What Steers Family Law Custody “Mistakes”? I’m glad you asked…
“I’m glad you asked that” is a phrase we see often in “RandiJames” writing. I’ve been posting in the form of comments, especially to the SFWeekly articles on the California Family Courts (for over a month now), and in lieu of a real post, here’s a relevant post by a fellow-blogger. At least, we cover some of the same topics.
MONEY is Helping Pedophiles and Batterers Get Child Custody in Family Courts, in California and Elsewhere
First, let me thank Peter Jamison for his extensive article California Family Courts Helping Pedophiles, Batterers Get Child Custody . Please, go read it. Understand that what he describes is not unique to the State of California.I want to point out a couple of things in Jamison’s article:
First, let’s talk about Amy Baker who works in the New York/New Jersey area. Actually, I have talked about her plenty of times:
Amy Baker and Parental Alienation Syndrome: Is This What Scientific Research Looks Like?The Ever Expanding Parental Alienation Theory: Amy J. Baker’s Research Revisited
Amy J. Baker and Parental Alienation: Behind the Veil of Ignorance
According to Jamison’s article, Baker appears to think that parental alienation syndrome has been given a bad name because it has been misused in isolated instances. But on what evidence does she have to base such an opinion? ….
Glenn Sacks, another PAS promoter quoted in Jamison’s article, states that courts are biased against fathers. Biased against fathers how? Maybe the rest of the sentence in the article was supposed to explain it:“and are overly protective of moms and punitive of dads when handling abuse allegations”
So does he mean that family courts are biased against fathers in cases involving domestic violence? Many state gender bias taskforces have consistently found that the courts were biased against women. From where does Sacks get his information? This is the deliberate misinformation that father’s rights advocates use when speaking to the public. They use general statements like, the courts always award custody to moms, to hype up their support, without specifying or clarifying that 1. most men don’t “fight” for child custody and 2. most women are still the primary caretakers of children–thus it would make perfect sense that the majority of women “win” child custody. If the mom is “the real parent” it is usually quite obvious. Sacks also supports a presumption of joint custody in child custody cases when there is often no evidence of equal or shared parenting within the intact relationships (nor is proof required, or sought). The bias isn’t in the court’s decision making in this case, the bias is in the assumption that joint custody is always good for every child.
Former judge DeAnn Salcido provides evidence of how the misogyny embedded in patriarchal thinking permeates the family court system–a system which unsurprisingly represents society’s attitudes at large:
I was basically told to be suspect of anyone claiming abuse,” she says. “I had senior judges telling me, ‘Be suspect. The dad probably has a new girlfriend, and the mom’s upset.'” The concept of parental alienation, she says, arose in private discussions “all the time” among court officials who espoused it.
And it is “professionals” like Amy Baker and spokespersons like Glen Sacks who continue to support this thinking with pseudoscience.
READ THE COMMENTS TOO:
Not to mention, how do you think all of this continues? Look at the universities and nonprofit agencies that support and employ these court players. Look at the funding of these organizations. Our dear old tax dollars. See Let’s Get Honest for a wealth of money trail information.
lso Randi, remembering your fine post on Michael Hayes and the wonderful Texas Attorney General, I discovered exactly who is getting those access/visitation SUB-grants, and to an extent, how they are being used. Source: USASpending.gov.Yes, exploring which Father’s Groups are getting how much of our (federal grants) money for which purposes is becoming REAL interesting.
^ ^ ^ ^ ^
For example, when the Indiana Child Support Services site has a direct link to Fathers & Families and is soliciting FAF to apply for grants (so they can split some of the proceeds) — why bother to open it to the competition? Just set out a red carpet for a single group: here:“Indiana Fathers & Families – http://www.in.gov/dcs/2461.htm
The Indiana Department of Child Services, Child Support Bureau, would like to welcome you to the Indiana Fathers & Families website.
Let's Get Honest! Absolutely Uncommon Analysis of Family & Conciliation Courts' Operations, Practices, & History 
Remind me to switch domains. After 2 years on wordpress, I still don’t see why wordpress deletes paragraph breaks, and I continue to extra get double-quotes.
They also announced a security breach (“low-level”) recently, a little disturbing.
Oh well.
familycourtmatters
April 27, 2011 at 11:16 am