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Ideally, with overwhelming amounts of compelling, objectively verifiable evidence that 1) the mother is unfit to exercise custody of the child; and 2) you are fit to exercise custody of the child.

Why overwhelming amounts of compelling, objectively verifiable evidence?

Courts generally (not always but generally) favor awarding custody to mothers, often even when the mother is the worse of the two parents. Why?

• An entrenched cultural belief that mothers are generally better parents, especially of young children. This is not an unreasonable belief (there are good arguments on both sides), but the problem lies in the rest of the points below:
  • Treating the belief that mothers are generally better parents of children as a presumption (an unfair one) that mothers are the better choice to be awarded physical custody.
  • A willingness to overlook a mother’s shortcomings and a corresponding willingness to exaggerate/fault a father’s shortcomings
  • Imposing on the father an illegal burden to rebut that unfair presumption to be awarded custody.
• Courts’ general (general, not unwavering, but pervasively general) refusal to treat the mothers’ accusations of spousal and/or child abuse against the fathers with a due degree of skepticism. What do I mean?
  • Everyone in the domestic relations and family law profession, from the judges to the lawyers to the social workers, etc. knows (knows—this is indisputable)
    • that one of the easiest ways to destroy any chance a man has of being awarded joint (to say nothing of sole) physical custody of children is to prove or persuade a court that the father is physically and/or emotionally abusive; and
    • so false allegations of child abuse against fathers are plentiful and obviously come as no surprise.
    • But few courts have the either the guts or the will to say so.
    • And many judges don’t want to “make the wrong call” (i.e., find no abuse—because there was not a preponderance of evidence to support such a finding—when it really was occurring). – Some are motivated by fear of (and thus preventing) harm to people. – Some are motivated by a fear of (and thus preventing harm to) their careers. Either way, it’s a cowardly and lazy way response. Courts need to do what the evidence dictates, not what expediency and self-interest dictate. If all it takes to be treated as an abuser is to be accused of being an abuser, that’s a recipe for injustice and ultimately failing children.
    • Consequently, courts’ generally (generally, not unwaveringly) tend to “err on the side of caution” when a father is accused of abuse and treat him as if he is abusive.