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Comment by DanBC | Hacker News Reader

Paternity tests are not banned in France. At will, secret, testing is banned. Parents can get court orders if they want a paternity test.

The US is similar: although there are kits you can buy off the shelf the results are for personal knowledge only and can't be used in legal proceedings. If you want to use a paternity test in court you need a court ordered paternity test from an accredited lab.

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Yes, if you really want to be paranoid about it: it's probably more a result of accredited labs' lobbying than crazy feminists.

That doesn't make any sense: "French men often circumvent these laws by sending samples of DNA to foreign laboratories". Did you mean foreign labs lobbying in France?

From DanBC above: At will, secret, testing is banned. Parents can get court orders if they want a paternity test.

The "labs lobbying" comment was kind of tongue-in-cheek: making fun of the "crazies" being paranoid about "crazy feminists"...

The real reason's probably more about bioethics: no dna profiling of people who don't consent without a court order (and children being too young to consent, you need a court order for a paternity test).

The reddit link is to a men's movement forum, so expect conspiracy theory and misinformation to be rife - it goes with the territory ... And feminism suffers from the same problem. Any prejudiced movement will suffer from victim mentality and reality distortion. That's not saying that sexism doesn't exist - but "taking a gender preference" leads to bias in one's views and ultimately creates more prejudice from those who believe in a gender superiority. The best solution is to think of everyone as people. Only accept a gender difference if it's essential. For example, avoid giving jobs based on gender as many companies do today ... Unless there is an absolute need, doing so is sexist (and quotas/targets to reach 50% are almost always sexist).

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