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

I am, to tell the truth, having an awful day, struggling with computer issues, web access, and, apart from the electronic struggles, with grief.

Also the long-term effects of chronic, for lack of a better term, Family Violence — in its ugly, needless, heartless, dishonest, deceitful and extortionist self. People reach a limit, and because I am NOT of the inclination to behave like those who have a conflict with me — i.e., my faith doesn’t endorse the criminal behavior part — I am finding it just this much family violence, all this just too much.

Normally this article wouldn’t be much of my concern — it’s talking about “Wage Gaps in MBA Programs” — I mean, a woman that has got through an MBA program is not likely facing the same issues I have been.

But from my perspective (year after year, there has been a return to literally begging status around the court fiascos, which is hardly unintentional from a systems, or my ex’s part; I’d been promised before separation that he knew how to get out of paying child support (wonder where learned it from….), but well, I just didn’t know at the outset of the program how many other parties profit from this. In fact I didn’t know til I revisited Liz Richards’ NAFCJ.net site and worked through the basics — almost no one else at the time was talking about the grants incentives…..

So what happens when WAGE GAP is multiplied by REPEATED WAGE DISRUPTIONS AND DECREASES (when an employee has to miss too much work, move for safety, return to court to try to contact one’s kids — often — deals with stalking and has to re-arrange work life for protection from it, has to take into account client/employer safety in future business dealings, and word gets around that the individual has “family problems” which interfere with work problems, and that’s chronic? The main concept behind having a sustainable work life is that it’s sustained. Or moves are strategic, or for exploring different options?

So, look at this from SFGATE.com (San Francisco on-line, it was also in the print edition, page A1):

“MBA Wage Gap between Men, Women Grows” Dec. 29, 2012

[Alison Damast is a Bloomberg Businessweek reporter. E-mail: adamast@bloomberg.net] Ten years ago, the wage gap between men and women graduating from top MBA programs appeared to have been nearly erased. {{that’s astounding, considering the rest of society..}} That suggested that women would launch their careers on an equal footing with men and then experience a gender-blind sprint up the corporate ranks. A decade later [i.e., NOW], a far more sober picture is emerging: The pay gap among graduates of elite business schools is widening, according to new research from Businessweek’s biennial survey of MBA graduates. On average, female grads from top MBA programs now earn 93 cents for every dollar paid their male classmates.

{{that still didn’t grab my attention. At least they are working!!}}

At about a third of the top 30 U.S. business schools, women earn less than men – sometimes considerably less. Female MBA graduates from the class of 2012 at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, for instance, earned 86 percent of male wages, while those at Stanford Graduate School of Business earned 79 percent.

{{Now, that has my attention. (I’m also remembering that Catherine Austin Fitts attended Wharton. Of course she had a lot of other things going for her personally as well, I saw some MIT in the background, time in China — she’s no slouch…)…Two more short sections of this article here:}}

“The gap numbers at the beginning are not very large and can be mostly accounted for by differences in grades, course selection and the fields people are starting in,” says Marianne Bertrand, an economics professor at University of Chicago Booth School of Business, citing results of studies on compensation among female MBA graduates from her school.

“What is much more striking is how much that gap grows over time.” The pay gap is especially wide for women heading to finance jobs.

A study of 2010 census data by Bloomberg found that among the six categories with the largest gender gap in pay were insurance agents, personal advisers and securities sales agents.

Women in those jobs earned 55 to 62 cents for every $1 men pulled in, the census data showed.

In 2010, research from Catalyst, a nonprofit group that focuses on expanding opportunities for women in business, found that female MBAs were being paid, on average, $4,600 less in their first job than men, a disparity that grows to $30,000 by mid-career, says Anna Beninger, a senior associate in Catalyst’s research department.

{{Add to this the fact that the dollar is hardly stable, you can imagine it makes an increasing difference!}}

Even women placed in high-potential leadership development programs often miss out on what are considered hot jobs, or projects most critical to career advancement, Catalyst found. Says Beninger: “Women’s careers lag behind men from day one.” . . . .

[Alison Damast is a Bloomberg Businessweek reporter. E-mail: adamast@bloomberg.net]

Another factor — the less support women in such positions have among each other, the more they are pressured to conform to acting like a man, and in bonding with men, turning on their less aggressive, career-oriented, lower-paid women who have chosen (or been born, or channeled, into) a different life path. I think this shows up in the family courts, for sure — which seem to have quite a few primary female leadership among them (I’m thinking of a small but very influential corporation, of mostly women, in Colorado, “Center for Policy Research.”)

Not this one at Rockefeller College, Albany New York (established in 1987):

The Center for Policy Research was formally established in September 1987. The primary focus of the Center is public policy research and analysis within the University community. It serves multidisciplinary, cross-departmental, and University-wide needs, and promotes the goal of increasing the University’s level of sponsored research activity. The Center promotes, encourages, and supports significant policy-related research of both fundamental and applied character. Research focusing on issues at all levels of government (international, national, state, regional, and local) is encouraged.

The Center for has over 20 years’ experience conducting applied research, analysis, and outreach across a range of public policy and issue areas. CPR has a long and notable history of managing and implementing grants and sponsored programs for the United States Government, including projects for the U.S. Department of Defense, the Office of Naval Research, the National Science Foundation, and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.   . . .

Past & Present Funders

• Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)
• Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA)
• Department of Homeland Security Science & Technology
• National Science Foundation (NSF)
• Office of Naval Research (ONR)
• MacArthur Foundation
• National Institute of Mental Health

See Affiliate “The Brunswik Society” (Egon Brunswik, 1903-1955)    Hover cursor for relevance to the field of Psychology today, and UCBerkeley Connection through Edward C. Tolman (<=<=hover cursor for short bio, think ‘Cognitive Psychology and notice use of white rats for experiments, b. 1886; heavily influenced by William James; Psychography bio “Researched and written by:  Eric Geary“), Tolman was Chairman of UCBerkeley Psychology Dept. spending a year in Vienna, met Brunswik?, and the Konrad Lorenz connection.

The Society:

The Brunswik Society is an informal association of researchers who are interested in understanding and improving human judgment and decision making. Members of the Society share an appreciation of the work of the psychologist Egon Brunswik. The Society has no dues. Its primary activities have been an annual meeting held every year from 1985 to 2008, a yearly newsletter (since 1986), and an internet list (since 1993).

