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Topics - Brent

#331
Yes, we can get this amazingly offensive item pulled from the Bon's shelves. Read on to see how....


First, the manufacturer, "David and Goliath" doesn't give a damn, and told me so pretty candidly.

They don't care that this shirt essentially tells people to commit violence against boys, and they told me they would "never" makea shirt that says to "throw rocks" at girls. What a shock, eh?

Now, these people are really starting to piss me off. I think it's a very offensive product, and to be told that they "don't care" is really the limit. So, I think it's time to go up the food chain to where people will listen- the corporate offices of the Bon. And that's what I did.

To their credit, the Bon was pretty responsive. You can call, write, or email the Bon to get the item PULLED OFF THE SHELF and returned UNSOLD to the manufacturer. And I think that's exactly what we should do. Since the manufacturer "David and Goliath" doesn't seem to give a damn, here's the contact info for the Bon. The lady I spoke with was very sympathetic and said that if people complained, the item would be pulled.

Phone: 206-506-6000

Address:

The Bon
1601 3rd Ave
Seattle WA 98181

Attn: Divisional Customer Office


Email: [email protected]

The very nice lady I spoke with said that every time someone calls, writes, or sends an email, they forward the complaint to the Divisional Customer Office for review. With enough complaints, they will pull this item.

Please, send a message to them and let them know that this kind of merchandise is NOT acceptable, and will not make you want to spend your hard-earned money at the Bon. The Bon is a reputable store, and I believe the Bon will do the right thing- but only if they hear from people.

Email: [email protected]

Phone: 206-506-6000

Postal address:

The Bon
1601 3rd Ave
Seattle WA 98181

Attn: Divisional Customer Office

#332
Call these a**holes today, toll free: 877-633-2843 and tell them that you think this shirt is SICK. It's offensive and an incitement to violence against boys.

"Todd" is the ass that designed this shit. Cindy is the Sales Manager, and she is a total ass who sees NOTHING wrong with the message this shirt sends. You can talk to them at 877-633-2843.

From Glenn Sacks:

There's a controversy in Seattle over ads for a T-shirt sold by Bon-Macy's, a major department store in Washington state, which says "Boys are stupid, throw rocks at them" and has a picture of a little boy running away as several rocks come flying at him.

A spokesman for David and Goliath, the company that makes the shirt, told KOMO-TV in Seattle that they have sold millions of shirts with this message and that it's their best seller. KOMO-TV interviewed local 4th graders about the shirts and several little boys looked visibly shaken by them.

As the father of an 11 year-old boy you can imagine how this makes my blood boil. The company says that despite complaints they have no plans to change the message. What can you do?  I'm urging all His Side listeners to call and/or email both David and Goliath and Bon-Macy's and let them know how we feel about them insulting and demeaning our sons.

Below are both company's contact information, and a link to the KOMO-TV news story (video included). Please feel free to CC me on all letters to the companies.

Sincerely,
Glenn Sacks
 

David and Goliath, Inc.
Toll Free 877-633-2843
Email: [email protected]

DavidandGoliathtees.com
 Bon-Macy's
Toll Free 866-464-8787
To Send an Email, click here: http://www.fds.com/contact/bonmarche/service.asp

To Cancel Your Bon-Macy's Credit Card,
click here: https://www.bonmacys.com/service/credit/contactus/index.ognc


KOMO-TV: 'Does This T-Shirt Send The Right Message?'
http://www.komotv.com/news/story_m.asp?ID=28700

 
#333
ACLU says alleged ''deadbeat dads'' jailed without due process

    EAGLEVILLE, Pa. (AP) - Ninety men serving time in a county prison for failing to pay child support were denied their due process rights, the American Civil Liberties Union contends.

    Thirty of the men were released from the Montgomery County Correctional Facility on Wednesday, officials said. The other 60 inmates were being interviewed by county officials and others, and they could be freed within days, said the county's president judge, S. Gerald Corso.

    Pennsylvania ACLU staff lawyer Malia Brink said that county courts throughout the state often jail such men, often referred to as deadbeat dads, for civil contempt without adequate notice or enough time for them to get lawyers.

    Typically, the men meet with domestic relations officials, are declared in arrears, and are quickly brought before a judge. The judge usually finds them in contempt of a court order to pay and jails them for about six months.

    Corso has ordered a review of court procedures for all those incarcerated for failing to pay support. Among the changes already implemented: Contempt hearings will be scheduled two weeks after enforcement conferences, and defendants will be advised throughout the process of their right to an attorney.

    ''The ACLU thinks everyone facing prison should have counsel,'' Corso said. ''We do not disagree with that.''

    Amid similar criticism from ACLU attorneys last year in western Pennsylvania, Westmoreland County judges agreed to provide court-appointed attorneys in child support cases and Lawrence County judges freed 37 inmates jailed for nonsupport.

    ''The ACLU hopes that the president judges of counties throughout Pennsylvania will respond to the ACLU's request with the same dispatch and sense of justice that Montgomery County showed,'' Brink said in a prepared statement. ''But we're realistic and realize that we may have to file suit against one or more counties who refuse the request.''

    Of the 90 child-support inmates, those on work-release were freed after agreeing to have the money they owe deducted from their wages. A second group was told they could leave the prison if they got jobs and agreed to return next month for hearings.

    The third group, which Corso called ''chronic offenders who have had three bench warrants issued against them in the last few years'' for failure to appear, will go before judges to see how their cases should proceed.

http://www.sungazette.com/wire/pawirestory.asp?articleID=2116&postdate=12/12/2003
#334
Having Their Cake and Eat it Too

December 12 2003
by Pete Jensen

Yesterday, the lovely and demure Karen De Coster, a blogger at LewRockwell.com, wriggled into on her spiked leather jumpsuit and took at hatchet to her favorite piñata - men.

Karen De Coster seriously needs to clarify herself.  Failing this, I'd say she is in more dire need of a Midol than any woman in the western hemisphere, or at least a reality check.

Now, on the whole what I have learned is that whenever any woman starts talking about "Meninists" they generally mean "Holy Smokes!  The chickens are starting to come home to roost!  We need to break out the shaming language if we want to keep having our cake and eat it too!"  When my buddy Andy emailed me that Mike had posted a new link from Karen DeC. and I needed to read what she said, I was kind of wondering.   And at first glance it seems to deride the Leftist and Liberal "Mr. Moms" that most of us call names.

At second glance, I'm seriously wondering.  Karen refers to an article written for Men's News Daily by Dr. Marty Nemko, and heaps abuse and scorn on him, albeit indirectly. And the rest of her diatribe says to me "Shaming language.  Wants her cake and eat it too."

Of course, it starts off mocking such men, and none to gently, but then she contradicts herself.  In one breath she says that good old fashioned western conservative and traditional values built and maintained civilization.  Then she becomes hysterical.

By all means, Karen.  Find an Oriental man who will put up with an American Woman.  American men have long ceased to have patience with her.  Maybe they can be fooled for a generation or so.  I doubt it.  Our eastern brothers are way too savvy, I've observed.

Now, on the whole (And here I insert the usual obligatory disclaimers that yes indeed, there are women who fit this mold to a lesser degree or not at all, lest the nitpicky whiney-babies inundate me with the usual nonsense, but ON THE WHOLE) the American Woman is a spoiled brat.  She's an egotistical, prissy, self-centered and immature princess who is used to getting her own way.  And this is being kind.  To be unkind, I'd say she's a loudmouthed, shrill and miserable harpy.  Men don't die earlier because they stress into coronaries.  Men die earlier because they yearn for the peaceful embrace of death.

Karen seems to bemoan the fact that the old days, where men were men, are gone.  Don't fret.  Where you find engineering feats, heroism, innovation, dirty, dangerous and thankless jobs that get paid squat, the trains running on time, efficiency and people slaving away from before sunup until after sundown, you'll find the good, old fashioned Man's Man there.  What you'll also find missing in droves is women.

Men are still doing all those things. They are just sick and tired of doing it for women, and indeed, are telling many women to make their own damn cake if they want any.  And this is what is getting women like Karen's knickers all tangled up.

Fact is, it isn't men that broke this covenant of ancient making.  It was done so, and done damn unilaterally, by women.  They didn't want to be sheltered, pampered, protected and given the easy jobs.  They wanted equality.  Well, they have it.  And all the responsibility that comes with the perceived "privilege."  And now that they see it isn't all it was beer and skittles, they want a choice – but of course, men shouldn't have this choice.  It should be handed, unearned and on a silver platter, to women because...

Um...

Well, because they're women and deserve it, so THERE! (Insert stomp of dainty little foot.)

Unh-uh, honey, it don't work that way.  You all let that genii out of the bottle fifty or so years ago, and now she's hanging around like a lazy mother-in-law who won't get a job, eating bon-bons all day.  Could those halcyon days of yore return?  Possibly.  I'm no seer.  Isn't a damn thing men can do to return it – it's up to women to give back some ill-gotten gains if they want to see it happen.  Have your cake.  Or eat it.  Pick one.

Far be it from me to belabor the obvious and give a fundamental lesson in economics, but when you have a job market flooded with potential employees, the value of labor goes down.  Ladies, you're not our helpmeets anymore.  You're not our companions, our friends, our partners.  You're our competition, and you're competitors that demand a handicap.

Sad fact of the matter is that a single earner household in the lower middle class is an impossibility these days.  Minimum wage jobs get you, what?  A hair above 12 grand?  Yeah.  Pay rent, insurance, utilities, a car payment on that.  Can't be done.  I live a spartan lifestyle, and twelve grand would not even begin to cover it.  Women in such relationships HAVE to work.  Brave new world.  Thank Betty Friedan.  But don't blame men.

Now, equal pay for equal work?  I'm indifferent.  I'm a man who believes in being philosophically consistent.  You want equal pay, get to it.  When I have to lift your load because you're too weak, or afraid you'll chip a nail, or can't show up on time if at all because junior has a cold, you ain't doing equal work.  And I don't give a fat rat's arse how important YOUR kids are.  It doesn't confront me none, as the great George Thorogood says.  I'm supporting MY kids.  Carry your own weight, madam.  Far too many women treat a job as something where attendance and performance is optional, yet they are first in line to complain about sexism, about not having daycare provided for them by a factory, not having rooms for nursing their kids, nap times, masseuses coming in, and all manner of pampering and catering to their wants.  All this costs money, but I'll be dipped if I can find many woman willing to be honest enough to concede that such money spent for the convenience of women shouldn't be taken from the pockets of men.  But, they want their cake and eat it too, and to have a man pick up the check for it.

If women want to compete with men for jobs, it is right, fair, and just that they get under the load and shoulder it equally.  We have words for men who won't do their share – slacker, deadweight, goldbrick, and useless to name a few.  I wonder how many women would shrug their shoulders with a "Gee, that's okay!" if some employer said to them, "I'm going to give this job/promotion/raise to this MAN over here, because he has the responsibility of a family to support."  Hell, if I did that here in Indiana, the howl of outrage would make people in Des Moines think a siren had gone off and a tornado was coming.

Karen seems to forget that the social contract is a two-way street.  Many of us might talk to our grandmothers, and great grandmothers and ask them what their end of the deal was, and you might find out that it's women who have fallen down on the job.  The so called "privileges" that men used to have were a means to live up to their responsibilities as the breadwinner for the family.  Responsibilities, I might add, that were enshrined in law with criminal penalties for the lazy and shiftless.  We still have those responsibilities, though.  And still enforced with the barrel of a gun.

We had the government step in and muddy the waters, blurring the line between the social and the legal with the force of law.  Government has become the new man in women's lives, with the fast car, the bag of groceries, the free money, and the slicked back hair.  Like anything new, though, sooner or later he gets old.  He's not sexually fulfilling.  He doesn't stay the night, and cuddle, and keep them warm.  He doesn't buy flowers, or leave notes on the kitchen table.  Too late have those who bought the feminist bill of goods discovered that where government is the answer, a stupid question has been asked.

Sure, women want their husbands back, but hubby has moved on.  He can get the proverbial milk for free from some sweet thang who just wants a quick hook-up.  He doesn't have feminine hygine products cluttering up his john, or someone bitching about him not putting his socks directly in the hamper.  Wife?  For what?  So he can work all day and come home and do "his half" of the housework?  I got news – we men found out housework IS an easy job.  We just need to find the time to train a chimp to do it.

A lot of older guys have found that they want women for only one thing, mainly because that is all they have to offer these days.  Wives and family for many men, who have already seen their children taken away once, is too risky.  We have our family.  We write it a check every week, and see them on weekends if Mom is feeling generous. Raise your own with some other sucker.  You've got your new boyfriend in the form of the Welfare State.  Of course, somehow the fact that women have made themselves less desirable and valuable as marriage material is somehow the fault of men who won't let women have their cake and eat it too.

This brings us full circle to the real focus of such ire and attempts to shame is those men who have tired of playing fair, tired of hoping she'd come around, tired of enduring the double standard because it's "The Right Thing To Do" when they get no credit beyond lip service for their work.  They've started to say, "Want to drink that cup of equality?  You're not going to just drink the whipped cream off the top.  Down to the bitter dregs."  Women in combat.  Women in dangerous jobs.  Women paying child support and being thrown in jail.  Mothers on Death Row.  You've come a long way, baby.  

