Archive for October 2010
Tricks, or Treats? Decide before Tuesday, Happy Halloween..
Some of my better comments are found on “Rightsformothers.com” a site that became necessary to reminds us that this word exists in relationship to families — hard to tell, from this (or, previous) Administration’s usages:
“An Event to End Violence Against Women.”
This afternoon, we marked Domestic Violence Awareness Month with the President and Vice President by highlighting the Obama Administration’s unprecedented coordination and cooperation across the entire government to protect victims of domestic and sexual violence and enable survivors to break the cycle of abuse.
Is that even a credible promise? Violence against women (not to mention men) has been going on for milennia.
It’s the coordination and cooperation part that frightens me…especially in combination with equally (if not moreso) “comprehensive and coordinated” efforts to stop the social crisis of fatherlessness — blurring the separation of powers, the different branches of government represented at each President’s oath of office (in which one PERSON represents the Executive branch, and one PERSON represents the Judicial branch, and NO PERSON represents the legislative branch — but the oath is to uphold the Constitution.
I believe those days when went down for the count somewhere between 1913 and the development of the Internet.
Children suffer, too. Joe Torre, legendary baseball manager, spoke today about growing up in an abusive household; being afraid to come home when he saw his father’s car parked in front of the house; and how he found refuge in baseball.
Issues like this one remind us that there is still work to be done if we’re going to make the promise of America real for every American – including women. That’s why, last year, President Obama created the White House Council on Women and Girls. He gave the Council an important mission – to make sure that all federal agencies consider the needs of women in every policy, in every program and in every piece of legislation he supports. Because of our focus on women and girls across the Administration, we have unprecedented coordination in the fight against domestic violence.
Today, the Department of Justice, Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, Treasury, Labor and FDIC announced new initiatives to protect victims of abuse and provide resources for families and communities to prevent abuse. Domestic violence and sexual assault are not just criminal justice issues – the scope and far-reaching effects of violence require a coordinated response across the Federal government.
The initiatives announced and highlighted today demonstrate a broad, comprehensive response to reducing violence against women. Specifically, these concrete actions include steps to:
- Protect Children and Break the Cycle of Violence
- Improve Legal Protections for Victims of Domestic Violence
- Increase Sexual Assault Arrests and Successful Prosecutions
- Help Victims Regain Housing and Financial Independence
Those are just a few of the steps we’re taking. But the bottom line is this: No one in America should live in fear because they are unsafe in their own home – no adult, no child. And no one who is the victim of abuse should ever feel as though they have no way to get out. We need to make sure that every victim of domestic violence knows that they are not alone; that there are resources available to them in their moment of greatest need. As a society, we need to ensure that if a victim of abuse reaches out for help, we are there to lend a hand.
That’s not just a job for government. That’s a job for all of us. Thanks to all of you for the work you do in our communities. This Administration is going to stand with you in this fight every step of the way.
Additional details on how the Obama Administration is working to end violence against women can be found by downloading the fact sheet: Obama Administration Highlights Unprecedented Coordination across Federal Government to Combat Violence Against Women (pdf).
Valerie Jarett is Senior Advisor to the President and Chair of the White House Council on Women and Girls
Yeah, well — here’s the FATHERHOOD.GOV/Press Releases
“I care about Men, Too” version:
That Oct. 18, 2010 announcement perhaps illustrates why announcing the intent to (garner the female vote) came so late in the game, before the voting booths open next week. Here it is — the whole page:
Washington DC, October 18, 2010 /PRNewswire/ — Nine out of ten parents believe there is a “father absence crisis” in America, according to two national surveys by the National Fatherhood Initiative. To inspire fathers to become more involved in the lives of their children, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Administration for Children and Families, Office of Family Assistance, the National Responsible Fatherhood Clearinghouse (NRFC) and The Advertising Council are launching a new series of public service advertisements (PSAs).
The new PSAs feature American Indian, Asian American and Hispanic fathers and their children in an effort to speak to all fathers and potential dads in a national campaign that was launched in 2008.
According to the NRFC, children who live without their biological fathers are on average at least two to three times more likely to experience educational, health, emotional and behavioral problems, to be victims of child abuse and to engage in criminal behavior than their peers who live with their married, biological (or adoptive) parents. Children with involved, loving fathers are significantly more likely to do well in school, have healthy self-esteem, exhibit empathy and pro-social behavior and avoid high-risk behaviors.
Was it acknowledged — in the Event to End Violence Against Women (or is it merely “abuse”?) that many times biological fathers are the perpetrators of such abuse including actually killing their children and/or wives?
So which is it — there is a way OUT of abuse, when perpetrated by a father? Or the absence of a father is the CAUSE of abuse? Well, it really depends on which audience is being addressed — by the same Administration, and same Executive Branch department called “Health and HUMAN services.”
“These new PSAs continue the National Responsible Fatherhood Clearinghouse’s tradition of delivering messages that inspire dads to give their children what they need to succeed: their time,” said Roland C. Warren, Media Campaign Director of the National Responsible Fatherhood Clearinghouse.
Created pro bono by C-E (Campbell-Ewald), the new TV, outdoor and Web PSAs emphasize to fathers that “the smallest moments can have the biggest impact on a child’s life.” The PSAs conclude with the campaign tagline, “Take time to be a dad today” and direct fathers to visit www.fatherhood.gov or call 1-877-4DAD411 for parenting tips, fatherhood programs and additional resources for fathers. New Spanish outdoor and Web PSAs were produced in collaboration with Hispanic Communications Network (HCN).
“We are proud to continue our work with the Department of Health and Human Services on this campaign that is helping fathers recognize the critical role they play in their children’s lives,” said Peggy Conlon, president & CEO of the Ad Council. “These lighthearted and touching PSAs will demonstrate to all fathers that the time they spend with their children can make a significant impact on their lives.”
“It has been our privilege to be a part of this worthwhile endeavor,” Bill Ludwig, chairman and CEO of Campbell-Ewald said. “We want to inspire a new commitment of active fatherhood with an engaging message to fathers that even the smallest moments can have the biggest impact on a child’s life, while capturing the hearts of viewers everywhere.”
Since its launch in 2008, the Fatherhood Involvement campaign has received nearly $97 million in donated media across television, radio, outdoor, print and digital. Per the Ad Council’s model, the PSAs will run and air in advertising time and space that is donated by the media.
HHS
Through HHS, the federal government supports responsible fatherhood in diverse ways. Because engaged fathers strengthen families and contribute to healthy outcomes for children, many HHS programs integrate support for fathers. These include Head Start, child support programs, and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families. HHS also supports programs that focus on responsible fatherhood, such as the Promoting Responsible Fatherhood grant program administered by the Office of Family Assistance.National Responsible Fatherhood Clearinghouse
The National Responsible Fatherhood Clearinghouse (NRFC) is funded by the Administration for Children and Families’ Office of Family Assistance’s (OFA) efforts to assist States and communities in promoting and supporting Responsible Fatherhood. Primarily a tool for professionals operating Responsible Fatherhood programs, the NRFC provides access to print and electronic publications, timely information on fatherhood issues, and targeted resources that support OFA-funded Responsible Fatherhood grantees. The NRFC Website also provides essential information for other audiences interested in fatherhood issues. The address for the NRFC website is www.fatherhood.gov.The Advertising Council
The Ad Council is a non-profit organization with a rich history of marshalling volunteer talent from the advertising and media industries to deliver critical messages to the American public. Having produced literally thousands of PSA campaigns addressing the most pressing social issues of the day, the Ad Council has effected, and continues to effect, tremendous positive change by raising awareness, inspiring action, and saving lives. To learn more about the Ad Council and its campaigns, visit www.adcouncil.org.Campbell-Ewald
C-E (Campbell-Ewald) is one of the nation’s largest advertising, direct and digital communications agencies, with offices in Detroit, Los Angeles, San Antonio, Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, New York, and Washington, D.C. A part of The Interpublic Group of Companies (NYSE:IPG), C-E partners with a score of national brands, including Alltel Wireless, Carrier, General Motors, Ghirardelli, Kaiser Permanente, Olympic Paints and Stains, OnStar, Remington Arms, USAA, United States Environmental Protection Agency, United States Mint, United States Navy and the United States Postal Service.Media Contacts:
Vincent DiCaro
National Responsible Fatherhood Clearinghouse
(240) 912-1270
vdicaro@fatherhood.orgLisa Cullen
The Ad Council
(202) 331-5052
lcullen@adcouncil.orgPat Baskin
Campbell-Ewald
(586) 558-7200
pat.baskin@c-e.com// div’).removeAttr(‘style’);
});
]]>In response to President Obama’s call for a national conversation on responsible fatherhood and healthy families, learn how you can join the President’s Fatherhood and Mentoring Initiative.
Información en Español
En respuesta al llamado del presidente Obama para una conversación nacional sobre la paternidad responsable y las familias saludables, aprender cómo usted puede unirse a la Iniciativa Presidencial de Padres y Mentores.
- RSS Feeds
- Email Updates
- Full Site Map
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Geesh — which way should I vote? Which side of the agenda should I advocate for? Let’s see: It’s not about MEN, it’s not about WOMEN — it must be about FAMILIES. Violence is not a gender issue, after all is it? Let me go check one of the largest nonprofits around (branch in SF, California and I think in Washingon, D.C.), the FAMILY Violence Prevention Fund — and see how they handle the discrepancy between abuse is caused by (men) and abuse is caused by (absence of biological Dads in the home), supposedly, and more initiatives will end both of those:
National Institute on Fatherhood and Domestic Violence
WOW — talk about brilliant marketing strategy — just combine them both. (Note, I have actually looked at the funding behind this group, at least on “usaspending.gov” and noticed certain years it skyrocketed — and the language change to accompany it. I also noted, corresponding with the increased federal funding (plus other very conservative foundations) the DEcreased usages of the word “mothers” in relationship to their own children. Do a search — check that out. Well, here’s that Institute. Like MOST Institutes (or, for that matter, “initiatives”) they are electronically and training-oriented. This sets up the technical infrastructure, the grants stream, and searching for young innocents to indoctrinate — and marginalize some of us who have become middle-aged trying to escape the Family Court Traps.
ublic and Private Partnerships:
The NIFDV has been supported by public and private partners including the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, the Ms. Foundation for Women, the Office on Violence Against Women, the Department of Health and Human Services, and the Family Violence Prevention & Services Program, Administration on Children and Families.
This project is being developed in partnership with other national organizations, such as the Center for Family Policy and Practice, the Institute on Domestic Violence in the African American Community, the National Latino Alliance to Eliminate Domestic Violence, Mending the Sacred Hoop, the Domestic Violence Resource Network, and the Minnesota Center Against Violence and Abuse.
The National Institute has three core elements:
- Training and Technical Assistance Leadership Academy
- Program Practice and Development Center
- Information Clearinghouse
Fatherhood has proven to be a powerful tool to reach men in understanding the effects of family violence. There is much to learn in this area and we need to move cautiously forward. Safety for women and children remain the focus and center of our work. By working with fathers in breaking the cycle of abuse, we will enhance the safety and wellbeing of their partners, children, grandchildren and future generations yet to come.
Fatherhood is a “tool” — interesting usage — a tool to reach men.
“Fatherhood” is a concept; it’s a word, and it’s a market niche, any more.
“We need to move cautiously forward.”
Well, yeah — tools can be dangerous.
Everyone knows that — right? Here’s from “cornbeltcarving.org” and General Tool Safety — the last few rules:
- Never try to catch a falling carving tool. Carve in footwear strong enough to protect your feet from falling tools.
- When sanding, use a dust mask, never blow, and protect your eyes.
- Never let children “play” with your tools or leave them alone in your workshop.
- Do not use any tools while under the influence of medication, alcohol, or when fatigued.
- Keep your tools in good working order, and keep your work area organized and clean.
In this information age, “WORDS” are tools. They do things such as pry kids loose from parents, dollars from working adults (for grants to support concepts like these, and institutes like these — NONprofits..), and the thinking process from humanity into hands of the experts that can’t decide whose kids are whose, or how to treat adults like adults: for example, with consequences for assault & battery behaviors such as loss of access to do it again. These mentalities USE children to TRAIN fathers to become less violent — to me, that’s no different from using them as bait.
Let me run that last NIFDV paragraph by again:
Fatherhood has proven to be a powerful tool to reach men in understanding the effects of family violence. There is much to learn in this area and we need to move cautiously forward. Safety for women and children remain the focus and center of our work. By working with fathers in breaking the cycle of abuse, we will enhance the safety and wellbeing of their partners, children, grandchildren and future generations yet to come.
Grammar Quiz: “We, Our” usage — who’s the “WE” ??? By working with fathers in “breaking the cycle of abuse” (see first grandiose promise, top of this post, and “Event” to End Violence Against Women) — We will ENHANCE the safety and wellbeing of their . . .
Hmm. Remember my post on the “-INGs” of the DV Industry? The job never gets done. It’s always beING done.
Vocabulary Quiz: (a.k.a. “Where’s Waldina”?)
Presumably — so far — to make a child, or a family with a child — for every BIO father [BIODads are the obsession of the fatherhood crisis movement; this can be hell on really fine stepDads who attempt to form a relationship with BioMoms], there is usually at least one corresponding mother — whether biological birth-giving, surrogate, etc.
So — where’s the word “mother”? How many words are used to substitute for the word “mother”?
Answer: 2: women, and partners.
I find that odd — there’s a social, linguistic taboo on using the word “mother” in public policy.
the word “father” receives major funding, as well as the word “family” and the word “children” or the word “partner.”
Hence, smaller, and privately-sponsored (or free) sites like “Mothers of Lost Children” or “RightsforMothers” have to sprout up and hope to make a difference.
Meanwhile (while you were sleeping) at least according to PBS, MIT and the Artificial Intelligence groups are trying
to make bipeds, including for military purposes, of course. No, I’m not nuts (I think!):
People working in the MIT Leg Laboratory are legged locomotion enthusiasts of all stripes. They represent several disciplines, including electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, computer science, physics, biomechanics, and aero/astro.
Alumni of the MIT Leg Lab:
-
- Marc Raibert founded the Leg Laboratory in 1980 and directed it through 1995. The Lab was originated at CMU when Marc was Associate Professor in Computer Science and the Robotics Institute, and it moved to MIT in 1986 when Marc became Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science and a member of the Artificial Intelligence Lab. He is now president of the company he co-founded, Boston Dynamics, Inc.
Makes me think that this Armageddon may actually come, and soon, whether from divine or purely human destiny. It is against human nature to put nine months into a child, nurse it, and then drop it off for social experimentation and/or the next generation of cannon fodder. I think the powers that be realize this and have a sick need to — yes — use women for incubators (til technology catches up) and make sure that mature mothers don’t get to both protest violence and retain regular contact with their offspring. We can indeed multi-task, and what a waste of time to compartmentalize and streamline every facet of human life for economy and “safety,”and convenience — for whom?
Well, enough for this protest…
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My Smartass Comments might just be Sound Advice:
(To be continued):
A collection of commentary, some that displays better on other sites:
Source: My post, Jan 2010 – on the Educating of America (high-profit, sterile, captive audiences).
The cost of Moral Reconation Therapy and what the “Duluth Model” actually is… Know what the Kool-Aid actually is.
Source: Rights for Mothers Post, and commentary (3 comments so far, I have 4th in moderation)
Put Yourself in TheLoop(21.com) for some Common Sense
Is the Black debt problem really self-inflicted?
A message of “financial responsibility” overlooks the historical and social factors that contribute
By: Jamelle Bouie | TheLoop21 (Add to your loop)
Mon, 10/25/2010 – 00:00
Rev. DeForest Soaries preaches that debt is a bigger problem for the black community than racismIn the middle of the 20th century, for example, when federal agencies provided billions in home loans, blacks intentionally were excluded. As such, millions of African Americans were kept from building equity and passing on wealth to their children and grandchildren. And this is to say nothing of the economic isolation and educational disintegration that closed most pathways to middle-class life for countless black people.
Unfortunately, the problem of debt is destined to get worse in the next few years. The recession has absolutely devastated African American families; nationwide, the unemployment rate for blacks has hovered at 15 percent for more than a year, while billions in savings have been wiped out by the financial crisis and collapse of the housing market. As of December 2009, according to a recent report by the Economic Policy Institute, median black wealth has dropped 77 percent to $2,100. Insofar that African Americans have made any gains toward closing the wealth gap, they have been virtually eliminated by the recession.
Pastor Soaries’ message of personal responsibility and uplift is understandable, and for some communities — maybe his own — absolutely necessary. But for the black community writ large, it isn’t enough to say “be more responsible” or “don’t spend your money on frivolous things.” No, when it comes to wealth and debt, the problems facing African Americans can’t only be ameliorated by individual effort.
In this world, it’s no shock that debt is a serious problem for African Americans; with so little wealth available, African Americans are far more likely to lack the assets necessary to survive during hard times. Indeed, according to the IASP, at least 25 percent of black families had no assets to turn to in times of economic hardship. And in the absence of assets, credit is often used as an emergency resource.
This stands in contrast to the image Pastor Soaries presents about African American debt. That is, he sees it as simple irresponsibility, “we still do payday loans, we still do rent-to-own, but you see, we’ll drive shiny cars and we’ll wear designer clothes, and we have all the appearances of doing well, but we won’t admit that we’re broke.”
But this isn’t true; the problem of African American indebtedness has its roots in Jim Crow, and the century-long effort to keep blacks from accumulating wealth and finding prosperity.
Get a Grasp on How Hypocrisy Happens (Religion helps…)
Phyllis Schafly Lives (2002/2005). Yes, it IS possible with a straight face to protest VAWA funding and not mention fatherhood funding, of approximate same lifespan:
“Time to Defund Feminist Pork — the Hate-Men Law”
- If Congress is looking for a way to return to principles of limited government and reduced federal spending, or to help finance the expenses of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita without raising taxes, a good place to start would be to reject the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) sponsored by Senator Joe Biden (D-DE). It’s a political mystery why Republicans continue to put a billion dollars a year of taxpayers’ money into the hands of radical feminists who use it to preach their anti-marriage and anti-male ideology, to promote divorce, to corrupt the family court system, and to engage in anti-family political advocacy.
- Accountability is supposed to be the watchword of the Bush Administration, but there’s been no accountability or oversight for VAWA’s ten years of spending many billions of dollars. There is no evidence that VAWA has benefited anyone except the radical feminists on its payroll. The Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing on VAWA in mid-July, but no critic of VAWA was permitted to speak.
- VAWA was first passed in 1994 after the feminists floated such bogus statistics as “a woman is beaten every 15 seconds” and “80% of fathers who seek custody of their children fit the profile of a batterer.” {{NOTICE: cite absent}}
- VAWA encourages women to make false allegations** and then petition for full child custody and a denial of fathers’ rights to see their own children. VAWA promotes the unrestrained use of restraining orders, which family courts issue on the woman’s say-so. {** see 2nd link from top for a great “false allegation” and theatrical imitation of blood in Dombrowski case — musta been a false allegation, right?} {{Family courts don’t typically issue those civil restraining orders, at least what I’ve sen. They help remove them, though…}}
NOTE: In Texas, one source I read said the HHS budget was one-third of the state budget. I think it’s time to change that.
No, I”m not going to talk about Daubert. I just like this explanation: Found at:
Why Theoretics?
Theoretics: the field of study which utilizes creative thought, disciplined logic, and the current knowledgebase to develop credible scientific theory. by Dr. James P. Siepmann, Editor-in-Chief
Though there are many courses at our colleges and graduate schools to teach us how to undertake and perform experiments for the various realms of science, there is a notable lack of courses to teach us theory development.
Theoretics is a field separate (albeit integrated) with experimentation, not only because good theory development is actually quite complex and intricate, but also because the people who make good experimentalists rarely make good theoreticians and visa versa. Theoreticians usually possess a more creative and unbound mind (e.g.. Einstein) while the experimentalist maintains a more meticulous and practical mindset (e.g. Edison).1 Rarely are the creative theoretical mind and the meticulous experimental mind contained within the same skull. So what we currently have are experimentalists trying to do theory development, and (excuse my candor) not very well.
Not only do most science journals require the focus of a paper to be an experiment or a statistical analysis of data, but about half of all the scientific articles published today contain at least one error of theory, either in logic or form. This is not acceptable. The implementation of Theoretics’ principles need to be done prior to any experimental undertaking, not only because it puts the “cart before the horse” but it will also help to determine the experimental methodology that should be used.
{{In Social Science, Psychology, etc. areas – errors of form can be seen in language, or grammar. One of my pet peeves is calling all the children of the nation “our children” — when the “our” present are a select group of policymakers, and many parents of the nationa are unaware of this group’s existence. This defies biology…}Or repeatedly asserting factoids as if they were scientifically data, when the studies supporting that have identifiable funding interested in obtaining certain conclusions. Is Psychology Science? NO, it is not! It’s labeling plus deduction plus a bit of prophecy, and eliminates per se factors that many people consider real (and act on as if real), to wit, spirituality. A scientific theory that has repeated exceptions is not a valid one unless those exceptions are accounted for, etc. AND, this aturho is very likely not talking about the judicial realm — but stateing that in so-called “scientific” realms, there are still errors of theory, in logic or form, about 50% of the time. What he’s saying is, the publication of an article doesn’t mean that it’s necessarily a valid theory.}}
Theories also change over time, and are occasionally proven invalid later, and discarded. When theory is used to support forced POLICY, then we have problems — big ones. People who had “theories” to support their policies included Hitler, racists, and others. In case you wondered, yes I AM referring to “fatherhood.gov” and associated paraphernalia.
Theory can also be the subject of a paper by itself, and I would submit that such “papers of theory” advance Science* much more than “papers of experimentation”. In order for a theoretical paper to be worthy of publication though, it must be able to remain valid in light of current scientific evidence and also be able to explain such data at least as good as the theory that is currently accepted.
Most of today’s journals consist of papers where an experiment is undertaken in order to validate a single argument hypothesis.** Such papers are undertaken to define or redefine some minuscule aspect of a sub-sub-sub-(and so on)-division of Science. Worse yet is that the more encompassing new theories are usually shunned unless they fall within the special/general relativity and quantum theory realms and are written by someone whom academia deems acceptable (papers today are usually accepted based upon who wrote it, rather than its merit)
**Parental Alienation, anyone?
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Let’s Talk about: The Unification States of America, Islamic Gender Apartheid, and why Family Law operates like a cult
Public mockings of even judges are tolerated on-line in the West.
We had best appreciate this liberty while some of it exists and start recognizing perhaps why this is tolerated as other systems fall into place. For example this same digital world has a double-edged sword, affecting basic processes in the judicial system, (google Joseph Zernik or Janet Phelan, or see my recent posts) and compromising basic concepts of due process, and of the states/federal distinction. Technology, technology, technology! often extinguishes and changes politics. If some cartoons go online, small deal in the larger picture.
Remember, the U.S. being the world’s largest jailor, supposedly to stop crime — what if crime ceases? If immigrants are expelled? Will the buildings go empty and those jobs shift to another sector of the marketplace?
We are allowed to mock several things on-line, with cartoons, but I feel the situation is further along than we realize. While others are less affected, those stuck in the courts often exhibit many of these symptoms:
1. Extreme identity confusion
2. Dissociative states – “floating” (getting triggered back into cult mode)
3. Panic and anxiety attacks
4. Depression
5. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (P.T.S.D.)
6. Psychosomatic symptoms (headaches, backaches, asthma, skin problems)
7. Problems with decision-making- dependency
8. Retarded psychological development- loss of psychological power
9. Guilt
10. Fear
11. Sleep disorders/ nightmares
12. Eating disorders
13. Sexual problems / Sexuality Issues
14. Lack of trust/ fear of intimacy and commitment- personal & work
15. Harassment and threats from group {{Again, that’s not a internal psychological problem, but an external experience that can cause such problems. In short, this is what cults, or gangs, DO if obedience is challenged, or disloyalty feared.}}
16. Grieving loss of friends, family
17. Spiritual “rape” of the soulSource:
Common Psychological Problems
of Victims of Cult Mind Control
Some people will be stronger, and maybe less susceptible to such controls or threats; their strength sometimes makes those who don’t stand up uncomfortable, and as such, group attempts to monitor, marginalize, slander, or silence others often increase.
What do Scientology, cults, gangs, and other subjectyourselftoourgroupmentalityorelse have in common with each other, with the family law system, and with, say Islamic gender apartheid? Or, woman-hating ultra-right conservative Christianity, for that matter? Already the parallels between domestic violence experience and the war vet (as to trauma) have been made.
How it’s done in some cultures:
Women the Future of Freedom
The liberation of Europe’s Muslim women is the best way to encourage assimilation into Western society, but the opportunity is being wasted.One of my heroines is Samira Ahmed, a 24-year-old girlishly pretty woman with large, brown, doelike eyes, dark, curly hair and a smile that seduces even the gloomiest of faces to lighten up and smile back. Besides her good nature, she is inquisitive and has a strong will to be her own person. Born to a family who left Morocco in the early 1980s and settled in The Netherlands, she is one of 10 children.
In the (northern) summer of 2005, I attended her graduation ceremony at a training college in Amsterdam. Samira received a diploma for pedagogy and a record 10 score (the highest possible) for her thesis.
This is the celebratory side of Samira’s story, for there is also a tragic side
. . .
On Samira’s stand none of her family showed up: no brother, no sister, no cousin, no nephew, no niece. Two years earlier, Samira had to sneak away from home because she wanted to live in a student house like her Dutch friends Sara and Marloes. At home she had shared a bedroom with some of her siblings and had no privacy at all. Every move she made in the house was monitored by her mother and sisters; outside the house her brothers kept watch. They all wanted to make sure that under no circumstances would she become Westernised.
Samira had endured terrible physical and psychological violence at home. Her family always had a pretext to question her, go through her stuff and forbid her from setting foot outside the house. She was beaten frequently. There were rumours in her community that she had a Dutch boyfriend. The beatings at home became harsher. Samira could bear it no longer and left. Soon afterwards, in the summer of 2003, she got in touch with me. I went with her to the police to file a complaint against her brothers, who had threatened to murder her. According to them, Samira’s death was the only way to avenge the shame she brought upon the family for leaving their parents’ house.
The police said they could do nothing to help her except file the complaint. They said there were thousands of other women like her and it was not the police’s duty to intervene in family matters. Ever since she left, Samira has been in hiding, moving from house to house and depending on the kindness of strangers. Mostly she is brave and faces life with a powerful optimism. Samira reads her textbooks, does her homework, and turns her papers in on time. She accepts invitations to student parties from Sara and Marloes and makes an effort to enjoy herself.
Sometimes, however, she has a sad, drawn look on her face that betrays her worries. Once in a while she just weeps and confides that she wishes her life were different, perhaps more like the lives of her Dutch friends.
How awful that her own, large family, could not rejoice with her successes, in fact threatened to kill her for it.
Her worries are far from over, though. She has no money; she has to find a job, and with her Moroccan name that will be far from easy in The Netherlands; she has to find another new place to live; she lives in an unending fear of being discovered by her brothers and slaughtered by them. This is no joke, for in just two police regions in The Netherlands (The Hague area and the southern section of the province of South Holland), 11 Muslim girls were killed by their own families between October 2004 and May 2005 for ”offences” similar to those committed by Samira.
In other words, in some cultures, such independence is punished by simply killing them: “honor killings.” Existing as a (female) individual outside the family is anathema. Their honor is worth more than her life. Think that’s only Islam, or radical Islam? By the end of this post, you might — as I do — realize that while presently, maybe so, that’s not the PLANNED future of the U.S. or other countries…to each its own slavery institution.
In my mind, there are three categories of Muslim women in Dutch society. I suspect that this distinction applies to other European Union countries with large Muslim populations as well. First, there are girls such as Samira: strong-willed, intelligent and willing to take a chance on shaping their individual futures along a path they choose for themselves. They face many obstacles as they try to assimilate in Western society and some may lose their lives trying to attain their dreams.
They chose — had to, to live with their own consciences, perhaps — “live free or die.”
Second, there are girls and women who are very dependent and attached to their families but who cleverly forge a way to lead a double life, and…
The third group are the utterly vulnerable. Some of these girls are imported as brides or domestic workers from the country of origin of the immigrants with whom they come to live. Some are daughters of the more conservative families. These girls are removed from school once they attain puberty and locked up at home. Their families get away with this form of modern slavery because the [EUROPEAN] authorities rarely take notice of these young women. The girls have often been brought up to be absolutely obedient: they perform household chores without question. Their individual wills have been bent to the servitude taught at their parents’ house and put into practice in their husbands’ homes or the homes of the people who import and enslave them. They can hardly read or write.
When they marry, they generally bear as many children as their individual fertility allows. When they miscarry, most of them view this as God’s will, not as a lack of proper health care, which they are usually prevented from seeking because of their families’ religious reasons.
Now, at the risk of alienating readers through length, or offending them through graphic description, I”m going to continue to post what this author, writing for AEI (of all places!) reports. Perhaps some of the qualitative parallels between this and MUCH of our family law system — or some of the most hated headlining cults or individual cult family situations (<>a father in Austria keeps a pregnant daughter in the basement, <> a married couple in Antioch, California, keep a young kidnapped, repeatedly raped girl in the back yard sheds, where she has two girls, raises them out back there (becoming a woman herself) helps him with his print business, and is finally sprung 18 years later when a female security officer at UC Berkeley recognizes the children acting “odd” (Garrido/DuGard), costing California taxpayers $20 million in damages, but at least all are alive ; <>a young woman in Colorado is forced to father 4 kids starting too early, by her mother’s “ex,” loses custody of them, temporarily regains custody of them, and is later forced to give them up to foster care and PAY the government, because the government’s charges to her, she cannot pay (search: “Girl, Interrupted!” or “It’s a Cryin’ Shame”)– will begin to show. <>A woman in Houston, Texas area is forced into a shelter, but but the courts insist Dad get visitation; four kids die. . . Here’s, from this same article:
The biggest obstacle that hinders Muslim women from leading dignified, free lives is violence–physical, mental, and sexual–committed by their close families. Here is only a sample of some of the violence perpetrated on girls and women from Islamic cultures:
- Four-year-old girls have their genitals mutilated: some of them so badly that they die of infections; others are traumatised for life from the experience and will later suffer recurrent infections of their reproductive and urinary systems.
- Teenage girls are removed from school by force and kept inside the house to stop their schooling, stifle their thinking and suffocate their will.
- Victims of incest and sexual abuse are beaten, deported or killed to prevent them from filing complaints.
- Some pregnant victims of incest or abuse are forced by their fathers, older brothers, or uncles to have abortions in order to keep the family honour from being stained. In this era of DNA testing, the girls could demonstrate that they have been abused. Yet instead of punishing the abusers, the family treats the daughter as if she had dishonoured the family.