(See Table of Contents of “The Essential Brunswik“.  Psychology being central to the family courts themselves, I’d take a look at it).

But this one in Denver, Colorado, established a little earlier in the 1980s — 1981:

The Center for Policy Research (CPR) is a private, nonprofit research agency** founded in 1981 to work with public and private sector service providers to plan, develop, and test projects that improve the effectiveness and efficiency of human service agencies and the justice, health and education systems. CPR provides comprehensive consulting, facilitation and survey research services and specializes in demonstration, evaluation, and basic research dealing with a broad array of services including:

• Childcare and Education;
• Child Support;
• Child Welfare;
• Court Services;
• Employment Programs;
• Health and Medical Issues;
• Incarceration and Reentry;
• Mediation and Alternative Dispute Resolution;
• Fatherhood and Child Access;
• Poverty; and
• Violence and Intimate Partner Violence.

To make contracting with CPR easier for federal government clients, CPR is a Management, Organizational and Business Improvement Services (MOBIS) and U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) contractor.

I did look up corporate history on this one (there were men involved), however, for many years it has been functioning with its women Ph.D. Board, and simply targeted one of the most profitable areas of government operations: The Child Support system.

CPR’s for-profit counterpart (among others) seems to be Policy Services, Inc. (If I remember the name right) — and they are often found publishing evaluations together, i.e., such as evaluations of the “Access Visitation” funding, which is in itself a fatherhood=pushing grants system (rarely works in favor of protective parents, apparently).

Yes, over time, if things diverge, given time (and no change of direction) they get further and further apart. (if you can imagine two parallel railroad tracks going from Point A to Point B. They are both headed towards point B, however, shortly after college, those on one track proceeds slower (see wages) but continue heading in the same direction; which one has more momentum — a faster train, or a slower? (considering that wages/salaries are in exchange for time, right?) Now, let’s talk about how after a mid-career situation, there has also been a divorce and marriage:

If both parents are working and standard (farm the kids out to schools and daycare) OR, if one of those parents, likely to be a mother still, has also been caring for them, or raising the children due to her particular (or, the family’s) sense that perhaps this is better for children than, say, pre-school, daycare, after-school care, etc.

The RE-gression of women’s pay to me sounds parallel to the RE-Gression of women’s status in other areas of life, which I’m going to say at this point has been an at first less noticeable, but gradually increasing shadow throughout my entire lifespan. As a young woman who went straight to college, and from there to work (work I loved) and eventually married, towards the later end of the curve I admit (certainly not out of character,though, plenty of women were doing this at the time). Context really counts — and not having a way to predict the quality of evil in a potential mate (unless there is a problem with characterizing repeat and escalating (mind-numbing) physical assaults on a pregnant wife as “evil” in combination with restrictions making it harder to get out of the home for an incident (transportation), or to get away from the relationship (finances)?). Escalating throughout the marriage…. If unemployment or underemployment were a temporary situation, or a somewhat periodic situation, that’s one thing. One might plan around it.

But the family law system here (like classic domestic violence as defined by the industry) virtually guarantees income interruption/underemployment, and huge extra debits with or without an attorney, for a full generation. That is, until a child who is born reaches majority, we’re talking 18-20 years — or more if there are more children involved) — when a separation happens nowadays.

The federal incentives polarize the situation and guarantee, sometimes even when the antagonist spouse otherwise might not have fought back, a volatile climate, setting the stakes so high that SOME individuals actually murder to win, if they lose a legal case. Or if not, engage in long-term traumatizing of the other side, and all associated with them.This then feeds people back INTO the welfare system (or social service system) at times, thereby guaranteeing the public (if unaware of the dynamics, particularly) will continue to justify more “services.”

This separation has become SIMULTANEOUSLY a tremendous, unending and almost unlimited professional financial opportunity for an ever-increasing number of expert professionals (see the biography of Leslie Drozd, last post, if you don’t get this yet. How is that going to affect children and parents (both of them?) We call it, “churning the case.” There absolutely is a motive for this, and it generally speaking is a simple, amoral one — greed (pride and arrogance help), social status — but mostly, plain old greed. Rationalization of immoral practices… As part of this, there is an almost ritual degradation of the chosen scapegoat side — or even both sides (i.e., public funding pushes a responsible fatherhood rhetoric and a domestic violence rhetoric.

This is not for either side — but for the audience, which is those funding it. (See a January 2011 post, “Happy New Year: What Rhetoric are You?”). Meanwhile the joke is on all of us, it turns out, as thanks to people who actually publicize the existence of Comprehensive Annual Financial Reports (CAFRs) AND the fact that the MSM has covered them up (though, it appears they are actually mailed copies) — and hence, money goes missing off-budget. [sample — landing page for state of Washington CAFR] [example added during a 2014 revisit to this post.  I have several posts on the issue since 2012]:

“Why Governments are Always Broke – Comprehensive Annual Financial Reports Revealed“ by Richard S. Nov. 4, 2012 (NaturalNews)

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For decades, governments have been siphoning off hundreds of billions of dollars in tax money and storing them in offshore accounts for public and private use.

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At the same time, they claim that there is no money in the budget or that they have no choice but to raise taxes, cut services, or both.

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As revealed in the Comprehensive Annual Financial Reports, there is far more money available than most would ever believe, it’s simply not allocated into their budgets. This creates the illusion that there is no money available, thus giving governments on all levels an apparent justification for the raising of taxes. So what is the Comprehensive Annual Financial Reports?

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Here is the definition from Wikepedia.org “A Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR) is a set of government financial statements, which goes beyond the minimums established for Annual Financial Reports completed by public sector companies by the National Council on Governmental Accounting (NCGA) statement 1.” These reports began in 1934 and are created at the federal, state, local and municipal levels. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comprehensive_a…)

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Why are these reports so incredibly critical and important? Because they explain where all of the money collected from taxes and countless other fees really goes and they explain just how the money is being allocated. While most people are aware of government corruption on many levels, these reports expose the absolutely stunning magnitude of this corruption and the staggering lies that have been fostered on the American people for decades . . . An example of this relatively simple yet diabolical scam is as follows. If a government has $10 billion available, they only allocate $1 billion into the budget and once that money is spent, they claim that they are broke. There is no more money in the budget and they must raise taxes or take some other action to “save money.”