Was it worth it?  Some women are saying it wasn't.  Let's see if there's any action to go along with these words, or if it's just another trick to get men to carry their load, and them claim half the credit.  My cynical and misanthropic self is betting the latter, but that's mainly because I see such rhetoric as being long on the traditional roles and obligations of men, and notably silent on those of women.

Having their cake and eat it too.  More like demanding ice cream for good measure.

Pete Jensen

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Pete Jensen is a Computer Engineer and Curmudgeon who lives in the wilds of Southern Indiana. He enjoys satirizing political correctness, and mocking its advocates. If you'd care to write him and talk reasonably he welcomes it. If you'd care to write him and froth at the mouth ideologically, he welcomes that too. You'll be grist for the mill, and know in advance he doesn't regard any such diatribes as privileged communication. That's right, you too can wind up lampooned by his searing wit and insightful barbs in front of millions on the internet."
#335
Divorcées and Social Engineers

Fathers face off against the marriage movement.

by Cathy Young

It is now a truth more or less universally acknowledged that children are better off when they have fathers and when their fathers are actively involved in their lives. But where do we go from there? Should the government be promoting fatherhood, marriage, and two-parent families? Or should it simply get out of the way and stop hindering fathers who want to do right by their children? The debate has pitted fathers' rights activists against advocates for marriage and "responsible fatherhood."

The government's fatherhood programs, an offspring of the Clinton era, are thriving under Bush. One Bush-era innovation is marriage promotion: The government has spent millions on programs to encourage poor people on welfare to get married and to help them develop better "marriage skills," an effort that has drawn criticism both from feminists who worry about women being pressured to stay in abusive marriages and from libertarians less than thrilled by social engineering. More recently, some fathers' rights activists have declared the administration's efforts part of an insidious machine that undermines rather than bolsters family and fatherhood.

The first salvo was fired by Stephen Baskerville, a political science professor at Howard University, in a May column for National Review Online that decried "government as family therapy." The government, Baskerville wrote, actively undermines marriage by allowing no-fault divorce and pursuing "one of the most dishonest and destructive policies ever foisted on the public: child-support enforcement."

In his view, government programs aimed at inculcating "life skills" and improving relationships simply serve to bring even more of the family under state control. "Here we see the culmination of a government perpetual-growth machine that has been building for decades: Destroy the family through welfare and no-fault divorce; then evict and criminalize the fathers; then institutionalize the children as state wards through various 'services' to relieve single mothers."

Just a week later, the National Review sitepublished an acid response from Tom Sylvester, a research associate with the Institute for American Values (co-founded by David Blankenhorn, author of the much-discussed 1995 book Fatherless America). Sylvester depicted Baskerville as an extremist spokesman for a "small but vocal group" of disgruntled divorced fathers, and went on to laud the Bush administration's pro-marriage programs as a much-needed effort to strengthen families and thus ultimately help the cause of limited government. More recently, in October, the MensNewsDaily site has featured a roundtable discussion between marriage advocates and fathers' rights activists, including Baskerville and Sylvester.

The fathers' rights activists, so often dismissed as angry men, make some excellent points -- including some aspects of their critique of the "marriage movement" and the "responsible fatherhood" advocates. Blankenhorn's writings, for instance, are based almost entirely on the assumption that the primary cause of fatherlessness is men walking away from their wives and children. He and other conservatives believe that the answer to father absence is for men to embrace their responsibilities and for society to hold them responsible. In Blankenhorn's striking metaphor, "Men do not volunteer for fatherhood as much as they are conscripted into it by the surrounding culture."

In fact, two-thirds of divorces are initiated by wives. This isn't just a matter of who officially files for divorce: As Arizona State University psychologist Sanford Braver reports in his 1999 book Divorced Dads, about two-thirds of the time it's the wife who wants out of the marriage. In many cases, non-custodial fathers find their relationships with their children thwarted by their ex-wives.

To some extent, government policies contribute to the situation. Despite nominally gender-neutral child custody laws, in practice fathers are still at a disadvantage. What's more, the courts and the government are far more interested in enforcing child support than in enforcing non-custodial parents' access to the children.

Some thought-provoking studies, particularly by University of Iowa law professor Margaret Brinig, suggest that women are more willing to end their marriages because they know they are likely to get sole custody of their children. Brinig and other scholars have also found that more frequent joint custody awards correlate with lower divorce rates.

Unfortunately, many fathers' rights activists undermine their cause by resorting to extreme rhetoric. Baskerville, for instance, claims that courts, lawyers, and bureaucrats have a vested interest in promoting divorce and "ripping away" fathers from their children: As he put in on The O'Reilly Factor in October 2000, "the more children they take away from their parents, the more business there is for their courts and for those who are the recipients of their patronage."

When Sylvester pointed out in the MensNewsDaily roundtable that a spouse, not the state, files for divorce, Baskerville's retort was even more extreme: "This is like saying the German state was not involved in the Holocaust because its victims were often turned in by their neighbors."

Baskerville, whose diatribes against the "divorce industry" have appeared not only in conservative publications but in libertarian ones such as Liberty, makes a good case that divorce increases government control over families. Once a couple has split up, the courts become involved in decisions that were previously made between husband and wife: whether to send the children to a private school, what kind of religious training they should get, how much money to spend on their clothing and other expenses -- and, no less important, how much time each parent will spend with the children. But is there any way to avoid that?

Baskerville argues that the spouse who elects to leave the marriage -- except on clear grounds of "fault," such as adultery, physical violence, or substance abuse -- should forfeit child custody, possibly with little or no access to the children. But not every divorce without an officially recognized "fault" is frivolous, as some fathers' rights activists would suggest.

Baskerville's proposal would force many people to choose between losing their children and remaining in an emotionally intolerable marriage. And one can imagine a disaffected spouse waging psychological warfare to push the other to file for divorce, or making false allegations of physical abuse or other "faults."

Yet there is no getting around the fact that the "marriage movement" supports extensive entanglement between state, therapy, and family. Obviously, we're not talking about shotgun marriages arranged by Big Brother. But in a federally funded pilot program in Oklahoma, cited as a model by marriage promoters, workshops that teach communication, conflict resolution, and other marriage skills are virtually mandatory for welfare recipients.

Principles aside (such as the quaint idea that the government shouldn't be micro-engineering people's private lives), it's hard to imagine that this approach could be effective. Even voluntary, individualized marital counseling is far from a surefire way to keep a marriage together. A large workshop that offers one-size-fits-all solutions to people with distinct personalities and problems doesn't hold out much promise.

Besides, low marriage rates and high divorce rates in low-income communities are related to plenty of economic and social factors that have nothing to do with poor communication. While the problem of fatherlessness is real, a federal initiative that throws taxpayer money at untested programs and turns Uncle Sam into a marriage counselor is not a real solution.

In a culture that values personal freedom, there is no real "solution" to the problem of divorce. Yet there are ways to minimize its negative effects, such as creating policies that ensure both parents have a meaningful post-divorce role in the children's lives. Joint custody, the alternative preferred by more moderate fathers' rights advocates, may not be a panacea, but for all its drawbacks, it would accomplish that goal.


Contributing Editor Cathy Young is a columnist for The Boston Globe and author of Ceasefire! Why Women and Men Must Join Forces to Achieve True Equality (Free Press)..
#336
I have no problem with gay people, but if they're dumb enough to fight for the right to get married, then to be truly fair they should get to experience the joy of divorce, too. "Stupid is as stupid does".

Iowa Lesbian Divorce
 
 Des Moines, December 12, 2003-  A judge's divorce decree for two women has sparked a legal challenge that could help decide whether some states can bar same-sex unions while others permit it.  

Gay rights activists say the divorce between 31-year-old Kimberly J. Brown and 26-year-old Jennifer S. Perez does not open the door to recognition of same-sex relationships. But a conservative group says it will ask the Iowa Supreme Court to overturn the decree.

   Chuck Hurley, president of the Iowa Family Policy Center, says his group believes the judge exceeded his authority.   Hurley and other conservatives fear the judge's decree, which refers to the union as a marriage, is the first step in legitimizing unions allowed in a handful of states but not permitted under an Iowa law passed in 1997.

   Brown and Perez, both of Sioux City, went to Vermont in March 2002 to take advantage of that state's civil union laws.   Their divorce was granted November 14th in Woodbury County District Court.

http://www.whotv.com/Global/story.asp?S=1562830&nav=2HABJeYn
#337
Father's Issues / Semi-Scientific Bull***
Dec 13, 2003, 07:07:04 PM
Note the asinine headline:

Attractive women found to make men bonkers

December 12, 2003
BY MARY VALLIS Advertisement

Science finally has proven what most of us have always known: Men have a hard time thinking rationally when they have beautiful women on their minds.

The study by psychologists at Ontario's McMaster University, reported in the journal Biology Letters, worked like this:

More than 200 students were shown pictures of men and women of varying attractiveness, then offered a chance to win money: If they rolled double digits on dice, they could either accept a check for between $15 and $35 the following day, or wait a week to eight months and get even more money -- $50 to $75.

After viewing pictures of highly attractive women, the male students were more likely to choose the immediate cash rather than wait a day for the extra cash.

But the female students weren't swayed by images of hot guys. They chose the larger reward.

So one would have to conclude that women are driven by money, no? The study would seem to show that they're more more focused on the $$$$$$$.  I'd hate to apply the word "shallow" or the term "mercenary", but I'd be hard-pressed to draw any other conclusion.    ...Brent


Another recent study documented changes in men's saliva when beautiful women are present. Men don't actually drool more, but their spit becomes super-charged with testosterone, University of Chicago researchers found. They paid 41 heterosexual male students $10 apiece to examine their saliva. They took saliva samples when the students arrived at the laboratory.

They were then led to believe the rest of the test was running behind schedule and made small talk with research assistants during the five-minute wait. Fifteen minutes later, scientists took another saliva sample. The testosterone levels in the saliva of men who had spent time with one of five attractive female assistants jumped by 30 percent.

"Results were generally consistent with the possibility of a mating response in human males," the researchers write in the latest issue of the journal Evolution and Human Behavior.

Guys like attractive women? Geeez, who could have predicted THAT? Good thing they did a study.

http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-beauty12.html


#338
Is Michael Jackson Guilty or Innocent?
#339
Why a men's movement?
Why should you care?
by Raj Kumar Singh


A female union shop-steward once said to me that "when business leaders try to form a union we call that a monopoly of power; we outlawed that sorta (thing) with anti-trust legislation. Maybe we should outlaw men's groups!"

I suppose that attitude is a valid one -- if you're of the school of thought that all men are malevolent, powerful Goliaths while the women of the world are pure, weak and blessed Davids. Nowadays, it seems there's a lot of support for the idea that when men fail in life it's because of a lack of gumption; but when women don't succeed it's due to "the oppression of our evil, patriarchal society."

Some of us, however, believe that males and females have an equal propensity for the expression of both power and weakness, oppression and love, for beauty of spirit as likely as hate. And for us a men's movement is no less apropos than, say, a National Organization FOR WOMEN.

So to all those who want an answer to the question "Why a men's movement," my response is...


...because every hour of every day, 4 American men die of prostate cancer (compared to the 5 women who die of breast cancer), but the research funding ratio is $1 for prostate cancer research for every $6.60 for breast cancer research.

...because fewer American males than females have health insurance.

...because for every 1 suicide committed by a female in this country, 4 are committed by males.

...because feminists only march for abortion rights - they never protest the lack of an oral contraceptive for men.

...because I've lived a lifetime listening to women demanding equal rights, but I've never seen women carrying placards demand EQUAL RESPONSIBILITIES.

...because, contrary to the ranting of many feminists, testosterone isn't a poison - neither is estrogen an ambrosia.

...because Gloria Steinem smiles when she speaks of male gendercide, the fact that men die an average of seven years younger than women. She takes pleasure in the notion that "as the baby boom generation ages, women will enjoy phenomenal clout in the voting booth."

...because when a woman stays out of the world of paid labor and takes care of the children, people applaud her for being a good mother. But when a man works extra hard to earn the money to support his family, people say that he's "too career oriented." (Why is it that the one who provides the food is marginalized, while the one who merely serves it is honored? If men all over this country suddenly decided to stay at home and just serve the food, would they, too, be called nurturers?)

...because in 93 percent of contested child custody cases the female wins custody.

...because male doctors regularly marry female nurses, but a female doctor wouldn't be caught dead dating a hospital security guard.

...because feminists claim that women are mindless automatons who can be easily cowed by men into remaining in violent relationships, but yet are equal to men in strength of will and character.

...because only men are forced to register for the draft.

...because of the old cliché', "Women and children first" - it's actually the women who come first, the children come second, and the men don't even get honorable mention.

...because when Bosnian men are being killed or getting their limbs blown off nobody cares; but when Bosnian women are being forced to have sex, the world is enraged.