- Girls and women who protest their maltreatment are beaten by their parents in order to kill their spirits and reduce them to a lifelong servitude that amounts to slavery.
- Many girls and women who can’t bear to suffer any more take their own lives or develop numerous kinds of psychological ailments, including nervous breakdown and psychosis. They are literally driven mad.
- A Muslim girl in Europe runs more risk than girls of other faiths of being forced into marriage by her parents with a stranger. In such a marriage — which, since it is forced, by definition starts with rape — she conceives child after child. She is an enslaved womb. Many of her children will grow up in a household with parents who are neither bound by love nor interested in the wellbeing of their children. The daughters will go through life as subjugated as their mothers and the sons become — in Europe — dropouts from school, attracted to pastimes that can vary from loitering in the streets to drug abuse to radical Islamic fundamentalism.
{My bolding certain phrases is not to diminish the others, but to point out my theme of attempts to stifle the will, and psychological affects of it, including suicide. Also, these practices ensure the next generation will also endure subjugation, making total enslavement easier through physical AND mental control.}}
European policy-makers have not yet understood the huge potential of liberating Muslim women. They are squandering the single best opportunity they have to make Muslim integration a success within one generation. Morally, governments need to eradicate violence against women in Europe. This would make clear to fundamentalists that Europeans take their constitutions seriously. Now, most abusers simply think that Western rhetoric about the equality of men and women is cowardly and hypocritical, since Western governments tolerate the abuse of millions of Muslim women when they’re told it’s in the name of freedom of religion.
Note WELL those last comments — in the non-Muslim households of the West, this is tolerated (in different forms) under the name of the supremacy of family. This has a theocracy root, and makes a mockery of the constitutions. Either the constitutions exist, and women, or fringe/marginalized populations are equally people, or they do not, and as such are a fraud, misleading women who hope that they were real, only to find out, “not for you.”
ALSO: there is a social need (survival, perhaps) to distance onesself from the outspoken, the rebels, and the weak and distressed. It is a hard thing to lose one’s social moorings; for years, I sought to understand the varieties of silence on my own abuse, and the vicious post-separation response of my own (supposedly liberal) family to it, and utter refusal to recognize me as an individual, that strength, determination, and resourcefulness had helped me break free – as well as determination that comes from my connection to children. That connection “had” to be broken. No recognition of my accomplishments post-separation (which were significant) was permitted; my kids were trained to dismiss these also, although they kept racking up. I was eliminated in the family terminology as a person — I had no past, and my future was to be at their discretion. Having broken the emotional and economic strengths, even as I sought to replace them, it is as though the moorings of society are exposed by these “canaries in the mines.” I had not experienced significant abuse or sexism (that I was aware of) as a young woman or professional — ONLY in my own marriage, and afterwards. Friends, whether religious or work, made during the marriage — none of who really intervened, or referred to any legal source for help — had to be replaced; new ones made professionally afterwards faced (second-hand or sometimes too close for comfort) the same relentless pressure I was experiencing, and no court, agency, or nonprofit was going to compensate.
I began to wonder why the experience of my family of origin was feeling like the writings of Ayaan Hirsi Ali, or of Nonie Darwish, regarding polygamy. I began to distance myself from “support” groups (while IN the abuse) to simple economic freedom resulting in permission to escape. The family courts had the system of constant contextt with my ex-abuser, so I still pushed for choice within those limits, and to stay in the profession I’d rebuilt. And – as things escalated — to switch to another “domestic violence-proof” alternative, which I had begun to undertstand — or at least believe — existed, if only certain conditions could be met, namely geographic flexibility (stalking had become an issue, and home no longer felt safe).
Once I began to see the economic forces in the family law system (typically lost in the “rhetoric”), and how psychobabble is actually just a mask for financial (corruption), plus the role of the INTERNET in centralizing the court system grants, and other things, I reported as I learned.
Part of regaining personal integrity is understanding — from one’s own (evolving) choice of sources “What happened?” and “What next?” People who have not been through some sort of cult experience may not comprehend how important this is; as brainwashing is relentless unless communication can be cut off with certain people, as Samira had to do, as a brave, but largely deserted, young woman, above.
On the other hand, once you see the connections (and my tendency is towards research, curiosity, and synthesis) there really is no going back to other understandings. I also pray more these days, as analysis doens’t “cut it” all, and I do believe that –while separate — emotionality and spirituality relate. I would sooner deal with a person enraged with me — and honest about (his or her) rage — than person driven by anger, yet repeatedly declaring they are not.
Below this section on “psychology” (as a means of control), is the BUSH/MOONIE/MONEY connection which (as my style is) was the heart of my post. This tells me, perhaps, WHY it feels so similar in these supposedly different venues.
How it’s done in other cultures:
Outright, upfront theocracy is unacceptable in many “Western” cultures. Although, toleration of the above behavior in Western cultures on the basis of, it’s a family matter, is common — note, this above was from WHICH European country? But generally, for the atheistic (supposedly) norm, there is always psychiatry & psychology to bring someone to heel.
Psychological Abuse: 3 Signs of Crazy-Making by Family, by Friend, by Enemy
(this book summary — and it is a promotion — by Dr. Jeanne King — details the behaviors — not the felt experience — of what people reporting abuse, or leaving a battering relationships (etc.) may face. As I look at it, it’s practically a recipe for what the family law system does, period. If possible).
1) Your “loved one” encourages you to see a counselor with them or see a counselor of their choosing. They say you need help or your relationship with them needs help, and they want to assist in your getting the help they want you to have. Yet, you have no symptoms for which you know to warrant such an intervention.
2) Your “loved one” or the counselor chosen by, or consulted with, your loved one encourages you to self-admit yourself for a psychiatric evaluation in the absence of symptoms that disturb you. Your voluntary admission into a psychiatric evaluation is much like you taking the weapon they seek to use to compromise you and your liberties, aim it at yourself and pull the trigger.
This protects those involved in the crazy-making maneuver from any liability of falsely utilizing the system to have you committed. It’s much like talking you into your own suicide, after which there is no murder, no murderers…no one to blame but you.
3) Your compliance with your own psychiatric admission becomes the condition for you to maintain rights that are being denied or being threatened to be denied. If you resist your voluntary admission into the sought-after psychiatric evaluation, then the thing you fear losing becomes the “carrot” to manipulate you to re-consider. This reconsideration re-invites you, manipulates you, to cooperate in your voluntary psychological evaluation and ultimate crazy-making maneuver.
Sounds crazy? You bet, it’s crazy. And sadly, this happens more often than most mental health professionals care to admit.
If you find yourself confronted with another person’s campaign to make you “crazy,” certifiably so, take a hard and honest look at what’s in store, before you become another victim of this form of psychological abuse.
The “Unification Connection” came up this past JUNE, 2010, as I looked at Congressman Danny Davis, in association with voting for more Fatherhood Grants at the House Ways and Means Committee website. I caught this coronation ceremony photos in a Senate Building in Washington, D.C. Say, what? ?? (Search my posts);
Note: This theme won’t show up in a typical, say, NOW Family Law section, or other arenas. I don’t know that even any of fellow-bloggers on ANY side of the family law crisis reporting will echo as to this theme. Then again, I’m typically the one researching the HHS grants and very upset by having the marriage forced on women after they have left violence; I am also sensitive to religious themes along those lines. The U.S. Government Grant — Unification Church connection is established in several strands: Illinois, Washington, and Arizona (N.A.M.E. being one). Ultra-conservative right-wing so-called Christian groups find out that some of this ain’t Christian. We as Americans should ALl be considered bout the constant erosion of individual rights (as in the bill of Rights and in the Constitution) and we should be grown-up enough to acknowledge that that often carries a religious theme. Well, here we go:
Since the following article, and my connecting this Unification church with the Forcing-marriage policies in the United States, may sound outrageous, here’s its author
Robert Parry is a veteran investigative reporter, who broke many of the Iran-contra stories in the 1980s for The Associated Press and Newsweek. Robert Parry’s latest book is Secrecy & Privilege: Rise of the Bush Dynasty from Watergate to Iraq. It can be purchased at http://www.secrecyandprivilege.com. It’s also available at Amazon.com.
To see two of the DIA documents, click here. http://www.consortiumnews.com/moondocs/index.html
For more background on the Moon Organization, see Steve Hassan’s Web site, http://www.freedomofmind.com/groups/moonies/moonies.htm
Bush, Moon, Money, and Marriage issues: A marriage not made in heaven:
The Dark Side of Rev. Sun Myung Moon
Part 1, Hooking George BushBy Robert Parry
July 28, 1997
Last fall, the Rev. Sun Myung Moon’s latest foray into the high-priced world of media and politics was in trouble. South American journalists were writing scathingly about Moon’s plan to open a regional newspaper that the 77-year-old founder of the Korean-based Unification Church hoped would give him the same influence in Latin America that the ultra-conservative Washington Times had in the United States.
(TIMELINE: VAWA/National Fatherhood Initiative — 1994, 1995 Clinton letter, 1996 PWORA (welfare reform), 1998, 1999 Congressional resolutions regarding fatherhood, and so forth — see my site and others.).
EVIDENTLY, A Bush in the Family is worth Two in the Hand:
Given the controversy, Argentina’s elected president, Carlos Menem, did decide to reject Moon’s invitation. But Moon had a trump card to play in his bid for South American respectability: the endorsement of an ex-president of the United States, George Bush. Agreeing to speak at the newspaper’s launch, Bush flew aboard a private plane, arriving in Buenos Aires on Nov. 22. Bush stayed at Menem’s official residence, the Olivos. But Bush failed to change the Argentine president’s mind.Still, Moon’s followers gushed that Bush had saved the day, as he stepped before about 900 Moon guests at the Sheraton Hotel. “Mr. Bush’s presence as keynote speaker gave the event invaluable prestige,” wrote the Unification News. “Father [Moon] and Mother [Mrs. Moon] sat with several of the True Children [Moon’s offspring] just a few feet from the podium.”Bush lavished praise on Moon and his journalistic enterprises. “I want to salute Reverend Moon, who is the founder of The Washington Times and also of Tiempos del Mundo,” Bush declared. “A lot of my friends in South America don’t know about The Washington Times, but it is an independent voice. The editors of The Washington Times tell me that never once has the man with the vision interfered with the running of the paper, a paper that in my view brings sanity to Washington, D.C. I am convinced that Tiempos del Mundo is going to do the same thing” in Latin America.Bush then held up the colorful new newspaper and complimented several articles, including one flattering piece about Barbara Bush. Bush’s speech was so effusive that it surprised even Moon’s followers.”Once again, heaven turned a disappointment into a victory,” the Unification News exulted. “Everyone was delighted to hear his compliments. We knew he would give an appropriate and ‘nice’ speech, but praise in Father’s presence was more than we expected. … It was vindication. We could just hear a sigh of relief from Heaven.”Bush’s endorsement of The Washington Times’ editorial independence also was not truthful. Almost since it opened in 1982, a string of senior editors and correspondents have resigned, citing the manipulation of the news by Moon and his subordinates. The first editor, James Whelan, resigned in 1984, confessing that he had “blood on his hands” for helping the church achieve greater legitimacy. Money Talks
- But Bush’s boosterism was just what Moon needed in South America. “The day after,” the Unification News observed, “the press did a 180-degree about-turn once they realized that the event had the support of a U.S. president.” With Bush’s help, Moon had gained another beachhead for his worldwide business-religious-political-media empire. After the event, Menem told reporters from La Nacion that Bush had claimed privately to be only a mercenary who did not really know Moon. “Bush told me he came and charged money to do it,” Menem said. [Nov. 26, 1996]. But Bush was not telling Menem the whole story. By last fall (Fall 1996), Bush and Moon had been working in political tandem for at least a decade and a half. The ex-president also had been moonlighting as a front man for Moon for more than a year.In September 1995, Bush and his wife, Barbara, gave six speeches in Asia for the Women’s Federation for World Peace, a group led by Moon’s wife, Hak Ja Han Moon. In one speech on Sept. 14 to 50,000 Moon supporters in Tokyo, Bush insisted that “what really counts is faith, family and friends.” Mrs. Moon followed the ex-president to the podium and announced that “it has to be Reverend Moon to save the United States, which is in decline because of the destruction of the family and moral decay.” [Washington Post, Sept. 15, 1995]
. . .
In summer 1996, Bush was lending his prestige to Moon again. Bush addressed the Moon-connected Family Federation for World Peace in Washington, an event that gained notoriety when comedian Bill Cosby tried to back out of his contract after learning of Moon’s connection. Bush had no such qualms. [WP, July 30, 1996]
Throughout these public appearances, Bush’s office has refused to divulge how much Moon-affiliated organizations have paid the ex-president. But estimates of Bush’s fee for the Buenos Aires appearance alone ran between $100,000 and $500,000. Sources close to the Unification Church have put the total Bush-Moon package in the millions, with one source telling The Consortium that Bush stood to make as much as $10 million.
Ka-CHING! and Diatribes against individuality, especially as found among American women:
Moon’s jingle of deep-pocket cash also has caused conservatives to turn a deaf ear toward Moon’s recent anti-American diatribes. With growing virulence, Moon has denounced the United States and its democratic principles, often referring to America as “Satanic.” But these statements have gone virtually unreported, even though the texts of his sermons are carried on the Internet and their timing has coincided with Bush’s warm endorsements of Moon.
“America has become the kingdom of individualism, and its people are individualists,” Moon preached in Tarrytown, N.Y., on March 5, 1995. “You must realize that America has become the kingdom of Satan.”
In similar remarks to followers on Aug. 4, 1996, Moon vowed that the church’s eventual dominance over the United States would be followed by the liquidation of American individualism. “Americans who continue to maintain their privacy and extreme individualism are foolish people,” Moon declared. “The world will reject Americans who continue to be so foolish. Once you have this great power of love, which is big enough to swallow entire America, there may be some individuals who complain inside your stomach. However, they will be digested.”
During the same sermon, Moon decried assertive American women. “American women have the tendency to consider that women are in the subject position,” he said. “However, woman’s shape is like that of a receptacle. The concave shape is a receiving shape. Whereas, the convex shape symbolizes giving. … Since man contains the seed of life, he should plant it in the deepest place.
“Does woman contain the seed of life? [“No.”] Absolutely not. Then if you desire to receive the seed of life, you have to become an absolute object. In order to qualify as an absolute object, you need to demonstrate absolute faith, love and obedience to your subject. Absolute obedience means that you have to negate yourself 100 percent.“
In case we’re not clear, this was addressed to women, particularly any woman who wants to become a mother.
A fellow-blogger, “rightsformothers.com” posts alternating photos at the top. ONE of them reads — on a sign held by a man: “Women are not Incubators.”
Well the man who wants to improve upon Jesus’ model (NB: who was respectful towards women) disagrees. And so, increasingly, does Federal policy towards mothers as seen in the family court programs subsidized by federal grants, many of which go to faith-based institutions. What happened?
I also wonder, if this same “spirit” has not entered into mainstream very conservative Christianity — slavish obedience. “God wants to use you, too.” While shunning works well for dissidents (there’s another church somewhere nearby more suited to your tastes), in the past about 10-15 years, I’ve seen it get worse — not better — on confronting domestic violence (i.e. wife-beating to ensure dominance) in the ranks of individual congregations.
ABSOLUTE OBEDIENCE, No PRIVACY — Sound like family court Archipelago yet?
One-World TheocracyDespite growing disaffection among many longtime followers and other problems, Moon’s empire still prospers financially, backed by vast sources of mysterious wealth. “It’s a multi-billion-dollar international conglomerate,” noted Steve Hassan, a former church leader who has written a book about religious cults, entitled Combatting Cult Mind Control. At his Internet site, Hassan has a 31-page list of organizations connected to the Unification Church, many secretively.
“Here’s a man [Moon] who says he wants to take over the world, where all religions will be abolished except Unificationism, all languages will be abolished except Korean, all governments will be abolished except his one-world theocracy,” Hassan said in an interview. “Yet he’s wined and dined very powerful people and convinced them that he’s benign.”
Hassan argued that perhaps the greatest danger of the Unification Church is that it will outlive Moon, since the organization has grown so immense and powerful that other leaders will step forward to lead it. “There are groups out there that want to use this organization,” Hassan said.
Who is Hassan?
Steven Alan Hassan, cult counselor and mind control expert, is the Nationally Certified Counselor and licensed Mental Health Counselor who has developed the breakthrough approach to help loved ones rescue cult mind control victims.
A former member of the Moon cult, ex-cult members and others seek him out for specialized counseling to help them recover from symptoms other mental health professionals are not trained to address.
Unification Church and “Family” Agenda:
(excerpts from “Religious Tolerance” website — its disclaimer at bottom of page).
History:
The Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity*** was organized in 1954 in Seoul, South Korea by Rev. Sun Myung Moon [“One who has clarified the Truth”]. Some sources say the organization started in Pusan, not Seoul. Its followers are often called Moonies by persons outside of the Association. However, this term is considered derogatory by its members, who refer to themselves as Unificationists.
**Counterpart to, or to replace, the Pope, one might ask?
Rev. Moon was born in what is now North Korea in 1920 and was raised in the Presbyterian Church. He is a Professional Engineer by training. When he was 15 years old, at Easter, Jesus Christ appeared to him in a vision, charging him with the responsibility of completing the work in the world that Jesus had started. During his adult life he has had trouble with legal authorities, having been arrested for practicing capitalism (a crime in North Korea), charged (but not convicted) in South Korea of other activities, and convicted of tax evasion in the United States. The Presbyterian Church of Korea, in 1948, felt that his views were incompatible with traditional Christianity; they excommunicated him.
In 1957, Rev. Moon published Divine Principle which is a collection of his beliefs, as written by a member of the Church. Two years later, Young Oon Kim moved to North America as a Unification missionary to establish a church presence there. Many of the members in the US expected a type of apocalyptic event in 1967. When nothing of that nature occurred, some members became disillusioned and left the organization. In 1972, Rev. Moon moved to the United States and started a major recruitment drive. A decade later, he performed the first of many mass wedding ceremonies in which more than 2000 couples were married. In 1984, he was convicted of tax evasion in the US and sent to prison for 13 months.
. . .
The third Adam was born in Korea between 1917 and 1930. (The first Adam was the individual described in Genesis; the second Adam is Jesus). He will be recognized as second coming of Christ, the perfect man. He will marry the perfect woman, and will become the “true spiritual parents of humankind”. Some members of the Unification Church regard Rev. Moon and his second (and current) wife Hak Ja Han as these parents, although the Church itself has never made this claim.
Practices:
The Unification Church is a profoundly family-centered Church. Members are expected to remain celibate during their youth. They are to subsequently marry, have children, and create an ideal family which contributes to world peace. {{cf. Ron Haskins / Urban Institute / HHS “fatherhood” policies –do it for your country and your kids…}}
The Blessing or mass wedding ceremony is the most important Unification ritual. Rev. Moon matches up each couple a month (or less) in advance, selecting from among the membership. The bride and groom are expected to marry, but can decide to opt out without disgrace. A Holy Wine Ceremony is conducted before the marriage; this purifies the couple so that they are able to have children free of Fallen Nature (resulting from original sin inherited from Adam and Eve). A special Three Day Ceremony is performed by the married couple some weeks after their wedding, before they engage in sexual activity. A Pledge Service is celebrated at 5 AM each Sunday, and on the first day of each month and on January 1. They celebrate four major seasonal days of celebration:
True God’s Day, True Parents’ Day, True Day of All Things. Chil II Jeol: Declaration Day of God’s Eternal Blessing True Children’s Day Foundation Day for the nation of the Unified World
. . . Other disturbing allegations:
Unification Church Books and Publications:
The Unification Church’s main religious text is the Bible. It is seen as teaching truth, but is not viewed as truth in itself. It is only a partial revelation. Rev. Moon’s interpretations of Christian beliefs and additional revelations from God are contained in the book Divine Principle, which was written in Korean in 1959 and translated by Young Oon Kim in 1959. The Church publishes the Unification News, and Today’s World.
They also publish a newspaper, the extreme-right wing Washington Times. According to the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC): “The Washington Times is relatively small (circulation 102,000) and money-losing (it’s been estimated that its backer, the Unification Church, has spent more than $1 billion to keep it going over the past 22 years). But its influence cannot be measured in those statistics. President Reagan once described it as his favorite paper. The first President Bush said it ‘in my view brings sanity to Washington, D.C’.” President George W. Bush gave a personal tour for top staff of the Washington Times during 2005-JAN.
Marian Kester Coombs, wife of managing editor Francis Booth Coombs, has had at least 35 news and opinion pieces published in the Times. SPLC quotes excerpts from some of her articles:
America has become a “den of iniquity” because of “its efforts to accommodate minorities.” White men should “run, not walk” to wed “racially conscious” white women and avoid being out-bred by non-whites. Latinos are “rising to take this country away from those who made it…[the] Euroamericans.“ Muslims are “human hyenas” who “smell blood” and are “closing in” on their “weakened prey,” meaning “the white race.” Blacks, are “saintly victims who can do no wrong.” Black solidarity and non-white immigration are imposing “racial revolution and decomposition” in America. The whole of human history as “the struggle of … races.” Non-white immigration is “importing poverty and revolution” that will end in “the eventual loss of sovereign American territory.“ Muslims In England “are turning life in this once pleasant land into a misery for its native inhabitants.“ According to the SPLC, the Washington TImes has published articles taken from white supremacist hate groups, anti-Semitic ads for a book called “For Fear of the Jews,” and an ad from a key Holocaust denial group. 8
Conflict of interest declaration:
The author of this essay was able to attend a convention on religious tolerance and freedom in Washington during the 1990s. The meeting was sponsored by the Washington Times, which is owned by the Unification Church. Airline fares, meals and accommodation were heavily subsidized by the Times.
Although the constitution of Singapore guarantees religious freedom to its citizens, it has banned the Unification Church. See: “Infringement of Religious Freedom” at: http://members.tripod.com/~teopl/ and “MERCILESS REPATRIATION ” at: http://members.tripod.com/~limcm
This site is almost too much to handle. Nevertheless:
W.’s Christian Nation
How Bush promotes religion and erodes
the separation of church and state
by Chris Mooney
The American Prospect, June 2003
n November of 1992, shortly after Bill Clinton was elected president, a telling controversy arose at a meeting of the Republican Governors Association. When a reporter asked the governors how their party could both satisfy the demands of Christian conservatives and also maintain a broad political coalition, Mississippi’s Kirk Fordice took the opportunity to pronounce America a “Christian nation.” “The less we emphasize the Christian religion,” Fordice declared, “the further we fall into the abyss of poor character and chaos in the United States of America.” Jewish groups immediately protested Fordice’s remarks; on CNN’s Crossfire, Michael Kinsley asked whether Fordice would also call America a “white nation” because whites, like Christians, enjoy a popular majority. The incident was widely seen as exposing a rift between the divisive Pat Robertson wing of the GOP and the more moderate camp represented by then-President George Herbert Walker Bush.
Fast-forward a decade. Republicans have solved their internal problems, and the party is united under our most prayerful of presidents, the born-again believer George W. Bush. Though not originally the favored candidate of the religious right-John Ashcroft was-Bush has played the part well. Virtually his first presidential act was to proclaim a National Day of Prayer and Thanksgiving; soon he appointed Ashcroft to serve as attorney general. Since then the stream of religiosity from the White House has been continuous.. . .
. Clinton also showed immense political sympathy for religion, but he didn’t nominate a slate of right-wing judges who could give the law a decidedly majoritarian, pro-Christian bent. And Bush has gone further than that. From school-prayer guidelines issued by the Department of Education to faith-based initiatives to directives from virtually every federal agency, there’s hardly a place where Bush hasn’t increased both the presence and the potency of religion in American government. In the process, the Bush administration lavishly caters to the very religious right groups that gave us the dubious Christian-nation concept to begin with.
Consider Bush’s faith-based initiative. In October 2002, the Department of Health and Human Services doled out $30 million to ~ 1 religious and community groups as part of the faith-based program. Sure enough, $500,000 went to Pat Robertson’s religious charity Operation Blessing. In addition, according to Americans United for Separation of Church and State, a grant of $700,000 went to the National Center for Faith-Based Initiative, founded by Bishop Harold Calvin Ray, who has declared church-state separation “a fiction.” Another $z.’ million went to Dare Mighty Things, a group affiliated with Chuck Colson, a Watergate felon turned evangelist who tries to convert prison inmates to Christianity and has the ear of the Bush administration. All of the religious recipients of Health and Human Services grants were connected to Christian ministries, mostly evangelical ones.
These grant allocations suggest that while Bush may not say he’s forging a Christian nation, at the very least he’s blending church and state to fund Christianity. And Health and Human Services is just one government agency now engaged in promoting faith-based initiatives. Under Bush, notes Americans United Executive Director Barry Lynn, the departments of Justice, Housing and Urban Development, Health and Human Services and Education all “are issuing regulations, guidelines and other directives that promote religion.” Bush has also placed influential religious-right figures in his administration. Consider a few little-noticed examples. David Caprara, the head of AmeriCorps/ VISTA, directed the American Family Coalition, a faith-based social-action group affiliated with Sun Myung Moon’s Unification Church. Kay Coles James, a staunch anti-abortionist who was formerly a dean at Pat Robertson’s Regent University and senior vice president of the Family Research Council, is now director of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, which monitors the federal workforce.
. . .
I don’t think Bush has set out to reshape church and state relationships, but by doing the kind of politics that he’s been doing, there are some strong implications,” says the University of Akron’s Green. Those implications were summarized, in their most radical form, by Pat Robertson in his l992 book, The New World Order. There, Robertson wrote, “There will never be world peace until God’s house and God’s people are given their rightful place of leadership at the top of the world.” America is certainly on top of the world, and with George W. Bush in the White House, religious conservatives are standing there with him. ~
In case this is NOT sinking in, it goes approximately like this: Unification Church (mass, arranged marriages, propagate and help save the world; woman as object/incubators, America as kingdom of Satan because of individualism, 100% obedience, one-world religion, mega-riches behind this, and well, SOMEONE has to be the head of that)(oh yes, and certain ethnic minorities — particularly Muslims, Latino — are devilish, dogs…) + BUSH (faith-centered initiatives, backed by the HHS grants, abstinence, marriage, fatherhood, we are a Christian nation, and Sun Myung Moon’s Washington Times is great reading ….) . . . . And we got “Dubwa Trouble.”
From “Metamyth – KoreaGate: Conservative Financial Ties to Billionaire Cultist Sun Myung Moon.
The Unification Church has funded, usually furtively, various conservative groups in Washington. One conservative insider told me over ten years ago that many Americans would be shocked at how much money for conservatives in Washington comes from Moonies.
It is rather anomalous that many political conservatives, and especially politically conservative Christians, work as closely with the Unification Church as they do. There should be more voices warning against the lies of Sun Myung Moon and the Unification Church. Does character matter?
David Becker, editor of the Christian Religion and Politics Digest
The enormously wealthy Reverend Sun Myung Moon has powerful friends in Washington and he uses his influential newspaper, the Washington Times, to keep these friends supportive of him. Moon has skillfully used the fear of Communism to gain powerful allies and to intimidate threatening foes. What few do not understand is that Communism is really not an issue with Moon, it is merely a banner which Moon uses to rally a large enough force to exert a powerful influence on society.
Rev. Sun Myung Moon may preach that he is the Adam and the Christ reincarnate, but he has been accused in a 447 page Congressional report with bribery, bank fraud, illegal kickbacks and illegal sale of arms. He was also accused of attempting to secretly build nuclear weapons for Korea. A Congressional report also indicated that Rev. Moon’s Unification Church was founded by a director of the Korean Central Intelligence Agency, Kim Chong Pil, as a political tool in 1961.
The House report states, “Kim Chong Pil organized the Unification Church while he was director of the ROK (Republic of Korea) Central Intelligence Agency, and has been using the church, which has a membership of 27,000, as a political tool.” Kim was among the inner core of Army officers who led the coup that brought President Park Chung Hee to power in 1961. The Moon organization denies any ties with the Korean government or intelligence community.
In 1977 Congressman Donald Frazer launched an investigation into Moon’s background. The House Committee report states that it uncovered evidence that the Moon organization had systematically violated U.S. tax, immigration, banking, currency and foreign agent registration laws. The investigator for the report commented, “We determined that their primary interest, at least in the U.S. at that time, was not religious at all, but was political, it was an attempt to gain power, influence and authority.” But after the inauguration of President Ronald Reagan all investigations were halted. Moon was Vice President George Bush’s guest at the inauguration and was a major financial contributor to the Washington conservative establishment.
A federal investigation into Moon’s finances led to a 1982 trial on charges of conspiracy and filing false tax returns. Moon was sent to the federal correctional institution in Danbury, Connecticut. He remained there for 13 months.
The Moon organization has spent an alarming amount of money in the United States in an effort to influence the government. More than $800 million has been spent on the Washington Times, alone. Most of Moon’s money comes from Japan. For almost 20 years there have been consistent reports that one of Moon’s most important financial supporters and advisors is Ryoichi Sasakawa. Sasakawa describes himself as “the world’s richest Fascist”.
In addition to his riches, according to author Walter Pat Choate [1996 Reform Party Vice Presidential candidate], “for more than half a century Sasakawa has been one of the primary political brokers inside Japan”. Choate claims that Sasakawa is part of Japan’s attempts to influence America’s politics and policies. “Many of Sasakawa’s and Moon’s operations parallel each other. They operate in the same way, giving away money, a great deal of attention to media and media organizations which operate across national borders, and the maintenance of a very right wing conservative focus,” states Choate.
Meanwhile, under religious tolerance + it’s a family matter, Westward-wishing Muslim young women, watch out.
Phyllis Chesler “gets” this and I think always has, from “Women & Madness” to her present warnings about politically-correct fear of telling the truth re: Jihad, and “Palestinization” of feminism . . . As others may speak about the LGBT-ization of N.O.W. – – leaving mothers somewhat in the lurch, in the church.:
The Muslims are Coming, The Muslims are Coming
Excerpt:
In France, young Muslims have been rioting for days—not about the age of retirement but in a display of hostility towards the French Republic; some are now describing this violence as “anti-French racism.” In Holland, young Muslims riot incessantly and call out the vilest hate speech imaginable against America, Israel, Jews, Holland, and infidels—and yet Dutch politician, Geert Wilders, is still the one on trial for telling the truth about Islamic jihad because it offended some Muslims.
No, the Wilders trial is not yet over; three judges must first agree with both the defense and the prosecution who have both asked that all charges be dropped.
