Let's Get Honest! Absolutely Uncommon Analysis of Family & Conciliation Courts' Operations, Practices, & History

Sometimes, the words “Family Court Archipelago” come to mind. Many times, I see it as a bottom-trawling, eco-system destroying huge net that grabs the bottom of society’s personalities, criminal, psychotic, narcissistic, megalomaniac, sociopath(ological), manipulative, or simply mercenary, greedy, control-freaks.

And I bet you thought I was referring primarily to some of the litigants. Nope...

Then of course there are the enablers, the gatekeepers, the naive, the people that gotta eat and work SOMEwhere, and that most dangerous of all creatures, those determined to rescue society through “therapeutic jurisprudence.” But I suspect that only Jesus, or some other saint, could continue working in these halls and not be transformed (jaundiced, calloused, or blinded) by them, or dragged down.

What’s helped me is to adopt something of the detached attitude that befits (or does it?) a scientist studying a new, alien species. Or looking at a familiar species with new eyes. Jane Goodall, for example has done this, but I believe she came out at least as compassionate as going in. What can get distracting is the fact that English is spoken, and that all living inhabitants (except seeing eye dogs) are human.

Aha! — but HOW human? Prepare to have your theories challenged.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~The real workings of the family law system are subterranean, even beyond the he-said, she-said, let’s reform this system dialogue. It’s also beyond the many nonprofits breeding faster than the fatherless children households that all those grants are supposed to save. It pretty much goes to the foundations behind the government behind the nonprofits, etc.

The CULT ANALOGY (not the main one, but watch out!)

I entered the system years ago (how many might compromise anonymity, if any remains on this site). The intense isolation and alienation it brings on are akin to the problems it claims to address, as described HERE.

(the article is from a man who successfully got free from the Unification church. The list of symptoms is similar to those experienced IN battering or otherwise controlling , cult-like relationships, including some religious groups One of the most common techniques is reframing reality, re-interpreting it according to a new, and centralized in ths leader(ship)(heirarchy) language. The BAD news is that there’s significant Unification church influence in the U.S. government and playing itself out in the family law venue. The GOOD news is that, like any good innocculation, a non-lethal does of the toxin can become an antidote. The challenge is the “non-lethal” aspect.)

The unending parade of “experts” with rapidly shifting terminology to define peoples private lives, and the simultaneous charging of them for this privilege, sometimes to the point of poverty, homelessness, being forced to beg to eat, and isolated from family, etc. (it’s an experience that can’t be really described, but those who went through it know each other, and do not come out the same as before. I doubt there is any “going back” to innocence or the sense that our own government (US) is one of the most hazardous to our health beasts around. I believe that by taking people’s productivity and creativity out of the work force a generation at the time, a pliable, gullible, and too-passive populace is being “made.” Divide and conquer. While the rich and the poor fight this out, the middle class, besides being as equally affected and involved (when it comes to divorce, custody, violence, and being accused of it issues) is also paying for its own oppression, in the form of prisons, schools, mental health institutions, juvenile halls, courts, and so forth. What I fear has been lost is the best of humanity, in the truest meaning of the word.

You may notice I didn’t post last week. I did research, however we (meaning those involved in my life and case) are in another transition and spin of the cycle of trauma. A generation ago, I thought it was just about one person, then maybe the enablers I knew about. I was SURE I could get free, being honest and diligent, I could get out with children, and do better for them, if I tried hard, stuck to it and was smart enough. This may be true, but part of the smarts is noticing how the scales are tipped. This requires instinct, not just data, and a little “archaeology” of the themes involved. It is fascinating too.

As a citizen and contributor to this world, I have ceased being concerned for just my own family, and am sounding some alarms. Don’t know who will hear. Few heard while I was being assaulted in the home, which is minor by comparison to what is described above as spiritual rape. Spiritual and physical go hand in hand, and we need to change course somehow.

YOU WON’T FIND THIS BEAST IN THE LOCAL ZOO . . . .

SOUNDING THE DEPTHS:

Intense interest, some specialized skills, persistence, and possibly even advanced technology (pressurized cabins, special cameras, bait, etc.) are required to catch a snapshot of this huge almost living organism, which has captivated the primal fears of men and women, devout and atheistic, politically right and progressive, and inspired thousands of fables over its awesome feats, stealth attacks, and invincible onslaughts.