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This scam has been going on for decades. It may be technically true that there is no more money in the budget, but that does not mean there is no money available.  . . . There is in fact plenty of money available to add to the budget, but by claiming the budget is empty, they can justify pilfering unimaginable amounts of money into offshore accounts to be used for various nefarious and even illegal purposes, including funding the enslavement of the American people. This is exactly what was done in the Roman Empire for centuries via toll roads which are also being set up in the U.S. today via the NAFTA super highway.

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No matter how much money is collected, they will almost never claim to have a surplus because their greed will never be satiated. Not only do they hide trillions in tax dollars in offshore accounts, but governments on all levels own over half of the stock market, including hundreds of major companies and other publicly traded corporations.

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Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/037868_cafr_financial_reports_governments.html#ixzz2zup5Jysf (among the references:   Walter Van Burien http://cafr1.com/)

That puts an entirely different perspective on the relationship between worker and employer, between taxpayer and government (i.e., the tax payers, income taxes withheld from wages, assume it’s some sort of “quid pro quo” (fair exchange) of taxes for services.  FINANCIALLY, it’s not — because the government collects and holds funds, earns money on them, invests them, buys more things – it’s a prosperous business.  These  profits when it comes to mutual self-government COULD have been returned to the taxpayers, in the form of, at a certain point — NO more taxes, less taxes the next year — but instead accounting labeling makes sure it isn’t. It also changes the social relationships throughout communities — because the not-for-profits have the edge over people who do not write off their taxes.  As the public remains unaware of the “private stashes” (they’re not 100% private, those recorded on the CAFRs — but if there’s universal CAFR illiteracy, not to mention plenty of basic financial illiteracy; and add to that general illiteracy, among the public — then how can people resist?    How can they keep government in balance, i.e., stop complete tyranny?  If we’ve been led to believe this basic a lie, that it’s taxes which fund public services? And I only learned this in 2012!!! Add to this divorce and the family courts: There were times — in the 1980s and early 1990s, where a mother could separate — or, if the father abandoned them, or ended up in prison, etc. — he wouldn’t be hauled back from incarceration to cause more trouble, or be encouraged (recruiting through the child support system to participate in various social science engineering projects, federally and private wealth funded) to file for custody if he’d been proven an unfit, violent, or simply “not interested” father. In these cases, and I”m always amazed when running across such a person — it seems a single mother actually could maintain an intact work life, or life. Then here we are with our degrees, and work qualifications, and having been a competent (possibly protective) parent — or a working one — are showing up with trashed work lives — AND/or, one of the worst things that can occur to any parent, and it’s happening to mothers SPECIFICALLY because of the fatherhood industry — and that’s having her children taken away, alienated, and being unable to protect them or participate in their upbringing after having focused primary energies of her life to do a good job at the same. But the post-welfare-reform “Backlash” area targeting all levels of women,whether low-income “welfare queens” (so-called: Read the Congressional Testimony leading up to this if you think I’m making it up. Consider that Newt Gingrich was pushing what we now have….).. or if we were NOT under educated and teenage mothers on welfare, then we were bad women for the opposite reason — we actually were educated, sentient, and were saying No to abuse within marriage, many of us were even competent to support a household without even receiving child support. The answer to this was co-parenting, nurturing fathers, bad liberated mothers, and in short, grammatically eliminating the word “mother” from the parenting rhetoric (at least in any positive sense). I obviously am not an MBA and can’t speak entirely to them, but it’s sad to think about. The SFGATE next segment I’m enclosing only because it mentions “private equity” which I’m learning is where the major bucks are (and ability to better control one’s economic future– it should be understood by more of us). And in this area, it’s saying fewer women are entering it from those business schools:

[“MBA Wage Gap between Men, Women Grows” Dec. 29, 2012, cont’d.] Female MBAs are drawn increasingly to careers in technology, consumer products, consulting and entrepreneurship, say placement officers. At Stanford, a higher percentage of MBA women (25 percent) than men (13 percent) went into Internet technology careers, says Pulin Sanghvi, director of Stanford’s Career Management Center. In contrast, 16 percent of men in the 2012 MBA class were drawn to private equity and leveraged-buyout companies, compared with just 5 percent of women. “If you saw a lower representation of women going into those industries, you’d also expect the median and mean average salaries to be affected by that, and that’s exactly what we saw,” Sanghvi says. Alison Damast is a Bloomberg Businessweek reporter. E-mail: adamast@bloomberg.net

What that last comment says to me is that, unless there is a representative block and some actual workplace “clout” representing specifically women in a given industry, they are going to pay us less, period. Women are still perceived of lesser value in too many places — and that perception is, first of all, false. I wouldn’t bring this up except if you look at who has been contending for the Presidency recently you’ll notice private equity was of course involved (Bain Capital, much?). I will blog this more in 2013, because that’s where the control is going in the country — to people who own the most and have the least public accountability. Although anyone with an MBA salary should be in decent shape (depending on balance of priorities), it’s still not right to pay women less simply because they don’t have the clout to demand better treatment. The MBA pay is one thing, but given that we ARE still bearing children and raising them (and men aren’t. If men are having children yet, I missed this. In return for having, raising children and sometimes even participating in religious services (let alone, who helps run some of these groups on a volunteer basis, huh?), this is how any uppity or outspoken women are being handled — the religious authorities appear to be running scared again:

OK, Let’s Talk Religion Plus Nonprofit Platforms to Control and Suppress anything remotely “Feminist.”