Meanwhile, in the United States, Juan Williams was just fired by NPR aka National Palestinian Radio for admitting that he, like so many others, including many Muslims, “feels” some trepidation when he sees Arabs in Islamic clothing board a plane.
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“Parental Alienation” is Sign Language….Like “Domestic Violence”
Don’t ask me why I decided to post this draft, revealing my thoughts the other day. I don’t feel like telling. Hope never dies that exposing verbal idiocy might result in a net reduction of it.
At least on the part of the consumers — the marketers, well, this language use is wise.
PART 1:
PARENTAL ALIENATION
The words “Parental Alienation” signify that somewhere on this earth, a certain business sector, playing on human emotions, is prospering. As does “domestic violence” “child abuse” “Children and Families” and “Fatherhood” (enough syllables, seems to roll well off the tongue), and “false allegations,” “resource center” and “batterers’ intervention,” “supervised visitation,” and the like. These noun phrases are now just part of the landscape, and have developed their own specialized biosphere, with flora and fauna.
If you were a fine-feathered, raptor, and could soar with piercing vision, specialized hearing (and feathers) and incredible adaptations for dive-bombing your prey from on high in spirals, like the peregrin falcon, or hearing it underneath the snow, like certain owls (obviously I’ve been watching PBS here), and your prey were compromised populations, you JUST might be an initiative, a conference, a collaboration, a task force, a commission, or a nonprofit organization part of one of the above.
RAPTOR FORCE: Eagles, Falcons, Hawks, and Owls
NATURE takes flight on an exhilarating ride with elite winged predators in Raptor Force.
Humans have had a unique relationship with raptors, nature’s aerial killing machines, for more than four thousand years, first through the ancient sport of falconry, and, more recently, as scientists and engineers have turned to these mighty birds — from golden eagles, red-tailed hawks, and turkey vultures, to great gray owls and the peregrine falcon — as the inspiration for the latest in aircraft design. Using the tricks and tactics of raptors as their model, engineers have devised fighter jets with unprecedented maneuverability and stealth.
In Raptor Force, you’ll learn the secrets of these astonishing aerialists, and how they’ve mastered, more than any other type of bird, the art of soaring. And with the help of engineer and falconer Rob MacIntyre’s ingenious miniature television station — a camera, transmitter, and battery small enough to be harnessed onto the backs of raptors — you’ll see for yourself what it’s like to fly with these deadly aces
I already brought up the concept of the Family Law System as a Giant Squid, fearsome tentacles lurking in the dar, able to tear apart ships, the stuff of mythology. Now it’s time to get the view from on high, the “Task Force” viewpoint, the elite, all-seeing, dive-bombing, never-see-it-coming social policy collaboratives (etc.).
Well, like raptors, they come in different flavors, and target different prey. But they’re all aerial artists. Some are solo, some fly in woods, some even work in teams, I learned through this show.
The owl uses sound — its ears are uneven. Its specialized facial feathers help with that.
The peregrin falcon is a dive-bomber. Specialized eye covering deflects flying sand particles, which at high speed, could sure hurt.
With birds, you can see this by their shapes, although closer look gets a finer appreciation. With humans, one has to be more sensitive to language and behaviors to figure out whether they are distressed prey, congregants meeting to figure out what to do about distressed prey, or raptors coming in for those lower on the food chain.
Some go for distressed Dads. Some go for distressed Moms. So long as the conciliation code (at least in my state) rules that ANY couple having a squabble about custody, that squabble per se gives jurisdiction of their young to the raptors. Excuse me, Conciliation Courts, a.k.a., later, Family Courts. Now, what typically distresses said Dads, or Moms, is generally the other Parent. Which brings us to “Parental Alienation.”
(1)
“Parental:”
Define “Parental.” Go ahead — I dare you.
For that matter, define “Parent.” Go ahead. I dare you, find an all-purpose word that fits all definitions, starting with the noun, before it became verbified (to parent) and adjectified (“Parental”), specified as to who has the kids (Custodial/noncustodial — a term also associated with prison, i.e., “taken into custody” as well as with winning a court debate, i.e., “custody granted.”), and finally market-niched (“Parenting classes”).
The word is already de-gendered, as if the world were not, or any of its 3 Abrahamic world religions were not.
(meaning includes “obeying.” This can get complicated in practice, as in:
ABC NewsProsecutor proposes jail time for parents who miss teacher conferences – 4 hours ago Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy introduced a proposal Tuesday at a Detroit City Council meeting that would require a parent to attend at least one .
In this case, the parent is childified…. and the prosecutor, in behalf of the education establishment, is parentified. Ironically, the word “educare” has a root meaning of Lead Out, not Box In (or, Stuff in, as in knowledge into people’s heads).
PARENT:
Now, like they say Eskimos have different words for snow, we have diversified words for “parent” — step-, bio-, surrogate- foster- adoptive- in addition to the older “grand-” (indicating biological). Whoever the kids in custody are living with at the time, they had better obey the Residential Parent, or the court may just switch them to the other one, or to another type of breeding ground called Juvenile Hall.
Such a diversity of language indicates a thriving business, and that obviously some parents are absent, or incompetent, or need supervision, etc. Which just goes to show who the “real” parent is as to assigning custody, but the real “parents” are as to assigning responsibility for any screwups.
Occasionally the word “father” or “mother” will show up in a new sarticle, or in a grants application, but generally, to say it’s neutral, it’s about custody rights, which means “PARENTAL.” Glad I established that. This word does NOT stand on its own when challenged — by anyone, almost — but it does mean, someone is open for business.
(2)
Alien-ation
Alien-Nation, etc.
Let’s keep this one short. I keep thinking about Arizona, where “aliens” are bad and you can be arrested for being alien improperly. So, I’d have to say that “alien” is bad in connotation, even though much business is done by resident “illegal aliens,” and in fact, some business would close were it not. Now, apart from UFO space-ship variety (promoting a different set of businesses, much of it digital, but also involving conferences…)
“Parental Alienation” is bad if a parent does it, but good if you’re in the business of protesting it, or running seminars for judges about it. The call “Parental Alienation” indicates a resonance to the AFCCNET.org philosophy that the goal is to reconcile marriages for the good of the nation. So the net value is neutral (one group of parents and affiliated associations use this term, an opposing group opposes the use of this term. This extends up into the stratosphere, where raptors flying around the Federal Aeyrie (?) can snag some grants to handle the problem, and plummet to street level with demonstration projects and initiatives. So, it’s good for them. Bad for taxpayers, I’d have to say.
============
WHO SETS THE DEBATE? The debate is not “PARENTAL ALIENATION” v . “CHILD ABUSE” any more than it is, categorically, Fathers v. Mothers, or Conservatives v. Liberals.
I see it as “teachers” vs. “taught.” My point in that last post is that I am no longer interested in the verbiage (pro/con) surrounding “alienation.” I am more interested in dishonest usage of the word “Parent” to obscure gender bias, but beyond that, I think it’s time to figure out the profit motive, and think seriously about the role of wealth (as opposed to jobs) in the larger picture. Then the networks become a little more plain to understand, beyond the rhetoric. ALthough I may not communicate it too well, an attempt is at the bottom of today’s post.
Meanwhile . . . .
Words are understood in their usage and in context, including who is speaking.
Parental Alienation is essentially a term coined to get certain things done, including therapists into the legal process, and conferences training judges (etc.) about it, into certain people’s resumes. Perfectly reasonable and pre-existing terms to describe the same thing aren’t as good a market niche. For one, “Stockholm Syndrome” or “traumatic bonding” or “custodial interference” in context might do as well. Or “brainwashing” or “child abuse.”
The debate about “Parental Alienation” is at a stalemate, but the field is full-throttle ahead, regardless of what any organization pronounces about it. It’s derailing the more important questions, and the distraction is intentional, I”m sure of it.
PART 2:
“Domestic Violence”
Domestic Violence Industry Awareness Month – My Comments on this site, responding to another Press Article, by DV Nonprofit responding to a family (he killed his kids) fatality surrounding Battered Shelter & “Unsupervised Visitation” and judge “just not understanding.”
After writing that comment (post-length, actually), I went back to TAGGS.hhs.gov and looked at how many (millions$) were going to Family Violence Prevention and Marriage/Fatherhood Promotion — in the same state. What a shocker. The real question is who is tracking BOTH sets of funding, and why not shut BOTH of them off, leaving some more funds at the local level, and perhaps some marriages might be less economically stressed, which might save lives (though poverty is no excuse for murder, nor is family “honor” !)
This blogger “gets” the grants racket. Needless to say, this POV is not circulated prominently by the DV experts.
Suggest just read the page. In case anyone wonders, I have never spoken to that blog author, I just happen to share many of the Points of View she reports (not all — for example, I’m not in favor of GPS ankle bracelets…). I suspect this will make sense to someone who has experienced some of the types of events she reports on.
It’s a long page, worth scrolling all the way through (and reading).
“Www.FamilyLawCourts.com/Domestic.”
Media rarely reports why these murders keep continuing. However, the reality is they’re profitable for the domestic violence businesses and police agencies seeking Grants.
And so, rather than divorce or break up; we are treated to headlines, like Postal worker charged with murdering pregnant girlfriend but never a real, substantive investigation.
So stories of failed mediation, follow. Murder – Suicide. Again.
As opposed to just killing the “disgrunted” wife. A more common solution. Hans Reiser finally confesses he murdered Nina Reiser after proclaiming his innocence for so long; because of a remark she made.
Kids willing and do, testify, but still these cases are kept in Family Court.
Not only do Family Court judges continually protect the economically superior, the Executive Branch of government rather than enforce existing laws, under the guise of helping women through the Office of Violence Against Women, fund police departments, who are not legally required to respond to calls for enforcement of restraining orders, instead. {{in which we see another blogger utilizes incomplete sentences...the “But also” is missing. Actually, it’s in the next sentence. Perhaps this writer’s sentence ligaments got torn in the process of a custody battle, like mine.pieces drop off in the execution of a thought. Pun not intended...}}
Worse, rather than use funds from their own budget, police departments request funds From DOJ for bullet-proof vests;so officers will be safer when answering calls; which may or may not include responding to calls from desperate women.
See: “LAW ENFORCEMENT” or “ARREST.” Recent news:
…and when might reporters out “Anger Management Classes” run by non-profits serve to buy a paycheck for the top management running them?
San Francisco Anger Management Programs Don’t Work. However, there is no shortage of these “non-profits” meaning the individual doesn’t profit from their services, in any city and backed by any politician.
Man on the way to Anger Management Class Attacks Woman
Wouldn’t it be nice if women could get This kind of security?
So domestic violence programs continue for the funding source they are, mostly without family court litigants being aware, how vested state and city officials are in micro-managing lives, . . . . .
or
To Discipline an Unethical Judge, Just Establish a Commission to Consider Whether To..
Since 1960, with complaints about judges now totaling nearly a thousand per year, but only Sixteen judges have been removed from the State of California.
Because the Commission on Judicial Performance, seldom performs, LA County, by necessity, instituted a separate body, to investigate,
Unfortunately, it was the non performance of the Commission on Judicial Performance, specifically the Commission’s private “reprimand” of two San Diego judges, now both, convicted felons to highlight public awareness to a body that will not act to protect the public from felons posing as judges.
What began as a voter referendum forty years ago, has outlived its usefulness.
Lack of judicial accountability in California is its own scandal, separate from the child abuse and gender bias perpetuated by judges running amok within the system.
The budget for the Commission on Judicial Performance, is $3,704,000, distributed as follows.
16 attorneys or counsel, and 10 support staff
Total salaries & wages plus benefits paid $2,629,000
Total support/operating costs $1,075,000
Total Budget $3,704,000The major task of the Commission of Judicial Performance is to investigate complaints about judges.
[From Sidebar:]
Thirty-five percent of its roughly the four million dollar a year budget, is devoted to not opening an investigation after receiving complaints.
This explains why, after receiving Nine Hundred complaints one year, the total number of judges who were “admonished” numbered, six.
Six.
Four million dollars, almost a thousand complaints, and six,
“Don’t do that.” from the CJP
As the numbers confirm, absolutely the Safest occupation in all California is being a bad judge.
“Parental Alienation” & “Domestic Violence”
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Street Level — this shows which infantry you are in.
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Strategic Level – either way, it’s profit, but this is how task forces are delegate to one area or the other.
Another blogger gets this — same as above, on the business of DV — now she weighs in on “Parental Alienation” (although, the Lauren & Ted case, last 2 posts, she took the opposite side I did), it just might be worth a read.
A Nation of Stockholm Children (Aug. 2009, on Open Salon):
In the continued coverage of the Jaycee Lee Dugard case, not likely to be reported is the larger issue of a nation roiling in an epidemic of Stockholm Syndrome kids.
Media’s near total black-out of our nation’s busiest court, dooms our children while ensuring the decades long epidemic of Stockholm children will continue for generations.The most extreme form of parental alienation I’ve seen recently involved a custody dispute in Lawrence, Kansas with the children of Arthur Davis seemingly part of a plan to beat their mother to death with a baseball bat. During a 9-1-1 call, Arthur can be heard screaming in the background to his son, “Hit her harder.”
From failing to educate the public to the profits of those who work in the divorce industry, or family court judges inappropriately adjudicating cases which should rightly be in criminal court;lack of media exposure ensures a nation of damaged children will become damaged adults.
Who profits? Therapists.
. . .(KEEP READING . .. . )
I’m not sure media blackout is the issue, but media spin, and a public so overwhelmed with info, they cannot process it. We do not know how the critical “operating systems” of the country actually work, including courts, law enforcement, government, and the role of religion in all this, child support systems, and the increasingly tightening of networks through the Internet.
Note: I cannot continue “teaching” (publicizing) through posts until my Internet access is up to speed (i.e., MHz very slow!). Just continue to keep in mind: The U.S.A. is the world’s largest per capita jailor, and captive audiences are captive for demonstrations of the latest theories, behavioral management techniques, or justification for (yet more) grants.
I saw a poster on a blog that says what to do, well enough:
It’s time to remember what this man did, and how he did it.
Also, to understand the INNATE characteristics of money — which is to congregate at centers of wealth, and drain from the extremities. That’s the kind of money the U.S. (at least) has, i.e., that which we BUY at interest, which will never be paid off, from the Federal Reserve. There are reasons we “have” to become a nation of consumers, and that failing to consume enough of what we really don’t need (and makes us sick, in some cases) has become an indication of “treason.” In examining the courts from the roots up, it does go to Washington, D.C., and to understand the monetary setting of policy by super-wealthy foundations and families (through government, through universities, etc.), it’s also necessary to grasp, even if dimly, that the North/South (?) division of the globe into countries forced to become export economies, rather than self-sufficient, to pay off THEIR debt — means that those products have to come back to the more industrialized countries. Yeah, I”m an armchair economist, but search “Susan George” on this blog (or just get the book) for a clue.
The Internet flattens, but access (or restricted access) to it also further segments society. The section in Maroon in yesterday’s post bears follow-up (if you can).
Here, is a description of what centrally based (and non-bona fide) money does to communities:
THE PROBLEM WITH CONVENTIONAL MONEY:
- It is partisan
Money as we know it is not a neutral service provided by the government. Our money supply is created by private financial institutions on a for-profit basis. This money system is designed to benefit those who provide it, not those who use it.- It is based on debt
Money is created when banks grant loans. Thus for every unit created there is one unit of debt.- We are encouraged to think of it as a ‘thing’
Money is essentially information and has no physical existence yet banks encourage us to think of it as a ‘thing’ so that they can ‘lend’ it to us and thereby make a profit by charging interest. ‘Thing’ money also has to be created, distributed and controlled so that there is not too much of it. It can also be stolen, lost, bought, sold and counterfeited, with serious consequences for everyone.- It is permanently scarce
The money to pay the interest on debt-money is never created. There is therefore a permanent shortfall of money to pay back both the principal and the interest.- It causes cancerous growth
Banks continuously need to create more money than is required to pay back their loans so that borrowers can pay back the interest on those loans. This is the source of the growth imperative of our economies. There must be a continual expansion of bank credit or else the economy goes into recession. Systemic growth leads to the environmental problems we now all face.- Its value is based on its shortage
The shortfall of money keeps it valuable. There only needs to be enough of it to buy back the goods and services available. This has nothing to do with the monetary requirements of people. Those who have none are not seen by the market and so are marginalised.- It is expensive
Every unit of conventional money is based on a unit of debt. This debt has to be paid back with interest, and the interest on the interest is compounding. Interest is built into the prices of everything we buy, resulting in higher consumer prices.- It redistributes wealth from the poor to the wealthy
Usury is the tool used by the wealthy to suck wealth from the poor and middle classes to the moneyed class. Parasitism and class antagonisms are the result of this.- It promotes dishonesty and corruption
You can get it without delivering anything of value (e.g. speculation, interest, gambling etc.) so people concentrate on ‘making money’ rather than producing/delivering anything of real value. It is usually far easier to get money through dishonest means than by honest work. When you have no money you have no choice but to try and get it dishonestly- It leaks away from where it is created
Conventional money knows no bounds and loyalty. It always leaks away to the ‘money centres’ (financial centres, big businesses, etc.)- It destroys local economies
Goods produced cheaper elsewhere replace locally produced goods. This creates a local shortage of money and reduces the market for local sellers. This also results in the irrational transportation of goods all over the world, consuming precious fossil fuels and creating pollution.- It destroys community
Dependence on money means we no longer need our neighbours. We can get everything from anonymous strangers in return for money. We have no obligation to anyone when the bills are paid. Every trade is a complete and closed action: you provide me with something and I give you money. End of story. No one does us any favours and we need do no favours for anyone.- It fosters competitiveness
The shortage of money means we all have to fight for a share of an amount that is too small to go around. The need to repay interest means that we have to eat others to prevent ourselves from going under.- It creates poverty
While it makes some super rich, it makes most people poor. Poverty is caused by a lack of money (not by a lack of jobs). Usury and the need to keep money scarce ensure that money constantly moves to those who already have money.- It causes social and cultural degradation
The elimination of local opportunities to exchange and relate to one another focuses attention on ways of getting money outside the community. Communities fall apart as they become indebted to entities outside their communities.- And so many more …!
Now let’s think a little bit about TIME. If a person is earning an hourly wage, then TIME in court is wages lost, to say the least. What about their “psychic” emotional and other energy. including creative and thought energies, which would otherwise be put into taking care of their own basic needs, and their family’s (such as it may be, if in a divorce or custody situation). It’s GONE from the mix. In waltzes in (federally, state, then “local” meaning, a child support agency at the county level) – and says we are going to transfer income from A to B. Consider the bureaurcarcy in that, and the antagonism it creates. Families have died over this. Let me repeat. I have yet to hear of a mother murdering over child support, but their is no lack of newsprint on fathers, in this context. His basic authority and social credibility — income producing — has been challenged by the government. Meanwhile, this same Child Support agency waltzes into the newly single mother’s life, perhaps (and if abuse was involved, likely newly poor single) and says, we will interface for you. And yet, this entire system, it later develops, has been co-opted as a custody-switching agency. A federalization of basic life processes. So I say, boycott it. It’s got the power to incarcerate — or not. At will, if a mother has signed over her rights as a result off initially going on welfare. (A fact not typically made much of — but in years to come, will figure highly in any contested case…).
So, here are all these taxes going to socially engineer the country, and causing a lot of strife, and competition for working in the fields supported by this social engineering. How many of the services provided are the most basic ones that we couldn’t do without, and how many of the infrastructures and institutions created are transparent enough for the average participant to actually comprehend
I am certainly not a go-back-to-the-farm proponent, but the codependency here is too much, upon JOBS. The key difference between “job” and “business” is who keeps the profits, and who gets to deduct expenses before taxes.
People who were raised to just love what they do, and specialize in it, are called “professionals,” often, which brings up — who is going to pay for them to do what they love doing, and market it, contract it, do administration, etc. (unless people wish to “do it all” and “keep it small”?) One of the safest places to be a professional in a field that will rarely go away, is to do it for the US Government (I think). And in the courts, too.
Well, there’s a lot more to all this, but the key in the courts is where is the money moving around to, whether through professional referrals, trainings, or simply directly from litigants to fees. Multiply that to all contested custody cases involving children, per state, be aware there are 50 states (and US territories), and think about it.
There is, FYI, a two-tier court track:
1. Can afford fees. They will be “soaked;” one party may be bankrupted later, or up front, to inspire more fights.
1a. Then the therapists can come in and counsel how to reduce conflicts.
2. Can’t afford fees. These will be the revolving door cases, but because there’s such an easy way to get INTO court again, any old OSC almost will do it, and most litigant’s aren’t smart enough to move to dismiss up front (on any of a variety of grounds), these will repeatedly be brought back to court — and possibly produce a candidate for food stamps, SSI, or some other part of the welfare system to continue justifying its existence. Their data will be mined for further studies by social scientists (etc.) in remote locations.
2a. Occasionally a 1a or a 2a may result in someone going off the deep end, with a weapon. However, as this eventually causes social and economic deterioration, over a period of decades, no lack of new, fresh faces for the family law system (and associated professions).
Just a little more on “interest”:
The first source of plunder upon your wealth is the concept of compound interest. Have you heard that the best thing you can do with your money is to let it compound? Such statements are everywhere. “Compound interest is the next best thing since sliced bread.” Do not let these statements fool you. Compound interest is a wealth erosion strategy that has cost the American people billions of dollars.
Why is compounding interest one of the most devastating wealth-eroding techniques? How could having your money grow and compound be bad for anyone? Those who plunder your wealth want you to believe that earning a high rate of interest, and leaving it to compound over a long period is to your financial advantage. Billions of advertiser dollars are spent on promoting this technique to many unwary consumers.
We will present the facts about compound interest. Make sure that you read this material slowly. Use a calculator or computer as you read to verify the accuracy of our numbers and findings. This lesson could save you millions of dollars over your lifetime.
Basically this site is reminding us that, compounding interest or not, what about taxes?
(co. 2004-2008, Evans Financial Group)
My point being, OK, OK,
be aware of the rhetoric,
but pay attention to common “cents” on where the “dollars” are going.
In some respects, could any ex be worse than this system long-term? The answer in many cases is, yes. But, maybe a civic duty is to get the field reports out, for posterity.
What are ALL the relevant elements of any situation — as best you can ascertain them.
Which of those are actionable — now, and in the long run.
What can you do not to overwhelm your personal comprehension system into “Paralysis”?
The human psyche can absorb a LOT of information (varies with individuals), but to act on it is natural. I think that overload jsut builds up tension and frustration, and a sense of powerlessness. To know what to act on, with purpose towards a certain goal, is critical to humanity. Being in systems of such chaos (and corruption) as these family law systems, is dangerous to the health. It tests character to handle it.
To give this post a semblance of structure, I’d like to conclude the way I started:
“Don’t ask me why I decided to post this draft, revealing my thoughts the other day. I don’t feel like telling. “
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My High Conflict with Promoting National Alliances
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I usually steer clear of this group, but there have been some “Family Squabbles” affecting bloggers I do hang out with, and share data with. A little explanation, after pausing to look at the kid-artwork above about “Protecting OUR children” [WHOSE children?] [boy, that protecting children theme really sets a group apart from the crowd, including CPS, crckids.org, etc.] and to notice the “ING” in “EnsurING the rights of children and protective mothers in family court.” Remember my recent post in the “-INGS” in the industry?
Who is this? well, it says, on the “About Us” page:
Lundy Bancroft is the author of three books in the field, including Why Does He Do That?, When Dad Hurts Mom, and the national prize-winner The Batterer as Parent. He has worked with over a thousand abusers directly as an intervention counselor, and has served as clinical supervisor on another thousand cases. He has also served extensively as a custody evaluator, child abuse
investigator, and expert witness in domestic vio
lence and child abuse cases. Lundy appears across the United States as a presenter for judges and other court personnel, child protective workers, therapists, law enforcement officials, and other audiences.
Co-founder # 1 is (obviously) not a mother (which doesn’t mean he can’t empathize with mothers, or even protective mothers). He is a professional in this field and on the conference circuit. As such, he is in sales (see books) and in consulting (see conference circuit). My pointing this out is not a valuation of Mr. Bancroft or his work, just a mention of what business he is in.
Co-founder #2 IS a mother, a protective mother, and her profile resembles many protective mother profiles (at least the sector with degrees who married wealthy abusive husbands, as opposed to poor abusive husbands, as opposed to those who didn’t marry, all of who could easily become protective mothers once they hit family law.
Janice Levinson holds a BA degree from Saint Leo University in Florida. She is a former teacher and protective mother of 3 grown children. She was a victim of the corrupt family court system for over a decade. After divorcing her wealthy and abusive ex husband, Janice had full legal and physical custody of all three children. {{That alone is unusual in these times; usually it’s joint both, or joint legal and sole physical: what decade?}} By the time her youngest aged out of the system she lost custody of her children, due to family court corruption. Janice was never accused of any wrong doing as she was an outstanding stay at home mother. {{Again, representing some of the protective mother population.}}
Janice is currently a nurse working on her BSN with a background in Psychiatric nursing. {Presumably that photo is around 16 years old; kids have aged out. If she’d put her baby’s photo on line with an open case, she might have been threatened with jail, like Ms. Dombroswki has been for doing this as a noncustodial mother.}
OK, so it’s one Mom who knows about wealthy abusive husbands, who lost in court {{might be helpful for understanding politics, methinks}}, who knows that family courts are corrupt, and one respected professional. Now, what about this protective mothers alliance? Is it a nonprofit and does anyone in it draw a salary? Have they built upon prior SUCCESS in this field? Because many organizations already exist. When did it start?
Janice along with Lundy Bancroft co-founded Protective Mothers Alliance International in April of 2009.
- LAST YEAR?? ??? I spent most of 2009 researching information from a group that started in 1993, and validating its message. Based on that the facts checked out, I expanded that information and started blogging the “missing data” that the professionals I guess just forgot to tell me in the prior decade. Is any such newcomer going to have new information, insight, or perspectives on what already exists in this field and fails to protect mothers? Has Janic’es veteran status helped her help a single other mother avoid the same pitfall and successfully retain custody, or regain it after losing it due to court corruption? If that answer is “No” (most of ours would be also), that equals a level playing field unless something new is brought to the table.
Co-founded? Well, who approached whom first, and why? Did she attend a conference he was at? Did he advise one of her court hearings? Howsa about that anecdote?
Does “co-found” plan to be an empire? Like founding fathers? I guess so — they move fast:
Since then PMA has acquired {{Acquired? Recruited??} more than 50 state chapter leaders in 30 states and several countries world wide. They have started a PMA blog talk radio show dealing with the many issues that involve the continued abuse by fathers through the family court system. {{Again, not necessarily unique}} Featured guests on the blog talk radio show are professional advocates in the movement with a special spot light {“spotlight“}on giving protective mothers a platform to tell their story.
My Comment:
Protective mothers are very resourceful about telling their stories, and already had platforms. Two of these are called “The Web” and include (free) blogtalkradio. Believe it or not, many of us are articulate and resourceful, and some of us even strike it up with a professional here and there, as “Janice and Lundy” have (Is Janice remarried? Does Mr. Bancroft have a tolerant wife in the wings somewhere? But I guess since this PMA is a “family” it’s good to have a Mommy figure and a Daddy figure around, on first-name basis to the rest of us.) Although it’s nice of them to give us some things we already had, platforms, apparently allegiance is expected in return — because this alliance (and especially recruiting & acquiring all those chapter leaders, persuading them that this is a better platform than the others…) must represent a whole lot of volunteer work, as Mr. Lundcroft sounds quite busy. Aspects of this uncomfortably remind me of the Unification Church, with wise parents, family squabbles (which Mom — not Dad, who is busy elsewhere bringing home the bacon) is responsible to settle –and unruly children.
SO, I guess (based on this “About Us” description) I get it. They lean towards the professionals as the centerpiece (called PR) and (for extra credit for the professionals, and PMA that is), non-gagged-by-a-judge Moms — who are already telling their stories, first, IN COURTS, and after that, nationwide, on blogs, on talk radio, and among themselves, and some even publishing, are not allowed to do it in on talkradio and in front of professionals and move over to the PMA umbrella, instead of whatever venue they were under formerly. Again, not exactly that unique.
Janice and Lundy have started a PMA bi-monthly news letter which is another vehicle for education and exposure about family court corruption. Janice continues to move forward full force in shining the light on the truth about the many problems that children and protective mothers face in family court.
I get it. Add to the above unique qualities (acquiring a network of chapter coorinators so fast at least speaks of persuasive or efficiency!), modesty.
WITH THAT INTRODUCTION:
This post wont make sense unless one reads the comment string on this link below, with an exhortation Why Can’t We All Just Get Along? from a group known for backbiting, excommunicating, and pretending there’s persecution when — where is that “persecution, exactly?” I dropped by to say, “Time’s Up!” on life is a grade school playground, and a nice monitor would actually make a difference; we must all behave ourselves now….
Getting me irritated sometimes brings out a string of information stored in the warehouse of my mind (from prior research). I thought it might be interested to post a (pretty much) first-run “rant” (I did pause to add links) that obviously went over comment length (4,096 characters is the common one). Rather than pare it down (what? and lose those choice tidbits and references?) I just moved the whole thing to my blog here as a post, adding a few lengths. More coherent comments may be found at “rightsformothers.com” which graphically is easier on the eyes. Those comments typically include blockquotes and links (at least three) and stay unified around the theme.
RE:
PROTECTIVE MOTHERS MOVEMENT NEEDS UNITY
(comments thread — here’s mine, that, as ever, was over “4,096” characters).
Good grief.
My intent in this comment (if approved) is to get enough people angry with me (if that helps) to check out a few non-coalition websites with a different approach than electing ONE set of leaders to speak for an entire nation of protective mothers. Remember, before USA, King George /British Empire was probably saying the same thing. “Why can’t we all just get along? And keep them taxes coming, Colonies! You are British subjects, right?”… The key concept is, who is colonizing WHOM in these matters?
Here are some interesting facts (themes) I discovered after following “characteristics of batterers” crowd (thereby losing my kids, or a more to-the-point approach of connecting the dots in the family law system) for a number of years
—
There are all kinds of interesting things one can learn by just NOT participating in “who’s your Daddy?” (or “Mommy?”) discussions — like these… Here’s a book that sustained me right after my abuse and gave me a vision for getting out of it. It contains zero professional jargon, but spoke to me, and the women in it all got OUT.
Believe me, I can handle professional jargon in a number of fields; it’s not all “jargon” to me. Unfortunately, the jargon in these industries frames AND limits the discussion from considering alternate viewpoints or explanations.
