I will admit to having a soft spot for dads, for the ones like my dad who selflessly raise, teach, guide and provide for their children. They are role models of what men should be in a society that is increasingly emasculating. That’s why it’s so troubling to think of their lack of rights when it comes to their unborn children. When a woman decides to have an abortion, a father has no legal recourse to protect his child.

In such cases, why would the father have no voice, his wishes carrying no weight? If that child is wanted, how can it be acceptable to abort, even from a pro-choice perspective? The vast majority of abortions terminate pregnancies resulting from consensual sex, and most women, and our legal system, holds that a father has a responsibility to the child should the woman choose to have it. So the father has government-enforced responsibilities if the woman chooses to keep the baby, but no rights if she choose to terminate.

Apparently unfazed by this inconsistency, our society goes right on treating men as second-class citizens when their unborn children’s lives are on the line, subjected to the whims of the mothers.

It’s well-documented that it’s not just women who suffer as result of abortions, but fathers, too. There are so many stories, too many, of fathers who were powerless to save their child and devastated by the result.

The issue of the father’s rights in a pregnancy has made it into the courts numerous times. In 1988, three lawsuits gained attention in which, in each case, a father sued the mother and, in one case, the doctor and hospital involved, for performing abortions without the father’s consent. In the 1992 case Planned Parenthood v Casey, the Supreme Court took on a Pennsylvania law requiring a husband to be notified of a wife’s intention to have an abortion. Unfortunately, in this case, the Supreme Court upheld the decision of a lower court to overturn this law. The lone dissenting voice on the appellate court was Justice Samuel Alito, now a Supreme Court justice. Still, fathers cannot legally protect their children from being killed, although the tide may soon be turning.

Earlier this month, Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker said he would sign legislation, AB237, that would allow a father, except in the case of sexual assault, to sue an abortionist for damages including personal injury such as emotional or psychological distress. While this legislation does not go far enough in giving a man the right to protect his child, it recognizes his pain in the situation. It will also, hopefully, give doctors pause in aborting a child without the father’s consent. The legislation is a step — hopefully, the first of many.

Parenthood is to be celebrated, and if there is a parent ready to accept the responsibility, he should be allowed to do so. Yes, the child is being carried in the woman’s body, but it is its own unique being, as much the father’s as the mother’s. It is not solely her child, not solely her decision to make. We so often hear “every child a wanted child,” Well, these children are wanted — wanted by their fathers. Let’s give fathers a voice in the lives of their children.