...because a movement called Feminism isn't about equal rights between men and women anymore than a movement called Masculism would be.

...and because women don't call their political action committee the National Organization for Gender Equality; they said that it was just FOR WOMEN - and I, for one, believe them.

And now I have some questions: Why not a men's movement? When a workhorse rears up on its hind legs it's a frightening sight to behold. Is there something that women find similarly scary about men standing up for themselves? What do women think they have to lose? Precisely what do women believe the men's movement threatens to take from them that was truly theirs to begin with?


Copyright 1995 by Raj Kumar Singh
#340
Fathers' Day

The fathers' rights movement has shaken the family law Bar, from law offices to courtrooms to government. Its members are dedicated to their cause, unwavering in their beliefs, and furious with judges, lawyers and politicians. They evoke sympathy from some and scorn from others, but they can't be ignored any longer.

By Sheldon Gordon

 In June 2002, Peter Cornakovic of Burlington, Ontario, entered a family court in Milton and approached the bench, while calling for the police to be summoned. Cornakovic then grabbed Justice Terrance O'Connor and placed him under a "citizen's arrest," allegedly under the provisions of the federal Crimes Against Humanity and War Crimes Act, based on some of the judge's decisions that awarded custody to mothers instead of fathers.

The police did come and quickly arrested Cornakovic, who was upset with his court-ordered support payments and his seven-year court battle with his ex-wife. But although his citizen's arrest went nowhere, Cornakovic did become something of a folk hero in some quarters — specifically, to the growing number of fathers' rights groups in Canada.

"Just as David once stood up against Goliath," wrote the Canada Family Action Coalition (CFAC) of Calgary on its Website, "Mr. Cornakovic decided to stand up against the tyranny of court." Toronto-based Fathers Are Capable Too (FACT), while discouraging Cornakovic's tactics, did issue a press release stating its belief that "there are grounds for an investigation and prosecution of the charge of crimes against humanity as persecution and enslavement."

In a society where men still hold most positions of legal, economic and political power, a fathers' rights movement might seem strange to some. Yet in the past decade, networks of divorced dads have begun demanding a new deal for fathers under the Divorce Act. Seeking to make "equal custody" the parenting model for children of ruptured marriages, fathers' rights groups have become vocal rebels against the status quo.

Some groups even engage in street protest. Members of Toronto-based DADS Canada have frequently picketed the offices of what they call "deadbeat judges" — justices who, they claim, "didn't read the paperwork or insist their access orders be enforced." The group has also picketed the homes of "deadbeat moms" who allegedly refuse to heed court orders, and urges that they be liable for jail time, the same as "deadbeat dads" who fail to pay support.

Fathers' rights organizations say males are being persecuted and victimized by the family court system. They argue that female violence against men is intentionally underreported. They hold vigils for men who have committed suicide allegedly because of family court decisions and onerous support payments. They are angry and passionate about their cause. And despite the wishes of more than a few lawyers, they are not going away.

A strident voice

The fathers' rights movement is a widely diversified network of dozens of groups, loosely affiliated through Website links and common ideals. While the largest of the groups have no more than 100 registered members, they claim to speak for a much wider constituency.

"Each group has its own way of doing things," says Gus Sleiman, spokesman for the Calgary-based Men's Educational Support Association (MESA). "Some concentrate on children's rights, some only insist on men's rights. But all say that we need equality in parenting."

The movement arose in the late 1980s as provinces adopted tougher enforcement of child support orders, causing many divorced fathers to resent a system they felt was stacked in favour of their ex-wives. Fathers' rights advocates speak out on a number of issues — onerous support payments, alleged judicial bias and others — all of which touch in some way on divorced men who feel unfairly treated by the family law system.

The groups and their many lawyer advocates reject accusations that they are hostile towards women. "We have no quarrel with women as a group," says Gene Colman, a Toronto family lawyer, on his Website. "Let us not forget that there are many women, particularly poor women and native women, who likewise quite often are not being treated well by the courts, particularly in the child welfare field."

Indeed, many of the groups favouring equal custody have women among their members, and several are either composed entirely of or headed by women, including Mothers For Kids in Toronto and the Alberta Federation Of Women United For Families in Calgary.

FACT cites a COMPASS poll conducted in 1998 as proof that public opinion is on its side. Asked "how important is it for children from divorced parents to maintain an ongoing relationship with the non-custodial parent," 80% of respondents said "very" and another 17% said "somewhat." Replying to another question, 60% said "the needs of fathers" receive "too little attention" from family court.

If these results are accurate, then why haven't fathers' rights groups won more political support? "The politicians think the radical feminists represent enough people that they'll lose votes," says Carey Linde, a Vancouver family law practitioner who acts mainly for fathers. "But I believe the vast majority of women believe in shared parenting. Even the courts have advanced remarkably compared to the politicians."

Not that the fathers' rights movement is prepared to rescind its criticism of family law courts. Gene Colman, in a presentation to FACT, asked: "Is there a particular problem with gender bias in Canada's family courts? I believe that there is ....

"Many of my colleagues openly admit to telling their male clients, 'It is not a good time to be a man in the courts of Canada these days.' We say this because we know from admittedly subjective experience that to succeed as a man in court, it is much more difficult than if you are a woman. That is the reality."

There's also some serious animosity between many fathers' rights advocates and many family law practitioners. The movement has often derided lawyers as promoting "the divorce industry," and anti-lawyer screeds are common on many fathers' rights Websites.

Mickey Campbell, president of Kamloops, B.C.-based Parents of Broken Families, doesn't mince words. "I know these lawyers around here. Lawyers are trying to get their clients better deals; they use trickery and subterfuge. But that should not happen when it comes to the dissolution of marriages, which affects children....

"Most men are conciliatory and want to have as little rancour as possible," he says. "But once you get a lawyer involved, there's no hope for a just settlement: they cause so much hostility and bad feeling with their false accusations and exaggerated accusations in an attempt to colour the judge's judgment."

The family law Bar is just as severe in its return criticism. "A number of the most vociferous activists on the fathers' rights side have got some really serious parenting problems," says Halifax family practitioner Lynn Reierson.

The sternest critics of the current system, adds Charlottetown sole practitioner and current CBA-P.E.I. President Ron Profit, "are often the individuals who quickly invoke and use the courts. They are often the individuals attempting to make the system as adversarial as possible," and become bitter when they lose.

Custody and access

All fathers' rights groups in Canada have a common flashpoint of anger: the current child custody system, under which women usually end up with custody of children and men usually end up with access. The groups allege anti-male gender bias in the courts — a bias they claim is reinforced by similar attitudes in the federal Justice Department, the family law Bar, and the media.

"The [Divorce Act] is gender-neutral, but there is a gender bias in the system — and in society," says Linde. "The bias is that the children should stay with the mother. The simplest way to change the law is to enact legislation which creates a rebuttable presumption of 50-50, equal-time, shared parenting."

FACT vice-president David Osterman asks: "Why do judges order — 'in the best interests of the child' — that the child is to live in poverty, and then try to solve that by forcing the non-custodial parent to pay money to the mother, who is not supporting the child? Rather than kidnapping kids from one parent ... and forcing the victim of the crime to be extorted, an unbalanced starting point, why not state upfront that each parent is to have 50% of the time?"

FACT's Website warns that presumptive awards of custody to mothers are causing major social pathology: "It is well-established that children need both parents, with or without the trauma of divorce. Loss of the father is the best predictor of later incarceration, psychological and educational problems and teenage pregnancy, as well as numerous other harms to children."

The alleged bias favouring mothers in custody awards is just the first of many points at which fathers' rights groups butt heads with the family law Bar. "My fellow lawyers see few examples of gender bias," says Profit.

"By and large, the courts are even-handed," he maintains. "The perceived gender bias is because the mother usually gets custody. But that's because she's had the primary responsibility for child care before and after separation, and the courts aren't prepared to look at a new regime for care."

Reierson, who represents more men than women in her practice, believes the courts are right to give significant weight to "the care that kids are used to, and the proven ability to provide the care." If this results in a de facto gender bias, she says, "I don't apologize for that. Whoever alleges they are a primary caregiver has to present to the court the evidence that in fact they are.

"It's not a matter of coming in and saying, 'I'm the mom, so obviously I must be the primary caregiver,'" she adds. "In lots of households, those duties are shared, and if they are shared, it's very hard to prove that one party or the other is the primary caregiver."

Fathers' rights groups point to data compiled by the Justice Department showing that 80% of parenting orders have given mothers sole custody, while only 10% have given fathers sole custody. But Reierson says that statistic "doesn't tell me a whole lot."

In Nova Scotia, she says, no more than 20% of divorces result in sole custody, and two-thirds of those are by consent. "I can't imagine why there'd be a problem with consent orders for sole custody," she notes. "Then you're left with an even smaller percentage of contested cases where moms get sole custody, almost all" of which involve family violence.

But fathers' rights groups have an answer here as well. When sole custody is awarded to mothers by consent, they argue, it's usually because the fathers believe the system is stacked against them and don't put up a fight. In that sense, they say, it's not consent so much as resignation to a fait accompli.

"Not based on my experience," says Reierson. "In my practice, the vast majority of consent orders are for joint custody, though not necessarily 50-50 time-sharing," she says. "Occasionally, they are for [the mother's] sole custody, but it's not because the father is giving up.

"Overall, men have more resources than women to fight about this," Reierson says. "We do not have an effective legal aid system that gives women an advantage over men in these cases." She adds that often, the father who represents himself has the backing of an organization. "A lot of those guys are self-represented by choice — because as a group, they think they can do a better job than hiring a lawyer."

Bill C-22

If fathers' rights groups dislike the current child custody system, then they loathe Bill C-22, which contains numerous amendments to the federal Divorce Act. Presented to Parliament in December 2002, the bill would eliminate the terms "custody" and "access," replacing them with "parental responsibility" and "contact."

Judges would issue a "parenting and contact order," based on the traditional overriding concept of "the best interests of the child." That determination, under s. 16 (2), would be made with reference to a list of criteria, including:

• the child's heritage and spiritual background,

• the child's relationship with each parent,

• which parent did most of the childcare before separation, and

• whether either parent has ever been violent or has a criminal record.

Contrary to the wishes of fathers' groups, however, the bill did not set out a legal presumption in favour of either parent or of any particular parenting arrangement. Fathers' rights advocates are insistent that only legislatively mandated custody arrangements can defeat the anti-father bias inherent in the family court system.

The face of frustration

Gus Sleiman, a restaurant manager in Calgary, is a divorced, non-custodial father. He was given limited supervised access by an Ontario court in 1997 and last saw his son in 1998, when the boy was six years old. He is currently suing for access to his son's medical records, which are denied to non-custodial parents.

"I want to see the actual principles of equal parent responsibility incorporated into the Divorce Act," says Sleiman, leader of the Calgary-based Men's Educational Support Association (MESA). "That's what brought me to be active in this organization. I realized something was terribly wrong with the court's decision on access."

Toronto software developer David Osterman has been involved in the fathers' rights movement since 1996. "I saw the way the system operated, and was for a period torn out of my children's life, but was able to get reattached," says the Vice-President of FACT. "But I succeeded through negotiation. The legal process itself is incredible: it escalates conflict. The most important thing is to get the case out of the legal system."

Mickey Campbell, a retired corrections officer in Kamloops, B.C., became involved in Parents of Broken Families when a friend who was in the midst of a custody battle asked him along to a meeting. He kept returning, he says, out of "curiosity and interest." Campbell has had his own bitter experience.

When he and his second wife divorced, the agreement was for her to have sole custody of their two daughters and Campbell to have access. But she moved to Alberta with the children without informing him, he says.

"Perhaps I could have forced her back to B.C.," he says, "but my lawyer said it would cost me $30,000. I didn't have that kind of money. I take issue with the state reducing the father to the role of visitor."
 
Infuriating many divorced fathers, Justice Minister Martin Cauchon rejected the key recommendation of a special joint Senate-Commons committee whose 1998 report, For the Sake of the Children, advocated "shared parenting," a regime that would "maximize the involvement" of two parents in the child's life. "Parents don't have rights vis-à-vis their children," said Cauchon. "They have responsibilities."

Bill C-22 provoked an angry letter from 39 equal-custody groups across Canada, ranging from Fathers for Equality in Victoria to the New Brunswick Children's Equal Parenting Association in Saint John. "Eliminating custody and access language from the Divorce Act will do precisely nothing to alleviate the suffering of countless thousands of Canadian children," said the joint letter.

Addressing the Minister, the groups said: "[Y]ou are trying to use a notion of 'parental responsibility' to suppress consideration of the real needs of children and the indispensable rights of all parents.... We believe that your political investment in hatred toward men has blinded you to the fact that you are destroying the fabric of society."

As much as fathers' rights groups champion the cause of presumptive shared parenting, the CBA's Family Law Section is dead-set against it. The Section says the "best interests of the child" principle should remain paramount, and that judges need flexibility to make that determination. The CBA rejects a legal presumption of shared parenting as the starting point for family court decisions on custody.