THE EVOLVING WOMAN
(google books link)
“The Evolving Woman: Intimate Confessions of Surviving Mr. Wrong.” Lanigan & Blanco. (c. 2000). These are short, written by real women survivors, and give hope.
Want something else to talk about besides who’s IN and who’s OUT –and from women in the system, AND if you would like to do this without promoting everyone else’s products for them, for free? hop on over to Nancy Carroll‘s blog (rightsformothers.com) and read some of its reporting, and I also comment there quite a bit (comments are post-length).
Or mine, as rough as it looks (not bad for someone’s first blog and without regular access to internet, either): “https://familycourtmatters.wordpress.com” . . .. Or any number of others who cover things NOT covered in the $135 or so downloadable book recently being promoted by Mo Hannah and Barry Goldstein. I will get it, when I get $135. To spare, that is. Also see (N. CA site) http://justicewomen.org and be sure to vote in any local D.A. elections and read its section on, does law enforcement have any duty to protect? (i.e., are restraining orders enforceable).
I’ll break ranks with some of my on-line friends and recommend reading — LOTS — of http://www.familylawcourts.com/domestic.html to understand — this person does– the finances behind the industry, and why you don’t ask a Commission from inside any industry on almost Anything to get things done, and how particularly foolish is asking the California Judicial Council to reconsiders its ways, before knowing what those ways are. Those who were demonstrating (West Coast) with a group called Center for Judicial Excellence about shredding of mediation records in Marin County, would be fascinated to find out what the transfer of an entire (that’s nationwide) computer system from PACER to SUSTAIN signifies to whether their own court orders are valid — or invalid. Makes a DIFF, folks. Google those terms, plus ZERNIK.
Guess what. This may lead you to some father’s groups supporting him also, reporting on Richard Fine’s wrongful imprisonment. Guess what. Anyone against corruption is on your side. Mr. Fine is, and what happened to him overlaps with our cause. Or see the lizlibrary.org, and how it’s not good custody evaluators or bad ones, but what are they doing in there to start with? ??? ???? (Therapeutic Jurisprudence). . .
. . . Or, how about the thing about judicial kickbacks, and bribes. It’s not like they “Just don’t understand” but perhaps there are some financial reasons they don’t? By the time we figure out which “Protective Mother Alliance” was the right one, (and, naturally, who is in its pantheon, and who’s head god), there might be no United States — they will be Federalized, like the domestic violence movement has been, and the fatherhood movement, and the child protection industry. I was asked to join PMA because of my research skills, after copying some charts to it in the earlier days. I declined, for specific and private reasons.
Well, one reason was that a quick look at the “Guardians of Truth” newsletter (grandiose, much?) showed, I felt, that the character was more about fan clubs and social alliances (plus Mr. Bancroft’s books and groupings. Notice, a fan of his writings, I have two of his books, have blogged him positively (for the most part) and have never had phone contact, or made that a high priority. However, if you want some little economic analysis behind the rhetoric, do your own audits (or visit my sites or anyone else who does this, PLUS sites ending *.gov).
Again this might be a little hard — a 1983 immigrant Ph.D. molecular biologist (Ph.D. obtained in U.S.) Dentist (picked up as a sideline? I think the guy has some brains…) in Los Angeles area (Joseph Zernik, Ph.D.) who doesn’t appear to have a vested interest (i.e. a product to sell) also picked up some skills in database (computer) analysis. I just heard about this recently, so here’s a few leads: “Computerized or Con-Puterized” by Janet Phelan (references also Kids For Cash and summarizes the problem), she also writes on the Probate Scams, which FYI relates to judicial corruption, i.e., kickbacks.
Guess what. Because these things keep going on, and trashing some women’s psyches (yours might be, too), sooner or later they could be elder incompetents, not just maternal incompetents, as far as someone who wants the assets is concerned. There is a network of judicial/guardianship/AND real estate issues in this matter, which (if understood) will clearly state that “educating a judge” is like Russian Roulette. Not wise to play….
When an L.A. judge throws an anti-trust attorney Richard Fine (also one who uncovered some child support scams, as the L.A. District Attorney Garcetti was sitting on $14 mil of collected child support) in coercive solitary confinement for over a year (age, 69) without a warrant FROM A COURTROOM and the arrest records are later doctored — I think it’s time to take notice.
So, you want “nationwide unity?” Does this mean leadership associated with this [PMA] group plan to take their products yet more national?
NATIONWIDE UNITY? Examples of total tribal “unity” — or else — are found in Nazi Germany, Rwanda, and other countries with similar genocides, or “genocide-like activities.”
I don’t think those are good role models. I disagree frequently with women I associate with on-line. It’s healthy, and sometimes even high-conflict, and productive. If any one of them had pulled this PMA style “gossip girl” or “ex-communication” routine, I’d not bother to revisit their site. Life, and time, is precious. Allocate it well. I’m only visiting this one now because I’m tired of intelligent women behaving like they weren’t (no offence to any intelligent men on this list).
NB: My father was a creative thinker, a.k.a inventor. Let’s not lose these qualities in our culture, OK? Without his NON-mainstream analysis of certain problems long ago, there wouldn’t be Facebook, let alone Facebook security leaks, and Facebook wars. There are IMPORTANT aspects of this system that Lundy’s wonderful books, much as I appreciate them, didn’t tell us, and that the latest one from Civic Research Institute also won’t (I looked at the [free] table of contents & front matter in detail, at least). For example, who’s footing which bills for whom. You can go as psychological and “they need more understanding” as you want, but a good financial analysis (and corporation genealogies from time to time) will handle that real quick.
Searching the Title of the Civic Research Institute Offering, besides this new publication, others on the same 3 topics already existed, and are getting scholarly sites as follows:
Scholarly articles for Domestic Violence, Child Abuse and Custody
… : The impact of domestic violence on child custody … – Cahn – Cited by 290
Domestic violence and custody litigation: The need for … – Keenan – Cited by 57
Child abuse and domestic violence: Legal connections … – Davidson – Cited by 72
RE: Judges just don’t understand. Yes they do. They understand, many of them, which side the bread is buttered on.
That’s the educator’s mantra. When will they understand? Understanding is directly related to caring; so the key question becomes, what do they care most about? Go tell the IRS “you just don’t understand” and see if re-educating them about their “attitudes” works, the next time they want answers.
One thing a certain judge in Los Angeles understood clearly, is that a certain attorney was getting too close for comfort. Response? Jail the guy without filing charges, “coercive solitary confinement” on a 69 year old man, and falsify the records of arrest afterwards. Now that news is not breaking, but that PROCESS should be in the headlines, and stay in our headlights.
The irritation in my tone here represents a LOT of legwork, googling, and producing chart after chart from government sites regarding HHS payments to (a) stop violence and (b) promote fatherhood = (c) undermine the process of law in the courts. Plus an awareness of the headlines, and awareness of what network marketing looks like — and this is network marketing, only unlike some groups, we are expected to network market without identifiable, tangible profits to those we are promoting. For example, like 1% of sales, or discounts on our own purchases. If this is all about altruism and helping women, then how about donating a percent of profits to legal representation — or, teaching us how to re-purpose information already available, congregate with likeminded people, and assemble and market (for free) a downloadable ebook? And as a nonprofit? And/or consult, based on the fact that you were connected enough and smart enough to get positioned in a new market niche? **
** (really: those are valuable skills, and respected by others who exhibit them. But when Moms needing help are homeless, on disability from their injuries and STILL not seeing their (minor) kids, perhaps there is a different priority of skillsets — and information — to acquire. Like yours…)
Most people find charts “boring.” I find them fascinating, when what’s in them may relate to my future, or my daughters’. Or explains the “communication gap” in the courts. I almost never fail to learn something. For example, the HHS ones numbering in the million$$ and saying “Discretionary” “Demonstration” and “Non-Competing” are particularly interesting, lacking even an abstract of their purpose and with a Principal “Investigator” who lacks a web presence. How many Think Tanks does it take to grind the process of wisely choosing what to think about to a halt?
You should see what’s up in Texas these days, multi-million$$ “discretionary” grants. And you should know who’s getting them. I will not — I repeat NOT — give my (on-line or $$) allegiance or time to someone, particularly anyone selling something, or asking me to promote their philosophy in protecting anyone, who doesn’t “show me the goods” in this industry, and who refuses to acknowledge it is an industry. When it comes to custody, show me the testimonials of success (not failure; let’s not make a profession out of failures, pls.) their contact numbers, and their case activity dockets, and who paid which professionals(if any) how much in them
There are some ways to get continued attention and support (speaking for me, at least):
- First of all, if it’s a professional in the courts speaking, PROOF: LET’S SEE YOUR TRACK RECORD (custody cases reversed after switch to batterer, or a challenge to get it to the abuser defeated — using your suggested techniques). If this is a NON PROFIT, I want the EIN# too, because the entire family law system got started, from what I can tell, with a slush found out of the LA County Courthouse. Give me that EIN# and first, we find out if you’re honest about the incorporation (and salaries of CEOs). Anyone running a for-profit or for-PR storefront shouldn’t be leading. They may follow, but they should not lead.
- Second, does your analysis account for ALL the primary principal “players” in this industry? Correctly?
- Does it allow for the possibility of actual corruption and bribe-taking? If so, it doesn’t acknowledge how government works. Let’s not be gullible in this matter, please. There’s organized crime (RICO), and then there’s government doing the same thing, only under the facade of legitimacy. Google “Dianne Masters” case in Chicago Area (these got caught, at least). Generally trafficking in drugs + children go together, and, again, a site: “http://inproperinla.blogspot.com”
- Any consideration that fails to take into account the actual (as opposed to supposed) role of the child support agency (Federal level, “OCSE”) in influencing the child custody business — and compromising the laws at a state level — through GRANTS to the courts – was born yesterday, and is either likely in on something, or clueless.
- Also relevant — I’m fed up with marketing “Risk Assessment,” whether the 1990s version of the more recent version, Borders & McLaughlin marketing to judges. Suppose they’re right even? (They seem reasonable, MOSAIC(tm) and that) why aren’t they fundraising for mace for battered women, or self-defense training? What level of risk would be acceptable for YOUR firstborn, or any others?
- I’m fed up with “Family Justice Center Alliance” concept which was essentially San Diego’s Casey Gwinn’s personal retirement plan, plus a $1 million grant from Verizon, in San Diego, afterwards, inflicted on the rest of us. In Northern California, the (virtually useless) ‘Alameda County Family Justice Center” got funded with a $3.8 million grant, exaggerates its figures of people helped, and the Exec Director was a crony (wife) of Bill Lockyer, appointment not quite above-board, as fund was obtained by Nancy-appointemtn not quite above bboard either O’Malley, D.A. in SF Bay Area. Oakland, being about the 4th or 5th most dangerous city to live in (nationwide) perhaps the appointment of a new D.A. (who decides to a good deal which cases do, or don’t, get prosecuted), maybe this criminal law enforcement CEO’s appointment should be run by the local residents openly, vs. faking openly;. I’m sure other areas have the same types of issues, many of which are not discussed, but could affect life or death.
Protective Mothers need to know about these issues and just not leave them up to others. There are many things Im fed up with, but unlike a judge or custody evaluator, I’m not going to affect your case outcome. On the other hand, if you developed a shorter attention span for nonsense, there’s a lot of valuable, ACTIONABLE information, right on the web. We are not in grade school anymore. There is no extra credit for barking a certain way, or barking up the wrong trees.
Unity among a “movement” is great — IF you have a good product and are totally ethical and honest about what’s going on. However, how about a little free-market capitalism and discriminating consumers, among traumatized parents?
Anyone people wanting to lead should open their books. Personally, I’m in favor of smaller, more localized and focused “salt-of-the-earth” groups who know each other, and hopefully make room for blathering idiots (case in point) with an eye for the odd detail or willing to track a hot lead, as well as the more polished leadership.
Can we dump the social scientists, PUH-LEEZE? If you don’t understand their role, wade through some of my site, I’ll help. This is where tax $$ are going. Get also a working definition of RICO and recognize it in operation. Also, it’s not for the weak of stomach. It really isn’t once the scope of the issues becomes apparent. Look what Jesus did starting with 12, or the 13 colonies did two centuries ago, being out-gunned by the British Empire.
And if you want to cite the civil rights movement hear, or Gandhi, etc. Remember this word: BOYCOTT. And, be prepared; jail might be involved. I have trouble with sign-ins on comments, but FYI I”m “Lets Get Honest” at familycourtmatters.wordpress.com. The blog is a little over a year old, has international visitors, and about 26,000 ** of them so far. (Have a nice day)
** per “statcounter” which got installed before “Feedjit” to right…
This NONPROFIT (if incorporated — I didn’t check) ALLIANCE is beginning to resemble, in website and behaviors (with the exception of the girl-gossip on-line mentioned above) the very same conference-circuit coalitions etc. that are getting co-opted by Federal funding, after which a centralized program theme is more easily distributed through the ranks (Training the trainers) while excluding less popular, and possibly caustic analyses that might put force many of the professionals to find a new line of work, as their role became extinct. This might put the non-mothers in the group in a better position to understand what it’s like to lose something precious, irreplaceable and which one has put dedicated years into.
BEAUTIFUL WEBSITE. LOOKS LIKE SOME OF THOSE THAT GOT GOVERNMENT “TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE” GRANTS AND WHO WOULD BE QUOTED IN THE HEADLINES REGULARLY, AFTER THE NEXT SET OF FATALITIES: Notice books being promoted:
I
click here to orderWhy Does He Do That? Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men
This fascinating investigation into what makes abusive men tick is alarming, but its candid handling of a difficult subject makes it a valuable resource for professionals and victims alike. Bancroft, the former codirector of Emerge, the nation’s first program for abusive men, has specialized in domestic violence for 15 years, and his understanding of his subject and audience is apparent on every page. “One of the prevalent features of life with an angry or controlling partner is that he frequently tells you what you should think and tries to get you to doubt or devalue your own perceptions and beliefs,” he writes. “I would not like to see your experience with this book re-create that unhealthy dynamic. So the top point to bear in mind as you read [this book] is to listen carefully to what I am saying, but always to think for yourself.” He maintains this level of sensitivity and even empathy throughout discussions on the nature of abusive thinking, how abusive men manipulate their families and the legal system and whether or not they can ever be cured. Jargon-free analysis is frequently broken up by interesting first-person accounts and boxes that distill in-depth information into simple checklists. Bancroft’s book promises to be a beacon of calm and sanity for many storm-tossed families.
click here to orderThe Batterer as Parent: Addressing the Impact of Domestic Violence on Family Dynamics The Batterer as Parent takes the reader inside of homes affected by domestic violence, imparting an understanding of the atmosphere that battering men create for the children who live with them. Bancroft and Silverman show how partner abuse affects each relationship in a family, and explain how emotional recovery is inextricably linked to the healing and empowerment of the mothers. The authors cover the important but often-overlooked area of the post-separation parenting behaviors of men who batter, including their use of custody litigation as a tool of abuse. Readers also are guided in evaluating change in the parenting of men who batter, assessing risk to children from unsupervised visitation, and supporting the emotional recovery of children. Although the book is written primarily for professionals, its accessible style makes it engaging and useful for abused mothers and anyone else wishing to assist children exposed to battering.
click here to orderWhen Dad Hurts Mom: Helping Your Children Heal the Wounds of Witnessing Abuse Can my partner abuse me and still be a good parent? Should I stay with my partner for my children’s sake? How should I talk to my children about the abuse and help them heal? Am I a bad mother?Mothers in physically or emotionally abusive relationships ask themselves these questions every day. Here, a counselor reveals how abusers interact with and manipulate children-and how mothers can help their children recover from the trauma of witnessing abuse.
click here to orderLEGAL ABUSE SYNDROME
by Karin D. Huffer, MS, MFT, chronicles her 20 years of research and clinical work with LAS, a form of post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). LAS is a psychic injury, not a mental illness. It is a personal injury that develops in individuals assaulted by ethical violations, legal abuses, betrayals, and fraud. Abuse of power and authority and a profound lack of accountability in our courts have become rampant, compounding an already stressful experience.
click here to orderUnbreakable Bonds
by Dr. Cheryl Meier / Dr. Paul Meier
How can you form intimate relationships that will make your life more fulfilling?Dr. Paul Meier and his daughter Dr. Cheryl Meier show you how to reconnect with yourself, your friends and family, and God. They share important secrets on how to develop unbreakable bonds with those you care about the most. In the four sections of this book, you will discover: – Direction-recognize your deepest longings – Detection-explore why people close themselves off from intimate relationships – Connection-learn how to recognize love and how to respond to it – Perfection- find out how to develop lasting relationships If you are longing for something more in your relationships, you’ll find everything you need in this practical, perceptive book to bring about lasting change.
click here to orderWhen Judith Herman’s Trauma and Recovery was first published five years ago, it was hailed as a groundbreaking work. In the intervening years, Herman’s now classic volume has changed the way we think about and treat traumatic events and trauma victims. In a new introduction, Herman chronicles the incredible response the book has elicited and explains how the issues surrounding the topic of trauma and recovery have shifted within the clinical community and the culture at large. Trauma and Recovery brings a new level of understanding to a set of problems usually considered individually. Herman draws on her own cutting-edge research on domestic violence, as well as on a vast literature of combat veterans and victims of political terror, to show the parallels between private terrors such as rape and public traumas such as terrorism. The book puts individual experience in a broader political frame, arguing that psychological trauma can be understood only in a social context. Meticulously documented and frequently using the victims own words as well as those from classic literary works and prison diaries, Trauma and Recovery is a powerful work that will continue to profoundly impact our thinking.
.
I THINK PROMOTION IS FINE. I JUST DON’T THINK IT SHOULD BE CONFUSED WITH ALTRUISM.
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Alienation Ain’t Going Anywhere —
NOTE: This continues my last post. Curious about Lauren v. Ted, I went and fetched it.
The evidence before me demonstrates a pattern of willful and calculated violations of the clear and express dictates of the parties’ Stipulation of Settlement,” Ross wrote in Lauren R. v. Ted R., 203699-02.
To review, the reporter, reviewing the ruling:
Supreme Court Justice Robert A. Ross in Nassau County ruled that the mother, Lauren R., willfully violated a court order by deliberately alienating the elementary school-age children from her ex-husband, Ted R.” (cite, below)
Ex-Wife Ordered Jailed for Alienating Children From Father
I SAID, INCREDULOUS:
Let’s look at ” willfully violated a court order by deliberately alienating“:
Did the court order mention not alienating — or was the court order about visitation? One is clear-cut. The other is a psychological assessment, less clear-cut, and gives judges a free license to call in the obedience-training authorities. Whether or not it is “deliberate” or as a consequence of moving on in life, is a matter for a mind-reader. Excuse me, “mental health professional,” a field I no longer respect (and this is probably why).
What kind of world do we (as a culture) want? One of action crimes, or thought (intent-) crimes ?? Guess which one you have here?
Only if the court order specifically SAID “don’t alienate” (which is too broadly worded to be enforceable, anyhow) is “deliberately alienating” a violation of it. However, this appears to be referring to failing to comply with visitation/vacation schedule, but doing it in a mean way. I believe that a Law Journal, of all places, should keep those issues separate. So should stipulations and custody orders, but often they don’t, setting the parents up for repeat litigation.
I wanted to know, was “not alienating” built into the court order (incredible as it seems, the answer is YES, this time. I say, “Houston, we have a problem!”)
Seeing this ruling, I felt readers should see how this is done, and who the judge quoted, and in general pick up on the practice of (OPINION ALERT. The rest of this paragraph is my feelings. Of course, much of this blog is — excepting the data research, charts, dockets posted, and news articles, etc…. But especially this next “rant” is a sound-off)
making custodial mothers (physical custodial/joint-legal) — apparently because they are women — responsible for relationship, even if they’re in a new one. This means, that somehow, any new man in the life, can’t “father” a children if it would, say, jeopardize their previous father. Put this in the pot and see how this blends with the fatherhood crisis. The biological Dad (presumably) is out of the home, and a remarriage has taken place. The systems of laws clearly influential in this ruling, were originally (Or, as slid through Congress) aimed at low-income fathers (which the “access/Visitation” policy literature, not to mention the “fatherhood” literature, assures us is the real problem. If it’s not the REAL Dad in the home, (even if there’s another father figure), those kids are screwed for life. Also, it’s important to encourage LOW-income fathers to be persuaded to pay their child support; and the way to do this has been declared, in policy brief after policy brief, is to use the children as a carrot, removing the child support enforcement as a stick, but keeping it there just in case. Theoretically.
This example is “replete with” language and references exhibiting this policy. While Lauren R. may or may not be a nice person — for all we know, she’s a B _ _ _ ch — the practices stand, and she has been threatened with weekends in jail for her behavior.
My CMA:
LINKING, COPYRIGHTs, Etc. – — the link to this opinion is on yesterday’s post, and here is:
Lauren R. v. Ted R.
NASSAU COUNTY
Family LawNew York Law Journal
June 07, 2010
Copyright © 2010, ALM Properties, Inc.
ALM = “American Lawyer Media”
Let me COMPLETELY CMA (that’s CYA with a pronoun change) on posting so much of this opinion here:
Disclaimers: I believe that posting this is legal and within the copyright use (general, limited) as my link on this blog states. My purpose in posting here is to illustrate, for general purposes and information:
- HOW this judge reasoned,
- how the stipulation was written, and
- who this judge cited, in jailing [or threatening to] an alienating EX, which court personnel were called in — and for how much*** — to get their piece of the action BEFORE she was threatened with jail and/or custody switch (?) (the ultimate threat) and
- What “remedies” are considered available (in NY, here) for Bad Moms (and presumably Bad Dads) in violation of DIVORCE-RELATED CIVIL DECREES
- how GENDER-NEUTRAL, mostly, the “parental alienation” is in theory, but gender-specific, in practice, it seems (my challenge to readers yesterday stands — find me a man treated this way by any court for the same reasons) — and in short,
- HOW our country moved from the “rule of thumb” (diameter of switch with which one could beat one’s wife, hear tell) to the Judiciary rules and case precedents, etc. (remedies for, rather than beating, just emotionally terrorizing into compliance, or making it clear that the authority of the bench could indeed throw more weight around if compliance isn’t good enough for any woman/slut who remarries (or, doesn’t) with kids and doesn’t do it well, etc. . . . . to demonstrate, and set an example (per HIS attorney) of how very few inches forward we have moved in the past century, vis-a-vis mothers who don’t retain their men… . .
(pause to remember the originally intended VERB of this supremely compound subject sentence…..)(oh yeah, it’s coming…)
ARE RELEVANT TO OTHER PARENTS. IT IS VALUABLE INFORMATION TO THE PUBLIC… As such, I hope I don’t get put in jail for putting this information up.
***“defendant’s counsel, $11,287.50 for Attorney for the Children’s fees, and $19,833.32 for Parenting Coordinator fees,”
To obtain the access so as to answer my initial questions (how could “not alienating” be in a court order?? and why wasn’t the custody interference sufficient?), I had to subscribe to this New York Law Journal. So will you, for pay, or as I did “Free Limited Access,” which means that in exchange for free, they collect data from me and can potential send me marketing material. Being in a good mood, I allowed this. “Free” anything, on-line,” is kind of like a FREE lunch, Food Stamps, Free Legal Services, or Free Restraining Order Clinics. Either you pay, or, you fork over some of your data for the privilege of accessing these things. So, I’m not linking the title today — see yesterday’s post — ,because who knows if my particular link leads to my particular self, which I don’t feel like putting on-line today, particularly after some commentary on the judge’s commentary that reading it inspires (like, “causes to well up”) within my soul.
My CMA, ct’d.
From what I can tell on the Permissions page, my purpose here is not any of those listed: I am not republishing it in a book/ebook for educational or promotional use. I am not republishing it in a print or electronic PUBLICATION for informational or promotional use. I am obviously not photocopying it (don’t you, either!) I am not sending it in an email. I am not republishing it in a marketing MATERIAL because I am not marketing anything. I am advised to click HERE for any other potential use, and that “HERE” says that about 3 different entitites (Rightslink(r), Incisive Media, and Copyright Clearance Center.com) are all in on the action of protecting Judicial opinions from being too widespread without someone being paid for this, and able to trace it.
Speaking of DIGITAL CLEARANCE ISSUES . . . Consider this an ALERT. I make it maroon, as it’s a “parenthetical” to this post.
While I am on this topic of DIGITAL CASE INFORMATION (although this is an ALM publication, and the New York Law Journal, something else — opinions are published in it, I gather — and case dockets, caes information totally another category, today, I ran across THIS concern, expressed by a man in Los Angeles. The fine print here is supplemented from some REAL detailed research, related, on the Justice System [All of it, including enforcement Sheriffs, etc.] in Los Angeles County, which he has called an “Extra Constitutional Zone,” while wryly commenting that the similar behavior is found in courts across the country. However, this article is about digital storage of case information, and compromises in the system as a human rights crisis. Read the fine print, he’s right, I bet:
THIS is a VERY brief, readable summary of the situation, which I am still mentally processing, of automated court systems, beginning in the 1980s, 1990s: “COMPUTERIZED or CON-PUTERIZED” (8/18/2010) — thank you, Janet Phelan, and Dr. Zernik. This is momentous — and a separate post…Here’s a clue to the extent of the problem:
Amidst the rumblings that “equal justice under the law” is being applied selectively and unequally, a new charge is now being levied against the courts, coming from an unlikely source. Joseph Zernik, 54, Ph.D., is a molecular biologist and former college professor. Born in Israel, Zernik came over to the US in 1983, to attend the University of Connecticut where he subsequently received his Ph.D. in molecular biology He was later to work as a professor –first at the University of Connecticut and later at the University of Southern California. Along the way, he also studied computer systems and orthodontics.
By the way, this is the kind of background — more than social scientists and psychologists (or attorneys) that is likely — when attention is given to the legal processes — and systems — in the courts — that can help us. The analytic and systems expertise (logic, in other words) beats rhetoric and reframing every time. I feel… Marshall McLuhan {1911-1980…hover cursor for descr.}warned us that the MEDIUM was the MASSAGE {hover cursor for descr.}(long ago) — this talks about the impact of the MEDIUM (of digital case records) on our legal process.
Beginning in 2002, Zernik began to scrutinize government and corporate data base systems, first in schools and later in banks and in courts. In 2007, he began researching how court computer systems, such as “Sustain,” installed at the Los Angeles Superior Court and PACER/CM/ECF, installed at the federal courts, have circumvented some of the basic and fundamental processes which we have previously taken as sacrosanct.
Around 1985, the Los Angeles Superior court installed “Sustain” as its first civil case management system, to replace the previous paper-based operations. The federal courts began computerizing their systems around the early nineties, according to a spokesperson for PACER, which is the Public Access system of the federal courts, developed under the guidance of the Administrative Office of the US Courts. Actually, the federal court installed TWO systems. One, called PACER, was for general public access. The other system, CM/ECF, is accessible only for the court itself and for court authorized attorneys. However, even on such attorneys restrictions of access were placed and authorization was granted only to view certain records.
In other words, alleges Zernik, there are now two separate systems in place –one for the public and one for the elite tier of lawyers and officers of the court. The courts therefore created two docketing systems, separate and unequal, and asserted the right to segregate persons into one system or the other. As a result, the public right to inspect public documents was severely mitigated. The spokesperson for PACER stated that there were indeed two systems in place, one for public access and one for filing.
Apart from the obvious issues raised by two separate systems which are apparently functioning for different tiers of individuals—the public on one hand and the lawyers and court officers on the other– Zernik uncovered further cause for alarm. When the court systems became computerized, the common law practices also altered, subtly and nearly undetectably. . .
BACK TO NASSAU COUNTY, NY a.k.a.,
How an ANTI-ALIENATION DIVORCE STIPULATION led to a Mom ordered to jail for violating it.
Justice Robert A. Ross
Decided: May 25; 203699-02
The continuing jurisdiction of the Supreme Court to modify or annul its custody and visitation judgments and orders, is set forth in Domestic Relations Law §240. Such authority is similarly provided to the Family Court pursuant to Family Court Act §467. In post judgment proceedings regarding a modification of custody and visitation, the standard is the “best interest of the child,” when all of the applicable factors are considered. See, Friederwitzer v. Friederwitzer, 55 NY2d 89.
Roughly translated, these two courts’ authority to mess with (alter) either parent’s life continues until all children reach majority, or some other worse event intervenes, which we hope it doesn’t. Think about this when conceiving children. Er– guess that advice is not too practical, how about BEFORE conceiving children.
Parental access, commonly referred to as “visitation,” is an important right of the non-custodial parent and the child. See, Weiss v. Weiss, 52 NY2d 170.
Roughly translated — the word “parent” and “noncustodial parent” obscures the purpose of these rights (rights?) — as seen by why women like me have to write blogs like this. The switch from mother and father to “parent” is not straightforward — it’s obscuring gender bias. Even the Wikipedia definiton of “noncustodial parent” forwards reader to the US Dept. of HHS site, “Fatherhood.hhs.gov” where, after the TOP left square, which reads
2006 Initiative / TANF Reauthorization
The Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 {{See 1996 for where this originated}} provides funding of $150 million each year for healthy marriage promotion and fatherhood. Up to $50 million each year may be used for activities promoting fatherhood, such as counseling, mentoring, marriage education, enhancing relationship skills, parenting, and activities to foster economic stability.
{{well, treating ex-wives like this may send a message to women not to, ever, become an ex-wife. Your life may not survive marriage, but it’s equally unlikely to survive leaving a marriage, at least emotionally intact. So in SOME sense, pushing this, nationwide, can — like threat therapy — warn married women not to mess up..This policy, essentially, is the welfare state mentality’s answer to the welfare state mentality, if you can follow the logic there.}}
one can scroll down to
Access, Visitation, Paternity, & Child Support
About half of all children spend some part of their life apart from one or both of their parents, and most often the parent that does not live with the child is the father. The laws that cover these relationships are the responsibility of the state (Family Law), but
Yeah, a BIG BUTT…
(Bighorn sheep charging) . . . The LAWS. . .. BUT . . . . (in contrast with the LAWS, we have a new concept, FEDERAL FUNDING to STATES to help them develop PROGRAMS….to “help.” They just want to “help”….
the Federal Government does provide states with fundingto assist in the development ofprograms that help establish paternity, collect child support, and provide non-residential parents with access to their children.
{{note — though found on “fatherrhood.hhs.gov” this refers to funding to help noncustodial PARENTS. See Dombrowski. See “rightsformothers.com.”. . . I never did see why so many people (women, in particular) fail to acknowledge that these A/V programs are related to the child support system. The federal government says they are….
