kind of humility would not only better ensure fairness for parents but also subserve the children’s best interest most wisely and effectively.
Utah Family Law, LC | divorceutah.com | 801-466-9277