Yet another sobering turn in our family relationships has surfaced with the revelation that there is a growing trend to paternity tests, sometimes ordered by the courts, sometimes sought by individuals - usually fathers - in settlement of domestic disputes or for the popular cause of migration. It has also been revealed that we now have a high ratio of children whose "daddy is not their daddy, but their daddy don't know", to borrow from a popular Caribbean calypso.

According to reports, as much as 33 per cent of men tested were proven not to be the fathers of the children said to be theirs. To put it in popular parlance, these are the fathers who have received 'jackets'. While it is a serious matter to any man so affected, the mere mention of 'jacket' becomes a joke to others. Some will describe such a reaction as insensitivity, while for others it might just be one more example of our penchant to "tek bad sinting mek laugh", that is, to use laughter to defuse a bad situation.

To the persons caught in this game, it is no laughing matter, however. While there is no empirical evidence to prove otherwise, it is more than likely that betrayal in the matter of a child's paternity has contributed to domestic violence. There is also the impact on the lives of the children who are at the centre of the dispute. It could not be easy for any child who has been living in the belief that the male figure, whom he or she respects and often loves as a father, is not what he is made out to be after all. The introduction of a stranger into the equation cannot be easy for any youngster either.

Fatherhood, of course, is not merely biological. Many stepfathers or 'substitute' fathers bond with the children in their care and develop into functional and successful family units; but that's not always the case. We believe that in the majority of instances, the child stands to suffer from the disillusionment and the family unit comes under strain.

The broken family is one of the major factors which we are called to take into account in trying to build a functional society. It is about time therefore that we move to discard some of the old bad habits which are holding us back. Cliché ideas about being entitled to "be fruitful and multiply" have no place in modern, progressive thinking.

It goes both for men, about whom the society has been much more indulgent in the matter of multiple partners, and for women, who should have got the idea by now that they can liberate themselves from antiquated ideas. If we are concerned about the men getting themselves 'jackets', then we have to find a term also for the women who are complicitous in the acts of irresponsibility in which the ultimate victims are defenceless children. Every child has a right to a name and an identity. To deny them of this by selfish acts of indulgence on the part of parents is less than honourable.

So - when we're through with the 'jacket joke', perhaps we can admit that there are no winners in the present scenario. The statistics arising from the paternity tests are calling us to take responsibility, if not for ourselves as adults, then for the children who deserve much better.