OK, one more grammar review before i move back to this ruling: This program, the ACCESS VISITATIOn NONCUSTODIAL PARENT and CHILD language, as cited (years ago) on FATHERHOOD.HHS. GOV says it this way. The STATES’ LAWS . . . . BUT the Federal Funding to STates to develop programs. Laws – – — BUT, . . . . Federal Funding. Laws — BUT — Federal Funding (to counteract the laws, to “help” the laws. Well, if the Feds are helping with existing Laws, why then is the word “BUT-T-T-T-T needed to describe the system?? . . . Also, (convenientlly for this end), motherhood.gov doesn’t mention to mothers going into the courts to look here for the 2nd half of the States Laws (which they focus on), BUT > T > T > T…
I’m driving this in, because what follows here is full of legal cites, and precedent, to justify the situation. But his language will soon reveal, alienation, alienation, alienation . . . .
In a scenario where one parent is demonstrated to have interfered with the custodial rights of a parent, a number of mechanisms exist [see, Scheinkman, New York Law of Domestic Relations, Second Edition, §23.14] to aid in the enforcement of custody orders and judgments, including:
1. Criminal Sanctions, pursuant to Penal Law §135.45 and 135.50;
2. Suspension of alimony or maintenance, pursuant to Judiciary Law 750,753;
3. Tort action for custodial interference;
4. Orders of Protection, pursuant to Domestic Relations Law §240
While the most factually apparent ground to change existing custody arrangements involves physical danger, the act of alienating a child against a parent presents a nefarious form of conduct that must be met with careful consideration and immediate, comprehensive remediation by a Court (see, Zafran v. Zafran, 306 AD2d 468; Lew v. Sobel, 46 AD3d 893). A change in custody should not be permitted solely as a means for punishing a recalcitrant parent (see, Lew v. Sobel, supra), but always requires due consideration of all of the other custodial factors. See, Robert T.F. v. Rosemary F., 148 AD2d 449.
Note. I’m not checking the cites. Any attorney should. What the heck is “Judiciary law?” (above). And I’ve never heard of a TORT for custodial interference, I thought family law was out of the realm of torts. Maybe NY is different than the other coast, where I live. But, if it was the same, it would still take an indignant judge to sign an order.
I love the ‘While . . . . physical danger [See, “Girl, Interrupted” Kristin Stillman] [“phsyical danger might cause a child to die, or suffer injury, (by contrast, this language says, a far , far worse) ALIENATING A CHILD is NEFARIOUS!! and requires immediate, comprehensive remediation. {{see “DastardlyDads.blogspot.com” for what is NOT “nefarious conduct,” per judges}} I also have to “love” the judge’s dismissal of “most factually apparent ground” in favor of “punishing a recalcitrant parent.” So much for “best interests of the child” — the motived is to punish a recalcitrant parent…. I’ve never heard “recalcitrant” used of an adult before. It means, literally, to “kick back.” Merriam-Webster definition give an Antonym (opposite) as the desirable state of women in this culture, this world, and with the help of judges, precedents, Federal programs, and rulings like this, surely they will return to this Edenic state:
Good grief!!! Recalcitrant has been used (in this example) of an employee, and a youth. Well, welcome, parents, to that category! The problem with recalcitrance is, a parent becomes:
While mindful of the consequential future effect of this determination (see, Lauer v. City of New York, 95 NY2d 95, 100), ….
Any sentence starting with “While” followed by data, or a statement of a situation, etc., is setting up the reader to consider that data LESS important than what follows, while declaring to the reader that this author at least weighed the pros and cons, but feels that the “while” side is less important than what’s upcoming. For a great example of this, look above, and the 2006 Access Visitation program blurb doing essentiall the same thing, only in a “This BUT that format.” “access/visitation is a matter of State & family law, the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT funds programs. . . . . etc.” Here, since the part in the while section is going to be overcome, it is vaguely worded and only gets one cite, prob ably someone suing the City of NY over a disastrous custody situation result. Maybe I’ll look it up. If this was a death, and this judge referred to that death as “the consequential future effect of this determination,” what does that say about this judge’s decision-making process?
Check out this case — and how UNrelated it is , on the surface, to the divorce case here: My cites (I’m not an attorney) are not 95 NY2d 95,100 (which sounds like an opinion), but show which case was cited. The divorce here resulted from a NY Medical Examiner’s initial diagnosis as an infant death as homicide by blunt instrument head trauma. At the time, the couple was married, and put through hell, particularly the father, who was fingered for this. Later, a re-examination of the child’s brain showed a brain aneurysm. Lauer v. City of NY sued over this. At the very high risk of losing reader’s attention here, I’m going to cite the (UNpublished) opinion on-line, so we see what the 10 words preceding a Supreme Court judge’s proclamation that willful interference with a custody order raises a strong probablility of parental unfitness:
2 No. 59
Edward G. Lauer,
Respondent,
v.
City of New York, et al.,
Appellants.
2000 NY Int. 62
May 16, 2000
This opinion is uncorrected and subject to revision before publication in the New York Reports.
Julian L. Kalkstein, for appellants.
Peter James Johnson, Jr., for respondent.
KAYE, CHIEF JUDGE:
On this appeal we revisit a familiar subject: whether a member of the public can recover damages against a municipality for its employee’s negligence. Here we answer that question in the negative.
The Facts
Three-year-old Andrew Lauer died on August 7, 1993. That same day, Dr. Eddy Lilavois, a New York City Medical Examiner, performed an autopsy and prepared a report stating that the child’s death was a homicide caused by “blunt injuries” to the neck and brain. Although the report indicated that the brain was being preserved for further examination, the following day a death certificate was issued stating that Andrew’s death was a homicide. Based on the Medical Examiner’s conclusion, the police began investigating what they thought was a homicide, focusing primarily on plaintiff, Andrew’s father. Weeks later, on August 31, 1993, the Medical Examiner and a neuropathologist conducted a more detailed study of Andrew’s brain. The report, prepared in October 1993, indicated that a ruptured brain aneurysm caused the child’s death, thus contradicting the earlier conclusion. The Medical Examiner, however, failed to correct the autopsy report or death certificate, and failed to notify law enforcement authorities.
Meanwhile, the police department’s investigation into Andrew’s death continued. Some 17 months later, in March 1995, after a newspaper exposé, the autopsy findings were revised, the police investigation ceased and an amended death certificate was prepared. As a result of this incident, the City Medical Examiner who had conducted the examination resigned.
Plaintiff and his estranged wife subsequently commenced separate actions. Lisa Lauer’s action against the City of New York and Dr. Lilavois, seeking damages for intentional and negligent infliction of emotional distress, was dismissed. In affirming the dismissal, the Appellate Division held that her allegations failed to establish “that she fell within any recognized orbit of duty upon which liability may be based” (see, Lauer v City of New York, 240 AD2d 543, 544, lv denied , 91 NY2d 807). {{ALWAYS RECOGNIZE THAT “ORBIT OF DUTY ON WHICH LIBABILITY MAY BE BASED.”}}
In the present action seeking $10 million in damages against the City of New York, the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, Dr. Lilavois and the Police Department, plaintiff alleges defamation, violation of his civil rights, and both negligent and intentional infliction of emotional distress. He claims that defendants’ conduct–including the Medical Examiner’s negligent performance of the autopsy, failure to correct the erroneous report and death certificate, and failure to disclose that Andrew’s death was not a homicide–“precipitated the destruction of [his] marriage * * * forced him to sell his home and leave his neighborhood, and caused him to become the object of public scorn, humiliation, ridicule, embarrassment, harassment and contempt throughout the City of New York.” He further alleges that he “sustained severe and debilitating emotional distress, emotional anguish, anxiety and mental suffering.”
On defendants’ motion, Supreme Court dismissed the defamation and civil rights causes of action, but allowed plaintiff to pursue his emotional distress claims. A divided Appellate Division modified Supreme Court’s order (see, 258 AD2d 92). All of the Justices agreed that the defamation and civil rights claims were properly dismissed. They also unanimously concluded that plaintiff’s intentional infliction of emotional distress claim warranted dismissal; that any causes of action based on performance of the initial autopsy were immunized as a governmental exercise of discretion; and that the Medical Examiner’s failure to correct the reports and accurately inform the authorities were “ministerial” acts. The Appellate Division divided, however, as to whether plaintiff could maintain a claim for negligent infliction of emotional distress based on those ministerial acts, a majority concluding that he could.
I don’t know if this was a custodial-father case, but the judge citing it here is TWO parents suing the city for damages on the basis of a Medical Examiner’s mistake, and failure to inform them of it. Wife was estranged at the time her appeal was she in 1993? Certainly there are more relevant cases in NY since then, however this judge cites one referring to an infant’s death, bad enough, being deemed a homicide, and tearing up the family’s subsequent decade as “consequential effect” before getting down to business, which is going to be ordering a recalcitrant, alienating ex-wife to jail. Here’s the sentence, again:
While mindful of the consequential future effect of this determination (see, Lauer v. City of New York, 95 NY2d 95, 100), ….
inasmuch as a Court’s finding of willful interference “per se raises a strong probability that the custodial parent is unfit” (see, Young v. Young, supra; Glenn v. Glenn, supra), whena pattern of alienation by the custodial parent is proven in any prior proceeding, that alienating conductmust [emphasis added] be considered and addressed by the Court in any subsequent proceeding involving custody/parental access. See, Audobon v. Audobon, 138 AD2d 658; Martin R.G. v. Ofelio G.O., 24 AD3d 305. Also, see CPLR §4213[b]; Robert T.F. v. Rosemarie F., 148 AD2d 449.
Apparently 4 cites re: alienation are given. 4 to 1, weighing in on the nefariousness of alienation, and it as a basis for action in subsequent custody/parent access proceedings. Wonder if any of those involved a woman as the injured party..
I too think that parents unable to comply with custody orders EXCEPT for good cause (like, death threats — google “Judge Lemkau,” in California, or similar cases in almost any of the 50 states). However, in my case, it meant nothing, even though I’d been repeatedly bringing this up, and myself as a custodial parent (sole physical only) was fit, and never deemed unfit, til — when complying with a court order, my kids disappeared — overnight. And no court or law enforcement (or anyone else) did anything about it. That principle haveing been now thoroughly established, no subsequent court orders were obeyed more than coincidentally, including custody/visitation. At this time, I knew nothing of these programs to help with “Access/visitation” although I specifically (a year before kids were taken) asked a judge for a safer exchange alternative. . . .. However LAUREN & TED’s court order/Stip. is so vague and overbroad as to be ridiculous. At least the part cited here.
The doctrine of res judicata bars the issue of whether alienation occurred in the subsequent change of custody hearing ordered herein. See, O’ bdoherty@chat.nyc.amlaw.corp Brian v. City of Syracuse, 54 NY2d 353, 357; Matter of Waldman v. Waldman, 47 AD3d 638; Braunstein v. Braunstein, 114 AD2d 46, 53; Town of New Windsor v. New Windsor Volunteer Ambulance Corps, Inc., 16 AD3d 403. {{HOWEVER}} Considering that parental alienation of a child from the other parent has been determined to be “an act inconsistent with the best interest of the child (Bobinson v. Bobinson, 9 AD3d 441; Stern v. Stern, 304 AD2d 649; Zafran v. Zafran, 28 AD3d 753; Zeis v. Slater, 57 AD3d 793), and that it has been proven in this contempt proceeding – – the “strong likelihood of unfitness” becomes a “factor” that must be considered in the change of custody hearing ordered herein.
Parental alienation is tied with UNFITNESS as a factor, although res judicata on alienation cannot be an issue in this custody change (as I get it). I tried to llok up “Brian v. City of Syracuse, 54 NY2d (etc.) but so far, it’s mostly this case, a slap in the face that lists the wife as the “Ex-Wife from hell” and is featured on “Parental Alienation Canada.” Father’s Rights groups are rejoicing, and someone even took out a “laurenlippe.com” website where you can see the collateral press damage. Maybe I jumped on the wrong bandwagon here, but I am reading that divorce stipulation, and it just doesn’t look fair.
Protraction or delay in parental alienation cases often serve to reinforce the offending conduct and potentially undermine any remediation that a court could fashion with appropriate therapy, parent coordination, and/or, a change in custody. See, Steinberger, Father? What Father? Parental Alienation And Its Effect on Children, NYSBA Family Law Review, Spring 2006;
{{At least this is honest, and says “Father” and not just “parent”}}
Johnston, J.R., Children of Divorce Who Reject a Parent And Refuse Visitation: Recent Research & Social Policy Implications for the Alienated Child, 38 Fam. L.Q. 757, 768-769. Under the circumstances of this case, this Court’s finding of a willful violation of an existing order of custody in the form of parental alienation requires a prompt evidentiary hearing to determine whether the children’s best interests, under the totality of the circumstances, warrant modification of the previously entered custody order. See, Friederwitzer v. Friederwitzer, 55 NY2d 89; Corigliano v. Corigliano, 297 AD2d 328; Martin R.G. v. Ofelio G.O., 24 AD3d 305; Carlin v. Carlin, 52 AD3d 559.
J.R. Johnston is probably Janet Johnston. I have a post (older) of Lundy Bancroft debating some of her assessments as failing to identify potential abuse — on this blog.
So much to say, so little time. Well, I told you, “Alienation” ain’t going anywhere!
PROCEDURAL HISTORY
By Order to Show Cause dated December 14, 2007, defendant sought an order to have the plaintiff held in contempt for her willful and deliberate failure to comply with the Stipulation of Settlement, dated October 30, 2003, in that she allegedly interfered with his right to frequent and regular visitation with and telephone access to the parties’ children, D. and N.; and by alienating the children from the defendant through numerous acts of disparaging the defendant to the children. {{Parts A 7 Parts B}} The Court granted defendant’s motion by its Amended Decision and Order dated September 9, 2008, to the extent that a hearing was ordered. This contempt hearing was held before me on May 15, 21, July 13, 15, 16, August 3, 4, 5, 6, 17, 18, 19, September 17, 2009, January 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 11, 12, 19, February 3, and 22, 2010.
If she dished out hell, surely this scheduled was some of it back. How could a single hearing occupy so many days? Because someone can pay an attorney to be there, constantly? or two attorneys? And they put the rest of us through hell/mediation because the courts are clogged? 12 hearings in 4 months, summer 2008, then a year break (no summer vacation for THIS custodial mother with her kids), a ruling Sept. 2008 ordering a hearing and a year break. A hearing Sept. 2009, a season off court and 10 hearings in TWO months…Poor people don’t get this, but this is affecting poor people.
The parties’ Stipulation of Settlement was incorporated but not merged into the parties’ Judgment of Divorce (Stack, J.). Pursuant to the unequivocal terms of the Stipulation, she was prohibited from “alienating the children from the defendant, plac[ing] any obstacle in the way of the maintenance, love and affection of the children for the defendant,” or to “hinder, impair or prevent the growth of a close relationship between the children and their parents, respectively, or cause others to do so.” Moreover, in sharing joint legal custody of the children, she was specifically required to consult with the defendant regarding decisions affecting the children’s education, health and religion. That Stipulation also clearly provided that each of the parties was to “exert every effort to maintain free access and unhampered contact,” “to foster a feeling of affection,” and not to “do anything which may estrange the children from [the defendant] or injure the children’s opinion as to the Father which may hamper the free and natural development of the children’s love and affection for the [Defendant].”
I think most cases are set up for failure from the start. Mine was. Domestic violence precipitated the separation (no divorce action even involved. Despite this, frequent visitation (more than frequent), and so vaguely written a visitation order as to guarantee difficulties around exchanges. Joint legal custody — one cannot do “joint legal custody” with an abuser; there is no “we” anywhere in there. Case in point, the DV. Even before divorce was ever initiated we were handled as though it was just a family squabble, even though a restraining order AND kickout was granted.
Here, Ted apparently was fore-armed to protect any “emotional abuse” by how it was worded. Her own divorce stipulation had a strict prohibition on it, worded in very similar terms to a restraining order; in fact, it in effect was one. The phrase “or cause otehrs to do so,” is in protective orders. If we were a fly on the wall, and read the whole stipulation, would there be ANY prohibitions on the father? The admonition to “both” parents not to estrange the children’s opinion of the Father” is a contradiction. Why would the Father estrange his own children? That makes no sense. The stipulation “not to do ANYTHING which MAY estrange the children from (Dad) or injure their opinion of the Fatehr” — good grief. A woman is to predict their possible response to anything she does or says, at all? How can a court order a party to “foster a feeling of affection.” Define, please !!!
To sustain the defendant’s application regarding contempt, he must demonstrate that the plaintiff has violated a clear and unequivocal court order which actually defeated, impaired, impeded or prejudiced the other party’s rights (see, Great Neck v. Central, 65 AD2d 616) or were calculated to affect those rights (Stempler v. Stempler, 200 AD2d 733). The movant must meet this burden by clear and convincing evidence (Bulow v. Bulow, 121 AD2d 423). The Court may not hold a party in contempt where payment may be enforced by other enforcement procedures (Wiggins v. Wiggins, 121 Ad2d 534), unless such remedies would be an exercise in futility or ineffectual (Farkas v. Farkas, 209 AD2d 316). Upon a finding of contempt, the Court may impose a period of commitment to jail (Powers v. Powers, 86 NY2d 63) or fine, or both.
In this instance, a lawful court order, in the form of a Judgment of Divorce incorporating the parties’ stipulation of settlement, was in effect. The plaintiff was shown to have actual knowledge of its terms. Ottomanelli v. Ottomanelli, 17 AD3d 647; Freihofner v. Freihofner, 39 AD3d 465; Kawar v. Kawar, 231 AD2d 681, 682. This order of parental access was not only in effect before and during the hearing, but unsuccessful efforts were made during the course of the hearing to utilize counseling and parenting coordination to remediate the alienating conduct of the plaintiff. See, Lew v. Sobel, 46 AD3d 893. See, also, Judiciary Law §753; Massimi v. Massimi, 56 AD3d 624.
. . . .
THE COURT’S ROLE IN ADDRESSING ALIENATION
Differing “alienation” theories promoted by many public advocacy groups, as well as psychological and legal communities, have differing scientific and empirical foundations. However, interference with the non-custodial parent’s relationship with a child has always been considered in the context of a “parent’s ability to encourage the relationship between the non-custodial parent and a child,” a factor to be considered by the Court in custody and visitation/parental access determinations. See, Eschbach v. Eschbach, supra. Our Appellate Courts recognize such factor, as they have determined that the “interference with the non-custodial parent and child’s relationship is an act so inconsistent with the best interests of a child, as to, per se, raise a strong probability that the offending party is unfit to act as a custodial parent.” See, Leistner v. Leistner, 137 AD2d 499; Finn v. Finn, 176 AD2d 1132, 1133, quoting Entwistle v. Entwistle, 61 AD2d 380, 384-385, appeal dismissed 44 NY2d 851; Matter of Krebsbach v. Gallagher, 181 AD2d 363, 366; Gago v. Acevedo, 214 AD2d 565; Matter of Turner v. Turner, 260 AD2d 953, 954; Zeiz v. Slater, 57 AD2d 793.
Where, as in the instant case, there is a finding of a willful violation of a court order demonstrated by a deliberate interference with a non-custodial parent’s right to visitation/parental access, the IAS Court, as a general rule, must schedule an evidentiary hearing before making any modification of custody. See, Glenn v. Glenn, 262 AD2d 885. See, also, Entwistle v. Entwistle, 61 AD2d 380; Young v. Young, 212 AD2d 114; Matter of LeBlanc v. Morrison, 288 AD2d 768, 770, quoting Matter of Markey v. Bederian, 274 AD2d 816; Matter of David WW v. Lauren QQ, 42 AD3d 685; Goldstein v. Goldstein, 2009 N.Y. Slip Op. 08995 [Dec. 1, 2009].
. . .
“In vivid testimony, the defendant recalled how the plaintiff willfully prevented him from exercising his rights to visitation with the children from November 4, 2007 through December 21, 2007”
This is approximately one month and some weeks. It is NOTHING compared to what mothers have suffered, often for years, and often without remedy. While it’s wrong, I note that the father filed an OSC by December 14th, and got action on it quickly. I wonder, in those many, many hearings, whether Mom got to testify at all.
Here’s a paragraph of the judge judging her by her emotional affect in the courtroom, and interpreting it:
Plaintiff half-heartedly testified that she wants the children to have a relationship with the defendant. Her view of the defendant’s role was a numbing, desired nominality, evident by her actions that were without any semblance of involvement by the defendant – – notwithstanding the clear joint custodial provisions. At critical points in the cross-examination, plaintiff was noticeably off balance – – hesitating and defensive – – with answers that dovetailed to either narcissism, or, a poor grasp of the affects of her conduct. The plaintiff was dispassionate, sullen, and passively resistant to the alienating efforts of the plaintiff. ***The continued litany of instances of alienating conduct, turned repression of the defendant’s joint custodial arrangement into farce.<+> The endurance in recounting instance upon instance of alienating conduct herein, was as daunting as it was indefensible.<*>
She is wrong for being off-balance, hesitating, defensive (this is a hearing of a contempt, and protesting it is her proper stance as a litigant! Being “defensive” isn’t wrong in this situation! And anyone might hesitate in giving an answer in court! Particularly a mother being grilled…
However, a judge throwing around psychological interpretations and language, as if they were FACT (“answers that dovetailed to narcissism or a poor grasp of the affects of her conduct.”) — this is testimony outside his expertise. (Unless he switched “effects” to “affects”). He’s trying to sound psychological, and misused the words: “Affects” characterize people, not conduct. He’s over-reaching, and over-interpreting. Here’s yet another evidence of “interpretation” of effect (results) as per se being evidence of a single cause, when most effects of any sort can have more than one, or multiple contributing causes:
The fact that the children were as angry as they were with the defendant in November and December, 2007, demonstrates, in my view, that efforts to alienate the children and their father were seemingly effective. The children demanded that defendant meet “their” demands before they would permit him to visit with them again. They demanded that defendant permit N. to attend F. A., that he withdraw his objection to their participation in therapy with their mother’s therapist
Is it possible that they were angry because they could not attend F.A. or wanted to participate in therapy? While as minors, they do not get to “demand” anything of their father as a condition of visitation, this judge states that their anger is evidence per se of efforts to alienate.
I’d be sullen too, in any such hearing. But this judge holds it against her. The sentence between *** and <+> makes no sense. The litany was from the father. So, if the “litany” turned (repression of joint custody) into something, then the “litany” was the agent of making a farce. A litany is a religious term, and involves recitation.
“The endurance in recounting instance upon instance of alienating conduct herein was daunting” — i.e., Poor, brave, Dad, enduring severe emotional pain by having to recount how many times his rights were disregarded.
Poor brave Dad brought the custody action; someone helped this hearing on — and on, but recounting facts is innate to bringing any action. Also, I wonder why these facts weren’t simply written out in a Declaration supporting the OSC. Why the courtroom drama? No kudos to him for having to recount his own emotional pain. The grammar goes like this, of that sentence: “The endurance . . . . . was indefensible.” Endurance is good. The situation requiring this endurance is what the judge considers indefensible. ENDURANCE — good. INDEFENSIBLE — bad. Basically, the judge is offended.
In this paragraph “reading” the mother, the judge has mis-used “affects” and “litany,” diagnosed “narcissism” (without quoting the counselors in the case, assuming one was actually qualified to diagnose, and had done so, but based on HIS reading of it) and is starting to get his words mixed up. Maybe that’s one of his “affects.” Selfishness is a character trait. “Narcissism” is a different, more extreme term so over-used, it’s almost become meaningless except to reveal a speaker who thinks him- or herself a psychiatrist. DSM has become mainstreamed in MSM (mainstream media) and shows up in legal opinions. to lend an air of expertise or authority.
These kids will probably do OK, relative to others in similar predicaments. I bet they are fed, and they are well-educated. Consider (evidence of a contempt):
Another example occurred on June 13, 2009, when plaintiff quietly escorted D. from Alice Tulley Hall during the intermission, ignoring the instructions from the G. Y. Orchestra staff that everyone remain until the conclusion of the entire program. Plaintiff purported she was unaware that defendant attended this special program in Lincoln Center. Defendant, who was in attendance at the concert, was left waiting at the stage door with flowers for D. Plaintiff ignored his text messages questioning where his daughter was. The plaintiff, when confronted with the notion that she may have precipitously ushered her daughter away before her father was able to give her flowers, retorted to the Court that “it was not her responsibility to make plans for T.”
Daughter “D.” is in a youth orchestra which performed in Alice Tulley Hall/Lincoln Center. Whatever else goes on between her parents (and stepdad) she has exposure to some other youth musicians, concertizing, and probably is able to talk with these kids as well. She will likely go to college and have a good shot at life as an adult. The “parental alienation” promotion was (ostensibly!) not aimed at families of this income level, though clearly emotional abuse affects everyone. I have seen worse behavior among rich people than poor, it seems, and the specialty can be forms of emotional abuse. . . . . In this particular incident, it seems to me that as a joint legal custodial parent, the father, being aware of this concert, might have texted the Mom — I’d like to see her afterwards, rather than just assumed he would, although certainly that was a reasonable assumption, that kids would stay. However, as these are elementary aged kids (or were, at some point in time, there may have been any number of reasons for leaving before it was out, even despite staff instructions.).
I omitted the central narrative, including accusations of breast-fondling and CPS involvement, which was met with retaliation for reporting by CPS.
From “Parental Alienation Canada” – the ex-wife from hell
Lippe [ALLEGEDLY] often went nuclear,
launching foul-mouthed tirades at Ted Rubin in front of the girls
— calling him a “deadbeat,” “loser,” “scumbag” and “f – – – ing asshole.”
Just wanted to note: what was the standard of proof in these hearings? Because when facts are quoted minus the attribution, by a judge (i.e., who said them) they become facts, in effect. Interpreting the word “deadbeat” was brought up — who paid for music lessons? Was this a stay-at-home Mom, or a working one?
In the relationships between people to psychologize without reference to what actually happened, in its larger context, is definitely tricky ground. In a custody switch to this Dad, is he working FT and remarried? Who would care for them during the week if not? Would they then lose any child support he was paying, or is she capable of putting in for it? Did any of this make the hearing (I’d bet not).
AGAIN, my blogging here is not to say this was a nice Mom or he was a bad Dad. She has plenty of hate mail, all over the internet, and I haven’t actually found a single positive word anywhere. So, I took the opposing side, and wanted to know how the jail thing happened to this women, but men who do worse, and go on to murder, are sprung from jail. Let’s get real about this system. The reality of their initial stipulation is, it was outrageous. that’s where the damage occurred.
Well, this is a 7,000 word post, and that’s enough for one post. Again — plenty of mothers are no longer seeing their kids, court order or no court order. What are our bankrupt options?
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NY, Nassau County: (another) Alienating Ex-Wife gets Jail-Threat Therapy; sounds like forgotten “Unalienable Rights” need a Resurrection?
Wonder when this was re-written as follows:
We hold these truths to be self-evident — that all MEN ~ at least ~ are created equal, and are endowed by their Creator by certain unalienable rights. . .. that among these are ETERNALLY UNALIENATED RELATIONSHIPS,** LIFE, LIBERTY, and the PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS . . . . .
**with the “fruit of the womb” of alienated relationships with (adult) ex-wives, i.e., namely, their kids.
THIS PROMPTED MY POST:
“Supreme Court Justice Robert A. Ross in Nassau County ruled that the mother, Lauren R., willfully violated a court order by deliberately alienating the elementary school-age children from her ex-husband, Ted R.” (cite, below)
Ex-Wife Ordered Jailed for Alienating Children From Father
THIS JUNE 2010 ARTICLE FROM the NY LAW JOURNAL IS BELOW, BUT WHILE READING IT, CONSIDER:
I lay THREE challenges before readers:
- (1) Find me ONE remarried FATHER who was jailed, or threatened with it — and lectured — for doing the exact same thing to his wife, and for the same reason. And where a judge cited in the reasons for his/her opinion, that the father “smirked in the courtroom.” I open up the contest nationwide, not just NY, although how’s about in this same county?
- (2) Find me how this same judge ruled on other similar cases.
- (3) Understanding that these policies supporting and promoting fatherhood, of which mandated shared-parenting policies(etc.) are but one arm — were pushed through Congress as a solution to the LOW-income father issue, the female-headed (poor) household, PWORA WELFARE REFORM (and I’ve posted some of the Congressional transcripts surrounding it on my blog, too) — and is obviously affecting some very NOT-POOR households (except to the extent they are drained of finances through legal fees or child support rulings) why should this case, here in Nassau County, profit from that philosophy, and WHEN will these policies, based on the erroneous target population (expanded to everyone with a Y chromosome and offspring under 18 years old) be retracted?
- The father here spent over $100K on legal fees, and won, to express how hurt he was from being deprived of a relationship with his kids for (was it, a period of six WEEKS?) ? Or was that just the exception to the rule? Because the policy IS part of welfare reform, child support collection, and based on the theory that Dads who have more contact with their kids will do better at paying child support.
- NOTE; “3” is an essay question and rhetorical, obviously…
- The father here spent over $100K on legal fees, and won, to express how hurt he was from being deprived of a relationship with his kids for (was it, a period of six WEEKS?) ? Or was that just the exception to the rule? Because the policy IS part of welfare reform, child support collection, and based on the theory that Dads who have more contact with their kids will do better at paying child support.
(“EXTRA CREDIT” — since our whole nation, almost, is either being taught, or teaching, or setting the national educational curriculum womb to tomb and how to marry, not have sex before it, divorce, co-parent, stop violence against women, intervene with batterers, supervise visitation, facilitate noncustodial parent’s access to their kids, support children, coordinate parents, counsel parents, manage high-conflict parents, promote mental health and evaluate the psychological health of everyone who is NOT a psychologist — I figured I’d get in there too…And put readers back to school ‘Extra Credit’ if someone is motivated to do the background on THIS case (i can’t..).
You can’t afford the time either? Got Job? OK, then (if you’re not in a job in one of the above professions), then you are paying for the rest of us to be threatened by judges for our bad attitudes towards our exes — OR, to utilize judges to communicate this threat to ex-wives, or ex-girlfriends. (For a great role model, take Mel Gibson…)… Seriously — if you have a “job” (i.e., pay taxes) you ARE funding these theories, and the courts. JUDGES are public employees, right? As are everyone it takes to run the family court business revolving door. But, ab ove and beyond that obvious function, and ALL the functions of running courthouses, there is ALSO a stream of federal funding to the Judicial Council of California to push policies that this is a prime example of. Anyone tracking those funds? Doubt it. (See bottom of my last post — it’s primarily what this blog is about, too…) OK, so EXTRA CREDIT would be:
- Find how the ex-wife’ attorney’s track record goes. . . The wussy (?)(or — sensible; after all, he may have to stand in front of same judge in other cases?) (or, threw the case?) mother’s attorney didn’t dare express indignation and outrage before a judge, but just, in the press, said:
-
Ms. R.’s attorney, Kieth I. Rieger of Barrocas & Rieger in Garden City, N.Y., praised Ross, but criticized the decision, likening it to last week’s missed umpire call that cost a Detroit Tigers pitcher a perfect game.