I think something was far over the limit as I said recently, to learn of an organization from Wheaton, Illinois posing as an organization from Kentucky (no one would really know who didn’t do the corporation lookup) whose SPECIFIC purpose is to undermine and attack people of my position, i.e., so-called “Biblical Feminists.” In other words, you can’t lump us with the Feminazis (who they also hate, naturally) whatever that is — but the sheer fact that I — and others — simply said NO! to assault and battery in the home, and moreover, if this wasn’t acknowledged and handled, then we are moving on in life, and not taking (someone’s) sorry ass back again. (I’m referring to the “Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood” which consists of a multi-denominational agreement to do what religious groups do — attempt to CONTROL (abusively) a situation that is entirely out of their hands now.) THey want to exert this control AND keep tax-exempt status (although from what I can tell, they can’t even maintain corporate status). I put this up under “In 2013, What Else will Councils of Men Decide About Women?”  

http://cbmw.org/history/ [if something that began in 1987 called “Christian” could be considered a “history”] CBMW has been in operation since 1987, when a meeting in Dallas, Texas, brought together a number of evangelical leaders and scholars, including John Piper, Wayne Grudem, Wayne House, Dorothy Patterson, James Borland, Susan Foh, and Ken Sarles. These figures were concerned by the spread of unbiblical teaching. Under Piper’s leadership, the group drafted a statement outlining what would become the definitive theological articulation of “complementarianism,” the biblically derived view that men and women are complementary, possessing equal dignity and worth as the image of God, and called to different roles that each glorify him. The group next met at the Sheraton Ferncroft Resort in Danvers, Massachusetts, on December 2-3, 1987, before the 1987 meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society. The draft was adopted in meeting and called the Danvers Statement on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood. The group then voted to incorporate as the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood. The organization built steam for several years, running an ad in Christianity Today that drew a huge response. It was clear that CBMW represented the concerns of a large, and to that point relatively quiet, constituency. During this period, Grudem and Piper worked on assembling and editing essays for a project released by Crossway in 1991 entitled Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood: A Response to Evangelical Feminism. Now known as RBMW (or, among younger complementarians, the “blue book”), the text was named “Book of the Year” by Christianity Today in 1992. It signaled that complementarianism rested upon extensive scholarship [sic] and featured an impressive array of essays on exegetical, theological, and applicatory topics.

Board members — note old-fashioned black-and-white photos.  (All board members are white males.  Is there also a “Complementarian” theology for separate but equal purposes of people with dark skin as opposed to people with light skin (segregatd further, of course, by gender). COUNCIL EIN# is 36-3635678.  Year 2012 Tax Form EZ shows (Schedule A part II “Public Support” columns 2008-2012) show that public support has been declining year after year; that only one board member is paid $15,000  (they’re probably pastors or professors elsewhere; see descriptions) and that their sole “charitable” activity [program purpose] is publishing books and pamphlets about the roles of men and women.

They claim spending $58,000 on books and pamphlets: “CBMW publishes and distributes books and pamphlets explaining the various aspects of the biblical roles of men and women and how they are essential for obedience to the scripture and for the health of the family and the church.” For comparison: Jesus to his disciples, sending them out: Matthew 10:1ff(KJV)

OR, you could incorporate, for tax exemption, form councils yourself, and take contributions to publish pamphlets better controlling behavior of men and women, and then NOT render unto Caesar what belongs to Caesar, like a yearly accounting of your commercial activities.  And forget that part about healing people.  Also forget that part about on your sons AND your daughters shall that spirit be poured out and they shall prophesy (or anything else might might empower the downtrodden or disregarded of society, as well as the heart of gospel message itself):   ACTS 2:14ff (KJV)

Moon into blood — recent lunar eclipse (so, flunk me for not resisting the temptation to mention this!):

“Hey, NASA this is how you make a lunar eclipse “Blood Moon” Time-Lapse” Fortunately, photographer Andrew Walker of 599 Productions is here to show NASA how it’s done so they can maybe put something better together next time. …Walker lives in Burbank, California, and the night of the eclipse he packed up his gear — two Canon 5D Mark IIIs, a RED Epic, a 16-35mm f/2.8L II lens for the wide shots, a 300-1200mm Canon Century zoom lens used for IMAX cameras, and an eMotimo TB3 and Dynamic Perception Stage Zero track for motion shots — and made his way to the CARMA array near Bishop, CA….Check it out for yourself, and if you like what you see go check out more of his work at 599 Productions or on his Vimeo profile. [rom Related link from that article, “Tetrad of eclipses” ] On April 15th, [2014] a rather rare astronomical event is taking place: the “blood moon.” While technically nothing more than a lunar eclipse, this particular event will [be] the first of four lunar eclipses to happen over the course of the next two years.

Checking {4/25/2014 here} their Illinois Corporation Search: (no “THE” in the title?)

Checking {4/25/2014 here} Illinois Charities Trust Database Search — they haven’t filed an annual return since Dec. 2012.  Which means, they are out of compliance, it looks like::

Main page (IL Attorney General’s site):

##### —-   EVANGELICAL THEOLOGICAL SOCIETY EIN#     In fact, I see here’s a Professor of Religion from IOWA who couldn’t believe this organization existed either! he commented that the Board showed all but one (the secretary) were a white male. I see they have since then (July 2011?) removed the photos Robert Cargill: There really is a council on biblical manhood and womanhood” This morning, I came across something I did not know existed, and I initially thought was a joke. But alas, this incredible discovery is real (although, imho, it is still a joke). Lo and behold, there exists (and I’m not making this up), a Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood. They even have a logo. I kid you not – A Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood! This is not an Onion article, nor is it satire. It’s a real organization. Their self-description (I kid you not – this is in the very first paragraph on their ‘About Us‘ page) reads: In 1987, a group of pastors and scholars assembled to address their concerns over the influence of feminism not only in our culture but also in evangelical churches. Because of the widespread compromise of biblical understanding of manhood and womanhood and its tragic effects on the home and the church, these men and women established The Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood. (underlines mine) Seriously! They formed their organization to “address their concerns over the influence of feminism not only in our culture but also in evangelical churches!” And they did so in nineteen eighty-seven! Not nineteen fifty-seven, not eighteen eighty-seven, nineteen eighty-seven! Who is this guy?

