Deleting Dad (2014)

• 83%
• 2014
• Documentary

Six fathers in Argentina who are very different share one thing in common: they are prevented from seeing their children after divorce. Even though though all evidence shows that they are loving fathers who want to be active parents, family court judges, lawyers, psychologists and society in general believes that children are best off with their mother. It does not matter if the mother prevents the father from seeing the children, or she lies or even tries to kill the children. Different professionals are interviewed and they happily admit that they do not care what the evidence shows, for them the most dangerous situation is for children to see their fathers, because they are men. The most influential psychologist in Argentina, Jorge Corsi, created a method that always finds fathers to be violent and abusive, that has no scientific validity. It is discovered that he ran a child pornography ring, but it doesn't matter: his method continues to be used in Argentina and the world over. This method is used because many professionals make money by prolonging family conflict. They ignore requests of the children to see their fathers. One 15 year old girl records a video asking the judge is she can see her dad, but this video is ignored. One mother beats her son so badly that he enters a coma, but she is given full custody and the father a restraining order. Erasing Dad asks if this system is sexist, by assuming that mothers are always better than fathers and shows that in other countries joint custody is possible. The film not only focuses on a few cases, but shows systematic institutional violence that harms not only fathers and children, but mothers, grandparents and siblings.