“I think all of us make mistakes, and I think he’s just made a good-faith, honest mistake in his assessment of this case,” Rieger said. “That’s why there’s an Appellate Division. I think he just did not accurately assess my client.
-
- Find how the father’s attorney’s track record goes. Too. I comment on the both of them in the body of the article, below. But attorneys have clients. Clients have case histories. Case histories have a custody-switch factor, a case docket, at times.
REALLY UNALIENABLE RIGHTS — BUT
(don’t smirk) ONLY IF ASSERTED:
Here’s part of the original, the wording of which has been forgotten. Or, which, the inclusion of men of color and women of all colors, in this, never was meant to happen . . . .
Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident:
That all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that, to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.
Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security
Such has been the patient sufferance of these colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.
New Version:
A father’s, at least, UNALIENABLE RIGHT NOT TO BE ALIENATED
(and, don’t smirk in court, or else…)
Ex-Wife Ordered Jailed for Alienating Children From Father
Mark Fass
New York Law Journal
June 08, 2010
A Long Island, N.Y., judge has sentenced a woman to six weekends in jail for repeatedly undermining her ex-husband’s relationship with their two daughters.
Supreme Court Justice Robert A. Ross in Nassau County ruled that the mother, Lauren R., willfully violated a court order by deliberately alienating the elementary school-age children from her ex-husband, Ted R.
Let’s look at ” willfully violated a court order by deliberately alienating“:
Did the court order mention not alienating — or was the court order about visitation? One is clear-cut. The other is a psychological assessment, less clear-cut, and gives judges a free license to call in the obedience-training authorities. Whether or not it is “deliberate” or as a consequence of moving on in life, is a matter for a mind-reader. Excuse me, “mental health professional,” a field I no longer respect (and this is probably why).
What kind of world do we (as a culture) want? One of action crimes, or thought (intent-) crimes ?? Guess which one you have here?
Only if the court order specifically SAID “don’t alienate” (which is too broadly worded to be enforceable, anyhow) is “deliberately alienating” a violation of it. However, this appears to be referring to failing to comply with visitation/vacation schedule, but doing it in a mean way. I believe that a Law Journal, of all places, should keep those issues separate. So should stipulations and custody orders, but often they don’t, setting the parents up for repeat litigation.
Ross held Ms. R. in civil contempt and ordered her to report to the Nassau County Correctional Facility every other weekend this summer.
Her term was to have begun on Friday, but was temporarily stayed pending appeal by a judge from the Appellate Division, 2nd Department, on Thursday.
FIRST OF ALL — that’s shock therapy, and a trait in bringing P.O.W. into compliance. You can find this treatment listed in places where a batterer is compared to a POW captor. One reason women coming out of that (I’m not saying that the woman in this case was…) have PTSD like veterans have PTSD. And why going through the courts exacerbates this — same treatement. Repeated, chronic threats to one’s integrity, and safety, every time one goes into court.
Comments: Penal law (criminal) has sentencing guidelines and limits. Civil law (torts, breaches of contract) have specific remedies. But, not well-known by the laypeople, FAMILY LAW is a different beast, and the contempts are to bring a party into compliance with a desired condition, and can persist until the desired (by individual judge) state is obtained. So, see the problem with that? Suppose the desired state is a state of mind? Now, that’s trouble, spelled out. . .. (I think the post I discussed this, with my non-legally-trained, but trying to grasp concepts-brain, was the one about an alarm system that failed, burning down a warehouse. The alarm system company was fined to the full amount (million$$) — because the civil law provides for this, and a contract was involved. When will we learn that marriage is not a real CONTRACT like that, with spelled out terms? (Enlighten me legally, if I’m missing something — such as options — in this statement).
“, The evidence before me demonstrates a pattern of willful and calculated violations of the clear and express dictates of the parties’ Stipulation of Settlement,” Ross wrote in Lauren R. v. Ted R., 203699-02.
“The extensive record is replete with instances of attempts to undermine the relationship between the children and their father and replace him with her new husband, manipulation of defendant’s parenting access, utter and unfettered vilification of the defendant to the children, false reporting of sexual misconduct without any semblance of ‘good faith,’ and her imposition upon the children to fear her tirades and punishment if they embrace the relationship they want to have with their father.”
This judge is indignant, and has the flourish (the first one being “replete with..”) to express it. HE TOO assigns motive. Of course, judges are supposed to have some judgement, but this is certainly an interpretation, and throughout, states, and restates, her intents. Mind-readers!
I wonder — do criminals at their sentencing for other than thought- or intent- or visitation-crimes, get the extra lectures to go with it?
The extraordinary hearing to determine whether Ms. R. should be held in contempt for violating the couple’s stipulation of settlement began in May 2009 and stretched over 23 days of hearings over the next nine months.
During the hearing, Mr. R. testified** to dozens of occasions in which his ex-wife either interfered with his visitation rights or purposefully alienated the children from him
“The hearing” ?? Which of the above 23 days? Was any of her testimony heard during this time, or was she able to rebutt any of it? Wouldn’t THAT be a set of transcripts . . . . . I know how family law hearings go; I was accused of this also, but did not interfere ONCE with custody by even a few hours — I wasn’t born yesterday. …. If an adjustment was made up an hour, I was requested to extend the pickup an hour. Then I was ordered to switch days of pickup, or had them cancelled on short notice, while children lived with me, and this many times compromised work, as moms can testify. This case, however, already had a stipulation.
“purposefully” entails assigning motive. Was wife allowed to cross-examine him on any of this? Was the interference documented and evidence for it found? Where is her testimony — was hits a hearing, or an interrogation?
“Interfering with his visitation rights OR purposefully alienated the children.” It is clear to me that the real indignation is over the alienation, not the cutting off of visitation. And again (readers), (assuming some are left!), I CHALLENGE you to find one MAN lectured like this for doing the EXACT same thing to a noncustodial Mom. While you’re looking, go to http://www.rightsformothers.com and scroll down far enough to get her story (hasn’t seen the son for YEARS, wages garnished to below housing, while working FT). Where is HER indignant judge?
The judge described about a dozen such incidents or patterns in his eight-page decision.
In the winter of 2007, for example, Ms. R. prevented Mr. R. from seeing his daughters for six weeks, Ross wrote.
“I observed the plaintiff smirk in the courtroom as defendant >>emotionally<< related how he was deprived of spending Hanukkah with his children, and was relegated to lighting a menorah and watching his daughters open their grandparents’ presents in the back of his truck at the base of plaintiff’s driveway,” the judge wrote.
Perhaps she’d seen his emotional performances before, including in a courtroom, and wasn’t as impressed as the judge. MORAL? Men can be soulful in court — it indicates sincerity, because we all “know” men are rational and logical, and when they truly DO emote, then what they are emoting about must be genuine, or why would their pain so move them to be soulful (in court)? Women, however, if remembering a different version of events, are warned that smirking at it could cost them custody — THEIR emotion must be in synche with the court’s emotions, or they’re screwed.
If true (presumably it is), that was sure mean. But, the point should the contempt of court orders re visitation, and should’ve been left at that. He is getting even now, more than, so far. And while I’m sure the pain (including humiliation, probably with another man inside, another factor, I bet) at this event was likely genuine, Mr. R. — UNlike many others, who will be affected by this decision, and the message it sends, I bet — many of us do not have $134,000 to lose, or at all, with which to console ourselves. With that amount of cash, he could I bet find another woman, maybe even make some more babies. There’s lots of them (count me out) around . . ..
MY point is — does this ever go the same way, with a different gender? Consider Joyce Murphy, who went to jail for interfering with custody when the courts wouldn’t do anything a bout her daughter being molested. She lost custody (threat therapy carried out). later, the same dude, not confronted and in fact one the first time, went on to molest some other children, whose parents DID report, and eventually she got her daughter back, though I bet not with an “oops” or apology from the court.
We DO have internet, and we ARE aware of other court cases around the country. I believe it’s time to shelve some of these theories– but since the courts don’t, I will again (below) review the Declaration of Independence. Certain rights are UNALIENABLE — and when a pattern of tyranny rules in one area of government, or throughout it, we have a right to change it, though not for a light reason. . . . Just a little reminder: The signers of that declaration pledged their honor, their fortunes, and their lives to this cause, and many of them lost all three. Well, maybe not the first one, in the long run.
Mr. R. also testified that Ms. R. consistently scheduled theater outings and social activities with her children so that they would conflict with his visitation, thereby putting him in the position of either consenting to a missed visit or risking disappointing his daughters.
Sounds like a play-book for many mothers I know who haven’t seen their kids in MONTHS, or YEARS.
The “crescendo” of Ms. R.’s contempt involved false accusations of sexual abuse against Mr. R., the judge wrote.
“Allegations that defendant had injured the child were found to be baseless and, by making such allegations, plaintiff needlessly subjected the child to an investigation by Child Protective Services, placing her own interests above those of the child,” Ross wrote. “This report was not made in ‘good faith’ — rather, the investigating agency warned the mother not to re-utilize the allegations and her children in her custodial litigation with the defendant.”
In addition to the contempt finding and the temporarily stayed jail sentence, Ross ordered a hearing to consider a change of custody and to hear Mr. R.’s application for more than $134,000 in attorney fees. Those hearings were postponed pending Ms. R.’s appeal.
Ms. R.’s attorney, Kieth I. Rieger of Barrocas & Rieger in Garden City, N.Y., praised Ross, but criticized the decision, likening it to last week’s missed umpire call that cost a Detroit Tigers pitcher a perfect game.
Maybe this (male) attorney didn’t pick up on the emotional overtones?? . . . . .
This judge has threatened this woman, and made an example of her, and lectured her in court; presuming the sexual abuse allegations to be false, and intended to make an example of her. Her attorney, seeing this — that comment is called Damage Control. He’s on the losing side and didn’t even support her in print, morally, at all.
“I think all of us make mistakes, and I think he’s just made a good-faith, honest mistake in his assessment of this case,” Rieger said. “That’s why there’s an Appellate Division. I think he just did not accurately assess my client.”
Stanley Hirsch, also of Garden City, represented Mr. R.
“I’m very hopeful that this case will be some type of warning to those who don’t have the children’s best interests at heart when they conduct themselves with their spouses,” Hirsch said. “It has great significance to my client, but I think it has a terrific overall impact on people who are going through a divorce and not getting along and involving the children in their disputes.”
Well, either the judge missed a pitch, or he sent a message. I’m going with the latter. Of course, the winning attorney was smart enough to put this in the plural, and keeping up the pretense that this is really a gender-neutral issue. That’s why the same people pushing “fatherhood” push this. (See my last post, the bottom section)
So, Yeah, we (noncustodial, now, mothers) got that. Loud and clear. Take your kids OUT of acttivities developing them personally, and don’t smirk in the courtroom, particularly in response to any lies. [FYI, that’s good advice].
Now get this — we haven’t forgotten the Declaration of Independence, or men, women and children who DIED ~ ~ and lives squandered ~ because of this pushing “parental alienation” and yet not enforcing this equally. And family law is NOT working for women attempting to protect themselves and their children from danger, which they have a right to — it’s under UNALIENABLE . . .
You want to go the “how dare you alienate a man from his “seed” theme (that’s the Biblical terminology for children)? And get the whole society and relatives wrapped up in it? Because while there are throwaway spouses, but having impregnated a woman puts a permanent bond between the man and his kids — and NOT the mother and his kids? We could just go back to sharia law and cut the facade of the Constitution, and all that.
HERE IT IS, AGAIN:
When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident:
That all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that, to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security.
- He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.
- He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our Constitution and unacknowledged by our laws, giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation:(NOTE: those who take time to review the material, and supporting systems to this FAMILY LAW system (as well as its history) will soon acknowledge that it is NOT based on LAW, but on PSYCHOLOGY, and it doesn’t protect rights of individuals when they conflict with an amorphous definition called “FAMILY.” Moreover, the funding of grants to the courts to sway custody decisions is indeed foreign to the (myth?) many American women believed, that they had some semblance of equality under the law, or some access to it, and did not become second class citizens on reporting abuse or leaving it.
There are others. (sorry about that print) — BUT, it should be acknowledged that whiel we don’t have a single “HE” as a king, or prince, it’s quite possible for an oligarchy, or a ruling “elite” to make the primary decisions far from those affected by them, jsut as King George had an army, courtiers, and messengers. . . . When the US Government is tarting to operate like this, we are simply colonized and cannibalized by our own. …
- He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our Constitution and unacknowledged by our laws, giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation:
- For taking away our charters, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering fundamentally the forms of our governments;
THIS IS HOW IT CONCLUDES:
Nor have we been wanting in our attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them, from time to time, of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity; and we have conjured them, by the ties of our common kindred, to disavow these usurpations which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too, have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity which denounces our separation, and hold them as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends.
We, therefore, the representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name and by the authority of the good people of these colonies solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British crown and that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved; and that, as free and independent states, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and do all other acts and things which independent states may of right do. And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.
Ah well, another noble idea defeated by a dysfunctional formatting.
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Domestic Violence INDUSTRY Awareness Month — let’s boycott!
I’m short of time. Let’s keep this simple: STOP, LOOK, and LISTEN….
“Ye shall know them by their fruits. “
(notably absent — stoppING domestic violence.)
Excuse me, scratch that —
Ye shall know them by their “-INGS”,
—
WritINGS often have titles end in -ING and are (thus) UnendING, which tells you the process (and deaths/destructions from this) never stop…
One prime indicator you are in this industry is any word ending in “-ing” in the title. Last post, I gave you the newest, latest, “Defending Childhood” initiative. Other times, it’s Explicating Domestic Violence, and of course the latest is along the lines of “Rethinking Domestic Violence.” Even if ALl these systems fail, or if people die as a result, it’s still possible to write on
“UnderstandING System Failure” (see my post).
Apologies in advance to any expert, and diligent writer/researcher, possibly very nice individual I will insult in this post. I do mean this. Your writings are interesting, and some of them hold some water.
Please bear in mind, I looked for help the past 10 years, which was unwise. In that time, I could’ve passed the Bar, earned another degree, or probably passed three self-defense courses, which might have been a better use of my time than attending conferences on DV or reading the literature, or expecting anything funded by U.S. or (my state) taxpayer dollars — extracted on the premise that these taxes are for helping people to handle certain social ills, so the taxpayers wouldn’t have to, personally — and could continue working and paying more taxes…while organizations that DON’T (or, are funded by foundations that don’t) transform society and policy….
Here’s a sample of the “-INGS” that indicate participation in the Domestic Violence INDUSTRY, or in the backlash to it, the Fatherhood (i.e., “ParentING” literature, by its real name) Industry.
(I obviously don’t mean “parenting” literature by married or cohabiting parents, but in the context of family law — see blog title…)
My sarcasm about the industry (well-merited) doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate the points raised by people in it (well, many of the points raised by people in it). What I protest is the SILENCE on the points rarely raised — which are the crux of the matter, and we poor slobs stuck in the system deserved to know earlier. Serves us right for following industry leaders before doing a background checks, or having ever become distressed — at all — in life… or having been raised in trusting nonviolent family environments, which fail to tell us how the world works, or at least the economy and the government. To this day, a real good (if uncomfortable) life consists of straining out myths. I hope my blog helps with some of the worst..
Redefining Harm, Reimagining Remedies and Reclaiming Domestic Violence Law
Margaret Ellen Johnson
University of Baltimore – School of Law
UC Davis Law Review, Vol. 42, 2009
University of Baltimore School of Law Legal Studies Research Paper No. 2009-4
Abstract:
Civil domestic violence laws do not effectively address and redress the harms suffered by women subjected to domestic violence. The Civil Protective Order (“CPO”) laws should offer a remedy for all domestic abuse with an understanding that domestic violence subordinates women.{{WE WANT LAWS TO UNDERSTAND SOMETHING? OR TO OFFER A REMEDY BASED ON SOMETHING?}}{{Rather, I suggest we start with an acknowledgment that they aren’t enforceable, anyhow, at leat not for long……As such, and per se, they endanger women unles respected by the person who got the civil PO. See Castle Rock v. Gonzales — isn’t this a lawyer or law prof. writing??}}These laws should not remedy only physical violence or criminal acts.{{Well, as practiced now — they often don’t remedy anything, though initially they do save lives (case in point). They are also considered less severe than criminal when kids get involved, though family law judges are notrious for ignoring criminal pasts in custody cases anyhow…Lord help the [yeah, woman , and especially any mother,] who didn’t know this, and press charges from day 1….}}All forms of abuse — psychological, emotional, economic, and physical — are interrelated. Not only do these abuses cause severe emotional distress, physical harm, isolation, sustained fear, intimidation, poverty, degradation, humiliation, and coerced loss of autonomy, {{TRUE — in fact sounds like a good description of slavery, which supposedly was outlawed...}} but, as researchers have demonstrated, [***] most domestic violence is the fundamental operation of systemic oppression through the exertion of power and control. Because CPOs are effective in rebalancing the power in a relationship and decreasing abuse, this remedy should be available to all women subjected to all forms of domestic violence. This Article proposes recrafting the civil law to provide a remedy for all harms of domestic violence and its operation of systemic power and control over women. Re-centering the narrative of domestic violence on this oppression rather than merely physical violence and criminal acts underscores the critical role of women’s agency and autonomy in legally remedying domestic violence. Too often, outside actors choose to save women’s lives to the exclusion of effectuating women’s choices about their abusive relationships.Keywords: Domestic Violence, Civil Protective Order, Civil Law, Women and the Law, Feminist Legal Theory, Gender and the Law
JEL Classifications: K19, K39, K40
Accepted Paper Series
Date posted: November 19, 2008 ; Last revised: August 16, 2010
Suggested Citation
I’m not going to fully engage with this article sounds interesting, eh? See my What Decade Were These Stories post, though — civil or criminal, the duty to enforce does NOT create a right for the protected party to demand enforcement. Bet they didn’t tell you that one at the local Family Justice Center.
Speaking of which, for CreatING Family Justice Centers — see my post “District Attorney Dubious Doings”
Speaking of which — and this is timely — see JUSTICE WOMEN.ORG (N. CA. based — same as Dr. Kelly, below — although I doubt the nonprofit organization founders can afford to fly around the country conducting trainings, like those in the industry can. And do….
Research can “demonstrate” anything, which I’m about to demonstrate.
To make my point, I’ll source another nice seminar held at this same Univ. of Baltimore School of Law, recently ….
ParentING Coordination:
HelpING High Conflict Parents Resolve Disputes**
{a word about those phrases, below….}
>December 7th – December 10th, 2009 – The University of Baltimore School of Law Center for Families, Children and the Courts, in partnership with the Association of Family Conciliation Courts, sponsored two two-day workshops. Dr. Joan Kelly presented Parenting Coordination: Helping High Conflict Parents Resolve Disputes and Ms. Mindy Mitnick presented Advanced Issues in Child Custody: The Child’s Perspective.
Key phrase: high-conflict (reframes DV/CA issues), “parenting Coordinatrion” and “HELPING parents.” Yeah, right…
<a href=”http://law.ubalt.edu/template.cfm?page=1408” rel=”nofollow”>SOURCE: University of Baltimore Law School.</a>
That this is a marketING phrase can be seen by searching on the title — it shows up as a TrainING seminar out of — “suprise!” – afccnet.org, which I don’t feel like downloading here: (note: try search yourself, in quotes, if my link doesn’t work)
“Parenting Coordination: Helping High Conflict Parents Resolve Disputes”
Or, I could search this by the Presenter, following the same Title, and trace it back to Northern California..She happened to also teach this at Baltimore School of Law.
FEE: $495 (Early Registration: $435 if paid by 10/21/10; $465 if paid by 11/4/10). MCLE & BBS (12 hrs.); MCEP (13 hrs – to be submitted for review to MCEPAA for approval, Provider #NOR045).
DESCRIPTION:
Parents with continuing disputes and litigation about their children following divorce present a difficult problem for courts, lawyers and mental health professionals, and increase their children’s risk of adjustment problems. For parenting coordinators, Special Masters, mediators, custody evaluators, lawyers, divorce counselors, therapists and other professionals who work with high-conflict families.Participants in this two-day workshop will:
- Understand the most recent empirical and clinical research on high conflict parents and their children and what makes these parents so difficult;
- Understand the hybrid nature of the parenting coordinator (Special Master) role that includes parent education, mediation, and where authorized, arbitration, and how the parenting coordinator process helps reduce parent conflict and address children’s needs;
THESE NEEDS WILL MOST DEFINITELY INCLUDE A NEED FOR TWO PARENTS — MOM AND DAD — IN THEIR LIVES, EVEN IF DAD WAS A BATTERER AND HAS A CHILD MOLESTATION RECORD. IF IT’S TOO OVERT, THEN THE SUPERVISED VISITATION PEOPLE CAN BE BROUGHT IN…
- Understand the distinctions between serving as a Special Master and therapy, custody evaluation, child representation or representing parents;
- Learn about parenting coordinator objectives, types of disputes settled, best practices, models, and critical elements in court orders or parent consent agreements;
- Understand the technical, ethical, clinical, and personal issues in serving as a parenting coordinator (Special Master);
- Learn from case examples, group exercises, and practice dispute analysis and decision-making.
About the Instructor:
Dr. Joan B. Kelly, a research, forensic, and clinical psychologist, was Director of the Northern California Mediation Center for 19 years. Her research, writing, and practice have focused on children’s adjustment to divorce, custody and access issues, using child development research in parenting plans, divorce mediation, and Parenting Coordination. She has more than 85 publications, and a classic book, Surviving the Breakup: How Children and Parents Cope with Divorce. Joan is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association, was recently appointed to an APA ask Force to develop guidelines for Parenting Coordinator practice, and previously served on a similar AFCC task force. She is a frequent presenter and speaker in the United States, Canada, and abroad.
Co-presenter (at Baltimore School of Law training, anyhow)
Ms. Mindy Mitnick
Besides having a very unique name, especially preceded by “Ms.” —
which may (or may not) explain why she present with Ph.D. (just kids — but seriously, in the INDUSTRY, Ph.D.’s count. Being a street-savvy litigant, even with a Ph.D. in something else does NOT — as Dr. Amy Cabrillo (pediatrician) learned the hard way when she begged a judge to listen to her high-conflict, uncoordinated parent self in NOT letting her suicidal and already troubled “ex” take three children on a weekend visitation. As we know (and wasn’t THIS in maryland also??) her plea was ignored, and her three children were drowned in a bathtub. Apparently their father was indeed coordinated in some matters, such as drownING his kids. This FYI, is called a “dispute” and “high conflict,” squarely blaming Dr. Castillo 50% for not holdING her marriage together, although certainly she was complyING with court orders… …Street savvy, educated, observant, alert, honest, etc. or not — you will be cut down to size by these professionals….
(is on the Board of Directors of AFCC, who helps sponsor these trainINGs.)
Mindy F. Mitnick Ed.M.
Edina, MinnesotaMindy Mitnick is a Licensed Psychologist practicing in Minneapolis. She received a Master of Education from Harvard University and a Master of Arts from the University of Minnesota. She specializes in complex custody cases, working as an evaluator, therapist and parenting consultant. Ms. Mitnick has trained professionals throughout the country about developmental issues in parenting schedules, effective interventions in high-conflict divorce, assessing allegations of sexual abuse during divorce disputes, and the use of expert witnesses in divorce cases. She has been a speaker for the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts, National Association of Counsel for Children, the National Center for Prosecution of Child Abuse, the Ontario Office of the Children’s Lawyer, and numerous statewide training conferences. Ms. Mitnick served on the Minnesota Supreme Court Task Force on Parental Cooperation and the American Bar Association working group to update guidelines for child witnesses in criminal cases. She currently serves on the AFCC Task Force on Court-Involved Therapy and is a board member of the Minnesota Chapter of AFCC.
In the training phrase above, from Univ of Baltimore School of Law:
December 7th – December 10th, 2009 – The University of Baltimore School of Law Center for Families, Children and the Courts, in partnership with the Association of Family Conciliation Courts, sponsored two two-day workshops. Dr. Joan Kelly presented Parenting Coordination: Helping High Conflict Parents Resolve Disputes and Ms. Mindy Mitnick presented Advanced Issues in Child Custody: The Child’s Perspective.
These are the key concepts to understande, as well as how the title itself is REPACKAGING and MARKETING CRIMINAL MATTERS {typically child molestation or battering, domestic violence, and/ or in some cases stalking, kidnapping, false imprisonment and in general other pretty nasty stuff that society doesn’t like — or at least says it doesn’t} AS PARENTAL” DISPUTES”
:
December 7th – December 10th, 2009 – The University of Baltimore School of Law Center for Families, Children and the Courts, in partnership with the Association of Family Conciliation Courts, sponsored two two-day workshops. Dr. Joan Kelly presented Parenting Coordination: Helping High Conflict Parents Resolve Disputes and Ms. Mindy Mitnick presented Advanced Issues in Child Custody: The Child’s Perspective.
We have here a prominent psychologist and educationist trainING a host of others how to view parents with a dispute. Keep in mind that some of the leading bleeding headlines you see also characterize the problem as a “dispute.” Some dispute!
The chief thing to understand about BOTH parents in any of these matters is that they can’t walk and chew gum unless a psychologist and/or divorce expert tells them how to, for a fee (see above…). Pretty soon, from what I can tell, that definition is going to expand beyond the about 50% of couples that divorce, to most of the population — except thsoe in the business of supervising them, and training others how to do so, whether this supervision is at the K-12 level, pre-school, prison, batterers intervention, supervised vsitation, fatherhood practicing, marriage-promoting, ABSTINENCE-promoting or Restraining Order Issuing level — or simply being a working PERSON FUNDING THESE EFFORTS. ….
I know we can’t “walk and chew gum” without help (although some of us were formerly surgeons, teachers, factory workers, business owners, stay-at-home Moms, working Moms, or functional in many, many other areas of society outside this world of family law…….) – because we need COORDINATION — right?
THAT link is at the CFCC level. I keep tellING people, including women in my situation, that this is the key to the puzzle, at least a major key. ….
Take a look at the -INGS in this California Courtinfo site — linking to the CFCC
Their program page includes this:
The Center for Families, Children & the Courts is involved with many projects related to family, juvenile, child support, custody, visitation, and domestic violence law and procedure. Click on the title below to find out about a particular program.
Access to Visitation Grant Program
The Access to Visitation Grant Program — I think it dates as far back as 1995 or 1996 at least — is a function of PWORA welfare reform, fatherhood promotion, and forced shared parenting concepts. It’s one of the best kept secrets around. I you read about it, you will see why there is an ongoING need for thes eprofessionals in the courts, and how YOU are (probably) paying for this, to the tune of (at one time) $10/million per YEAR, nationwide.
OK, OK, I’ll spell this out, right here now:
Overview
The Judicial Council is charged with administering and distributing California’s share of the federal Child Access and Visitation Grant funds from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Office of Child Support Enforcement. These grants, established under section 391 of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (Pub.L. 104–193, 110 Stat. 2258)—title III, section 469B of the Social Security Act—enable states to establish and administer programs that support and facilitate noncustodial parents’ access to and visitation with their children.The congressional goal of the Child Access and Visitation Grant Program is to “remove barriers and increase opportunities for biological parents who are not living in the same household as their children to become more involved in their children lives.” Under the federal statute, Child Access and Visitation Grant funds may be used to support and facilitate noncustodial parents’ access to and visitation [with] their children by means of activities including mediation (both voluntary and mandatory), counseling, education, development of parenting plans, visitation enforcement (including monitoring, supervision and neutral drop-off and pick-up), and development of guidelines for visitation and alternative custody arrangements.
The use of the funds in California, however, is limited by state statute to three types of programs:
Supervised visitation and exchange services;
Education about protecting children during family disruption; and
Group counseling services for parents and children.
The primary goals of California’s Access to Visitation Grant Program are to enable parents and children to participate in supervised visitation, education, and group counseling programs—irrespective of marital status and of whether the parties are currently living separately permanently or temporarily—and to promote and encourage healthy relationships between noncustodial or joint custodial parents and their children while ensuring the children’s health, safety, and welfare. The overarching goal of the grant program is to increase noncustodial parents’ access to and visitation with their children through accessible and available services statewide for low-income families who are now or have been in family courts.
Aimed at low-income families, ostensibly, it affects ALL families. particularly ones where some wealth exists are going to get soaked.
This is the best kept secret around and should be “outed” during Domestic Violence INDUSTRY Month — because the domestic violence INDUSTRY leaderes never talk about this, or a whole damn lot of other key factors at play in the c ourts.
Why should they — and ahve to go find another job? ?? What, you got to be KIDDING!
Yesterday’s post cited an article in a Northern California area (Marin County) that is getting high press, and some organizations around it (one called “Center for Judicial Excellence.”) and an upcoming audit of the family court system, supposedly. Who’s kidding whom? The eXISTENCE of this CFCC and its role in the courts, and the Access Visitation funding is not even mentioned (by name) in ALL of the comments below, which span many categories. Moreover, the ONLY reference to AFCC (and some indications a woman had actually read Marv Bryer,Idele Clark – one of the cases involved, I believe — and others) — she reads like a madwoman.
HEY — when you type on a computer, are you constantly aware if it’s DOS or WINDOWS or Apple based? (obviously that’s not my field of expertise)? Are you translating binary code? Probably not –right? But how would it work if someone hadn’t designed that to start with?
Now let’s talk about the INDUSTRY. It’s SELF-REPLICATING THROUGH UNENDING TRAINING, enabled in great part by this wonderful INTERNET.
Them that can, DO. Them that can’t, teach it’s said. Well, there’s SOME truth to that ..
Trust me (or don’t) — it’s important to understand this system — and it’s a model for other similar ones.
Remind me, some day, to publish my English to ING-lish guide to these marketING systems posing as “help” to uncoordinated parents in a dispute, or the restrainING order mills.
Don’t get me wrong — I wouldn’t be alive today without one. But it most certainly upset a LOT of people, and (except that I’m still alive typing) they have more than gotten even for the indignity…
EVERY balance sheet has a + and a -. But a business sense says, that in relationships, your – may very well be my (or my cronies’) +. Failure to realize this is setting onesself up. When it comes to altruism, it may be a factor, but I’d bet it’s generally not the primary one in most ongoing relationships. Self-interest is part of human nature. Most people, nowadays, in the US (probably safe to say) do not raise their own food or defend themselves. So, what fields is everyone going to?