Dr. Robert Raymond Cargill is Assistant Professor of Classics and Religious Studies at The University of Iowa. He is a biblical studies scholar, classicist, archaeologist, author, and digital humanist. His research includes study in the Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls, literary criticism of the Bible and the Pseudepigrapha, and the Ancient Near East. He has appeared as an expert on numerous television documentaries and specials and is an advocate for social justice and public higher education. He previously worked and taught at UCLA. Full CV here. Childhood and Undergraduate Education

(VERY interesting history, you should read it. He turned down offers at USC, UCBerkeley and Pepperdine — and went to a local community college, working himself through. he later turned up at Pepperdine (I guess I can forgive that in light of what he’s been doing with the degree, i.e., going into the LMFT field or hooking up with the Pat Boone? Center on the Family there., which also appears to be on the HM/FR grants stream)…! — see Qumran, etc.) I’m glad others share this sentiment. See his last sentenceS:

Sigh. Here’s an observation: if this group had the word “Islamic” in it, and all of the members were citing the Qur’an and the women pictured were in burqas or veils, I’m guessing the members of this same CBMW group would condemn it as Sharia Law fundamentalism suppressing the rights of women. But somehow, because it’s a Christian organization and they’re citing the Bible, this group has no problem suppressing the roles of women, and citing divine authority in doing so. The use of religion to suppress women is wrong regardless of the religion used to do so. This – THIS! – is precisely why non-Christians hate fundamentalist Christians: because they use scripture to keep women down, when all Jesus ever wanted to do was lift them up. I shake my head…

From this apparent satire? of this group, I learned that the same DYNAMIC DUO WHO started this “Council” also in 2005 started “The Gospel Coalition” (link therein). I just looked at the dozens (it says under 50) of photos of TGC’s all-male leadership, with less than a handful of black men, and perhaps one or two Asian, Hispanic, anything less than ruddy-complexions — and a 12/29/2012 Post by a Woman(no less) on “Six Books of Theology Every Christian Woman Should Read.” (or similar). The list of books were ALL written by men, naturally. And, as these things go, the BIBLE was not one of them, and apparently irrelevant to “Solid Theology building Solid Women.”… <br / Well, Church people are often into “buildings” right? Always have been. If one can do Cathedrals,surely one can also construct people… build them, as it were….. [Paul, I Corinthians, addressing divisions within the church, and exactly this type of behavior: “as a wise master builder… other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Christ.” Perhaps he’s referring to enduring foundations, and not the internet coalition man-made fads? Anyhow, how nice of Rebecca Stark to have participated in the regime (seriously — go there. “TGC” — look at the board members, and of course the main thing about their “Confessional” is the “Tri-une” (hyphenated) God. It goes down-hill from there.. (actually, looking at the Confession, it should be ruled out because it’s simply clumsy. You’d think that so many people (men,pastors) coming together might have actually picked up some real wording from the scriptures which, if nothing else, are eloquent and have stood the test of time. This stuff reads like “spam,” it’s not even well-organized, let alone inspired! Funny how they are so insistent the Bible is inspired — if they believed this, then why not focus on quoting it? (As someone who actually IS inspired by the Bible, and has been for decades, this summary sounds unbelievably ADHD (for contrast, read Ephesians 1-3!) an d notice that the church is a “her,” something you don’t find much in the New Testament. It is much more referred to as a building, or the One Body, etc.

. . .God’s New People We believe that God’s new covenant people have already come to the heavenly Jerusalem; they are already seated with Christ in the heavenlies. This universal church is manifest in local churches of which Christ is the only Head; thus each “local church” is, in fact, the church, the household of God, the assembly of the living God, and the pillar and foundation of the truth.

This is literally a patchwork quilt of verse fragments (from different books of the Bible addressed to different readership), with some added stitch work phrases in-between, such as “God’s new covenant people” (I don’t believe it occurs), “the universal church” (doesn’t occur, although the concept of the spiritual unity of believers in Christ as a “temple” does), “local church” (“Church which is in the household of …. etc., or by reference to geography — but not the word “local” church). In each of these fragments, taken out of context, significant thought elements from those passages are missing and without looking at the text, or being familiar enough with how it reads to call this — who would know? Literally, the sense is of dealing with people (regardless of prominent position, which they are also clearly seeking MORE of) who are simply insane. They are ADHD; there is a wish to state a listing of beliefs, but it lacks the coherence that actual scriptures (at least within chapters and books) itself does. That people who may actually be Bible readers (inbetween sermons and bible studies, and running church-plant operations with pre-fab gtracts, or developing mentoring relationships whose main goal is to indoctrinate) will tolerate this from their leadership is a problem; the pattern of compartmentalization appears to be catching. Then imagine the same leadership telling them who to marry, whether to divorce, whether to actually report to the authorities criminal behavior among their ranks (and lose face, obviously), or whether women can speak in the church…. Here’s the apparent sources of that patchwork:

• “come to the heavenly Jerusalem” is a phrase from Hebrews.
• “seated with Christ in the heaven lies” hails from the Pauline epistles; Ephesians 1 comes to mind, and unique in that phrase is an acknowledgement as God seating us “in Christ” in the heavenlies, i.e., God =/= Christ.
• “the household of God” is from Timothy, I don’t know where “the assembly of the living God” comes from, and “the pillar and foundation of the truth” also from Timothy.

Here’s some more from the belief:

The church is the body of Christ, the apple of his eye, graven on his hands, and he has pledged himself to her forever. The church is distinguished by her gospel message, her sacred ordinances, her discipline, her great mission, and, above all, by her love for God, and by her members’ love for one another and for the world.

• Body of Christ — Pauline epistles, see first Ephesians
• Apple of his eye (look it up @ bible.cc: I’m busy!)
• graven on his hands (Isaiah?)
• he has pledged himself to her forever (?? — but you can see how they are paralleling marriage. It’s also evident that “God” (present in passages re: Christ in the scriptures) is now absent, and reduced to a “he.”
• “The Church is distinguished by her gospel message.” – Well, I’ll say that starting up things like Councils on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood has indeed distinguished “the Church” in this era, as things like The Inquisition, the Crusades, and other behaviors has in past times. Where they are thinking of in the scriptures in that last phrase, your bet is as good as mine.” Notice the word “her” used six times in one sentence. Go find that in scripture somewhere (new testament — after all, it’s “God’s new covenant people,” right?) referring to the church: Contrast with the elegant Ephesians 4 which starts out referring to “walking worthy of the vocation” (Calling/church probably have same root word there): “1 I therefore the prisoner of the Lord beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called 2 With all lowliness and meekness with longsuffering forbearing one another in love 3 Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace 4 There is one body and one Spirit even as __ ye are called in one hope of your calling 5 One Lord one faith one baptism 6 One God and Father of all who is above all and through all and in you all 7 But unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ”Where is the feminine church in that passage? OH WELL!!!

