The United States Legal System has in the last few decades been inundated with cases concerning paternity and child support. Everyone must keep coming back while tests are run and statements are taken to determine the biological father’s identity. The cases continue to pile up, exhausting hard-working welfare and courtroom personnel, not to mention frustrating other litigants who must wait extended periods for court dates. Just look at the many cases of unknown paternity that Judge Mills Lane must contend with on his court show. He then has less time to devote to more serious cases: family members fighting over a baby stroller, friends suing for custody of an iguana, transvestites squabbling over a cake mold.
Official paternity tests, while being more accessible and more affordable than in the past, are still difficult to obtain if the suspected father is unwilling. Too expensive if the mother is struggling just to feed her family. It's unfortunate that not everyone can appear on Montel Williams or Ricki Lake and get a free paternity test, results revealed to the world.
The Harding Institute for Genetic Research (HIGR) believes it has the answer. They’ve begun mass marketing a cheap, home version of the paternity test. It only costs $49.99 for the whole kit. The customer needs only supply a DNA sample from the man and the child.
If he's been a dog, letting it all hang out, he may have children out there somewhere. If one of his many women tries to force him to commit by showing up with a "Junior" in tow, he need not worry until he's made sure it's really his. He just needs to test a sample from the child and compare it to the results from his sample. It's that easy.
Unwed mothers don't need to worry that he'll disappear once the words "paternity test" come up in casual conversation. If he refuses to take the test--no problem! She can just pull a few strands of hair out of his comb while he’s asleep in the other room. If the subject is not living with the mother, she need only find an excuse to shake his hand and scratch him as she lets go. The skin sample under her nails is enough for a definitive answer. A promiscuous mother need never be embarrassed again by a child’s innocent question of, "Mommy, Who’s my Daddy?" Now she will be able to answer honestly and confidently, knowing she has scientific proof that the unemployed drunk passed out in the next room in her child’s biological father.
HIGR sends the customer everything needed to collect, store, and test samples in the privacy of the home--no more talk show fiascos. The best feature of the Home Paternity Test is its accuracy. When faced with the certain facts of his paternity, a father may be more willing to settle matters out of court, freeing up valuable dates for other litigation--like child support. At 99.95%, its results are accepted as proof by almost every state.
Jose Cuervo, one of the researchers who made the Home Paternity Test possible, said in an interview, "Proving paternity can be an emotionally draining experience for everyone involved--especially the child. When I was just a little boy, such things were unknown. Being a free-spirit, free-love hippie, my mother was unable to tell me who my father was. For years I thought the picture that came in her wallet was my long-lost daddy who disappeared while doing important Greenpeace work with the endangered species of the Amazon River Basin. Finding out later that it may have been one of her many acid-tripping "friends", well, that scarred me for life. But now the children of the future don’t have to live a lie or worry about which loser might be their dad--mom can check right away." That kind of security in an insecure world usually doesn’t come cheap, but now it does. The Home Paternity Test. Knowing is half the battle.
July, 1999