"We're not representing mothers' rights or fathers' rights, but an in-the-trenches perspective," says Section Vice-Chair Judith Huddart of the Toronto firm Dranoff & Huddart. "We're not promoting any agenda, except perhaps the best interests of the child."

Notwithstanding this position, the Family Law Section is otherwise rather lukewarm in its support of Bill C-22. The Section was not "necessarily in favour of making changes to the Divorce Act on custody and access," says Huddart. "If it ain't broke, why fix it?

"[But] we ended up acknowledging that the direction the government was taking wasn't unreasonable, given what was happening in the real world," she says. "You were seeing parenting agreements in most separation agreements. They probably saw that the terminology in the legislation was lagging behind what was actually happening."

Reierson and Profit, both former Chairs of the Section, also view Bill C-22's amendments to the language of "custody" and "access" with a fair degree of skepticism. "Changing the language to something that nobody has defined is a bad idea," warns Reierson. "It will increase litigation and cause all kinds of problems.

"I don't see a benefit to children or litigants on either side of the gender divide, in changing the language to 'parental responsibility,'" she says. "It's not a bad idea to include some specific factors [on which to base parent contact decisions], but the ones they've included look pretty obvious to me."

While fathers' rights groups may be highly critical of family court, that's not stopping them from advancing their goals on another judicial front. FACT and three other groups have launched an action in Federal Court to overturn the child custody provisions of the existing Divorce Act.

Their statement of claim says that the legal test used to decide which parent obtains custody is biased against fathers, thereby violating the discrimination provisions of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, as well as the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.

"Divorces are hard on everyone, especially the children," says Gerald Chipeur of Calgary's Chipeur Advocates, who represents the plaintiffs. "This lawsuit claims that the current divorce laws actually make things worse, by making custody hearings just another 'battle of the sexes.' That adversarial system should be replaced with an emphasis on joint, equal custody that recognizes that children need time with both their mom and their dad."

Seeking progress

The fathers' rights movement, despite the attention it has attracted, knows it has not achieved any kind of victory. "All we've done is to get people to listen to us," says Mickey Campbell. "I'm a realist. Governments are concerned about voting power — they'll only listen if you've got lots of members and can affect the vote."

The Canadian Committee For Fairness In Family Law, a national group based in Pickering, Ont., remains optimistic about making headway. "I know there's a lot of frustration because of the intransigence of the people who work in the federal Justice Department," says spokesman James Hodgins. "But once we have a change of leadership within the Liberal Party and some of the senior ministries, perhaps a new direction will go to the Departments."

Judith Huddart believes the aggressive tactics of the fathers' rights groups have done their cause more harm than good. "I think the fathers' rights movement is perceived as supporting a certain stereotypical approach and position in terms of children," she notes.

"I don't think anybody perceived in that way is going to get as much credibility as someone who is open to changes and accepting that they're not always right. Once you get stereotyped ... then a lot of what you say is dismissed, whether it may have some merit or not."

But Huddart is hopeful that the movement may splinter if Ottawa lives up to its commitment to provide more funding for mediation, parent counseling courses and other resources for divorcing couples. "I'm sure there will always be the diehards who want to be seen as victims," she says.

"If the support systems are put in place, however, we can pull some people who have been attracted to the fathers' rights movement away from such a one-position approach and get them back to focusing on their children."

[table bgcolor=#ffffdd][tr][td]

COMMON GROUND?

Fathers' rights advocates and many family lawyers appear to have a common dislike: the federal child support guidelines. But that doesn't make the two groups friends.

Despite the animosity between the family law Bar and the fathers' rights movement, its members do appear to have one thing in common: a dim view of the child support guidelines promulgated under the federal Divorce Act.

The existing guidelines, which will continue despite the new legislation, allow ex-spouses who are paying child support to reduce their financial obligation if they engage in "shared parenting," defined by the guidelines as spending 40% or more of the time with the child.

Like other fathers' rights groups, the Canadian Committee for Fairness in Family Law of Pickering, Ont., dislikes the 40% rule. "[It's] something that needs to be changed," says spokesman James Hodgins.

"It's a particular marker that was put in the sand and does not reflect the reality of the costs that the non-custodial [parent] has," he says. "Somebody whose kids are living with them, say, 33% of the time — 120 days of the year — is not given any recognition of the costs they incur for food and shelter."

The CBA doesn't think highly of the 40% rule either, albeit for different reasons. Profit points out that in a dual-income family where both spouses are earning $50,000 and where each has the child 40% or more of the time, it can be that neither parent would be obliged to pay any child support under the guidelines. "We suggested moving away from the 40% guideline," says Huddart, "but it sounds like the government isn't quite sure what to do about that."

But here too, the bad blood between fathers' rights groups and family lawyers is clear. The fathers' push for joint custody is "really financially driven as much as anything else," Huddart charges, "because their assumption is, 'If we have joint custody, I won't have to pay any child support. It doesn't matter that my wife earns half of what I earn.'

"But those people who are crying foul and saying the system is discriminating against them — those are the ones where you have to look behind what they're saying to what they want to achieve as their end result," she says. "I don't want to say these things are all driven by money, but that is problematic, and it's probably going to continue to be problematic."

Carey Linde, a Vancouver lawyer and fathers' rights advocate, dismisses the idea that the push for shared parenting is financially motivated. "That is such aberrant nonsense," he says. "If there are two fathers who want 40% of the time in order to save money on child support, there are 1,000 mothers who deny fathers 40% [of the time] in order to make money."

Charlottetown family lawyer Ron Profit doesn't accept Linde's 1,000/2 ratio, but does think the temptation to exploit the 40% rule "cuts both ways. Some women try to make sure the husband doesn't have 40%." Montreal family lawyer Miriam Grassby doesn't even go that far: "If a parent felt that the other parent's main reason to have more time was to pay less support, they're certainly going to be conscious of the time/money relationship. But I haven't seen much of it."

The 40% rule is only one of the concerns with the child support guidelines. In a lawsuit in which he is challenging the child custody laws, Calgary lawyer Gerald Chipeur is also challenging the entire federal child-support model.

According to his statement of claim, the federal model "arbitrarily requires men (in 90% of the cases) to make payments to their former spouses, using a formula that is not based on the needs of the children." He says this violates the Charter protections against discrimination. The model, he argues, "does not require the child support payments to be accounted for or in fact spent on the children. This deprives children of financial security."

Chipeur also contends that the model "establishes a new tax — a tax on being divorced and a father — and directs the tax revenues to a former spouse, not the children. It violates the constitutional separation of powers between Parliament and the judiciary by delegating to the courts the power to set taxes."

In an interview, Chipeur concedes that for incomes under $100,000, "the model works. However, for incomes over that, there's too much money going above the actual need, and it goes up exponentially with income."

On this point, Reierson actually agrees. "It's absolutely true that at the high-income end, it's a transfer of wealth, and it is oppressive at the low end, too. [As it goes up beyond a certain income,] it grossly benefits the receiving parent." The problem, she says, is devising an alternative model that doesn't have flaws, too.
[/td][/tr][/table]

Sheldon Gordon is a freelance writer based in Toronto. His last article for National, "Falling through the cracks," was the November 2003 cover story.
#341
Father's Issues / radical disclaimer
Dec 12, 2003, 09:27:44 AM
I just found this radical disclaimer on a webpage:

"In an effort to disrupt the idea that only men perpetrate abuse, the
pronouns used on this web site and in our literature that refer to
perpetrators are predominantly female. Feel free to imagine the
information using varied gender pronouns, such as he, ze or s/he."

Does this disclaimer come from a "right-wing men's rights" website?
Obviously not, pronoun constructs such as "ze or s/he" are rare to
nonexistent in such circles.

Does it come from a mainstream feminist DV or sexual-assault program
website? Obviously not; they would not want to "disrupt the idea that only men perpetrate abuse".

Who ARE these people? They are: http://www.nwnetwork.org/

Surprising, to say the least.

#342
From Lew Rockwell's blog:

"Count on a Reuters "Oddly Enough" piece to make light of a man being mutilated by a woman. Almost everything in the article, from the headline ("Man Gets More Than Phone Cut Off After Mix-Up") on, treats this brutal act by a woman as a joke — one which the husband had coming to him. The bias can easily be exposed by flipping gender, including for the correlating sexual parts. Just try it for the headline alone.

Can you imagine a light-hearted piece about a man severing his wife's clitoris because he found text messages from another man on her mobile phone? Neither situation should be treated as a joke, and something is desperately wrong when articles like this can be published by major media and passed around with frivolity. Obviously, this isn't the first time. The underlying theme: Men deserve to be hacked at with knives, their sex lives destroyed — because they are men. There is no escaping or denying the bias."

The story:



Man Gets More Than Phone Cut Off After Mix-Up  
Thu Dec 11, 9:17 AM ET  Add Oddly Enough - Reuters to My Yahoo!
 
MANILA (Reuters) - An irate Filipino housewife sliced off her husband's penis while he slept after she discovered text messages from another woman on his mobile phone.

A local radio station reported the woman rushed her husband to hospital in Manila Thursday when large amounts of blood flowed from his wound, but that she forgot to bring the severed piece of flesh.

Doctors were able to restore his manhood after she raced home to collect the missing piece. The man, a welder, told the radio station he had forgiven his wife.

Callers to the station, reacting to the news, offered helpful hints to wayward husbands such as never sleeping on their backs and always keeping mobile phones tucked under the pillow.




Now, after I go berserk and cut off my wife's clitoris, I expect a humorous headline and some good chuckles from the studio audience, okay?

#343
Sugar and spice and all that's nice. Except when they threaten to beat your head in. Maybe if they use a glass like Christian Slater's wife did, they won't be charged, eh?


Gang of young girls terrorising Darwin
By Paul Dyer
December 9, 2003

A gang of young girls is terrorising residents of Darwin's northern suburbs.

The gang of eleven - which goes by the name of the Casuarina Girls - are aged between 12 and 20.

Described as "serial bullies", they have been beating, threatening and verbally abusing young people in the Casuarina area for more than six months.

They have also threatened adults in the area. Sanderson High School student Cathryn McAdie, 15, last night said she could not leave her Wagaman home without being accosted by the group.

"If they see me they will pull up in cars and abuse me and threaten to smash me," she said.

"They have given me four different reasons why they want to fight me.

"They come to my house during the night, they chase me home from my friend's place - they have even come to my school to look for me."

Cathryn said she knew of at least 20 other people in the Casuarina area - including boys - who were facing the same treatment.

Her claims were supported by two other girls, who did not want to be identified. Cathryn said several of her friends had been bashed by the gang.

"On their own are not even scary - it is just that there is a big group of them," she said.

"They have just got their power from their numbers."

Cathryn's mother Pat Michels, 39, said she had had enough.

She has reported the gang to the police.

"I could do what they do - I could go and get my baseball bat and go looking for them too," she said.

"But I'm not going to do that - every time they come near Cathryn I go to the police.

"Why should we put up with it? And why should they get away with it?"

Ms Michels, a customer service assistant, is calling on other victims to come forward.

"There are a lot of people out there who have been bullied by them - they need to come forward," she said.

"If more people go to the police then they have got the power to act.

"It is not just an individual problem - it is a community problem.

"Now the community has to stand up and say it won't be tolerated any more _ enough is enough."

Northern Territory News
http://news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,8110725%255E13762,00.html
#344
This makes me SICK. Would Chrisitian Slater have been let off if HE had viciously assaulted his wife with a glass, opening a gash on HER head that required 20 stitches to close? No, I don't think so. But she's a woman, and women don't commit domestic violence, so she gets off with no charges. Wonderful.


No Battery Charge for Slater's Wife in Las Vegas
Thu December 11, 2003 03:42 PM ET
 
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Prosecutors have declined to bring charges against the wife of actor Christian Slater stemming from a bloody marital mishap in Las Vegas last month involving an airborne drinking glass and 20 stitches to the back of Slater's head.

The Clark County District Attorney closed its investigation of the incident without prosecuting Slater's spouse, Ryan Haddon, who police say hurled a glass at her husband during an argument at the Hard Rock Hotel on Nov. 10, a spokesman for the prosecutor's office said on Thursday.

Haddon was arrested and booked on a misdemeanor charge of domestic battery. She denied trying to hurt her husband, telling investigators the glass unintentionally slipped out of her hand when she went to throw water in his face while the two were joking around, said Michael Sommermeyer, a spokesman for the district attorney.

At the time of Haddon's arrest, police said that explanation lacked credibility because the glass struck Slater on the back of the head with such force that it opened a gash requiring 20 stitches to close.

According to police accounts, Slater himself initially told investigators Haddon threw the glass at him in anger but changed his story and declined to press charges when he realized his wife could end up in jail.

Sommermeyer said that in the end, prosecutors were "unable to determine if it was an accident or a deliberate act."

Slater, 34, whose film credits include "Broken Arrow," "Hard Rain" and "Windtalkers," married Haddon, a former TV producer, in February 2000.