And where are the intellectuals going to make an honest — scratch that — make A living?
We don’t have royalty over here, so one has to go somewhere… Social Sciences, Psychology, TeachING . . . .CoordinatING, managING, etc. Where is the endless supply of customers coming from?
What better database than people who get into troubled relationships (domestic violence) and try to get out (divorce) but have children before they do (parenting). It takes a global village, right?? ThinkING — now that’s got to be taught also…
Did I mention PublishING? that’s a prerequisite for Ph.D.s, isn’t it? At least to get started, and retain a reputation.
The question with any policy ending with the word ING is — who is between and among?
Uniformly, almost, I find it is between or among professionals in one field (or another) getting their act together about how to describe and deal with People who are Not Present. In otherwords, the US’es in any field discuss the THEMs. In this way, groups that were formerly an Us/Them dichotomy (the most obvious being the Fatherhood/Domestic Violence groupings) pat themselves on the back for collaborating — on how to scam the new “THEMS,” which is, as I again say, the poor slobs who still think that law means law, and not psychological therapeutic jurisprudence for fun (theirs) and profit.
And we indeed are a consumer society — or else the sky will fall. How can and who can be forced into consuming psychological, parenting, and other counseling they neither need, want, nor are going to follow? Only someone in severely compromised situations. Voila, Family Law System. ….
HENCE, the FINANCIAL balance sheet often reveals much more than any custody evaluation. I’m all in favor of it, when it comes to reform. Personally, though I’d favor boycott where possible, and watch out, where not. Women’s groups should learn from men (but not forget that gender issues remain, and always have been there) and men should learn from women when we’ve had enough; you are going to be out on your ass, and if these policies keep up, up until the invention of the artificial womb or human clone, we are going to recommend our daughters stop giving birth; except that we love them, some of us sometimes regret that we did, to spend an entire childhood like many of them have had to — half in abuse, and half (possibly still in abuse) in the income-draining court system.
(I love you, girls… . . . Love, your real Mom…and you are why I ever bothered with this blog. I wanted you to know what was, and what wasn’t certain people’s fault — and NONE of it was yours, ever. I also want to warn you what’s ahead if you don’t gain your own wisdom about your own past someday, I hope soon — or when you’re ready to. Sorry I can’t mention you by name, but I bet you’ll recognize my writing style….)
Lies are always wrong, and intentional deceit. The largest lies were not from either parent (though I DID NOT!) but from the policymakers in washington, D.c., and others who framed legislation to make a joke out of the court process, and for their own pocketbooks…If I had left earlier, given these policies, I likely would not have even seen you grow half up…
Make SURE you know your travelling companions in life, and choose the best ones you can in any situation. Never take things for granted, and try to study the wider systems you are in. Specializing is rewarding (and builds good discipline and attentiont o detail), but professions change rapidly. As women, you need to know some feminist roots, and where feminists have forgotten the “fundies,” and both, fighting, have forgotten the history of this country and the world.
ALWAYS, always, the love of money is the root of evil, and generally speaking, highest emotions in life are about that, and possibly social status and access to sex (which money, plenty of it represents). Remember that the net time some legislator or anyone else (such as a preacher) tries to lecture you about your personal habits. . .. Don’t go into marriage if you do, defanged. it’s just not wise! That man needs to know he respects you or you’re gone, kids or no kids. Respect comes first, and equal access to finances to take off if you need to (that was my mistake, daughters).
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“All We Like Sheep” Congregate and Bleat…except Shepherds, and Sheepdogs…
In honor of my almost a full generation “dealing with” domestic violence issues, and also in honor of yet another “Domestic Violence Awareness Month” I’m about to boycott it, and simplify (or stop) this blog. I may simply put links from my commentary to other blogs, or not.
Several of these are on the site “Rightsformothers.com” — and you can see “Let’s Get Honest” to exhort readers (“Noncustodial and Custodially challenged mothers” is the subtitle, but we know that visitors include POTUS (that’s President of the U.S., i.e. someone from this office is viewing the site. Any blog can track its visitors — I do, obviously).
Yesterday, I was protesting the sheeplike wish to let shepherds whos nonprofits are unlisted, and whose ideas don’t quite address the CAUSES of the crises in the courts so much as the existence of it, speak for us (whatever their ability to speak, or connections to get platforms to speak from) or fight our battles. Or lead the charge, even. Or, sell our stories on video or anywhere else. (“Selling” could mean, not for pay, but for promotion and prominence as addressing the problem). Feedback AND analyses from infantry has to have the understanding of infantry, and has to happen.
Repeatedly, I exhort “us” to distinguish between professionals, who continue to earn a living marketing one solution, or another and bankrupted — or close to it– distraught parents. It’s just a business system — someday we’ll get this, I hope. It’s not “about” what it self-declares itself to be about.
Here’s one sample, my responding to a Mothers of Lost Children Oct. 1, 2010 march in Washington, D.C., and the excitement and hope that comes from having someone from the Dept. of Justice actually acknowledge their presence. After pointing out that a nonexistent “Council for Justice” was sited, as well as old data on the problem, and asking that a well-known leader present provide the EIN#s for both of the known nonprofits in this field, etc., I write:
Those are virtually a compilation of some of the very organizations we already sought help from. Whether funded by HHS, or DOJ, it’s a CRYIN SHAME that so many have figured out, so easily, that we haven’t figured THEM out (initiative, demonstration, coalition, research and developments, reporting and consciousness-raising), or haven’t figured out the basic SOP — which is to get in on the grants from the wealthy (includin the IRS-funded U.S. Federal Government) to study the poor. …
The latest of which is called — give me a break! — “Defending Childhood.” Add this one to my post on The Trinity of Hoodlums (note — I often “ballpark” [approximate only] the titles of my own posts…)
So does the recent, new improved “Defending Our Children” initiative introduced by Attorney General Eric Holder. ….
Attorney General Holder Announces Defending Childhood Initiative
September 24, 2010
On September 23, 2010, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) issued the following press release:
Washington—Attorney General Eric Holder today officially unveiled Defending Childhood, a new Department of Justice initiative focused on addressing children’s exposure to violence. The goals of the initiative are to prevent children’s exposure to violence as victims and witnesses, mitigate the negative effects experienced by children exposed to violence, and develop knowledge about and increase awareness of this issue.
There’s nothing new under the sun, particularly in this field, except more taxpayer $$ to “study” “prevent” “resource” etc.
“For me, the issue of children’s exposure to violence has been both a personal and professional concern for decades. As our nation’s Attorney General and as a parent, it remains a top priority,” said Attorney General Holder. “Through renewing and refocusing our efforts to serve our nation’s most vulnerable and most distressed children we can transform the country we love for the better – one child at a time.”
A key component of the initiative is a multi-year demonstration program. Phase I includes planning grants for eight demonstration sites announced today. In Phase II, up to four communities will be selected from the initial eight to receive funding for further implementation of their plans, based on the availability of funding. This program supports the development of comprehensive community-based strategies to prevent and reduce the impact of children’s exposure to violence in their homes, schools, and communities.
The eight demonstration sites are:
* City of Boston, MA ($160,000)
* City of Portland, ME ($160,000)
* Chippewa Cree Tribe, MT ($153,210)
* City of Grand Forks, ND ($159,967)
* Cuyahoga County Board of Commissioners, OH ($157,873)
* Multnomah County Department of Human Services, OR ($159,349)
* Rosebud Sioux Tribe, SD ($159,534)
* Shelby County, TN ($159,099).Some examples of the efforts these grants will support are:
* improving the identification, screening, assessment, and referral of children and their families to appropriate programs and services
* increasing access to and utilization of quality programs and services
* developing new programs and services where gaps exist.The grantees will work in collaboration with other local organizations, including victim service providers, tribal non-profit organizations, and community based organizations with a documented history of effectiveness concerning children exposed to domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, or stalking.
In addition to the demonstration program grants, the Department of Justice is committing additional funding for research, evaluation, public awareness and partnerships related to the initiative. The other awards announced today are:
* Action Partnerships for Professional Membership and Professional Organizations Responding to Children Exposed to and Victimized by Violence ($1,498,932) – Office for Victims of Crime
* Evaluation of the Attorney General’s Children Exposed to Violence Demonstration Program: Phase I ($500,000) – National Institute of Justice
* Public Awareness and Outreach for Victims in Underserved Communities ($995,089) – Office for Victims of Crime
* Research and Evaluation on Children Exposed to Family Violence ($1,244,869) – National Institute of Justice.
Or that we Moms haven’t figured out earlier to cut the “empathy” and go for the cold hard analysis of this system — as WE observe it working. For example, groups like MDRC and PSI come out and contract, evaluate, report on , and fine-tune more demonstration grants on — you bet it — “poor.” Wonder how we got and stayed that way? Don’t understand the tax system, perhaps…. Just clueless, listening to others listen to our stories.
THIS IS AN INFO-FILLED COMMENTARY; MIGHT BE WORTH A LOOK . . . . .
THEN — ACTUALLY LOOK AT THAT “CRYIN’ SHAME” POST AND TELL ME WHY WE SHOULD GIVE CREDIT TO A SINGLE OTHER INITIATIVE UNTIL THE OTHERS HAVEN’T BEEN AUDITED, AND PROVED, DISPROVED, AND IF THEY DON’T MEET THE STANDARD, STOPPED . . ..
Here, the story starts — notice, one day before our nation’s Attorney General unveils another program that’s supposed to stop fiascos like this one.
Crying shame: Kristen Stillman relinquishes her four children in court
Kristen Stillman does not cry. The tears were beaten out of her early on — as was any hope that someone might listen to her, rescue her, during those twelve hellacious years she was held prisoner at the house in northwest Denver where her mother had left Kristen and her twin, Will, when they were only eight years old. The only way to survive was to feel nothing, to be like “a zombie” as she endured the beatings and rapes that resulted in four pregnancies before she was twenty.
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Kristen finally let herself feel when she was in the hospital after giving birth to her fourth child, a boy, and learned that her oldest child, a girl of five, had been abused by the elderly father of her rapist, Eric Torrez. Then, finally, she realized that she would have to rescue herself — for the sake of her children.
AFTER DOING SO, SHE AND HER TWIN BROTHER WENT BACK FOR THEIR OWN CHILDREN, WHO THE RAPIST HUSBAND OF HER MOTHER, who abandoned them, (the children came from the rapes — cf. Garrido)
. . . But she’ll keep memories of the children — how attached the girls were to her, how the little boys loved to cuddle. And she’ll have something more tangible: a big bill from the Family Support Registry for their time in foster care. The most recent bill caught up with Kristen just before her court appearance, and a payment was due the next day. She is now $4,979 in arrears, and there’s still one more bill coming, one that will include fees through September 14 — when she officially was declared no longer a parent.
“Denver Human Services is sympathetic to the long-term ramifications past abuse has on parents who were themselves victims,” says a statement prepared by the Department of Human Services. “However, our highest priority must remain the best interest of the children and the system they rely on to keep them safe from abuse. Parental fees are an important form of support for children who need foster care. When there are extenuating circumstances, the courts can and often do grant deviations from the statutorily established fees; DHS supports the court’s process and will consider what course of action will best serve the minor children in our care
AND, WE ARE SUPPOSED TO TAKE THIS “DEPT. OF HUMAN SERVICES” SERIOUSLY WHY ? ? ? ? ?
. . .For Kristen, though, this bill feels like a prison sentence, punishment before she can move on with life. If she were not in arrears, she would still have her driver’s license that was suspended because of outstanding child-support bills, might still have the job she lost when she could no longer get to it. She understands the care her children have gotten, appreciates the care her children have gotten. But if the Department of Human Services had taken care of her, there would be no foster-care fees.
Understanding any single system of life well provides an analogy for others. WIthout SOME skill or point of reference for describing as vast a general situation as “Domestic Violence” one tends to just “imbibe” the general rhetoric, lean towards one side or the other, and — especially if compromised somehow in life — just go with the flow, or where it seems safer.
I chose a religious reference above because it’s familiar to me. The Judeao-Christian culture was nomadic, at least in part, so sheep analogies spoke them, whether from the prophet Isaiah, or (choose designation — few people agree on this one) or later, Jesus Christ, or after that, the “apostle to the Gentiles,” Paul.
Whatever one believes, the fact has to be faced that many people see themselves as shepherds of docile and clueless in life sheep. Moreover, it just so happens to be helpful to also feed off the flock, and in general sometimes fleece them.
We cannot understand life without metaphors, without some organizing point of reference. These need to be flexible, and between individual groups, a negotiation for meaning around common ground can happen.
- Which are you — a Sheep?
- Or, a Shepherd?
- Or, a Sheepdog, who is skillfully trained to hear the master’s voice, or whistle, or gesture, and gets meaning and sustenance off taking dues, and handling the flock.
Anyone who has seen sheepdog trials in action, whether in person or televised, is surely impressed and thrilled to see this work
Analogies from this sheep/shepherd/sheepdog culture permeate ours — not only in the concept of churches and “faith-based” etc. who commonly refer to their charges as a flock — but also, similar attitudes and roles are, I fear, very prevalent among policymakers, government leaders, and the actual masters in these matters — the foundations and extreme wealth running our society more and more from the top down. This includes top-flight universities, whose “Centers of Excellence” disperse knowledge about how to handle the masses, particularly unruly portions of them who get out of line from time to time, thereby revealing that alternate ways to live exist.
Hence, ‘METAPHORS WE LIVE BY” (LAKOFF & JOHNSON) is an important book:
CONCEPTS WE LIVE BY
Metaphor is for most people device of the poetic imagination and the rhetorical flourish–a matter of extraordinary rather than ordinary language. Moreover, metaphor is typically viewed as characteristic of language alone, a matter of words rather than thought or action. For this reason, most people think they can get along perfectly well without metaphor. We have found,on the contrary, that metaphor is pervasive in everyday life, not just in language but in thought and action. Our ordinary conceptual system, in terms of which we both think and act, is fundamentally metaphorical in nature.
The concepts that govern our thought are not just matters of the intellect. They also govern our everyday functioning, down to the most mundane details. Our concepts structure what we perceive, how we get around in the world, and how we relate to other people. Our conceptual system thus plays a central role in defining our everyday realities. If we are right in suggesting that our conceptual system is largely metaphorical, then the way we thinks what we experience, and what we do every day is very much a matter of metaphor.
But our conceptual system is not something we are normally aware of. in most of the little things we do every day, we simply think and act more or less automatically along certain lines. Just what these lines are is by no means obvious. One way to find out is by looking at language. Since communication is based on the same conceptual system that we use in thinking and acting, language is an important source of evidence for what that system is like.
Primarily on the basis of linguistic evidence, we have found that most of our ordinary conceptual system is metaphorical in nature. And we have found a way to begin to identify in detail just what the metaphors are halt structure how we perceive, how we think, and what we do.
To give some idea of what it could mean for a concept to be metaphorical and for such a concept to structure an everyday activity, let us start with the concept ARGUMENT and the conceptual metaphor ARGUMENT IS WAR. This metaphor is reflected in our everyday language by a wide variety of expressions:
This book was cited in a discussion of the role of science in the courts, even….
Here’s just one (fairly esoteric) sample:
Jefferson’s “wall of separation between Church & State” is so powerful that, at least in the minds of the American public and perhaps in the minds of most American lawyers, the language of the metaphor has replaced the language of the law.6 Further, the image created by the metaphor has defined our understanding about the relationship between religion and government in America.7 The metaphor has had such astonishing longevity because it meets all the requirements of an effective metaphor: it is simple, concrete, visual, creative, and concise. Further, Jefferson’s care in writing the metaphor should inspire us to take care in crafting or borrowing metaphors for our own
writing.
We need to be alert and vigilant about the use of language — which entails so much metaphor — in our culture.
The language of the family law system PER SE deals with “families.” Individual rights are secondary. Moreover, a history of this field shows clearly that INCORPORATED INTO ITS PHILOSOPHY (at least its publicized philosophy) IS THE MENTAL HEALTH PERSPECTIVE — psychology. LESS COMMONLY ADVERTISED — the origins of the business model, i.e., as psychology is an inexact science (if indeed it IS a science, rather than just a worldview, like any other religion) the courts become “conflict resolution” rather than facts/evidence, or crime/punishment, or even torts-based (i.e., violation of a contract). Also woven into there is the concept that marriage is GOOD for society, and divorce is BAD.
I see it as simply one of multiple ways to “fleece” the innocent and subjugate entire sectors of society to policies set in Washington (NOT locally) and with an overall attitude of the shepherds, wise and benevolent, like “The Lord” of Isaiah (below), or the Psalms (Psalm 23: The Lord is my Shepherd) or, as it may be, a later admonition that “pastors” (itself a shepherding term) not “Lord it over” their flock, for money (!!!), but out of love, and as subjects to that Great Shepherd of the Sheep, namely Jesus. Who, in the gospels, also called himself the good shepherd, etc.
However, as the world flattens, the Internet speeds it up, and within the US, at least, the States/Feds boundary blurs in more and more institutions (schools, courts, criminal databases, child support, and the entire federal grants system, welfare, Head Start, and so on and so forth), the vast array of “sheep” and “sheepdogs” and smaller and smaller circle of “shepherds” are starting to treat human beings like slaves, and more and more like — well, see my post on “MILK SUCKS” to see (if I got all the data in there) how one intelligent, accomplished, and self-sustaining Canadian dairy farmer, dispensing raw milk from healthy cows, became a true enemy and was almost put out of business for his impertinence.
Now I want to talk about the excuses for doing this: Namely, the poor are incompetent, the divorcing parents are selfish, and the mental health professionals are truly concerned about the safety and well being of children.
Yeah, right.. .. ..
I’ve listened so long to people framing domestic violence as a psychological issue (someone has to study those batterers), or as a legal issue (there are criminal laws against assault and battery), or as a spiritual issue (probably the LEAST helpful approach as to stopping it), a family issue, or a social issue. In fact one could go on framing and reframing the issue til one’s own offspring could make a FINE living off of doing nothing to stop it.
ALL WE LIKE SHEEP – Source of quote:
ISAIAH 53:
Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.
5But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.
6All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.
7He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth.
8He was taken from prison and from judgment: and who shall declare his generation? for he was cut off out of the land of the living: for the transgression of my people was he stricken.
The theme of innocence, and of society’s cruel and collective need to produce a scapegoat — usually the innocent –to purge their communal sins, didn’t go away and hasn’t, for thousands of years. Let alone war, cultures besdies Judaeo-Christian have had plenty of human sacrifice, directly, let alone the indirect ones of wars, and simply social structures based on greed, and using other people to contrust national monuments or institutions. The language always supports the habit of sacrifice. These metaphors are resisted, or incorporated, but the fact is, they also persist.
I, too, am concerned that our common culture is going back towards the dark ages, when it comes to women and children – and all in the name of somehow helping them. Or, Stopping Violence. Or, Stopping Child Abuse. Or Children’s Rights. Or Families and Children. Or — a recent one: “Defending Childhood.”
The “Department of Health and Human Services” and the “Department of Justice” are the “shepherds” and their grants employ a LOT of people and run demonstration, research, and evaluation programs upon them, and dispense a certain type of rhetoric that continually indicates they are “on” the job and “preventing” (you name it). …
MEANWHILE, just under the radar, I learn myself that, as of 2005, a Supreme Court case out of this same state (Colorado) settled that NO restraining order needs enforcing. Which raises the question, — then why are they continually being issued?
In an article from May 2009, discussing an impending audit of the courts, and of course, the psychological travails of embattled and bitter, divorcing (i.e., bad sheep) parents, and the trouble the (sheepdog) psychologists have in protecting children from (not causing …) the years-long custody battles, and of course describing the zealous reformers (who I happen to disagree with) the comments run the gamut of viewpoints.
I scrolled through the ALL yesterday, and NOT ONE, ALMOST, fingered the Dept. of Human Services and the interminable series of grants pumping the system full.
Which begins:
Toby and his brother and sister are psychological time bombs.
(Well, call in the psychologists then!)
THIS woman relates her experience, and names several names. She acknowledges the problem, including that it’s a money mill, and says bring back “fault divorce.”:
Posted by Sue Correnti, a resident of another community, on May 29, 2009 at 8:50 pm
I have had the opportunity to view the Family Law Counts first hand since 1995. The real issue in my case was the safety of my then 8-year old daughter. I went to Los Angeles Superior Court thinking this is where justice is to be foundThought the use of laws in motion my ex husband lawyer Yale class of 1967, was able to turn our divorce into a circus act. During my 12 years in the system, no one wanted to even hear about the child’s well being or even talk with her. My first six months cost $60,000 and then he was able to alienate me from any legal representation by suing me, my attorney and two girl friends for Rico and Conspiracy for $5million. This plays havoc in the home that brings piles of papers in the mail box daily, stacks on the dinning room table. I guess I should be grateful that my case got consolidated into a business litigation because they value Attorney Client Privilege more than the value a child’s well being. Along the way I came to know Connie Valentine at California Protective Parents, Karen Winner who wrote a book called Divorced From Justice in New York. This is not just a situation in Marin County, but an epidemic across the United State. Los Angeles is one of the most corrupt court systems that I believe started this mess years ago. It all began with No Fault Divorce and the true reason it came about. No fault divorce turned family law into a money mill, with warriors tampering with the courts. Providers tapping into the money mill and so on. I personally requested an evaluation deposited my check Paid to Los Angeles Superior Court. The truth is that it went into a private bank account that had noting to do with the court. It seems that The Psychiatric Panel was running a private business in the courts. This was discovered the account was closed. Thanks to a grandfather who’s daughter had been wronged Marvin Bryer. He went though trials of deceit. He altered me of the disaster I was walking into and I canceled the evaluation. This is only a small sampling of the corruption going on in the system of judge shopping, pay offs, tampering and political influences. I am still not divorced and cannot even imagine wasting my time and energy in a system that is so broken. My daughter and I went from a home in Playa Del Rey on the hill over looking the ocean to the maids quarters in someone’s home with one bed and closet. Yes I confess that I could not abandon my child to child care and expect her to succeed. I was continually down at court for years, in the business litigation where in one case I became a cross defendant , another the defendant, and still another a defendant all in Pro Per. All consolidated to one Judge…I could not make a living and keep going back and forth to court. I did not get any support until 1999 when the DA finally prosecuted the lawyer father and then the fine was only $650.00. No more than running a stop light. I was not aggressive in this divorce action, because I did not want to loose custody of my child like other women had done. I lost my life savings instead. Why should a person loose everything to get a divorce she did not even want?
The follow up is my daughter is on her way to Medical School in August to be a Pediatrician and care for children that are in need and underprivileged. The time I spent with her has paid off, she is going to be a beneficial presence on this planet. Her father has never contributed and I guess feels like he won, but the truth is no one wins. I qualify for her loans and scholarship, because I have nothing but, love in my heart.
I congratulate the people that have stayed with this for so long, Connie Valentine, Bonnie Russell, Idele Clark, Karen Winner, and now Kathleen Russell at CJE. Demand that all our courts be examined. Then turn and ask how fair it is that a person gets married, has kids and someone wakes up one morning and says they don’t want to be married. Why should the person not violating the marriage be punished and loose their children? There should be some penalty for walking on your family or harming your family. Bring back Fault Divorce and see how the divorce rate will go down and kids will be cared for.
I disagree with “fault” divorce. I am a product of two parents who held it together til I was in college, and later married a man whose parents actually held it together until he (details cannot be revealed, but they never did divorce. They just kept their dysfunctional marriage together). I am STILL unlearning some bad values learned in that scenario. We held it together far longer than appropriate, and the stress and tension from my parent’s own marriage probably resulted in my being in the same circle of people where I picked up a husband who, idolizing marriage (and no one can live up to an “idol”) had behavior that was in the basement, i.e., battering, control, fear-based decision-making propped up by a superficial connection with religion. In another life time, he’d be a radical Muslim and polygamist; he did not actually believe in the values the Bible speaks of, one of which is “charity.” (i.e., love).
I think it may be valuable to do away with marriage, but Fault Divorce? No…. I also do not put the different people above in the same category, although I believe the first 4 have actually suffered through the system, the next to last is a filmmaker? and the last, a PR Consultant. Here’s what Bonnie Russell commented on this site:
And here’s one comment indicating this system is indeed a racket, and referring to the restraining order quandary
To: Parenting Project:
The press is not afraid to tell the story. They either don’t care or don’t recognize a story about institutional gouging and greed.
Family values and corporate media are not a fit. Although, as FamilyLawCourts.com links on the home page demonstrates, the busiess of government is; Business. Family court remains a huge, unregulated industry. And with media barely casting a glance, members of Congress have been indicted for kick-backs to various attorneys and some non-profits. (This is also reported on the home page.)
Local conflicts? How about the former Contra Costa Commissioner, Josanna Berkow who once sat on the board of the San Francisco Kids Turn (another non-profit) and then Ordered litigants to that particular facility? Is would seem a big enough conflict for any media as the “Ka-ching” factor is, well, glaring. Anyone notice besides me?
If media felt like examining the industry, Pulitzer prizes could be the result. And it’s not as if it would require a lot of digging because in the course of decades of no-media; judges are saying the funniest things on-the-record.
Also, media could wake up people up to the fact that domestic violence is a huge and hugely profitable business model, especially when in 2005, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that police officers aren’t legally required to enforce restraining orders.
That decision is located on the Left hand page of http://www.FamilyLawCourts.com/domestic.html
Naturally one might wonder – why then do police departments keep marketing Restraining Orders? And the answer is: For business purposes. PD’s can in a wonderful public relations kind of way align themselves with any non-profit and request federal funds (without depleting their own general fund) for monies to be used for say, bullet-proof vests….for the calls they choose to answer; which may or may not include calls from family crime victims. Again, by focusing on gender rather than the business model, the public is distracted from the lucrative business of “domestic violence.”
And they have. All this is easily enough found – the problem is no one, media or co-workers, or neighbors don’t mind, as long as it isn’t their child.
So even the most glaring examples of something amiss escapes notice.
Consider the Family Justice Center (a national franchise) which is all hype and pr while the numbers of victims increase.
It’s a quasi-governmental agency run by a the YWCA – a faith based organization. So much for the separation of church and state. The problem is – it’s not as if this isn’t happening in plain view. It’s that media either doesn’t recognize or is too lazy to deliver these kinds of block buster stories.
And in regard to the Family Justice Center (what a name!) I suggest people write to Verizon as they are a huge contributor of grants, and applaud them for donating phones to assault victims – and request no money change hands.
Would love for some editor to assign a story on the money doled out to non-profits “addressing” domestic violence….but I’d love to be 5’5″ and that’s not happening either…
This is not even close to the mainstream view; I agree with several aspects and can validate them. However, again, the question is, what to do?
Here’s a high-profile mother whose sons (if I have the case right) ended up dying, after being kidnapped, due to a bad family court case decision. She gives more details. For some reason, many people were coming out of the states and locally to put in on this one article — it’s worth a long read:
osted by Regan Martin, a resident of another community, on Jun 2, 2009 at 5:14 am
My story was featured on the National Domestic Violence Hotline Web Link website
Also on cover of Chicago Tribune Web Link
I think you’ve probably heard of the cases (Connolly Boys Jack and Duncan Web Link ) across the nation where fathers/husbands are killing their wives and children. It’s becoming a national epidemic.
FACT: Family Courts are putting women and children in harm’s way.
This has happened in my case. A family court judge modified the criminal OP while abuser was out on parole but being prosecuted for 13 cnts of viol of OP, the judge ordered I give him my contact info. He then viol OP 3cnts 3 days later. The judge caused this.
I was brutally handcuffed, raped and beaten in May 2006 by this man.
Please watch this short video and you will know my real life fear – daily. Web Link
My rapist/husband made the 911 call, he wrote a confession to the rape. Yet they allowed him to plea out of the sex crime status thus tainting all new court cases.
Social Security gave me new #’s they said I and my battered children had over whelming evidence to warrant a new identity.
Then the Family Court Judge gave this man my contact number and granted visitation to the 200lb man who whipped two 30 and 40 lbs little boys with video cables.
My abuser was true to form he re-violated within 3 days of receiving that order.
Family Court Judges can not MAKE batterers good father’s by simply ordering it. We need DV specific laws that give women and children effective legal guarantees of personal-security.
Otherwise the death count will increase.
Here’s another, who says we need to file a Civil Acts section 1983 federal lawsuit:
Posted by SELF IMPOSED EXILE, a resident of the Fairfax neighborhood, on Jun 3, 2009 at 12:27 pm
THE SOLUTION TO THE MARIN FAMILY COURT AND ALL CALIFORNIA FAMILY COURT PROBLEMS:
The solution is a CLASS ACTION FEDERAL LAWSUIT under the civil rights act section 1983….
First it will only work so long it is approached as a long term solution for both we the people and the State….in other words, you will not get to hang any judge nor will you get “YOUR” particular case “DIRECTLY EFFECTED.”
THe suit must attack the California Family Code, and the conduct of the Court. This must be done in federal court, not State court.
As an example: THe Family Code claims “the best interest of the child,” but this term of art is not clearly defined, and is left effectively entirely up to the dicretion of the court….it is well established that any law that is “vague” is unconstitutional….so are laws that state one thing but when excuted result in wrongful conduct. THe STATE has no right to subject anyone to “psychological” exam and cannot commit anyone without at least two psychiatrists making a determination of mental illness…but in family court you can lose custody of your children “because a custody evaluator, determines that as a parent your too “didactic” to be a good parent….(look it up, it means you behave like a marine drill sargeant, very strict!) its much moe difficult for Child Protective services to separate parents from their children than family court….think about it, its the level of proof…..
Worthless, because none of these experts can point to any legally cognizable source, to prove that they can medically or otherwise determine, what is a good parent or what is a bad parent. Example: A parent with ADD or ADHD is not necessarily “incompetent” because of this problem, a Parent who has bi-polar disorder, is not necessarily bad for their children because of this “illness” and with meds or without is no better or worse than the rest of us….want proof….read the files…a divorce occuring when the kids are teenagers, kids who are well adjusted,( means they go to school and are not in criminal trouble) clearly common sense says the parent with Bi-polar is not harmful to the kids! They made it this far, as teenagers with this “parent” they’ll make it the rest of the way too!
Want a simpler example: Is a strict parent or a leinient parent, “in the best interest of the child” to be appointed the “Custodial Parent,” even this simple choice gets abuse by the system, because NEITHER is wrong, or BAD, or UNFIT, and neither label should be used to “appoint” who is going to be the CUSTODIAL PARENT.
Every parent who wants this to work has a task…..