More along the same lines….

Crucially, this gospel we cherish has both personal and corporate dimensions, neither of which may properly be overlooked. Christ Jesus is our peace: he has not only brought about peace with God, but also peace between alienated peoples. His purpose** was to create in himself one new humanity, thus making peace, and in one body to reconcile both Jew and Gentile to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility. The church serves as a sign of God’s future new world when its members live for the service of one another and their neighbors, rather than for self-focus. The church is the corporate dwelling place of God’s Spirit, and the continuing witness to God in the world.

((**re: His Purpose — in this para it refers to Christ. I’ve linked to the original they’re jumbled up attempting to quote — (Ephesians 2) which not only is elegant, but contains grammatically complete thoughs which flow beautifully with the previous chapter 1, which focuses primarily on GOD’s purpose.. If grammar means anything take five literate non-Christians and ask them to read those chapters aloud and see if they can identify whether (grammatically) God and Jesus Christ are interchangeable (in sentence structure). )) Again, if one gets used to a hodgepodge statement of beliefs, anachronisms (“corporate” absolutely has a different meaning since the invention of the UCC (Uniform Commercial Code in the U.S.) and invention of “nonprofit corporate” status for religious institutions!…. Expect the same treatment of legal language when legal matters are handled, I suppose. http://www.johnstackhouse.com/2012/04/01/gospel-coalition-council-on-biblical-manhood-and-womanhood-reveal-huge-prank/ Anyhow, I’ll be back on that CBMW site on at least one of my blogs. I’m glad others noticed they exist

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Back to the bad Biblical feminists (or nonBiblical ones) who have left religiously-justified oppression, including violence and threat of more violence to underscore the entitlement . . .. . Certain moms have standards. Society needs to deal with this! And there literally are people who believe if women like myself actually used our voices and were given a voice, not as “victims seeking help” or people to be “empowered” (same deal), but if we were not shamed, excommunicated, isolated, labeled, ROBBED (financially and of access to our own children), and derided, the sky would fall. I have to conclude after some years — they are right. You had BETTER pull out all those stops, because (and I know I’m not alone in this), some of us have truly had enough ugliness and name calling simply because we can’t get along with multiple programs of indoctrination into our unworthiness to exist, parent, speak, initiate– evangelize? — collect child support, be spared (allowed to stay alive) by virtue of locking up a spouse who has threatened to kill us and demonstrated CLEAR intent to do so in public, dramatically — until we can get the hell outta dodge (WITH our children, who deserve better) (see bottom of last post, case from Georgia, where this did NOT happen, again). We are tough — women are tough. We can take childbirth (designed for it) and we have proved we can take — although shouldn’t need to — abuse. We can multi-task. We have courage, and we are many times philanthropic by nature — not because we need a tax write-off! We also think differently to an extent, or at least can, which I figure is probably a factor of the child-bearing function (who knows?). Where this gets complicated is when women in power, seeking to rise quickly to the top of the courts, or evaluating others’ children situations, they can get REAL mean, and worse than an abusive over entitled male in the same situation. I do believe this is because we are consistently valued as worth less than a man in any given social situation, by and large. ANECDOTAL: I had an experience recently in a situation I probably shouldn’t have walked into, but did (just changing up the routine some) and yes, it was with an ignorant middle-aged male in my face about Bible stuff, who settled it by shouting and stomping out, after which he then DROVE away leaving his wife to pick up the pieces with me (because I followed after and demanded an explanation. She will be picking up pieces for a long time hence. As you weren’t there (and I don’t expect people to accept hearsay; I’m just talking about my reaction), I am going to mention that the audience he was preaching to were all disabled (wheelchairs or walkers, elderly) and not likely to protest much; and that after I’d been asked to share something, I read a passage from the Bible aloud which was completely in accord with what’d just been shared (basically) and said almost nothing else. The real issue appeared to be I was confident and non apologetic. His wife told me later she could see it coming for those reasons: “You are both confidendent and independent.” Nothing was said in front of the wheelchairs, but as soon as they were out he started an argument. As I am getting older, I admit that my time is more valuable and by actually going and then trying something (i.e., when offered to, standing up and reading aloud), I had my answer, and won’t be back, which it was expressed, I’m not welcome either. However, this was a truly UGLY experience, as I think about all I and other women in my shoes have gone through specifically through religious venues over the years. I believe it is a time when the lesser of men (not the better of them) will be coming to the forefront and demanding the podium; they are truly afraid of women who think AND speak, and have no intent at least in the religious sphere that OUTSIDERS (those not pre-screened for submissiveness or a particular doctrine) are really going to have a say, or say. I made a mental note to either never walk into a church (traditional, nontraditional) again which I had not myself started (and thus has some initiative in saying who speaks and who doesn’t!) without a visible male for a “shield” from such outbursts — or simply (and no doubt the better choice) simply never to walk in again. We shall see, but this ugly situation, although I know how it started, and that it was inappropriate, it sill had an effect. Moreover, I had come there for somewhere to associate with other people who (on their material) professed to believe the same scriptures, or immediately parallel ones, I had simply read aloud that day. If I cannot be safe from verbal assaults from a man THERE, then in WHAT place is it safe for a woman– also a mother — with something to offer the world, and good at it, too — can exist? This may seem immaterial, but I am talking also we have a class of women walking around who have been completely cut off from contact (or any meaningful contact) with our children, in violent manner, without sufficient proof many times, and this can happen either by forcing them into a system we KNOW to be both abusive, dangerous and highly connected with the pharmaceutical industries (i.e., foster care and from there, to adoption), or being simply handed off to the father (with or without his new, replacement “mom”), or if we keep them, then we are likely to be under frequent and constant attack through the courts. If we win in court, as sometimes happens (initially) we can still lose our lives, or our toes (as it were — Teri Jedusa-Nicholai, Wisconsin case; on a routine visitation, he fought her (she obviously fought back) and got her into a snow-covered garbage can, drove her 18 hours and ended up locking her in a storage unit in another state. This woman only survived through fighting back HARD, and the father having made two tactical errors (I’m not advising the next perv here what they were) resulting in her being rescued. She had been pregnant at the time, and still lost all her toes, and had a miscarriage, and suffered extreme PTSD as you can imagine. THe court fined her ex $29 million, and of course he appealed and (last I heard the case) was fighting her for contact with the children, after attempting to murder their mother, such that even YEARS after the dramatic, near-death incident above, she was still being forced to deal with him in the courtroom. I cannot tell you what it’s like to have been subject to many similar threats, and see these incidents spinning out, year after year, in my local communities and other states. This really does happen. Some of us — and I am in this category — go through OVER ten years of dealing with this day in, day out, month in, month out, and year in, year out — without significant relief, safety, or change in dynamics. In my case, it has outlasted my children becoming adults, and the death of a parent, and I was basically forced out of a profession I’d rebuilt AFTER leaving the abuser. In short, the same dynamics continued to apply and be applied. I know my case is similar to others in that regard. So, I have to say, anyone who is unable to understand why women might be seriously angry at this point in smite, and what degree of self-restraint it requires not to act out on it as sometimes our exes have — doesn’t seem to know what time of day it is. No one wants women acting like men, really — at least it seems a large sector of society doesn’t want to (and its institutions), but I have to point out what acting like women (whatever that is supposed to entail), or — as it happens — acting like full-status human beings, and speaking up about our status specifically (why not? Would it be better to say nothing and just “endure” some more?) has, collectively, gotten us. It has gotten many killed (those are called casualties in a war) and generations of orphaned children — within the United States, I’m talking about. It has gotten women chased down, hunted down literally overseas in other countries they fled to for safety. (There are several classic cases which come to mind) ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

