Birth Rights
by Jeffrey Greene
Part 1 appears in this issue.
conclusion
Holding his breath, Nick quickly passed through the suffocating miasma emanating from the Birthing Circle and stepped out on his front porch. “It’s a boy!” he shouted to the crowd of friends and neighbors, who stood up, cheering, clapping and crowding in to shake his hand, hug him and slap him on the back.
Surrounded by so much supportive energy, intoxicated both by the strong drink and sheer elation at having become a new father, Nick hardly noticed the big black SUV that had pulled up to the curb in front of his house. But the six large men in red robes, cowls and black face masks that piled out, carrying what looked like Tasers were impossible to ignore. They approached the small crowd and surrounded it with swift, efficient movements.
Nick stepped out from the center of his now quiet neighbors and approached the apparent leader, his elation quickly evaporating. “Can I help you, sir? We’re having a little celebration here.”
“We know, Mr. Patrick,” the man said. “Your wife just had a son — congratulations, by the way — his arrival overseen by the Birth Mafia. We can smell them from here.”
Wondering how the man even knew his name, much less that he had a newborn son, Nick drew himself up to his full height. “Well, sir, you’re on private property, and I’d appreciate it if you and your friends would leave.”
“We plan to, Mr. Patrick, once we get what we came for. Okay, folks, my associates are going to briefly confiscate your cell phones. If you’ll all just hand them to these gentlemen behind me and get back in your lawn chairs, we’ll have a peaceful intervention here.” Sullen, confused and decidedly scared, Nick’s neighbors complied. The leader turned back to Nick.
“Who are you? What’s with the robes and masks?” Nick demanded. “What gives you the right to come onto to my property and threaten us?”
“We haven’t threatened anyone, have we? These tasers are for our own protection. We represent an organization called the Red Fatherhood, and this is an intervention on behalf of disenfranchised men everywhere. Please step aside, sir.”
“What kind of intervention? This is totally insane.”
“Your son’s destiny hangs in the balance, Mr. Patrick. Left to the man-hating Sisterhood, he’ll grow up to be a weak, timorous, over-sensitive drone, with no other function than to fertilize eggs and waste his best years doing the grunt work of nurturing children. Raised by us, he’ll be a strong, decisive hunter-gatherer who will respect women for the service they are biologically designed to perform and demand their respect for him.”
“You can’t be serious. Is this some kind of prank? I mean, red robes? Really?”
“Oh, we’re deadly serious, Mr. Patrick. We invite you, as the father, to join us in our struggle against the Female Oligarchy. You’ll have a direct hand in his upbringing. Your wife, of course, is also welcome to join our cause. We would prefer that the birth mother raise the child, guided by the time-honored standards of the male and female roles in the process. But the issue is too important to leave to parents brainwashed by the Sisterhood. Whether you choose to join us or not, we’re liberating this child.”
“Liberating!? You mean kidnapping!” Nick said, desperately trying to reason with the man. “You must know that you can’t possibly get away with this. Please just leave now, and we won’t call the police.”
“We’re going in now, Mr. Patrick,” the man responded in a tone that brooked no further dissent, gesturing with his taser. Two of the masked, hooded men followed behind him as Nick led the way inside, hoping that the women had become aware of the ruckus outside and called the police, but they hadn’t finished the whole ritual birthing nonsense yet.
He found himself emotionally torn. He deeply resented the way women had so high-handedly co-opted the male role in child-rearing, or at least parts of it, but the idea that the son he hadn’t even seen yet was about to be abducted — and who knew if a newborn could survive that kind of handling? — filled him with a rage exaggerated by his sense of helplessness. Clearly, he couldn’t reason with these men. They were as blinded by their beliefs as Sister Lily and company were by theirs. Was Reg still in the kitchen? Maybe he’d called the police.