Every “organization” has a task…
AND EVERY LEGISLATOR has a task ….
BUT REMEMBER: If you dont believe that Fathers are equal to Mothers as parents then YOU WILL LOSE….United we stand divided we fall, and so far the “system” is very good at dividing and conquering….just look where you are now, and even when you know the law on your side and the facts on your side, it did not help….
Parents, that means mothers and fathers need to go to their county court house and look at every family law case, no excuses, all you need to do is give the clerk the file number and sign it out, then accumulate data: Who got custody? Why did they get custody? If there was a custody dispute, what does the law say they should have done, and what did they do? YOUR RIGHT, you cant determine these facts unless you read and understand the Family Code regarding for example “custody evaluations” and I guarantee you that 80% of these evaluations were wrongly imposed, and unfortunately for those who were “seriously hurt by assault” 80% of those cases that determione there was abuse “have absolutely no proof.” Opinions are not proof, their opinions are no different than seeking out a fortune teller for answers, and thats why we can defeat these unconstiutional laws and procedures….but you need to document statics from the files, WHY DO YOU THINK the family courts do not kee these records, they would damn their findings and show the injustice of it all….
ORGANIZAIONS like CJE, CA NOW, ad Fathers4Justice, and others can be a unified force for raising awareness and funds for the legal team, as well as to keep the Fourth Estate aware of the process…keep in mind the Organizations jobs are to promote getting a fair trial of the constitutional issues, but remain free from “gender bias” cause its not about women or men or children, its about a “systemic failure” that must be destroyed before we are destroyed by it.
LEGISLATORS have the task of assisting parents and organizations to prevent obstruction of their efforts, and to see to it that the laws that they make because of “whining complaining constitutients do not end up on the books just because it makes a good “campaign sound bite” but because it has constitutional merit, and does not double what laws we already have that should be enforced, rather than ignored…for example, California grants immunity to evaluators, and lawyers, (et litem, for one) because they are part of the family court process….this is unconstitutional and this State law violates the SUPREME LAW OF THE LAND, because what these ancilliary people do is basically “investigate for the court,” so do policemen, and shrinks for the criminal justice courts, BUT we hear all the time of police being busted for violating the rights of the “prisoner” and abusing them, so the immunity is not absolute, and the Civil Rights Act section 1983 does not recognize ANY IMMUNITY, not even for judges, even though, on this point the US Supremes have decided that they do have “limited immunity.
So either we keep complaining or somone else here will jump forward, haw about it Ms. Russell, and lets get a force together to be feared??????????????????
Anyone??????????
And here’s another one who mentions some of the “ring” of conflict-of-interest personnel, and how after finally getting free from abuse (by doing without child support and moving across the country) a woman then sought help for her PTSD, and the PTSD of a daughter who’d suffered abuse from years 3 to 6. Only problem? She’d picked a (female, incidentally) psychologist who was part of this ring. Her life became hell again and her re-entry into a LEGAL PROGRAM (Law school, in other words) sounds like it was aborted, because of intentional triggering of her PTSD by her new partner and the psychologist she went to, to seek help from it. In all of the comments, hers is the only one that mentions the “AFCC” which I believe is key to this system. That alone tells you how successful it’s been — hardly enters the public dialogure, and when it does, the narrator sounds beside herself.
A Macro-view of this broken system following as brief an introduction as I can manage!
I have been a victim along with my 3 daughters 3 times since 1993! Each and every time there was CORRUPTION…..a ratio of 3:3. My first was Mallory (now turning 17) which set precedence in IL after 5+ years and aided in having bogus child abduction charges against me dismissed only after the newspaper wrote about it. She was forced to endure from age 3 to 6 basically all forms of abuse in the meantime we both were saddled w/ PTSD. Furthering the harm is the fact that the decision was not entirely accurate (which upsets Mallory). For example: it states that there was no conculsive evidence of …… abuse! There wouldn’t be any because it was NEVER INVESTIGATED! FYI her case is: In Re The Parentage of MMW, A Minor 296 IL3d 877 Decided on June 1st, 1998 in the 2nd dist. of IL
At the end of 1999 I moved to NY (a state I knew was of THE MOST CORRUPT via years of research including education by Marvin Bryer and others) thinking that my now 8 year old would finally have a dad, a good dad! Since winning my appeal, her father dropped our of contact and currently has none so he doesn’t have to pay support. We gave up years of support and lived in lesser conditions because Mallory didn’t want to take the chance of her father wanting visitation just because of support (as if he was paying for it).
I sought out a psychologist, Dr. Gina Scarano, (not carefully enough) in NY to help Mallory’s PTSD which was very active and to help my new significant other (Rick Collins) and I keep a healthy relationship (preventative medicine) because I knew Rick (via self reporting) was an ex- alcohol and drug addict and womanizer whose parents were divorced and who claimed his father abused him. My ptsd was in remission as per my own evaluation (self-educated but also accepted by Albany Law School and SUNY for a Joint Degree of a MSW/JD) as well as that of this psychologist.
The majority of Dr. Scarano’s interaction/interviews with me revolved around what happend in our court case, and every tiny detail I knew about PAS, Father’s Rights, AFCC, CRC, Idele Clark, Marvin Bryer, Jerry McKenna and a judges pedophile ring, and those who attended ROCKAmerica in 2001 (Reform Our Courts 4 Kids) etc!!! EVERYTHING except what I have recently added as a macrotheory of WHY they do this! At the time I did ROCKAmerica and started law school my ex, Rick (later a conspirator with Scarano) did things to trigger my ptsd before and during our drive for me to take the LSAT which I took without any accomodations. Both of them made me agree not to do any more activism after that and I didn’t.
Then Rick proceeded to further trigger my ptsd, try to convince me and my children that we didn’t love each other at times when we were separate and began abusing me to the point that I felt suicidal. He and Dr. Scarano were especially good at making me feel worthless and not loved by my daughter that I fought for from 1993-98 and the daughter I just had given birth to a year earlier. Later I was to learn my own psychologist and my ex conspired to harm me and to further it with the hopes of me committing suicide! I started drinking heavily to cope, always going to a hotel so my children wouldn’t see me like this while my own psych did more things to trigger me such as a fraudulent report to CPS which brought my emotions right back to my ptds trauma (it was unfounded) and …..
THEN….to attempt a fraudulent guardianship to Rick knowing that loss of my daughter would be a situation to “push me over the edge” as Rick put it to a lawyer friend of mine later on! Scarano DID NOT REFER ME TO ANY OTHER TREATMENT, MATTER OF FACT I TRIED TO FIND OTHER TREATMENT THAT WOULD BE SUCCESSFUL NOT KNOWING AT THE TIME THAT SCARANO WAS NOT JUST INCOMPETENT BUT DOING THESE THINGS TO WORSEN MY CONDITION ON PURPOSE! HER FEEDBACK ABOUT MY INTERNET DISCOVERY OF BIOFEEDBACK WAS “THAT’S HOKEY!”
WHY WOULD MY OWN PSYCH SEEK TO DESTROY ME AND MY GIRLS? Because as she failed to disclose to me, SHE WAS AND IS ONE OF THEM!!!!!!
She is a forensic psych for family court and has helping in the defense of a military man who molested his 15 year old daughter by using her bs psychobabble….thank GOD she failed and his conviction was affirmed on appeal!
NOW, this is the difficult part. The second time I lost custody was on Mallory’s birthday, 8-21-2002 after I hospitalized myself and got on my feet with the help of Dr. Mo Hannah (who along with others at ROCKAmerica saw what I didn’t in Rick….an abuser). During this time I got one of those FR law guardians and knew I was in trouble. So here I was back in my trauma environment, trying to care for a 1 1/2 year old and 8 year old on public aid in a @$#! HOLE apartment sleeping on mattresses. Of course this was more likely than not to happen (that’s legal language) because of Scarano’s recommendations and manipulations as well as her instigations of abuse.
Posted by familycourtstrategycouncil@yahoo.com, a resident of the Bahia neighborhood, on Jun 17, 2009 at 7:52 pm
During this time Scarano was conspiring with Rick and a lawyer, Veronic Cardozza O’Dell to do a fraudulent guardianship over Mallory knowing it would torment me further. Being in court/trauma zone again, I got a FR law guardian, paige crable who constantly attacked and triggered me (no doubt friend’s with Gina like the current law guardian) So eventually after Scarano threatened to tell the court things to make me lose Madison I tried another ave by having Rick take her for a week or so to see what it is like 24/7 with a 2 year old. Didn’t work, the law guardian told him to go to ct for custody and Judge DUGGAN (a weirdo per my experience with him at a DV law school event – probably a perv) ON MY ANSWERING MACHINE as if I was there. 2nd ex parte’ transfer.
THEN DURING FINALS being so a mess because they gave Rick the authority to decide my visits SCARANO had Rick w the patient call me to tell me she was pregnant!!!! that’s all I need to say put me in a hospital I need a stress vacation/.
Later I forgave and went back to him (dumb) we both filed law suits against Scarano but after she contacted him and it started all over again I left….he called CPS, I was unfounded and he was indicated
I had a Temp order of protection but it got transferred to Warren CO were Scarano’s friend is and as a law guardian she threatened that if I did not move back to Warren co I would lose custody, so I was badgered into an order requiring me to move out of a house my mom bought to an area I could not afford…so I fought it, I lost with my attny LOUIS-JACK (snake) POZNER at $250/hr (also a ZIONIST – relevant re Macro take on things) v RICK……I lost in a “hand delivered (to Rick) decision SOLE CUSTODY AND LEGAL….now I am controlled by him!
HOWEVER, I found out later that IT WAS FIXED ON THE DAY BEFORE OUR SCHEDULED FINAL HEARING DATE AND MY LAWYER WAS IN ON IT! W/THE JUDGE AND RICK AND THE CLERK HEARING IT ALL WHICH MAKES HIM AN ACCOMPLICE!
I also have much more evidence but NO ONE TO HELP EXPOSE it!
I have audio, and docs including 2 being used in the Scarano case, one were she had writes that her breach of confidentiality….could be DANGEROUS!!! TO THEIR “ORGANIZATION” but after 4 years now she submitted 2 more docs squeezing for the children after dangerous, although it makes no sense with that! She also recently filed an affirmative defense that she was JUSTIFIED in her action. LOL…and in our 2nd depo she admitted to a section of my med records that she altered and SHE GAVE MALLORY’s TO HER LAWYER WITHOUT MY PERMISSION….Cause she knows she’ll have to doctor those too plus Mallory has grounds as her patient to sue as well. Not sure if Fred Altman will have any energy for that after this is through.
Well, trial should be in a few months and I could use all the support I can get! I am praying that it exposes it all and it comes crashing down around them like they have done to millions of American’s lives!
Marci FAMILYCOURTSTRATEGYCOUNCIL@YAHOO.COM
As I know I do too, at times!
I posted this one because it was the ONLY mention of ‘AFCC” in the entire set of comments. Yet this organization is critical to who they are (see my ABCs or “Shady Shaky foundations post). There are many more, including afthers who (correctly) peg the child support system. Other fathers (I believe) say we should united with them against the abusive system. It’s “not a gender issue.”
Well, but there are few areas of life where gender is NOT an issue . . . .
No one, that I can see, brought up fatherhood.gov or Welfare Reform (how the Access Visitation grants proceeding out of this theory actually impact custody cases). Nor the many, many organizations (large ones) position themselves close to the federal faucet to demonstrate, evaluate, and report on the effectiveness (or lack thereof) of these programs.
How well trained we are not to investigate, and to expect someone else to do it for us. . . . .
“Ba a a a ! !! ”
And last, today, I again exhort people to READ this link and understand its contents. I wish I had years ago,but it takes time to process all the information, compare with reality, and come to a firm viewpoint (of course all viewpoints subsequent to adjustment if more RELEVANT truth surfaces…)
AGAIN, today, I lost about one-third of a post as the internet connection failed. This includes several graphics (of sheep – what else?) and some commentary. I found the interactive aspect of the comments, though, better than any paneled, pre-planned conference I’ve attended, or heard about, or read the proceeds of. That kind of vibrant discussion is better.
As you can see, people’s proposals, analyses and opinions vary. Some people want fault divorce back in. (No thank you). Some say, do an audit, others talk of cronyism. Some say, we can’t afford an audit (as a state). Many parents (moms) whose stories are in the news, comment — as do Karen Anderson, Joyce Murphy, and a father in Indiana who said his child support jumped suddenly from $72,000 in arrears to $90,000, so he had to move to become a truck driver, with his kid in California. (??) At least he brought up the child support factor.
I’m for boycotting as much as possible anything close to the system. “Beware Greeks Bearing Gifts.”
I am no “Don Quixote” (chasing at windmills because it’s romantic) — I want my life back, and trying to save the world here, doesn’t help get it back. I’ve done my part speaking up; for now — and on a general day am going to lose a chunk of a single post. Enough of that. Do your homework, or pick a leader to follow. I think enough alarm has been sounded — my recommendation is to get clear of the population base which is going to be demonstrated upon. Morally, I also recommend not working for social scientist, psychiatrists, or anyone profiting from the chaos in the courts, but I understand people like to eat . . .. . I’m not your Mama . . . .
To summarize:
No law enforcement has a duty to enforce. No D.A. has a duty to prosecute. But if they did, you still can’t sue them, even if their failure to do so resulted in your kids getting killed, or a close relative. Given this, what are the restraining order mills DOING?
The answer is to be found by a closer look at things resembling “Defending Childhood” initiative, above. This translates as “we know you’re clueless, or numb, and have changed the wrapping paper on the free gifts to our associates.” It’s a Cryin’ Shame — but who’s going to audit?
That said, I’d be dead (and or possibly children and husband — and no, I wasn’t going to do this) had not one existed about a decade ago.
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“Rethinking Domestic Violence” ~ “Understanding Women’s Responses to it” — the Dueling Dr. Duttons
Another half-baked (but also likely half-entertaining/informative) post from 08-21-2010.
These situations are so ridiculous, anything other than (a) mocking or (b) exposing the court dockets makes me feel like a collaborator. To be honest, part of my motivation is to simply not lose the time I put into this one, looking up data. Another part is to cover up the prior half-baked (Wacko in Wisconsin Part 2) post I just published.
One thing that’s NOT half-baked is the systems in place to justify trafficking in children, one way or another, at public expense, and then when this is brought to the public’s attention (or the public tries to bring it to the government’s attention) the same personnel (probably laughing and rejoicing among themselves) simply pick a “boilerplate” demonstration grant from one of the many already in place, change a few nouns and verbs, and apply for some more grants to study the problem they’ve created — one of which is, poverty.
This is NOT a half-baked system, but a fully-cooked business plan. More on that later…
Another which is, language is becoming meaningless, at some point. ….
HERE WE GO, AGAIN:
Which would you rather understand (or Rethink) —
- Domestic Violence? Or
- Women’s Responses to it? (1992-93, but quoted plenty, along with other publications) Or,
- Thinking Errors that Cause System Failure, * Or,
(*from the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence recent conference in Anaheim, CA)?
- This Woman’s (my!) Response to the Thinking Error that Assumes the System actually IS Failing (I believe it’s doing exactly what it was designed to do. The “failure” depends on one’s POV (point of view). For example, if I sell you some land under the Brooklyn Bridge, I profited and you didn’t. Long ago some people sold the Island of Manhattan. That was not profitable for them. Another flavor of what I think is on the link above advertising for the NCADV conference where this occurred. Scroll down to LetsGetHonest comment on the whole deal.
The two Doctor Duttons are not, in fact dueling, and may or may not even be dealing with each other. But their Research — and by now we should know our 3 Rs: Research comes with Rhetoric, Right?
One thing both of them are doing, as well as researching, is publishing (this IS what Ph.D.s do, right?), and unlike women and men stuck in the court system, or violent relationships (or poverty), not perishing. Even though, if YOUR life depended on knowing which was more correct thinking, they would stil probably continue to research, publish, and not perish. IN fact, both are prominent, and what they write is worth reading, probably. Anyone who has got to Ph.D. had better publish.
One thing EVERY woman in a battering relationship, especially with children, and about to go for help, ro to the courts, or a child support order, or to a nonprofit agency on one side or the other of rhetoric, is the difference of viewpoint. Women have been so socialized to go for help (particularly in certain religions), they just MISS this. Others are also socialized to be punished if they stand up and just demand it, i.e., Claudine Dombrowski et al.
Take, for example, Claudine Dombrowski.
If experts were selling books that comprised almost SOLELY of the case dockets of women’s lives after they reported abuse and actually had a child, probably the abuse would just dang STOP.
Here’s the court docket in Shawnee Kansas — it is fourteen and a half years long. The next hearing is set for october. The last hearing (yesterda [@Aug. 2010]y), she STOOD UP and reported 67 contempts of a recent court order (allowing her to see her daughter). While that contempt is not severe emotional cruelty bordering on the torture (beatings) that started the case (batter, parental alienation, interference with a custody order, or in short a pattern of simply bad behavior), Claudine’s actually going to court with the paperwork must be smacked down SOMEHOW. I”m not quite sure what bad behavior Claudine showed this time, but it seems they grabbed her cell phone. Being that she’s also been noncustodial most of the time (i gather) I’m sure her finances are being grabbed to pay child support for this circus.
It is possible to be punished for a sort of gag order that prohibits one from exercising one from exercising First Amendment Rights, to protest in justice. The place this is SO o o o . . . . easy is when a psychologist, or mental health professional, particularly anyone relating to a CHILD, is involved:
08/20/2010 – MISC. Petitioner in person and by Donald Hoffman. Respondent in person and by Robert E. Duncan, II. G.A.L., Jill Dykes, present. Court Reporter: Digital Div. 13. Matter proceeds on review of Court’s order of January 28, 2010, establishing unsupervised parenting time for Respondent. Dr. Rodeheffer offers testimony – matter continued to a date to be agreed upon for additional testimony. Court finds that Dr. Rodeheffer’s report of May 18, 2010, has been published on the website of Respondent. Court suspends Respondent’s parenting time pending final hearing in this matter. Respondent’s counsel is to review Respondent’s cell phone to determine if there are images of report on Respondent’s cell phone – Respondent’s phone time with minor child to continue but to Petitioner’s home phone. Due to publication of report on the Internet, which deals with minor child, Court finds that there is a privacy interest of the minor child that is central to these proceedings and outweighs the public interest and orders that the files, records, and transcripts of the case be sealed until further order of the Court. J. Dykes to do order. DBD
Here’s one from April, 2009:
03/20/2009 – #86 Demand Motion filed and entered by CLAUDINE DOMBROWSKI, PRO SE, FOR JUDGE DAVID DEBENHAM TO RECUSE HIMSELF FOR VIOATIONS OF CANNONS ONE THROUGH THREE BIAS AND PREJUDICE TOWARDS RESPONDENT 03/20/2009 – Journal Entry filed. DBD 03/24/2009 – ORDER APPOINTING COUNSEL FILED – DBD. 04/06/2009 – MISC. Petitioner in person and by Donald Hoffman. Respondent in person and by Robert E. Duncan. G.A.L., Jill Dykes, for minor child who is not present. Court Reporter: Digital Div. 13. Respondent withdraws motion for recusal of Judge. Court considers evidence offered through affidavit and stipulations of the parties and after listening to arguments of counsel, finds that Judge Johnson on September 27, 2006, ordered “Respondent to withdraw any and all likenesses of the minor child over which she had control that may be appearing on the internet or other public places or public access and further that Respondent was ordered not to present child at public rallies, demonstrations, newscast or otherwise publicize the child’s name or likeness in furtherance of Respondent’s efforts in the instant case”. Court found 1) based on incidents detailed in the affidavit and the stipulations of the parties that Respondent had violated the Court’s order by intentionally placing photographs of the minor child on Respondent’s website and to links accessible through the Respondent’s website and to websites that the Respondent was either maintaining or contributing to; 2) that as of April 4, 2009, the photographs of the minor child were still accessible; 3) that as of April 6, 2009, the photographs were not accessible. Court finds Respondent to be in Indirect Contempt. In mitogation, Respondent offers that photos were part of a family tribute to her deceased grandmother. Court fines Respondent $1,500 and orders her to serve 30 days in jail. Court allows Respondent to purge herself of the contempt by removing all photos, likenesses and name of minor child from the internet or any other public place or public access on which she has control by April 15, 2009, at 3:00 p.m. Respondent is ordered to pay Petitioner’s attorney fees of $600 for prosecuting the motion to show cause, Respondent is ordered to obtain a psychological evaluation by a Psychiatrist. Respondent is prohibited from filing any motions on her own unless the motion is signed by her attorney or she obtains permission of the Court prior to filing. Parenting time as previously ordered – 2 hours supervised visitation per week through Odyssey Group. Respondent currently has a P.O. Box and does not wish to disclose her address. Court ordered, and Respondent agrees, that any filing mailed to her P.O. Box shall be deemed personal service. R. Duncan to do JE. DBD 04/24/2009 – REQUEST FOR TRANSCRIPT FILED BY: CLAUDINE DOMBROWSKI
The Publishing and Not Perishing Perspective is very different from the others.
The Profiting or nonprofiting from being expert on these matters is very different from the others.
The topic of adjusting Thinking Errors (or understanding them) is very definitely swampland — and where the solid ground is very probably depends on IRrational belief systems. Do you want to correct thinking errors based on information from The Holy Spirit? Then go to Dr. Abshier, ND (Naturopathic doctor, Christian Counselor, Political Philosopher).
1) Thinking Errors: Processing Problems, Irrational Beliefs, Irrational Thinking, and Self-Defeating Beliefs: There are many nuances and variations of the various cognitive distortions. They all include some degree of error in perception, proportion, meaning, processing and judgment: The thinking errors include: irrational beliefs about cause and effect, erroneous attributions of meaning, and wrong philosophical connections about the larger play of life in history and politics.
I happen to think his fields are interrelated — a nice combo: Naturapath (do it how the Creator designed it, or as close as possible; Christian Counselor (do it how the Creator designed it, hmm… is he fundie, or fatherhood promoter? conservative or liberal?? Was Eve responsible? Was she inferior? Did Jesus change that? What’s the domination quotia in this one?) and Political Philosopher. – – I just hope he can keep them all straight and segregated during counseling.
Are you a “design, quality, or manufacturing engineer or manager,” who needs to understand why people, unlike materials, often screw up, causing system failure? Then take this 2 – 4-day organization/management course:
Eogogics.com (“the science of knowledge sharing”)
Root Cause Analysis of Component Failure: Understanding Human and Engineering Factors for Improved Product Performance.
Design, test, and maintenance engineers; failure analysts; technical purchasing agents and supplier quality engineers; and engineering managers looking to integrate the lessons of failure analysis into a more comprehensive design operation, and procurement process
The standard presentation of this course assumes background in mechanical or materials (metallurgical) engineering. However, with some tailoring, the course can be understood by an audience with a bachelor’s in any engineering discipline
Are you a Computer Software person who doesn’t want to see another Y2K bug scare? Or a plain old person who wants to know why we had to go through that? Then go to:
Systems Failure is a role-playing game written by Bill Coffin and published by Palladium Books in 1999. The fictional premise for the game is that during the “millennium bug” scare . . .
A report investigating the causes of system failure in a software context, and highlighting and classifying those causes.
The Google search of this shows a title remarkably similar to the NCADV conference title, above:
Understanding System Failure And The Thinking Errors Which Cause · International Space Station’s Cooling System Failure Raises Long …
scitechbox.com/topic/system–failure – Cached
Which I find interesting, and revealing. For one, how original is the thought coming out of it? For another, systems that systematically fail to do what they SAY they want to do may have had another intent to start with. Either that, or two types of systems may have merged, and the antibodies in the one rejected the other, causing “System failure.”
Actually, this is exactly what happened in the family law system. You cannot add JUSTICE based on PROCESS based on Constitution and Bill of Rights with Mental Health Practitioners (for one, it’s illegal to experiment on human beings, and abhorrent. For another, IS psychology a science? I say, no. It’s a language set and interpretation of reality….). The Family Law system is a merger of (at least) two systems — legal & mental health. That’s simple fact — see AFCC. The other “invisible agent” in the matter (unless one has eyes to see it) is the child support system, i.e., the financial factor. That’s another fact — see “Access Visitation Funding” and a site ending *.gov.
So this system is indeed a hybrid — like a mule. Mules are great for work, strong and stubborn, but they have to be bred — they are sterile and can’t reproduce. They get a lot of work done, though… Same deal with this system. It CANNOT reproduce justice with a bunch of immune-to-accountability and READILY subject to conflict of interest (or bribes) professionals, and private clubs and conferences where they meet and prepare a strategy to throw on the whole system.
Perhaps by now readers have figured out MY system, and that I am playing games with Google in order to show similar phrases in different contexts (applications). That happens to be MY response to a decade in this system. It’s part of my STOP, LOOK and MOCK policy (see above post responding to the Thinking Errors post). I really do hope some will STOP, LOOK , and THINK. It beats rocking back and forth in a chair with grief, or shaking with PTSD, or sitting within range of someone who has now determined that such behavior is a thinking error which needs an Rx — which one of their business allies has been marketing. It makes me happy, and with luck, will offend someone and cause a quick BLINK of THINKING about what such systems have done to our Constitution and Courts.
Here’s one that’s a little closer to the topic — someone analyzing PTSD patient’s / trauma survivors’ “Thinking Errors.”
[PDF]
THINKING ERRORS THAT LEAD TO FAULTY CONCLUSIONS ABOUT ONE’S ROLE …
File Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat – Quick View
We have identified fifteen thinking errors that can lead trauma survivors to draw faulty … Obliviousness to totality of forces that cause traumatic events. … Failure to recognize that different decision-making “rules” apply when time is …. have conscious control over their autonomic nervous system. …
This ARTICLE IS 1997, .
Handout 10.4: Thinking Errors, Faulty Conclusions, and
Cognitive Therapy for Trauma-Related Guilt by Edward S. Kubany, Ph.D., ABPP
Published in National Center for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Clinical Quarterly (1997, 8, 6-8). Reprinted in Trauma Response (1998, 4, 20-21). This article is in the public domain.
THE FIRST PAGE IS INFORMATIVE:
“There is growing recognition that trauma survivors’ explanations of their involvement in trauma may contribute to posttrauma symptomatology and interfere with the process of recovery (1,2,3). These explanations often revolve around cognitive aspects of guilt, which is conceptualized as an unpleasant feeling accompanied by a set of interrelated beliefs about one’s role in a negative event (2,4,5). My colleagues and I have identified four cognitive dimensions or components of guilt, which include (a) perceived responsibility for causing a negative outcome, (b) perceived lack of justification for actions taken, (c) perceived violation of values, and (d) a belief that one knew what was going to happen before the outcome was observed.
Considering this Cognitive Therapy, which correlates trauma such as combat veterans, rape victims, battered women, and incest survivors, — the latter three which FREQUENTLY are in this system — addressing the trauma and helping them correct thinking errors saying they were responsible for it — and, on the other hand, the Family Law (and sometimes Family) systems which, quite literally, blame the woman for her abuse (or minimize it), blame her for not maintaining a child’s attachment to the other parent (but fail to do this the other way round when a noncustodial Dad has won a custody switch in court) can cause some real Cognitive Dissonance (and more business for other therapists). Let me express this as a formula:
TRAUMA-BASED HEALING APPROACH + FAMILY COURT PICK A PARENT TO BLAME approach = INCOMPATIBLE = CYCLE OF DISTRESS = GOOD FOR $OME BU$INESSE$.
Add to this:
This therapist just said, trauma victims can NOT predict outcomes (so much for instinct, let alone pure prophecy). I don’t agree – I accurately predicted my daughters were going to be snatched, based on instinctive and ongoing assessment of the patterns around me. They were. I couldn’t predict exactly when or how, and I didn’t have the wherewithal to stop this. I accurately understood before it happened that the officers were not going to enforce, stop, or help, but there comes a point of overload of situations when one cannot process them all and handle them all.
A major business to the courts these days IS in exactly the business of prediction. It’s called Lethality Assessment, and it’s been around a very long time. I don’t share that point of view, because it’s my life, and kids (and women like me) whose lives are being risk-assessed. I’d rather go with PROTECTION (WHICH A RESTRAINING ORDER, FYI, ISN’T, REALLY).
Imagine applying the “risk prediction” process to something as important as, say, getting (someone) pregnant.
Mary Ann Dutton
Professor, Department of PsychiatryPSYCHIATRY, RESEARCH DIVISION
Mary Ann Dutton, PhD, Receives Grant
Mary Ann Dutton, PhD, Receives Three Year Grant from National Institutes of Mental Health
Mary Ann Dutton, Professor of Psychiatry and Associate Director of the Center for Trauma and the Community, received an R34 grant entitled A First-Line Community-Based Mindfulness Trauma Intervention from the National Institute of Mental Health. The study, which will run for three years, addresses an important new area in trauma.
The overall goal is to address the huge mental health care disparity for low-income, minority women exposed to intimate partner violence by obtaining new knowledge and skills in order to develop and test an accessible, tailored, and culturally-appropriate mindfulness-based intervention sustainable as a first-line intervention or delivery in non-mental health community settings. To narrow the remarkable mental health disparities gap, three interrelated studies using different methodologies will be conducted to develop and pilot test an adapted mindfulness-based trauma intervention. The proposal has three specific aims 1) to develop a mindfulness-based trauma intervention for PTSD and other trauma-related psychological (depression, somatic symptoms, quality of life). Intervention development will include writing intervention and training manuals, developing measures of intervention fidelity, and pre-piloting the intervention for feasibility and accountability; 2) to pilot test the interventions with low-income, predominately African-American women exposed to intimate partner violence and to examine potential mediators (mindfulness, coping self-efficacy, social support) of improved outcomes, and 3) to pilot test measures of the cost of administering the intervention. This pilot study will provide preliminary data for a rigorous large scale clinical trial to examine both self-report and biological outcomes of the mindfulness-based trauma intervention.
/
OR, you could go with another “Dr. Dutton” — here:
http://www.drdondutton.com/books.htm
Rethinking Domestic Violence
“Dutton’s analysis of domestic violence research and discourse is comprehensive, refreshing, and enlightened. He has gathered the latest work from multiple disciplines to create a volume that will surely be a cornerstone of a radical, distinctly feminist rethinking of domestic violence practice.” More…
Printed in Canada
Cover design: David Drummond
GIVE ME A BREAK. If he was an imminent target of DV (or his kids were), there’d be less publishing and more protecting.
Both Duttons have valuable things to say — and when I feel truly safe, I’ll be sure to read them. Maybe.
Let's Get Honest! Absolutely Uncommon Analysis of Family & Conciliation Courts' Operations, Practices, & History 