“Jaws” has nothing on this — I think a different sea creature captures the essence —

Holy Squid! [National Geographic article] Photos offer first glimpse of live, deep-sea Giant.

Like something straight out of a Jules Verne novel, an enormous tentacled creature looms out of the inky blackness of the deep Pacific waters.

But this isn’t science fiction. A set of extraordinary images captured by Japanese scientists marks the first-ever record of a live giant squid (Architeuthis) in the wild.

The animal—which measures roughly 25 feet (8 meters) long—was photographed 2,950 feet (900 meters) beneath the North Pacific Ocean. Japanese scientists attracted the squid toward cameras attached to a baited fishing line.

The photo sequence, taken off Japan’s Ogasawara Islands in September 2004, shows the squid homing in on the baited line and enveloping it in “a ball of tentacles.”

“Architeuthis appears to be a much more active predator than previously suspected, using its elongated feeding tentacles to strike and tangle prey,” the researchers write.

They add that the squid was found feeding at depths where no light penetrates even during the day.

Giant Breakthrough

Despite people’s fascination with this deep-sea behemoth, the giant squid’s life and habits have remained largely a mystery. The little information known has been mostly based on dead and dying specimens that were caught by commercial fishing boats or washed ashore.

The mysterious creature has inspired countless sea monster tales and has been the subject of various scientific expeditions.

(SEPT. 27, 2005 ARTICLE, JAMES OWEN FOR NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC NEWS, paragraphs not in order necessarily)

After the H.R. 2979, “new improved” Julia Carson Let’s Promote Fatherhood some more (“Shh! don’t alert the new subclass of noncustodial MOTHERS about this vote”) hearings of June 17, 2010, announced all of June 10,2010 on the (U.S.) House (of Representatives) Ways and Means committee page fiasco (my description), I did my usual “who are THESE dudes?” google searches.

ONE thing many of them are is simply colleagues at Institutes, whether virtual ones, or academic ones, they are not being publicized at the local family courthouses, family facilitators’ offices, or domestic violence shelters and police stations, hospitals, etc. — where the impact of these policies are felt. Did I say food banks and soup kitchens?

Which is not to say that participants won’t be recruited from there, or prisons, or child support agencies after a license has been revoked for nonpayment (not to worry, we have pro bono legal help to help any red-blooded American (male) father — excuse me, “noncustodial parent” — reconnect with his children.

It’s not as though it’s the first time they’ve published the same thing from different platforms, whether The Urban Institute, or Brookings, The Center for Research on Father, Child and Family Well-being (rearrange words to match logo, no matter how you cut it, the word “mother

” won’t be in the title), Columbia, Princeton, Johns Hopkins, and one I just found, above. In fact, I might make a patchwork quilt of the various logos and acronyms one day…

Then, more directly related to the courts, you have: AFCC, CPR, PSI, MDRC, BWJP (and the “Duluth model” groupings), MPDI, FVPF, and the entire NCADV nationalized network of knowing what’s up.

==========

Anyhow, just for fun, I strung together some of the author’s names, tossed in Sara McLanahan (who as I recall worked on the Fragile Families, or other research projetc) and hit Search:

Here are: (google search):

Kirk Harris, Ronald Mincy, Sara McLanahan, all Ph.D.’s

And here, from 2001, is a nice publication on how Community Foundations can help Fatherhood Programs.

(can anyone help me retain an infrastructure sufficient to support myself after becoming noncustodial and losing a profession while going to court, police stations, mediator’s office, child support office, two conferences in one year specifically addressed to help women in my situation (I couldn’t afford entrance fee and kinda talked/volunteered/audited myself in. It was great, and validating, and in the process of sharing some of my story (and protesting some “New Warrior” model program being promoted in one of them), I got a little PTSD, left my keys there, came home and almost spent a night on the street, until two (gentlemen) cooperated with phone calls to locate it, and I returned for the errant keys, and even made it to my job the next morning.

The key situation addressed how compromised my situation was, between the no credit, and the repeated job losses, such that I didn’t feel it appropriate to call up former colleagues or clients and ask for help I had family in the immediate area — that was out of the question for help, would compromise the hearings then in place. My phone was out, too. This happened to be in an area where the shops close up early. That was a few years ago. Situation is worse now. . . . that was only the FIRST year I had lost contact with the girls, and at the time I had at least one job left..