But as they entered the living room, and the women in the circle facing the door stopped their chanting and stared open-mouthed at the red-cowled brutes armed with their nasty little electric guns, Reg quietly stepped out from the kitchen and walked over to the leader of the Red Fatherhood. The two men nodded a greeting, and Reg whispered something in the man’s ear.
Nick was shocked into silence. Stepping around him, the leader told one of the men to join him and the other to guard the women, then soft-footed it upstairs.
Nick glared at Reg. “I wondered how these lunatics could have known about the birth, much less his gender. So you’re their inside man, eh, Reg? Wow. I knew you were a misogynist, but this is goddamn crazy.”
“I’m sorry, Nick. You’ll never know how much I wanted your child to be a girl. But it’s boys they want. That we want.”
“But it’s my son. I’ve known you for twenty years, Reg. Doesn’t that cut any ice?”
“Of course it does, Nick. I hate that it had to be your kid. But I don’t think you realize the gravity of the situation. Our female President is in full sympathy with these fanatics. Women who are card-carrying members of the White-Cowled Sisterhood control both houses of Congress. Day by day, men are losing more of their civil rights. It won’t be long before we’re deemed useful only as sperm donors.
“And they’re winning the propaganda war, too. Lots of young men are beginning to believe that they alone are the cause of all that’s evil in human beings. Seventy percent of the teachers in both public and private schools are women, many of them fellow travelers with the All Men are Pigs Lobby. We’re not far from an all-out gender civil war.”
There were screams and shouts from upstairs, and Nick heard Julie weakly refusing to give up the child. Instinctively, he started moving toward the stairs, but stopped when he felt the taser in his back.
“Please don’t try it, Nick,” Reg said. “Tasing is an unpleasant experience. You have my word that no one is being hurt up there. I know you hate me for this, and I don’t blame you. But things are only going to get worse from here, unless we men take back our civil rights.”
“Kidnapping isn’t the way to do it, ‘old friend,’” Nick said, shaking with anger. “And it only feeds into the Sisterhood’s narrative that men are inherently violent.”
The Red Fatherhood men were descending the stairs now, the leader carrying a swaddled, squalling infant in his arms. Nick wasn’t prepared for the shocking flood of joy, terror and protective rage coursing through him at the sight of his child in a stranger’s arms.
At that moment, a bull-horned voice outside blared, “This is the police. The house is surrounded. Your guards are under arrest. Come out with your hands up. Don’t make this any worse for yourselves than it already is.”
Reg’s face went white, and the two members of the Red Fatherhood looked at their leader with frightened eyes. The man stopped halfway down the stairs, shook his head resignedly, then went back upstairs long enough to hand the baby back to its mother.
“Drop your weapons,” he said to his men. “Raise your hands and form a line behind me. You, too, Reg.” He slowly opened the door and led his men out.
Reg, the last to go, turned and spoke to Nick in a low voice. “This was just a skirmish, Nick. We lost this one, but the war is coming. Now it’s up to you to assert your male rights in raising your son. I hope you do. Goodbye.”
Nick’s reply was a disgusted shake of his head. Sister Lily had left the birthing circle and approached him. He had to restrain himself from hugging her, instead offering an apologetic shrug, not knowing how else to express the feelings overwhelming him.
“You called them, didn’t you?” he said.
She smiled. “Yes, Sister Laura saw what was happening from the upstairs window. She contacted me on my headset, which has a Wi-Fi connection, and I whispered a call to 911. I was afraid the police wouldn’t get here in time. This isn’t the first attempted abduction of a male infant, Mr. Patrick, nor will it be the last. Some have been successful.”
“Thank you, Sister Lily. I’m deeply grateful and ashamed of the way I treated you earlier. But you should also know that I don’t totally disagree with my former friend’s politics, just his methods. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to see my wife and baby.”
“Well, get on up there, man,” she said with a laugh, giving him a gentle push. “I’ll answer any questions the police have. You have more important things to deal with.”
“Yes, I do,” he said, bounding up the stairs.
Copyright © 2025 by Jeffrey Greene