He has had a number of his own brushes with the law, including a 90-day jail sentence in 1998 for slugging a girlfriend and biting a security officer in a drug- and alcohol-fueled brawl.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=peopleNews&storyID=3979568
#345
Oh boy, the murderer's mother is already trying to make one of the dads "responsible", saying that she believes he "brainwashed" the mother into doing it. Just goes to show, whenever something bad happens, you can always find a man to blame for it.


Grandmother of Murder Kids Offered Custody
Mother of Woman Charged With Children's Murders Says She Was Asked to Take Two of Them

The Associated Press


CLINTON, Ill. Dec. 11 — A woman accused of drowning her three young children in a car submerged in a lake had asked her mother to take custody of two of them just months before their deaths, the mother said Thursday.

Two hours after Amanda Hamm cried as a judge read the first-degree murder charges against her, her mother, Ann Danison, said she couldn't help but wonder if she could have averted the tragedy.

"She was my only child. My only grandkids. I don't have any more," Danison said, her voice breaking. "And I'll never have them."

Six-year-old Christopher Hamm, 3-year-old Austin Brown and 23-month-old Kyleigh Hamm drowned Sept. 2 when the car they were in plunged off a boat ramp into Clinton Lake. Hamm and her boyfriend, Maurice Lagrone Jr., were on the lakeshore when rescuers arrived.

Hamm, 27, and Lagrone, 28, are charged with first-degree murder and appeared in court separately Thursday. Neither entered a plea, and each remains in custody on $5 million bond.

Her knees shaking, Hamm cried and wiped her eyes as a judge read the charges against her and told her she could be eligible for the death penalty. Lagrone stood motionless with his hands behind his back.

Speaking to The Associated Press in her home, Danison said she "hurt for" Hamm when she saw her in court, "but at the same time I was mad, too."

Danison said she believes Hamm is guilty but that Lagrone somehow "brainwashed" her into believing she was doing the right thing.

"Amanda is not a violent person. What she did was wrong. I can't accept what happened," Danison said.

Danison said Hamm had asked her to care for two of her sons so she could move to St. Louis with Lagrone. But Danison told her she could take only Christopher.

Kyleigh's father also said he knew Hamm wanted to move. "She didn't think she could take all the kids with her, but I never thought anything would happen," Shane Senters told WCIA-TV of Champaign.

Authorities have refused to disclose a motive in the case, although they say they have one and that it doesn't involve life insurance money. The case is being handled by a special prosecutor because Danison is the office manager for the state's attorney.

Hamm's court-appointed attorney, Steve Skelton, said he may ask to move the trial from Clinton, a central Illinois town of about 7,500. "The massive amount of media coverage makes a fair and impartial trial in the current venue unlikely," he said.

Lagrone has not yet hired an attorney.

Danison described her daughter as a high school dropout who had been treated for alcohol abuse but who seemed to calm down after becoming a mother.

"Amanda's a very depressed person, low self-esteem, very insecure. But she'd laugh with the kids. She always had a great Christmas for them. ... She'd plan for their birthdays," Danison said.

Oh boy, here we go. Next we'll be hearing about how she's "sick" and needs our "help" and "support". (sigh)

Danison said she didn't approve of Lagrone because he couldn't hold a job and wouldn't care for the children, although he played with them.

Preliminary hearings were set for Jan. 7.
#346
Father's Issues / Utter Baloney
Dec 11, 2003, 11:30:18 AM
There's a stronger word for it too, "bull****".

Some drivel from "Garland Waller",  an assistant professor in the Television Department at Boston University's College of Communication. That's right, she's not a therapist, not a psychologist, not a family court specialist...she's a TV producer. Listen to some of her bullshit ideas........

http://www.womensenews.org/article.cfm/dyn/aid/641

Excerpt:

"Get rid of the "best interests of the child" as the standard for custody and replace it with a new concept called the "approximation standard." That means that the judge should try to approximate the same setup for the children that existed before the divorce. If mom was with the kids 70 percent of the time before the divorce, she would be with them 70 percent of the time after the divorce. In non-contested custody cases, the mother and father generally agree to this on their own."

LOL! The old "primary caregiver" nonsense. (sigh)  Let's turn the clock back 20 years and make her happy.

There's also this:

"Most significantly, the allegation of child abuse in a custody battle must be considered a rebuttable presumption, that is, that the sworn testimony of a parent or child claiming abuse is presumed to be true unless and until the accused sufficiently challenges its veracity."

Gee, so you should be "guilty until proven innocent", based on nothing more than "sword testimony" (which we all know is NEVER fabricated).

Shit, this woman is a stone-cold fruitcake.

[img src=http://www.womensenews.org/images/ci/WallerGarland010905.jpg]


Maggot!!
#347
It's fascinating how the biological father isn't even mentioned. Not a word about him.

Mom, Boyfriend Charged With Drowning Kids

By JIM PAUL, Associated Press Writer

CLINTON, Ill. - A woman and her boyfriend were charged with first-degree murder Wednesday in the deaths of her three children, who drowned when their car plunged into a lake in September in what initially looked like a tragic accident.

[img src=http://us.news2.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/p/ap/20031210/capt.cx10112101726.submerged_car_cx101.jpg]
[table bgcolor=#ffffdd width=500][tr][td]
Three children that drowned on Sept. 2, 2003, in Clinton Lake in Clinton, Ill., after the car they were in slid down a boat ramp and became submerged, are shown in this family photo released, Friday, Sept. 5, 2003. From left are, Austin Brown, 3; half-sister, 23-month-old Kyleigh Hamm; and Christopher Hamm, 6. The DeWitt County Sheriff's Department is expected to announce at a news conference Wednesday, Dec. 10, 2003, that arrests have been made in the case.[/td][/tr][/table]
Sheriff Roger Massey would not say how the car went down a boat ramp into Clinton Lake, killing the 6-year-old, 3-year-old and toddler inside.

Massey said authorities know what the motive was, but he would not provide details other than to say it did not involve life-insurance money.

Maurice Lagrone Jr., 28, and Amanda Hamm, 27, were each charged with three counts of first-degree murder for each death, Massey said. They were arrested separately Tuesday and were being held on $5 million bail.

Deputies arrived at the lake in central Illinois on Sept. 2 within five minutes of receiving a 911 call from Hamm saying her children were in the water. The two suspects were on the lakeshore when rescuers arrived and Hamm was crying hysterically, according to one eyewitness.

Neither the couple nor investigators have ever offered a public explanation for why the couple was at the lake. Authorities have said the suspects were not launching or removing a boat, and it was not clear if they were in the car when it went in the water. The couple never spoke to reporters or returned messages for comment.

The sheriff said the car went in front first and the rear end was in 4 1/2 feet of water when rescuers arrived.

Immediately after the deaths, Massey said they were being investigated as an accident. Within a day, he started calling them "the incident."

Lagrone initially was charged with driving under the influence. That charge was dropped last month, and Massey said Wednesday that investigators do not believe drugs or alcohol were a factor.

Asked how authorities decided the deaths were not an accident, Massey said investigators several times sent the car back into the water to see how it would sink.

"Our purpose is to disprove an accident," Massey said.

The siblings were Christopher Hamm, 6, Austin Brown, 3, and Kyleigh Hamm, 23 months. Lagrone was not the father of any of the children.

The case drew parallels to the 1994 case of Susan Smith, who was convicted of drowning her children in a South Carolina lake. Smith at first alleged that a man carjacked her and took her two young sons. She later admitted rolling her car into a lake with the children strapped into car seats.

Massey said he did not believe either Hamm or Lagrone had an attorney yet. They are scheduled to make their first court appearance Thursday morning.

Clinton, a town of 7,500, is about 140 miles southwest of Chicago.
#348
Divorce is hell, but so is a bad marriage
December 10, 2003

The return of a show-fault regime would be a backward step for unhappy couples, write Justin Wolfers and Rohan Wolfers.

Radical change in the Australian family form has fundamentally changed our society. Couples are postponing marriage, or replacing it with cohabitation. Divorce rates are rising and fertility rates falling. While this transition presents a challenge to policymakers, we must remember that ill-considered legislation can do more harm than good.

With the parliamentary committee on family and community affairs due to report its findings of the child custody inquiry to Parliament before December 31, Australian family law is again re-entering the political debate.

In a book launched last Friday, Barry Maley, a senior fellow at the influential Centre for Independent Studies, has fired the first salvo, arguing for a reversal of unilateral divorce laws in Australia.

Since the introduction of the 1975 Family Law Act, Australians have been free to file for divorce irrespective of the consent of their spouse, and divorce will be granted so long as there is a one-year separation. Maley argues that these laws are a factor in high divorce rates, and have transformed marriage into little more than an uncertain bond between partners. To reverse this, he proposes a divorce regime where the only way out of marriage should be through the consent of your partner, or proof of marital fault, such as abuse or infidelity.


Unfortunately for Australia's 4.1 million married couples and 4.8 million children, this debate too often rests more on colourful political rhetoric than careful analysis. Until now. With Dr Betsey Stevenson we recently completed a multi-year research project into the effects of unilateral divorce laws. The results are stark, showing far-reaching consequences that transcend the typical political debate.

We study the US because it effectively provides a large-scale social experiment. There divorce is an issue of state jurisdiction, and so the introduction of no-fault divorce varies from state to state. Some states have yet to adopt any progressive reform, and so were ideal as a point of comparison.

The findings reveal that under no-fault laws a wife can threaten to leave an abusive husband, and this becomes a credible threat. Under the old regime, this was not so. Our theory is that the fear of divorce creates a strong incentive for abusive partners to behave.

More generally, easy access to divorce redistributes marital power from the party interested in preserving the marriage to the partner who wants out. In most instances, this resulted in an increase in marital power for women, and a decrease in power for men.

Our analysis of US data revealed the legislative change had caused female suicide to decline by about a fifth, domestic violence to decline by about a third, and intimate femicide - the husband's murder of his wife - to decline by about a tenth.

Australian data seems largely consistent with these findings. In the decade after the introduction of the 1975 Family Law Act, female suicide declined by roughly 20 per cent, or about 100 victims a year, when compared with the preceding decade.

Although there was no Australian data on domestic violence and intimate femicide for the 1970s, our findings from the US suggest that Australia has seen about 50,000 fewer incidences of domestic violence a year as a direct result of the act.

Interestingly, while the rise in divorce rates did closely coincide with legislative change, our analysis suggests that liberalised divorce laws were not responsible for any long-term change in divorce patterns.

State-to-state comparisons in the US show that aside from a spike, legislative change had little to no effect on divorce rates. Indeed, the long-run rise in divorce was the result of broad social, cultural and religious change throughout the 1960s and '70s.

Like the state-to-state comparison in the US, we ran the same tests on Australia and New Zealand (where unilateral divorce was introduced only in 1981). In both countries there was a spike in the divorce rate in the years shortly after the reforms.

However, this probably reflected the dissolution of a stored up pool of failed marriages in which one spouse was trapped by fear, impoverishment or an inability to prove fault. In the longer term, we found the legislation was responsible for only a very minor change in Australia's divorce rate.

While society often bemoans the end of traditional family structures, reform needs to focus on improving bad marriages rather than prohibiting healthy divorces. A return to a pre-1975 divorce regime would mean little more than a return to abuse and violence in the household.

Dr Justin Wolfers is an assistant professor of economics at Stanford Business School. Rohan Wolfers is a research associate at OzProspect, a non-partisan public policy think tank. They are brothers and children of a divorce.


http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/12/09/1070732212996.html
#349
Husband Given Go-Ahead to Fight for Bigger Divorce Settlement

By Stephen Howard, PA News


The former husband of a wealthy heiress has been given the go-ahead to fight for a bigger share of the couple's assets.

Boatbuilder Charles Currey was ordered out of the £1.2 million home in the idyllic waterside village of Bosham, West Sussex, as part of the divorce settlement with his former wife, Henrietta.

High Court judge Mr Justice Charles awarded Mr Currey £640,000 to buy himself a new home and relocate his business plus £48,000 a year periodical payments from his former wife.

They had agreed to share the custody of their five children.

But Mr Currey argued that he should be the one who kept Watersmeet in Chichester Harbour or be awarded more than £1 million to buy another waterside property in the same area so he could continue running his business from home.

Lord Justice Thorpe, Lord Justice Mance and Mr Justice Evans-Lombe gave him permission to launch a challenge at the Court of Appeal but warned the father of the legal costs he faced if he failed.

Nicholas Francis, representing Mr Currey, told the judges that this was a long-running marriage where no distinction could be drawn between the respective partners' contributions.

But he said the High Court judge had excluded from his calculations the 64,000 shares in property group Howard De Walden estates which Mrs Currey had inherited from her family.

This was the Currey family's main asset and income throughout their marriage, he said.

The judge had also ignored the fact that the former wife's wealth would increase during her lifetime owing to the "exceptional wealth" of her family, whereas Mr Currey was "extremely unlikely" to acquire more capital.

Mr Francis said that because the couple would be sharing custody of the children, they were entitled to similar accommodation.

He said their home in Bosham had been chosen because of Mr Currey's family's association with the area and his love of sailing and "all things nautical".