SO, here they are, and I wish to show part of that SQUID. Its intent is to affect (almost) everyone; but few get to realize how connected it is centrally. MOst of us are taught to think (especially in public schools) in a fragmented compartmentalized manner. Go to classes, do your homework, obey orders, and all will be well. There’s another life track for those who don’t buy that routine as well. Anyhow:

[PDF]

What Community Foundations Can Do (“Fathers Matter 2001”)

– 1:32pmFile Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat – Quick View
Casey Foundation and Ronald B. Mincy, then of the. Ford Foundation, drew more than 100 …… Sara McLanahan, Irwin Garfinkel, Yolanda Padilla. The …
http://www.cfleads.org/ccfy/toolbox/docs/ccfy_fathers_matter.pdf

This is a 38-page pdf. On page 30, “Funding for Fatherhood Programs.”

(note: women going to family justice centers aren’t generally told about these, at least last I checked, that they even exist!). IT lists various sources:

• State and Local Welfare Agencies
• State and Local Child Support Agencies
• Local Workforce Investment Boards (formerly Private Industry Councils, “PICs”)
  
• Foundations, among the largest listed:
  • The Coalition of Community Foundations
  • The Annie E. Casey Foundation
  • The Charles Stewart Mott Foundation
    
  • The Ford Foundation
  • The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation.

(Poor, underappreciated bubba fathers, not enough Presidents, judges, scholars, initiatives, or foundations are paying any attention to them once she’s impregnated . . . . )

“Research demonstrates that fathers matter in the lives of their children.” (OK, whose? research. Who paid for that research? Go back to square one, and repeat til saturation point is reached).

This is not about the children, or the fathers. It’s the Road to Serfdom — no privacy, and a completely planned economy. It’s about money, certainly — but not primarily for the fathers, or the children. After all, our currency itself is debt-based, and the more low-income employment workers are around, the higher the profits for the tax-exempt corporations.

So, Steer Clear of the Squid.

It’s an economic, centralized (with multiple coalitions, or coalition of coalitions) system that sucks life out while promising to put it back in. The Inky Depths of the IRS collect $$ and bait of projects and conferences are dangled. Those who get some, get some. Then they learn to dangle bait of “we’re helping you” to others. … Show me reduced homicide rates, show me, fewer traumatized families. Show me a President who can acknowledge his birth mother and call her “my mother” in public! (Dr. Mincy, you too — you did all right, can we accept that you had a decent Mom somewhere along the line? What’s the story? Hit the top echelon and then work out your previous history on the rest of us? )

And like it does, if one of its tentacles is caught, it can regenerate, or even spare one or part of one. Individuals had better start re-tooling their lives to be prepared to do the same, because sooner or later it’s going to become a science fiction nightmare, except the fiction part

!By the way, another interpretation of the “Ink” (I don’t know if Squids do ink, but Octopi do. And I hear they’ve got large brains; scuttlefish are no dummies, nor octopi, nor squid. You can’t be a predator and grow large by being stupid…) – – is the “ink” on the page. Internet aside, that “ink” could be called the language.

Get an accountant, get to Guidestar.org, or get involved and ask questions.

Please forgive a rambling post; it helps me defer some of the more pressing concerns, but writing it is sort of like using a computer with too many programs running at once. The human body is not meant to run on emotional overdrive for such prolonged periods, but ongoing litigation where even winning a “point” or a favorable court order doesn’t bring closure (or even enforcement of the same), it’s wearing.

I just watched an elderly parent go, from afar, and cannot mourn, and haven’t heard from my kids since. The manipulations and conniving barely stopped a week for the memorial service, nor could I. For another example of this, google “Claudine Dombrowski,” whose petition is also before an international appeals.

The other day, I also ran across a humorous post by a young woman who fled overseas with her mother for safety, after Minnesota and the U.S. failed to protect her. The U.S. (I forget what stage this case is in, currently) of course wants her mother back to reprove her for failing to stick around and watch her kids be beaten, or herself. They lived in refugee camps for some years before getting asylum: Jennifer Collins.

She speaks back to Glenn Sacks, who has been “dogging” her mother’s case for years, on behalf of fathers everywhere. This young lady enquires about the silent MRS. Sacks. Some of us are thinking we might want to hear her side of the story . . .. .