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This being the last day of 2012, I wanted to put up a few links (to my prior work) that summarize some of the principle, ah, “problems” we have surrounding the family court system.The Family Court Franchise System — see especially posts dated May 8, 9, 10th and 11th, 2012. These are information-rich and cover a number of categories in detail. Some of the material comes from a forum I used to participate in here; if you see then posts labeled username “Outlaw” (Outlaw Wild Double-Bill Kickback Courts to be specific), that’s me. I deal with parenting coordination, NACC (this organization should be understood), the healthy marriage movement (How California Healthy Marriages Coalition — far from the only one — actually got $15 million in grants over the years), and much more. I SPECIFICALLY wanted to point out — as I also noted on a recent post, “How It’s Done” (I think it was) an organization that protective mothers are NOT told about, and should be: “Fathers and Families Coalition of America.” There are two major reasons they should know: 1. It is a Coalition in place specifically for fathers’ rights nonprofits (often themselves grantee organizations posing as marriage counseling, and several of the board of directors, I note, have a “Rev.” in front) — which get HHS grants. It exists FOR this purpose — to connect the grantees with this agenda, to the funding stream. 2. The “Jeffrey Leving, Esq.” Connection. A fathers’ rights attorney with direct connections to Obama, and the White House (not to mention, he’s an attorney!) appears to be a sponsoring organization of the nonprofit. This lends me to agree with Walter Burien (see sidebar, CAFR1.com links) in his stance that attorneys should not be allowed to hold public office. I heartily agree, based on, for one, the BAR and its London connection, adn for another on what they do once they get there! Maybe in other times, this was OK, but now, forget it! BELOW this line is the entire May 7th Post. Starting about the sixth paragraph, it tells how FAFC (Fathers and Families Coalition of America) got started in Arizona — “coincidentally” (not really!!) with 1996 welfare reform, block grants to the state, and the deliberate funding of fatherhood programs (plus access//visitation programs) at the federal HHS level. Other posts above (see my link, above) have titles such as “A National Army of Parent Coordinators — How it Walks and Chews Gum” and “How Our Government sets up Shell(?) Nonprofits to Move Product: Whether curricula or Children. Which is where? GALS come in,” and two on the theme “NACC — National Adoption Centers.” The site takes several seconds to load (at least it does for my server) but I believe this proof — documentation — is much better visually, easier to read than this blog here (Family Court Matters) and for the thinking man or woman (i.e., the “Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhoods” personal nightmare)concerned about these issues, I do believe I have made the point — if you take the time to look at the charts from TAGGS. It is Cold, it is New Year’s Eve, and I have not seen either of my children in a very long time. That doesn’t mean I am not forced to deal (in a rather ugly manner) with other family members responsible for this in ongoing issues, and of course that the father (who didn’t want custody after all, and demonstrated this beautifully shortly after getting it to start with) I left many years ago still has major arrears which I wish he would face up to and pay regularly — in the exact amount the court told him to — on this. If court orders become a joke, I guess I should just file it under the rest of “The Myth of the Rule of Law” and figure life out differently, huh? But here are some genuinely good, I feel, references for parents who still have minor children, and in particular I mean mothers (Men somehow tend to know a lot more about the child support and grants system than women do, probably a factor of the herd instinct and who’s in charge of which herds….): All material is copyrighted to me (author of this blog in 2009-2012) unless other words marked. Please share, but credit — link back — to the source. Thanks!) PLESAE NOTE — MUCH BETTER VIEWED AT THE ORIGINAL SITE, AND MORE ACTIVE LINKS THERE ALSO…. You may need to scroll down to the May 7th post on “Paternity Testing,” which is good, to view the other ones also….