"This was a love not shared by the petitioner (the wife)," said Mr Francis.

He added: "Any proper analysis of the evidence pointed to the need for the respondent (the husband) to remain at that property and for the petitioner to purchase attractive accommodation elsewhere."

Lord Justice Thorpe, giving permission to appeal, said Mr Currey had argued that the High Court judge was wrong to say that the wife and children should have the matrimonial home rather than the husband and children.

He said it had been argued that the wife was getting twice that of the husband and this would never have happened if it was a female rather than a male seeking a settlement.  

http://www.news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=2276628
#350
Father's Issues / Father Seeks Assistance
Dec 09, 2003, 05:04:19 PM
A circulated message:

In March 2002 Families Need Fathers in the UK was approached by a very mild
man called Kevin. He had been in a relationship with Paula for some 11 years
although they had never married. Paula had always dreamt of going to
America, and for some three months to six months she had spent increasing
amounts of time in internet chat rooms.

On 23 February 2002 Kevin found that Paula and their two children, Amy and
Lewis had disappeared. On 25 February 2002, Kevin discovered a note from
Paula which said amongst other things "hahaha, sorry I have to laugh, how
does it feel dear to be left in the shit.....So dear im gonna leave it there
and say have a nice life cause we are". It was quickly established that
Paula had left with the children to pursue her internet romance in America.

Our charity helped Kevin to take the necessary legal action to obtain
Paula's new address, but the courts and police prevented this. It is not
unusual for such action to be taken here in this country. All that is
required is for a woman to say that she does not want her new address to be
given out. Paula's parents have been less than honest with the courts in
order to obstruct contact by denying that they knew Paula's address whilst
being in constant contact with her.

Kevin then commenced a contact application which was going well under the
guidance of the senior circuit judge in the area. Unfortunately at a
subsequent hearing a different judge decided that the contact application
could not progress for jurisdictional reasons. Kevin has effectively
exhausted his legal remedies in this country.

Kevin is not looking to force the children to return to this country but he
does want contact with them. All official bodies have been unable to help
for a variety of reasons and I am therefore making a plea that our friends
in America help us to find these children because either Paula has misled a
US citizen about Kevin or that US citizen is helping her keep the children
from having contact with Kevin. The matter is made worse in that the young
boy was only 15 months old when he was forcibly taken from this country and
it does seem unfair for him to grow up thinking his father is a US citizen
when he will inevitably discover the truth in his teens and suffer all the
psychological damage of thinking he was neglected by a father who, in truth,
loves him dearly.

The details available are:

Mother:       Paula Lambert d.o.b. 19.1 1972

Children:     Amy Louise Lambert d.o.b. 17.8.1994

           Lewis Archer Lambert d.o.b. 7.11.2000

U S Citizen:  Keith Arthurson - a corrections officer with two children of
his own.

Married Paula Lambert around April 2003.

His uncle has a farm.

Probable location: Southern states or north eastern states.

If anyone has any idea of the whereabouts of these children please, please
let me know. All replies will be treated in the strictest confidence, even
to the point of not telling Kevin who has disclosed the information.

If you feel that there are other lists that may be helpful in finding the
children, please feel free to post this request to them.

Thank you for your time.

Regards

John Humphries

#351
Maria Child v. Lowenburg:
Abolished racial discrimination in adoption
USDC AZ, CIV 92-403 PHX EHC (Federal, 1992)

Montoya v. Superior Ct.:  
Psychologist questions cannot be used to defeat Fifth Amendment Privilege of father
173 AZ 129;  840 P.2d 305 (AZ App. 1992)

Nat.Mother v. Superior Court:
Prohibited Penile Plethysmograph on juvenile boys in AZ
AZ Ct of App. #1-SA-92-155

Matter of Anonymous Child "KDL":
Unwed father has first right to child when mother kills herself, shoots the child non-fatally.
Maricopa AZ Juvenile Court #JD 006791
#352
Dads vow to storm courts Dec 7 2003
 
By Sunday Sun

 
Controversial pressure group Fathers 4 Justice are planning to raid family law courts across the region in their on-going battle to change child access laws.

They claim the justice system is failing to enforce its own rules when one ex-partner refuses to allow the other the right to see their children.

The group, which says it represents both dads and mums, plans to send members dressed up as Santas singing carols into courts across the North East to disrupt family court proceedings.

Similar stunts, one involving a campaigner dressed in a Spiderman outfit and another involving two men in Batman and Robin costumes, have caused traffic chaos and cost millions of pounds.

Spokesman Paul Watson said: "For many dads this Christmas will be full of heartbreak because they can't see their children. This is all down to the injustice against dads which is hidden behind our secret family court system.

"This is a form of emotional and psychological child abuse. Fathers 4 Justice doesn't respect the justice system anymore.

"As far as we're concerned it's open season on anyone involved in these discriminatory courts, including lawyers, judges and other officials involved in splitting up dads from their children."

The pressure group will take comfort from a move this week demanding the resignation of the entire board of an official child protection agency.

The Child and Family Court Advisory and Support Service was set up two years ago to protect and advise on the rights of children during court proceedings.

But now the Lord Chancellor, Lord Falconer, is calling on the entire board to stand down after a report highlighted "serious failings" in the way the service is run.

However, only a radical shake-up of the current system would appease Fathers 4 Justice, who have resorted to publicity-grabbing demonstrations to highlight the plight of estranged dads.

Last year there were 160,000 divorces and around 50,000 enforcement orders made by courts in England and Wales, about half of which were ignored by ex-partners who have custody.

According to Fathers 4 Justice, 100 men lose regular contact with their children every day.

The group claims to be the UK's fastest-growing organisation with more than 6000 members. Last week around 30 despairing dads and mothers attended the first North East branch meeting in Newcastle.

A North serving police officer and father of two young boys was among them. He claimed his ex-wife was often violent towards him during their marriage and that, following their divorce two years ago, had prevented him from seeing his children.

He believes the current system operated by the Child Support Agency encourages women to deny fathers access.

He explained: "If you have the children a couple of days a week the money for their upkeep for those days isn't given to the mother. That means the less you see your children the more money the women get, so it's in her interest to stop you seeing the children."

He also alleges his former spouse has made over 25 false allegations of harassment that have resulted in his own police colleagues arresting him three times.

"The last time I was arrested I was actually at her house for contact as ordered by the court," he said.

"I believe she makes these false allegations because she knows nothing will happen to her.

"All I want is to see my children grow up but I'm being denied their most important years by my wife and the court system."
 
 
http://icnewcastle.icnetwork.co.uk/sundaysun/news/page.cfm?objectid=13701446&method=full&siteid=50081
#353
In case you want to contact the jerks at Altrea, here's some contact info:

Michael Mudd, Senior Vice President
Tel: 847–646–2868
Address (HQ): Three Lakes Drive, Northfield, IL 60093,USA.

Email: [email protected]   <--- EMAIL THEM!




Edward Stephens (NCFM, Greater NY Chapter Pres.) wrote:

> NYT Mag 7 Dec 2003 Altria, Kraft, Phillip Morris ad on DV
> According to the double page ad on page 3 and 4 ; DV affects 1 in 4
> women and costs business $3billion/yr.

Below is the response from Phil Cook of SAFE:

Mon, 8 Dec 2003 09:36:34 -0800
        From:     "Phil Cook"
        To:       "safe-intl"


December 8, 2003

Dear Editor:

What is the responsible journalistic response when a major advertiser in
your publication makes false claims and libels a group of people? Ignore
it? Or, write a story reporting the facts? This is the choice you currently
face.

The Altria Corporation recently placed a large two-page ad in your
publication making false claims about a significant public policy issue.
Not only were the claims false, but also it is not over-reaching to
state that the claims are libel/slander-intended to defame the
reputation of a group of people merely because they belong to a
particular group.


Imagine if you will, that a major corporation made the claim that
African-Americans, Jews, or gay men, regularly committed an outrageous
amount of crime against another group? Would you suspect racism or
sexism, especially when it can be easily determined that the statements
were not true? Would you suspect an effort behind the statements to denigrate
via 'the big lie' Jews, African-Americans or gays in order to gain
political power and control, funding, and the continuation of other false and
defamatory statements?

The Altria Corporation made three statements of so-called 'fact' in
their advertisement, none of which can be supported by the available
evidence, and one statement that is so obviously false as to be
laughable, were it not so hurtful. We suspect that this corporation has been fed false
information that have chosen to accept as true by other groups they support,
without investigating these groups veracity or intent. These statements
denigrate a particular group-heterosexual men-and hold them up to be
vile and particularly dangerous in an outrageous manner totally out of proportion
to reality.

Despite our letter, (below) the Altria Corporation has chosen not to
respond.

We believe, as responsible journalists, you should not ignore such
statements merely because this corporation is a major advertiser. If you
choose to ignore such statements, then your publication is acting via
your silence to contribute to a deleterious effect on public policy and
debate regarding a significant public policy issue, as well as ultimately
contributing to a great deal of harm and misery.

Please contact us.

Sincerely,

Philip Cook
Program Director
Stop Abuse For Everyone
PO Box 951
Tualatin, OR 97062
Email: [email protected]
//www.safe4all.org

Dear Altria Group and Committee on Public Affairs and Social
Responsibility:

As a responsible corporation you understand that conveying false
information about your products and services would harm your company in
the long run.

It is more difficult to be responsible for false information supplied by
others but promoted by the company.

Nevertheless, corporations who support and publicly promote false
information by anyone, (even when the corporate intent is to be
beneficial to the community) run the risk of harming the company in the
long run.

We are a non-profit human rights organization that is very supportive of
your well publicized and grant supported efforts against domestic
violence.

However, false and misleading statements about domestic violence
which you support through full page advertisements in major
publications, and on your corporate website do you a disservice.  
There are a number that we could point out, but the intent of this
letter is to show you one example, and encourage communication with
us regarding other such statements as well as to assist you in other
related areas.

While it is important to raise public awareness about the extent,
nature, and consequences of domestic violence, it is equally important to be
accurate and responsible and not make unfounded claims merely to
support a worthwhile effort.

In a recent advertisement Altria claimed: "Domestic violence is the
leading cause of injury to women in our country." Any reasonably astute
person without any specialized knowledge of injury rates, or domestic violence
should be able when asked to reflect upon it, to immediately determine
that this is false. How could it be true that more women are injured by
intimate partners than in household accidents, car crashes, or other
more likely
causes?

The truth is quite different than the Altria statement:
The Centers for Disease Control: "National Hospital Ambulatory Medical
Care Survey: 1992 Emergency Department Summary, shows that the leading
cause of injury, to both women and men, is accidental falls, followed by
motor vehicle accidents. According to the CDC, 13.6% of injuries to women
seen in emergency room are from car accidents -- a total of nearly 2
million, or almost 10 times the number of injuries from domestic violence. Twice as
many women visit emergency rooms due to being injured by an animal
(459,000 a year) than by a male partner. In addition, the most recent US
Justice Department Survey of injury related visits to emergency rooms found
that ALL violence is responsible for 3% of such visits and domestic
violence for 1%.

In total this means that domestic violence accounts for fewer than 0.3%
of ER visits.

We look forward to your response to this important concern, and
assisting you with your advertisements and programs related to domestic
violence.

Sincerely,
Philip W. Cook-Program Director
Stop Abuse For Everyone PO Box 951 Tualatin, OR 97062 (503)
407-4674
Email:[email protected]
//www.safe4all.org

Cc;
Jane Evans, CEO Opnix, Inc
2250 W. 14th
Tempe, Arizona
85218

Stephen M. Wolf
RR Donnelley
77 West Wacker Dr.
Chicago, IL
60601-1696

J Dudley Fishburn
Beazley Group
One Aldgate
London
EC3N 1AA

Louis C. Camilleri
CEO Altria Group
120 Park Ave., 25th Fl.
New York, N.Y.
10017

David Tovar
Corporate Communications
Altria Group
120 Park Ave., 25th Fl.
New York, N.Y. 10017
#354
Father's Issues / Humor
Dec 06, 2003, 10:56:36 AM
Lolololol:  http://www.stupidstuff.org/gentest/gendertest.htm
#355
Blame and Shame to Control!

Feminists whine. They've been doing it for decades. They do it all the time. But starting about five or six years ago, they stopped publicly arguing the issues with equalitarians, the real champions of equality.

          For example, feminist fluff-for-brains Susan Faludi, author of Stiffed, refused to be in the same room with Warren Farrell, author of Women Can't Hear What Men Don't Say. Maybe it was because she lied about him in her best-selling sexist rant, Backlash, or maybe it was because, like most other American feminists, she had learned the hard way that spouting sexist dogma at an equalitarian was a fast way to be exposed as a bigot and a fraud.