And, FINALLY IN PHOENIX — An older daughter, being molested by her father, tells her pastors who encourage her to forgive him and restore the relationship. Boy, does that sound typical. Daughter #1 ages out. Later, Daughter #2 reports, and this time finally, something is done.

The pastors were arrested for their “failure to report.” I can’t think of a single example of this I’ve heard anywhere outside Catholicism. This practice would send a message to fathers that churches are not safe havens for perps. Here’s the story, and the blogger asks where was the mother here? (Invisible, as usual)

http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/2010/07/28/20100728phoenix-father-sexually-abuse-daughters-abrk.html

Phoenix father, pastors arrested in molestation case
by Krystal Klei – Jul. 28, 2010 10:34 AM
The Arizona Republic

A father was arrested on suspicion of molesting his two daughters, and two of the family’s pastors were arrested on suspicion of failing to report the accusations to authorities, according to the Phoenix Police Department.

The father was booked in connection with one count of sexual abuse, two counts of child molestation, and eleven counts of sexual conduct with a minor on July 9, Phoenix police spokesman Detective James Holmes said in a written statement. The Arizona Republic is not releasing the father’s name to protect the identities of the victims.

The man was arrested after his then 16-year-old daughter told a neighbor that she had been molested by her father for several years, Holmes said.

According to police, when the neighbor confronted the father about the accusations, he apparently admitted his involvement. The father also told the neighbor he knew what he was doing was wrong.

Following the confrontation, Phoenix Police officers were flagged down, Holmes said. The girl was with the neighbor when she talked to the officers, he added.

During an interview with Phoenix Police Child Crime detectives, the girl told officers of at least one instance of sexual intercourse, several instances of sexual contact over nearly a five year range, and of the molestation of her older sister by her father, Holmes said. He added that she told officers the molestation lead to her older sister moving out when she turned 18 years old.

PAUSE TO DO THE MATH: 16 – 5 == ______ yrs old when molestation began… One victim aged out, no problem, there were two girls involved.

According to police, the father admitted to sexually abusing both his daughters when questioned and was then arrested.

The older daughter, now 19, told her two pastors, Daniel and Laura McCluskey, about the alleged abuse in 2008 at Church On The Word on the 8000 block of West Camelback Road, but they did not report the accusations to police, according to Holmes.

Instead, the pastors met with the older daughter and the father. During the meeting, according to police, the father said he snuck into his daughter’s room at night to touch her. The pastors suggested the girl forgive her father, because he was repentant, Holmes added. The pastors told the girl to restore her relationship with her father.

They do the same when women report violence. Men, realizing this, suffering no public reproof, humiliation, shunning, nothing — get even worse. Our hell coulda been over with if these pastors cared as much about their flock as the wallets and services and “numbers” attached to leading their flocks. These are what the Bible called “hirelings” — they push “peace” when there is no peace. See Jeremiah 23 if you’re a Bible reader….

According to police, the father stopped sexually abusing his older daughter after meeting, but continued to sexually abuse his younger daughter.

Under Arizona Revised Statute, the pastors were arrested for their failure to report the abuse. The Statue states the pastors had the duty to report to Child Protective Services and/or law enforcement.

Under Arizona Revised Statute, the pastors were arrested for their failure to report the abuse. The Statue states the pastors had the duty to report to Child Protective Services and/or law enforcement.

The pastors were arrested on Tuesday in connection with one count each of failure to report sexual abuse, Holmes said.

Let’s see what the follow-up is. Will their flock say, well they repented (i.e., got caught) and we should take them back in?

Do stories like these ever make it all the way back to Washington, D.C.?  Apparently not — here’s the Housee Ways and Means COmmittee, same old, same old, in 2001 — must not’ve heard about situations like the one in Arizona (Or, the news coverage omitted that this Dad was a stepdad??  ? Because having a biological father in the home WILL cure society’s ills, fo’ sure..)

