Posted on 07/30/2002 2:36:00 PM PDT by Stand Watch Listen
The National Organization for Women (NOW) recently released Family Court Report 2002, which claims that family courts are "wrought with gender bias" against women. However, the respondents to the survey upon which the report is based were not chosen at random, but instead were self-selected from among those whom NOW calls its "constituents." If one selects a survey's respondents, one can make the survey show almost anything. For this reason, these types of "self-selected listener opinion polls" (SLOPs) are viewed as junk social science by serious researchers.
NOW's report sounds the alarm on women's "loss of custody through gender bias," but the vacuity of this claim can be demonstrated by examining how rarely courts grant custody to fathers in contested cases.
For example, a Stanford study of 1,000 divorced couples selected at random found that divorcing mothers were awarded sole custody four times as often as divorcing fathers in contested custody cases. A study of all divorce-custody decrees in Arlington County, Va., during an 18-month period found that no father was given sole or even joint custody unless the mother agreed to it. According to Frank Bishop, the former director of the Virginia Division of Child Support Enforcement, almost 95 percent of custody cases in Virginia were won by mothers.
An Ohio study published in Family Advocate found that fathers seeking sole custody obtain it in less than 10 percent of cases, and a Utah study conducted over 23 years found similar results. According to the 2000 Census Bureau report, mothers constitute 85 percent of all custodial parents.
Even the 80 percent to 95 percent maternal preference documented by these studies and others understates family-court discrimination against fathers by identifying many coerced child-custody arrangements as "uncontested." The vast majority of divorces involving children are initiated by women, and women usually are granted temporary custody of the children. Judges are reluctant to switch children from the custody of one parent to another.
Fathers, left to fight an uphill battle to gain custody — and often out of both money and hope — sometimes give up. Others spend their life's savings trying to obtain joint physical or sole custody so they can remain a part of their children's lives. Devastated financially and with little hope of winning, they often sign consent orders granting custody to mothers. In both of these common scenarios, the child-custody arrangement is "uncontested."
NOW has attempted to obscure this antifather family-court bias by claiming "according to several studies, when there is a custody dispute, fathers win custody in the majority of disputed cases." Yet NOW's claim, proclaimed in its 1996 national conference resolution attacking the fathers'-rights movement, and again in Family Court Report 2002, is without merit. All three of the sources NOW cites used survey pools that either were nonrandom or in which contested and uncontested custody cases were lumped together.
Once custody is lost, divorced dads often are at the mercy of both custodial mothers and the family courts. Divorced dads' complaints include blocked visitation and unenforced visitation orders; "move-away" spouses who permit or even use geography as a method of driving noncustodial fathers out of their children's lives; acceptance by the courts of false and/or uncorroborated accusations as a basis for denying custody or even contact between father and child; rigid, excessive and often punitive child-support awards; and burdensome legal costs.
The presence (or absence) of a father in a child's life is the largest factor in predicting whether a child will graduate from high school, attend college, become involved in crime or drugs, or get pregnant before age 18. The greatest and least recognized force behind America's epidemic of fatherlessness is the way courts allow custodial mothers to drive fathers out of their children's lives.
The solution to the problem is shared parenting, which creates equality between divorcing couples by replacing the option of sole physical custody, which occurs in the vast majority of custody cases, with the presumption of joint legal and physical custody. If divorcing parents are unable to agree on a shared-parenting plan, the courts would order a plan that would afford both parents equal physical time and decision-making power. Children gain from shared parenting because it allows them to retain the ongoing emotional, physical and financial support of both of their parents.
NOW has lobbied hard against shared-parenting legislation and today is the main obstacle to equality in family court. Yet during the 1960s and 1970s many of NOW's leaders, including former president Karen DeCrow, were sympathetic to shared parenting as part of their efforts to erase all gender inequalities. Family Court Report 2002 again reveals just how far NOW has drifted from this admirable goal.
Dianna Thompson is a founder and executive director of the American Coalition for Fathers and Children. Glenn Sacks writes about gender issues from the male perspective.
'The Children Of Children' A Rockin' Window On Divorce
Source: Toogood Reports; Published: July 29, 2002;
Author: Gerald L. Rowles, Ph.D.Divorced Dads: Shattering the Myths
Source: Men's News Daily; Published: July 22, 2002;
Author: Roger F. GayWhy There Are So Many Women in the Fathers' Movement
Source: CNSNews.com; Published: June 21, 2002;
Author: Glenn Sacks and Dianna Thompson
Since it is axiomatic that the child benefits from exposure to both parents except in cases of abuse or neglect, NOW's resistance can't come from concern for the child. No, it's about Little Tommy Mealticket. Children represent power over men, power in the form of money (child support) that is extorted from men by the state on women's behalf. THAT is NOW's motivation, nothing nobler.
My wife has successfully stalled for over a year in getting a mental health evaluation with little or now consequences to herself. She still has sole temporary custody of the children even though my PREVIOUS lawyer told me that the court has very little bias anylonger.
Yeah, right. It will take two kids floating face down in the bathtub before anyone takes my concerns seriously. :((
Family court is a joke.
The article gives a couple examples of what I went through, and over a five year period I spent nearly $30K fighting. I gave up, and have essentially fallen off of the face of the earth as far as the court system is concerned. Someday, I know I'll see my daughter again - when she's an adult and independent from her deranged mother. Don't count on the courts to help you do anything but drain your wallet into the system, and use the fact that you are a caring parent against you. They don't care that she may be psycho - it just keeps all of you "in the system" in one way or another.
The article did not even touch on the crime of child support.
Family law? HAH!
As a Dad who had custody of my son from 18 months old let me tell you that whatever is temporary becomes permanent. Plus, don't hold your breath getting child support. My ex refused to pay and while Dad's were being carted off to jail for owing a few months my ex was forgiven years of back support with no reason what-so-ever.
At leat everything else was 50/50.She got the assets and I got the debt. I still can't for the life of me understand why she refused to give me the crib.
To make a long story short, we got hammered by a judge who promptly decided that, pursuant to the socialist based child support guidelines in New Jersey, that he should not only pay these minor items, but give each kid an additional $ 2,000.00 a year so they wouldn't have to work. The father was honestly just trying to instill some values like hard work, frugality, and personal responsibility and the judge turns around and reinforces the exact opposite behavior.
I left the court room bewildered. I hadn't lost like that in a long time. The court is right by Washington's Headquarters in Northern New Jersey. Outside the court room are portraits of some of the founding fathers and revolutionary war heroes like Nathaniel Greene. I remember thinking to myself, if only these guys had known.
Holy bananas....your court date is late next spring!? Didn't think my courts could be any worse at scheduling. Guess I was wrong.
Been there, done that.
You and your kids are in my prayers.
This is a surprisingly common situation.
You can kiss the money goodbye, please don't spend any emotional energy or fees on that issue-the money is gone, forget about it.
Save your energy for caring for your child.
They never give up the crib.
They did know.
That's why they had automatic father custody, and a male-only franchise.
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