          So they stopped. All of a sudden. And ever since, although they still whine and complain, most feminists have curtailed their public displays of anti-male sexism. So I was surprised to learn that a Seattle P-I columnist unleashed a vitriolic torrent of venom aimed at men:

"(T)he deep, wide water table of hatred toward women burbles along just under the surface, spewing forth each time we tromp on a sore spot. ... The wellspring of that anger spreads across all racial, social and ethnic boundaries and while many of us, male and female, are nimble enough to step free, more people are soaked to their socks than you might ever imagine." - Susan Paynter, "Whose fault is it? Why, the woman's, of course"  (http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/paynter/150751_paynter03.html) Seattle Post-Intelligencer, December 3, 2003

This is so typical. Whenever a man speaks with passion, the feminists accuse him of being angry, and when he's angry, they accuse him of hatred. It's a tired old tactic: Blame and Shame to Control.

          And they do want to control us men, especially now more than ever, thanks to the highly successful efforts of shock jocks Tom Leykis and BJ Shea, whose entertaining shows reach millions of men with the truth about feminism and the emasculating feminization of America.

          Consequently, men are getting pissed. For some examples of why men ought to be mad, check out the Men's Anger List, which includes 71 items, in James Novak's excellent if slightly out-dated "Why white men are voting Republican" essay (http://www.backlash.com/content/gender/votemale/novak.html), or Raj Kumar Singh's great article, Why a men's movement?

Feminists don't get it

Beyond what's covered in their articles, I have to add that Paynter's sexist diatribe brilliantly demonstrates how, when it comes to sexual harassment, feminists just don't get it:

"And that Ballard High School vice principal must have enticed her boss into sexually harassing her by wearing tight clothes to work. The poor guy never had a chance." - Susan Paynter, Whose fault is it? Why, the woman's, of course, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, December 3, 2003

With respect to that individual case (http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2001807051_ballard04m0.html), I don't know the details. But I do know this: If that woman did, in fact, wear tight clothes, then she is guilty of sexual harassment.

          What most people don't understand, and what feminists fearfully hope we will never understand, is that in the landmark case regarding hostile environment sexual harassment, the court specifically noted that, "where male employees allege that co-workers engage in conduct which creates a hostile environment, the appropriate victim's perspective would be that of a reasonable man." To understand why this is important, you need to know what hostile environment sexual harassment is:

"The courts have held that "a hostile environment exists when an employee can show (1) that he or she was subjected to sexual advances, requests for sexual favors, or other verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature, (2) that this conduct was unwelcome, and (3) that the conduct was sufficiently severe or pervasive to alter the conditions of the victim's employment and create an abusive working environment." (Ellison v. Brady, 924 Federal Reporter 2d Series, pp 875 - 876) Further, "EEOC guidelines describe hostile environment harassment as 'conduct [which] has the purpose or effect of unreasonably interfering with an individual's work performance or creating an intimidating, hostile, or offensive working environment.'" (Ellison v. Brady, 924 Federal Reporter 2d Series, p 876)" - Rod Van Mechelen, Sexual Harassment, 1991 - 1992

Simply put, in the eyes of men, a woman wearing tight clothing is engaging in conduct of a sexual nature, and because we can get in trouble for noticing (and it's hard not to notice), that creates a hostile work environment for us. By definition, that's sexual harassment.

          Oh, come on now! What guy doesn't want the women at work - especially the attractive ones - to wear sexy outfits? How about the ones who don't want to get fired? This is why Tom Leykis tells us to ignore our female coworkers.

          That's good advice, but it gives women free reign to do anything they want to harass us as long as employers allow it. Worse, most marriages these days begin as an office romance, and as long as only the reasonable woman standard is applied, women have all the power, and it's all arbitrary. This is why I'm telling you it's time to start actively defending ourselves against this sexist double standard.

          If, by definition under a reasonable man standard, a female coworker is sexually harassing you, don't ignore it, report it. It won't take more than one or two cases for word to get out, after which women will demand clear cut rules that spell out exactly what is and is not allowed. Men who are real harassers won't like that, but for the rest of us, it will be a small first step in the right direction.

http://www.backlash.com/content/gender/
#356
The tyranny of victim culture

Daily Mail, December 3 2003

The government claims that the Domestic Violence Bill which was published yesterday will put the 'needs of victims' at the heart of the criminal justice system. In fact, it does something very different. Incredibly, it takes an axe to the very notion of justice itself.

For the bill proposes something at which one has to rub one's eyes in disbelief. It will give the courts the power to impose a 'restraining order' to protect an alleged domestic violence victim from a defendant, even after he has been acquitted in court.

So even if a man – and it is almost always a man who finds himself in the dock – has been found not guilty of assaulting his wife or partner, he may still be treated as if he is guilty and prevented from going anywhere near her. He will leave the court without a stain on his character, only to be treated as if he were a criminal. This measure will destroy the very concept of innocence itself.

Appalling as this is, however, it is merely one strand in a far broader and sinister pattern emerging from current government measures, which – under the guise of protecting a range of politically correct 'victims' -- amount to a wholesale onslaught against justice, freedom, truth and objectivity.

The assumption lying behind the invidious Domestic Violence Bill proposal is that if a woman makes an allegation of abuse against a man, it must be true – even if a court has found no substance to the charge. It thereby enacts the ultra-feminist belief that all men are guilty. Far from giving victims, as ministers claim, 'the support they need to convict the guilty', it will create an entirely new type of victim – men who are innocent, but are treated as if they are not.

The driving force behind it is not a concern for victims at all. It is a rabid anti-man agenda (evident also in separate moves to rig rape trials against men) which presents men as invariable abusers and women as invariably abused. This was made clear by the Solicitor-General Harriet Harman who said this was 'a tough new law which will protect women and offer violent men a choice – stop the violence or you will face prison'.

In fact, all reputable research overwhelmingly indicates that women are just as likely to be as violent towards their partners as men – and even land the first blow more frequently than men. Yes, more women than men are actually killed by their partners; but that is due more to the fact that men tend to be stronger rather than any innate abusiveness, which is shared equally between the sexes.

These facts, however, are drowned out by the fact that ultra-feminism has claimed a general victim status for women. This is part of the 'victim culture', in which any group whose situation is in some way disadvantageous claims this is due, not to chance or individual incompetence or misdeeds, but to external 'oppression'. This status then entitles it to demand preferential treatment, including the presumption that anything its members may do is legitimate and anything its 'oppressors' may do is not.

As a result, victim culture produces a complete reversal of responsibility, in which innocent people are deemed guilty of discriminatory or prejudiced acts towards members of the self-designated 'victim' group which by definition is always innocent. Far from protecting real victims, therefore, victim culture reverses the roles of victim and victimiser and produces real injustice.

It also destroys notions of truth and objectivity. For the essence of victim culture is that these 'victims' define themselves as such. Despite the fact that this is wholly subjective and therefore eminently challengeable, this self-definition nevertheless trumps any objective reality. So the woman who claims she is the victim of domestic violence trumps the man who is aquitted of the offence.

The same pernicious fallacy underpins the new employment equality regulations that came into force this week. These regulations outlaw discrimination, victimisation or harassment on grounds of sexual orientation or religious belief. Clearly, real prejudice or discrimination is wrong. But these regulations – imposed upon Britain by the EU -- usher in a truly Kafkaesque nightmare for employers, who now face being accused of victimising or harassing employees on the grounds of sexual or religious orientation of which these employers may be completely unaware.

Far from correcting injustice, these regulations pave the way for infinite injustice – not least because the grounds for complaint are once again based on the alleged victim's subjective perception rather than an objective test. So someone can say he thought that his employer believed he was gay and that was why he didn't win promotion – and win a case for harassment.

Or employees can sue for 'violation of their dignity' on account of sexual orientation or religious belief. With the threat of being hauled off to a tribunal on the basis that someone -- of whose sexuality or religious beliefs a colleague was blissfully unaware -- took grievous offence at his playground humour, people are going to be too terrified to open their mouths.

If a Muslim employee, let's say, expresses a mild opinion that women should stay at home rather than go out to work, this will now constitute harassment if his female colleagues decide this remark was an offensive attack upon them. And their employer also faces potential legal action unless he disciplines this Muslim employee. What on earth is all this going to do for communal relations?

Similarly, if an employer restricts staff breaks, he might be sued for discrimination by, say, a Muslim who needs to pray at regular intervals. So the hapless employer will have to allow such breaks unless he can prove it would seriously damage his work. The contortions required by all this descend into politically correct farce when the regulations solemnly intone: '...it could be justified to refuse permission to a firefighter to take a prayer break at any time when she is responding to an emergency'. Just how many female Muslim firefighters can there be in Britain?

This is all sheer madness. The potential for abuse is endless. It opens up the prospect of legal action on the basis of any perceived slight. It will tie businesses up in knots. It will increase ill feeling towards women and minorities. And it will force intrusion into private lives, which will be turned into a public battleground.

Moreover, such potential abuses will be enforced by their own commissariat, the proposed new Commission for Equality and Human Rights. According to ministers, this body – which will replace the Commission for Racial Equality, the Equal Opportunities Commission and the Disability Rights Commission -- will provide more 'joined-up' support for a crackdown on discrimination and the promotion of 'equality and diversity'. It will also for the first time promote and police human rights law.

Far from expanding equality and diversity, however, this new super-quango is likely to worsen the Orwellian nightmare of victim culture. It will be a vast bureaucracy enforcing a hugely expanded, oppressive agenda of political correctness that will set citizen against citizen and conduct a witch-hunt against any attitudes of which it disapproves.

At the root of the injustice of victim culture is the substitution of objective tests and rules by subjective experience. This replaces a system of law based on generally accepted beliefs by a free-for-all in which self-designated victim groups write the laws to suit themselves.

This lies behind the proposed Civil Partnerships Bill, which gives most of the legal privileges of marriage to cohabiting homosexual couples on the grounds that the fact they don't have such privileges is proof that society is discriminating against them. In fact, it is doing nothing of the sort, because marriage is a unique institution in which society has a particular stake.

This obvious truth, however, is now brushed aside on the grounds that anyone who doesn't have something that someone else has got is by definition a victim of prejudice. So marriage is to be further attacked and weakened, because the subjective definition of a self-designated victim group now trumps all our existing laws, customs and understandings.

Even more dramatically, the proposed law reform for transsexuals will enable another 'victim' group to trump our very understanding of what it means to be a human being. The Gender Recognition Bill, announced the day after the Queen's Speech, will allow transsexuals to register for a new birth certificate in their adopted sex, and to marry in that sex.

Now of course, people who feel the need to take the drastic step of changing their sex deserve every sympathy and consideration. But apart from the fact that surgery is not always a solution to their problems, the proposal would establish personal identity on the basis of a lie.

For their new birth certificate would say falsely that they were born into the sex which they now profess. But this would not be true. And if they marry, there are grounds for saying that they would be marrying someone of their same 'real' sex. For despite their 'gender reassignment', it does not follow that just because they feel themselves to be, and desperately want to be considered as, a member of their chosen sex, that they are indeed so.

After all, the bill also expressly states that they will retain their rights and obligations under their old gender, such as being a mother or father. So we may have the grotesque situation, for example, where a transsexual may be pursued for child support as a father, even though as a woman he has married another man.

How can our society have got into such a terrifying, nihilistic mess? At root is our profound loss of values and the emergence instead of two destructive doctrines. The first is 'identicality', the belief that if anyone doesn't have what other people have got, they must be the victims of prejudice. The second is gross personal irresponsibility, and the corresponding tendency to blame others for any personal misfortune.

This has given rise to the compensation culture of human rights – the defining religion of the EU -- which has encouraged group after group to define itself as victims, and use the ever-expanding army of grasping and ideological human rights lawyers to make money out of exercising the desire to control the lives and thoughts of their fellow citizens.

The foundation stone of English liberty is the principle that everything is permitted unless it is expressly forbidden. We shall soon reach the point where everything will be forbidden unless it is expressly permitted. Discrimination and prejudice are wrong. But the victim culture is scything through the foundations of truth, liberty and justice, and establishing in their place a truly victimising tyranny of the self.

#357
Judge claims intimidation in row over child custody
By David Wroe

Canberra
December 2, 2003

The Chief Justice of the Family Court has accused a federal MP of attempting to intimidate him by calling for his resignation amid a heated public debate over child custody.

Chris Pearce, Liberal MP for the eastern Melbourne seat of Aston and a member of the parliamentary committee examining reforms to joint custody law, said yesterday Chief Justice Alastair Nicholson should step down because he had unduly tried to influence the committee.

A prominent parenting lobby group, the Shared Parenting Council of Australia, joined the call for Justice Nicholson's resignation.

But Justice Nicholson told The Age via a spokeswoman he had no intention of resigning. "I view calls for my resignation by the Victorian MP Chris Pearce and the Shared Parenting Council of Australia as an attempt to intimidate me in the carrying out of my duties," he said.

The outspoken Justice Nicholson has attacked suggestions that the Family Court should be stripped of the power to adjudicate in child custody battles.

The committee, due to report by the end of the year, is expected to recommend that a tribunal comprised of psychologists and legal experts be set up to decide how custody is shared between separating parents. The Family Court would deal only with financial disputes arising from the separation.