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MAY 7 Paternity Testing on an International Fathers (=Families) Group I am a mother. There is no motherhood.gov — we’re supposed to understand how to be Moms innately.  Only Dads get this level of teaching about how to be Dads, sometimes also called a get out of child support (or get it reduced) free card.  Sometimes not (the system does keep people on its toes, for sure). When a Mom goes protective or separating from a violent marriage, then she can get mandated mediation or (if there’s some money somewhere to be dredged up), parenting classes, co-parenting classes, parent coordination, custody evaluation, and (eventually, often enough), a parental alienation label somewhere along the line from divorce to homelessness or close to it.  The full wrath of the faith-family-fatherhood institutional funding can be called forth at the ungodly situation of a single mother not needing — well, a man.  Or, having a non BabyDaddy one in the household. I thought we should look at the DNA of a well-connected fathers (and families) group, one I’ve seen at length over some years, and tracked some of the corporate status of some of the affiliates. The paragraphs below came from page 5 of a description of the “Fatherhood Practitioner Healthy Marriage/Relationship Educator Certificate(tm) Program” which was offered Feb. 2012 at a conference of the Fathers and Families Coalition of America (not to be confused with “Fathers and Families” of Glenn Sacks fame) My quote below was only 2 paragraphs in the original, which should be within Fair Use, however I do wish to acknowledge the Intellectual Property Rights of (FFCA)tm, an Arizona-address corporation with international connections. I’d like us to see what is meant by “grassroots” in this field, which seems to coincide pretty clearly with the availability of lots ‘n lots of TANF grants.  Emphases (bold, paragraphing, etc.) are mine: Organizational Capacity In 1996, Arizona Fathers & Families Coalition, now Fathers Families Coalition of America (FFCA), started as a grassroots consortium in response to welfare reform proposals and the professional development needs for in Arizona from Head Start programs and other community based organizations. In other words, low-income fathers were clamoring to be taught about fatherhood.  This is why recruitment efforts for such programs are never needed.  Some Dads got together and thunk it up. The motivation to create and incorporate Arizona Fathers & Families Coalition (FFC), Inc. had its genesis when it was awarded a statewide Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) Young Fathers grant, a Basic Education/Life Skills TANF grant, Federal Job Reverse Access Commute grant, three county TANF grants, Statewide TANF Career Preparation grant, and TANF Character Education grant for K-12 youth. These services were provided to diverse populations throughout Arizona (all required extensive community assessments and tailoring of services). As TANF was aimed at single-female-households, we are glad that a hookup was made between TANF, which was to help eliminate poverty through Add-a-Dad diversions, I”m glad the generative, connectivity sparks were flying.  No — seriously:  how can something be awarded a grant and “have its genesis” at the same time — doesn’t someone have to apply for the grant and actually name an organization on the grant application?  (Kind of like a birth certificate). As I’m reading it, it sounds like the motivation to create and incorporate is directly connected to the availability of state-wide money from the US Dept. of HHS/ACF — how is that “grassroots”? Arizona was one of eight states to utilize Temporary Assistance for Needy Families resources to establish Young Father’s programs for low-income fathers. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, Washington, DC rated this young father program as one of the best in the nation (1999). So . . . .. it was a demonstration site, one of eight.  That sounds local and grassroots… Since 1999, FFC/FFCA has provided the following services both nationally and internationally: community assessment, training, technical assistance, capacity building, research, grant development, policy briefings, local, state, regional and national conferences, and community assessment instrument it developed, Practitioners Effective Fatherhood Services Scale which includes information regarding program standards. That would put it a few steps against the MDRC-evaluated “Parents Fair Share” program which ended up needing a state audit (Missouri) which found out — well, key components of the program weren’t met. (around 2004). In 2004, the FFC Board of Directors transition as a dba Fathers & Families Coalition of America. FFCA served as a national consultant to National Head Start Association’s Male Involvement Track (for seven years), the State of New York Healthy Families institutes, and tribal nations in Alaska (Seward), California, Arizona, Wisconsin, and New Mexico. Additionally, FFCA has provided training and technical assistance in Puerto Rico, Virgin Islands, Hawaii, and to programs in Guam, Micro-Indonesia, Japan, and Ghana. These examples illustrate the far reach of FFCA to help others expand their capacity to serve families and fathers. Are US taxpayers still paying for the international T&A?  Excuse me, I mean T&TA (Training and Technical Assistance, which is grants-code for, not real assistance, just ‘how-to’ facilitation — often downloadable and conference-based). To date, FFCA has provided training and technical assistance to diverse communities and faith-based agencies and to well over 10,000 fatherhood practitioners. Since its 1996 conception, FFC/FFCA has successfully pulled down over $40 million of new funding (state, foundation and federal sources). More info viewable at: http://www.fathersandfamiliescoalition.org/images/ATT00022.pdf Don’t miss how the US is split up into Affiliate Regions (5) and browse some of the professionals involved.  If you want a real sample of how many hats one person can wear at once, make sure to review Nathan L. O’Neal, MBA, Ph.D. in Colorado, which may also explain why domestic violence movement has kind of stalled in its progress as well these days.  They have to go straight to HQ for funding to do T&A, or are having fatherhood practitioners lead the dialogue — and fatherhood practitioners often also have strangely high-up access to things like child support agencies and the task forces to improve the courts and  . . . . well, just go read. One of the reasons I chose to include this was my recent (within the past year and a half) exposure to some protective mothers — in fact it was called Battered Mothers- annual conference, only to find out that no one seemed to know what a “Fatherhood Practitioner” even was.  I mean, the vague concept of “fathers’ rights” groups was mentioned (but I don’t recall a single one was named).   The hotshot material didn’t mention TANF diversions, that I could tell, or factor in the role of the Child Support system in recruiting men into fatherhood programs — none of that.  In short, women were kept in the dark, but encouraged to protest “parental alienation” talk.  Nor were they told which group(s) are most heavily promoting “parental alienation.” Meanwhile, the field of fatherhood practitioner development and training has been around so long, the term is trademarked now.  And there I guess professional practitioners, and then paraprofessional practitioners (?).  Stand besides us and watch how it’s done . . . . . . The Certificate Program will be offered at the 13th Annual National Conference, February 21-24, 2012. Attendees will receive seven hours of instruction of three days. The curriculum has six (6) core-learning domains and over 30 competencies to enhance paraprofessional and professional practitioners’ engagement strategies for both fatherhood and marriage/relationship programs. The course material will provide essential information that will support participants’ efforts to effectively recruit, retain, and motivate fathers, mothers, and couples Sponsorship solicitation There’s more, but I thought we should understand how these things get started — often enough, with welfare reform. You can look it up further.  (By the way, I couldn’t find the trademark mentioned above — but may have been looking in the wrong place, who knows…) Posted 7th May by Liberty Labels: WHY 1996 TANF? StopChildAbuse=Add-a-Dad theory fatherhood faith-based Jeffrey Leving Title IV programs

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Regardless —

BEST WISHES FOR A SAFE ENTRANCE INTO 2013 AND A BETTER YEAR AHEAD! HOW WILL YOU PARTICIPATE IN MAKING THAT HAPPEN?