Child abuse occurs most frequently within stepfamilies, and, in fact, most sexual abuse occurs in stepfamilies.²⁴ Sexual abuse of girls by their stepfathers can be at a minimum six or seven times higher, ²⁵ and may be up to 40 times ²⁶ that of sexual abuse by biological fathers in intact families. When it comes to the risk of abuse with unrelated males, Barbara Dafoe Whitehead explains:

“Stepfathers also pose a sexual risk to children, especially stepdaughters. They are more likely than biological fathers to commit acts of sexual abuse, and are less likely to protect daughters from other male predators. According to a Canadian study, children in stepfamilies are forty times as likely to suffer physical or sexual abuse as children in intact families.” ²⁷

It is worth noting that stepfathers cannot make up for the lack of a biological father. In fact, Maggie Gallagher notes:

“Children in stepfamilies do no better on average than children in single-parent homes…Failing to understand the erotic relations that are at the heart of family life, they [sociologists] failed to predict what, sadly and surprisingly, later research strongly suggested: Remarriage is not only not necessarily a cure; it is often one of the risks children of divorce face” ²⁸

[EARLIER in this post — see it has footnote 3…)

Even a diligent absent father can’t supervise or protect his children the way a live-in father can. Nor is he likely to have the kind of relationship with his daughter that is usually needed to give her a foundation of emotional security and a model for nonsexual relationships with men… ³

Hmm….

Promiscuity, teen pregnancy, child sexual abuse, and ongoing difficulties in later family life are results of feminist misandry infecting society with a “father hatred” causing father-absence;

Well, there’s nothing like blaming half of humanity for the whole of humanity’s problems.   Oh, it’s only the misandrists, not ALL women . . . .  What do we then, call a husband who beats his wife?  A loving spouse concerned for her moral upbringing?

Father-absence promotes anti-social behavior as well as criminal activity and psychological problems.

Father-absence?  The older daughter, above, might’ve had to pick up with an inappropriate relationship (if not in college or financially independent yet) get to compensate for Father-PRESENCE — inside her vagina…

How about Pastor-silence?  During the next set of National Prayer Breakfasts, how’s about a moment of Silence representing the silence of the pastors on child abuse, including incest, and domestic violence within their ranks?

HERE’S DAVID BLANKENFOGHORN AGAIN, SELLING HIS BOOK ON FATHERLESSNESS:

Fatherlessness is the most harmful demographic trend of this generation. It is the leading cause of declining child well-being in our society. It is also the engine driving our most urgent social  problems, from crime to adolescent pregnancy to child sexual abuse to domestic violence against women. Yet, despite its scale and social consequences, fatherlessness is a problem that is  frequently ignored or denied. Especially within our elite discourse, it remains largely a problem with no name.

I had a father growing up.  So did my children’s father, growing up.  So did our own children.  NEVERTHELESS, our father’d childhoods met in respectable circumstances, married, and produced healthy babies, who also grew up with a father in the home — him.  But my kids’ and my own sleep was disturbed more than once by assaults.  One developed a sleep disturbance I know from nightmares from this time.  Sometimes they and more often I, was kept awake late (or wakened early) for lectures and interrogations.  I knew more poverty and violence in this marriage and trying to leave it, than I ever did growing up, or working. I got up, out, and back to work.  Family law put me down, him back in, exit the work, on both parents’ parts.  Your tax $$ at work.

My personal nightmare, to this day, is this man attempting to get back in my life, even without the children in it.  He “bought” this perfect family myth hook line and sinker, and it sunk us.  See “Squid,” above.

If this trend continues, fatherlessness is likely to change the shape of our society. Consider this prediction. After the year 2000, as people born after 1970 emerge as a large proportion of  our working-age adult population, the United States will be divided into two groups, separate and unequal. The two groups will work in the same economy, speak a common language, and  remember the same national history. But they will live fundamentally divergent lives. One group will receive basic benefits – psychological, social, economic, educational, and moral – that are  denied to the other group.

The primary fault line dividing the two groups will not be race, religion, class, education, or gender. It will be patrimony. One group will consist of those adults who grew up with the daily  presence and provision of fathers. The other group will consist of those who did not. By the early years of the next century, these two groups will be roughly the same size.

HE’S WRONG.  We are rapidly dividing into two social strata — those who pay taxes to enable demonstration projects to reinstate marriage, fatherhood, abstinence, parenting, and paying child support, and possibly with a little extra help from the True Parents, Rev. & Mrs. Sun Myung Moon’s contacts within American ultra-right.  INcluded in this group are the families owning or having started the foundations that endorse this.  The taxpayers will get poorer and poorer and eventually either jump ship (become a social scientist, clinical psychologist, or other form of behavioral trainers, or their support staff (the statisticians) — or, become the subject matter.  I predict there will be no middle ground sooner or later.