The committee was initiated by Prime Minister John Howard to examine the idea of rebuttable presumption of joint custody, which means the Family Court would assume joint custody of children unless there were good reasons to favour either parent.

Justice Nicholson has been a vocal opponent of the idea, saying it could jeopardise children's interests. He recently described the idea as unworkable and "far too simplistic". Justice Nicholson is due to retire in March.


An angry Mr Pearce issued a statement yesterday urging him to "bring forward his much anticipated retirement... and retire now".

He said Justice Nicholson was breaching the separation of powers between the judiciary and Parliament.

"These have not been light-hearted comments. They have been very strong attacks," he said. "Justice Nicholson's attack on the committee... confirms his total lack of regard and respect for the parliamentary process and the Parliament's role in developing and legislating the laws of Australia.

"It is Justice Nicholson's role to administer the law and not to make it."

The committee's chairwoman, National MP Kay Hull, chose not to comment. "Obviously this is a personal issue for Mr Pearce and Chief Justice Nicholson," she said.

#358
Study aims to salvage image of fatherhood
First of its kind in Canada: 'Fathers are often treated as buffoons in our public images'
 
Heather Sokoloff  
National Post  
http://www.nationalpost.com/home/story.html?id=7C65F9B0-C31D-483B-83ED-6E72D9881B24

Thursday, December 04, 2003
 

Television shows and movies feature childish dads such as Homer Simpson and Al Bundy, and incompetent fathers such as Eddie Murphy in this year's Daddy Day Care.
 
University researchers hope to debunk the pop-culture image of fathers as incompetent bumblers with the first major national study of male parenting.

The $1.6-million study will look at everything from why so few fathers take paternity leave to the differences between straight and gay fathers in a five-year project involving eight universities, 25 community organizations and the federal government's Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.

"Our goal is to bring fatherhood out of the shadows," said Kerry Daly, a professor at University of Guelph's department of family research and co-chairman of the newly created Father Involvement Research Alliance.

"Fathers are often treated as buffoons in our public images. TV and advertising play on this idea that fathers are deficient and inadequate at what they do.

"That is not reflective of the sincere effort many men are making trying to be more involved with their children."

Dr. Daly said fathers often want to take on greater parenting responsibilities, but hold back because cultural norms say their primary role is as a financial provider, while mothers may feel uncomfortable giving up control of the scheduling of children's activities.

"Why don't men do more at home?" Dr. Daly asked. "We need to reframe the question and ask, 'What is it about the family dynamic that keeps us stuck in this pattern?' "

According to Statistics Canada, fathers spend two-thirds of the time mothers do on child care. Only 10% of new fathers have taken paternity leave since the federal government expanded the program in 2000.

Negative stereotypes about fathers come from TV shows that depict male parents as overgrown children, such as Homer Simpson and Married With Children's Al Bundy, or movies such as Mr. Mom and Daddy Day Care that poke fun at the idea a man could be a child's primary caregiver.

"Homer is certainly the champion incompetent father," said Dr. Daly, the father of two teenagers.

Societal expectations for fathers are so low, he noted, that the news media often portray involved fathers as heroes -- suggesting good fathers are the exception, not the norm.

Research shows children of involved fathers do better in school, exhibit higher levels of emotional well-being and have an easier time making friends, even if the father does not live with the children.

And men who participate in family life report less stress and more satisfaction, Dr. Daly said.

He said Canada lags behind the United States and Australia in developing resources for fathers. Bill Clinton, the former U.S. president, secured funding for the National Center for Fathering, for example, while the University of Pennsylvania maintains the National Center on Fathers and Families.

The Canadian project, part of the federal government's Community University Research Alliance, will focus on issues raised in seven different research groups: aboriginal fathers, new fathers, fathers of children with special needs, divorced fathers, teenage fathers, gay fathers and immigrant fathers.

Dr. Daly hopes the research will help people understand fatherhood is something completely different from motherhood and accept that each gender brings a different approach to parenting.

For example, Andrea Doucet, a researcher from Carleton University, found stay-at-home fathers sometimes encounter resistance from mothers when they attempt to join neighbourhood playgroups. Even when they are welcomed, the fathers had little to contribute to discussions about breast-feeding or recuperation from childbirth. Instead, the fathers preferred doing outdoor activities with their children.

Dr. Doucet also found stay-at-home fathers took a masculine approach to the home, preferring bathroom renovations to doing the laundry.

"I think we've been on this track, that we thought mothers and fathers would eventually be fully interchangeable," Dr. Daly said. "But part of the recognition we are coming to is that will never be the case.

"There was an expectation that men would eventually turn into good mothers. That is not going to happen. Men can be very caring, but in a different way."

RESEARCHING 7 TYPES OF DADS:

Divorced and separated: Judges usually decide custody cases assuming a father's responsibilities to his children are largely financial and often award sole custody to the mother, says Edward Kruk, a University of British Columbia professor. His group will examine the nature and extent of separated and divorced fathers' responsibilities to their children.

Teenage: Annie Devault, a Université du Québec en Outaouais professor, says a big problem for young fathers is overcoming societal preconceptions that they do not want to be involved in their children's lives. Dr. Devault is putting together a group of teenage fathers in Ottawa and helping them make a film about their experiences, which will be used by social service organizations across the country as an education resource.

First time: Ed Bader, who runs the program Focus on Fathers for Catholic Community Services of York Region is preparing workshops for new fathers on how to help their children develop and how to manage their own stress.

Aboriginal: Jessica Ball, a researcher from the University of Victoria, will lead a project investigating how to get fathers more involved in two local early childhood education programs. Her group will write recommendations on how the programs can more fully include fathers.

Children with special needs: Ted McNeil, a social worker at Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children, will oversee a research group that will come up with recommendations on how medical and social service organizations can include fathers in the parenting of special needs children. Often, these services are used primarily by the children's mothers.

Gay: Rachel Epstein, co-ordinator of the Lesbian Gay Bisexual Parenting Network for the Family Services Association of Toronto, will look at some of the differences and similarities between how gay and straight fathers parent their children. Much research has already been done on lesbian parenting, showing that children do not appear to suffer negative effects when they are raised by two women. Ms. Epstein will look at how male homosexual couples divide parenting and housework responsibilities.

Immigrants: David Este, of the University of Calgary, will examine why children and their mothers who have immigrated from foreign countries seem to have an easier time adapting than fathers. The situation sets up the potential for conflict when the father is having difficulty letting go of cultural behaviours that are not appropriate in Canada. This group will work with immigrant men to help them shift their thinking.

#359
Men learn all about spouse abuse in family court

December 5, 2003
by Russ Maney

A recently divorced friend of mine is afraid of the mailman. He cringes as he checks his email. His heart races every time his beeper goes off.

No, he's not being stalked. He lives in fear of Family Court. Just this past week, another fat envelope of injustice came in the post — another ruling ordering him to pay more money he doesn't have.

My friend did nothing that warrants such one-sided treatment. No physical or verbal abuse, no smoking, no drinking, no drugs, no adultery, no gambling, no "too many nights out with the boys." The "irreconcilable differences" his wife cited boiled down to money. She wanted to spend it. He wanted to save it. She wanted the divorce. He wanted to save the marriage.

Now, thanks to draconian spousal maintenance, child support and numerous other private school, therapy and other medical expenses, the court is now forcing him to pay, he's poised on the cliff of bankruptcy. Forty-three years old and a well-respected family doctor, he can't afford to live anywhere but in his old bedroom at his parent's house. Meanwhile, his wife drives a brand new $50,000 SUV, lives comfortably in what was their upper-middle class house and cashes his checks.

This isn't an isolated incident. Anti-male bias in family courts is epidemic. A study conducted by the Massachusetts Supreme Court found that when fathers are brave and rich enough to seek custody of their children, they receive primary custody less than a third of the time and joint physical custody less than half the time.

When it comes to who cashes whose checks, the trends are even more lopsided. According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, less than a third of custodial fathers receive child support from their former spouses, while 80 percent of custodial mothers do. Even more telling, almost half of these non-custodial mothers default on paying, while less than a third of non-custodial fathers do.

Many researchers now believe that this bias is wrecking the institution of marriage itself. According to the National Center of Policy Analysis, at least two-thirds of divorce suits are now filed by women, most often without grounds of wrongdoing by the father.

If you know you can take the kids — and the house and the bank accounts — with you, why stay and work on the marriage? To be clear, we're not talking about victims of abuse or adultery, who have every right to run and should. These are women who think the grass might be greener on the other side of the "irreconcilable differences" fence. And it well may be, especially if they get to bring most of the "green" from their current side of the fence.

Unfortunately, there's often little the man can do about it. Thanks to most states' current "no-fault" divorce statutes, a mother can have a half-dozen previous divorces, commit adultery, level false charges and (in some cases) even assault the father, and none of these will have any bearing on custody or child support decisions.

The ethical stench emanating from many family courts gets even worse as you dig deeper into the cesspool of recent decisions. Florida's Supreme Court ruled earlier this year that Michael Anderson had to continue paying child support, despite DNA tests that showed he wasn't the father. He's far from alone. A 1999 Florida Department of Revenue study found that about one-third of men identified by mothers as possible fathers in child support cases were found not to be the fathers after DNA tests.

In cases like this, many argue that once a man agrees to be a father, both emotionally and financially, then he shouldn't be allowed to wriggle off the hook, even if he turns out not to be the father. But what if that hook was a lie all along? Anderson married the woman in an attempt to "do the right thing," after she had become pregnant and told him the baby was his. She knew it might not be, but he didn't know this until three years later. The Florida Supreme Court formally endorsed this blatant fraud by ruling that Anderson must continue paying child support anyway.

My friend was raised to believe that courts were hallowed ground — ivory towers of wisdom, truth and justice for all. Now, not only has his entire life been shattered financially and emotionally, so has his faith in "the system."

I, too, have been divorced, but this column isn't sour grapes. My own experience, in a county without family courts, wasn't biased. I'm thankful that my ex-wife has been similarly fair and shares custody of my daughters with me. It's a shame that I appear to be an exception to a very disturbing trend.

Meanwhile, my friend waits for the next envelope and wonders where he'll get the money to pay for it all. There are far too many good men just like him.


Russ Maney



To read more of Russ Maney's columns, please visit //www.russmaney.com.
#360
An interesting comment from "The Backlash" (http://backlash.com/content/gender/)


Murder, rape and a hero - In New York three stories provide contrasting views of masculinity. In the first, Warren Farrier murdered his wife, pumping five bullets into her brain.

"A Brooklyn woman's husband yesterday slashed her tires, forcing her to go to a bus stop - where he pumped at least five bullets into her head as she pleaded for her life, police said." - Heather Gilmore, Larry Celona and Theresa Kiley, Hubby's Slay Trap (http://www.nypost.com/news/regionalnews/12477.htm), New York Post, December 3, 2003

About a year ago, after 13 years of marriage during which she filed complaints against him for domestic violence and infidelity, Mrs. Farrier separated from her husband and got a restraining order against him.

          In the second case, Luis Carmona retracted his guilty plea in last year's Flushing Meadow Park gang rape case.

"One of five Mexican immigrants charged with brutally raping a woman in Flushing Meadow Park last year agreed to plead guilty yesterday - then scrapped the deal at the last minute, saying "I didn't rape anyone."" - Eric Lenkowitz, Queens 'Rapist' Flip-Flops on Plea Deal (http://www.nypost.com/news/regionalnews/12466.htm), New York Post, December 3, 2003

          There is no deep meaning to be discovered by dissecting the lives of these people, no hidden truths, and somewhere feminists are taking note, shaking their heads while muttering about the foul nature of men as they add these cases to the long list of crimes committed by men against womanity.

          The only insight to be gleaned is from how they will react, in contrast, to the following story of a father's heroism:

"A toddler died when flames engulfed her Queens home early yesterday, and her father was clinging to life after trying to save her. Sam Solise, 69 - who had already rescued his 6-year- old daughter and the girls' mother - was in "extremely critical" condition at the Staten Island University Hospital burn center." - Ikimulisa Livingston, Alisha Berger and Philip Messing, Dad's Vain Bid to Save Tot in Fire (http://www.nypost.com/news/regionalnews/12431.htm), New York Post, December 3, 2003

If feminists take note of Solise's efforts at all, it will be to brush it aside, cast it as a patriarchal oppressor protecting his property, or to look for sordid details with which to diminish his character. That's because the essential nature of feminism has long turned to bigotry, and herein lies the illiberal truth we must tell.

          Where conservatism accepts and builds on the nature of things as they are, liberalism posits a perfectibility to which all may aspire. The liberal goal of feminism was to overcome the limits imposed by anatomy to achieve perfect equality. During the past few decades, however, an illiberal lot cast the feminist idealists from their ivory towers, then converted the once-interesting structure of ideas into drab and unimaginative tenements housing squalid anti-intellects mounting monuments to masturbatory fantasies in which women, unencumbered by all things masculine, are magical, and men, the invisible magic by which work gets done.

          But if there is magic in the world, it's not to be found in separating the sexes or mounting one over the other, but in the ways which our differences fit. For that is the nature of which our magic is made.