Category: Blog

Sacramento, CA–Research consistently shows that women are at least as likely as men to initiate and engage in domestic violence, and that a significant minority of the injuries sustained in domestic violence are suffered by heterosexual men. This research is increasingly coming to light, for a few reasons:

1) Dissident domestic violence experts have worked hard to stick to science and solid research methods in the face of tremendous pressure. Many of these attended the Sacramento Domestic Violence conference From Ideology to Inclusion: Evidence-Based Policy and Intervention in Domestic Violence in February. (Dr. Jennifer Langhinrichsen-Rohling, one of the speakers from that conference, is pictured above. To learn more, click here. Photo by Kevin Graft.)

2) The feminists’ media stranglehold on gender issues has weakened somewhat.

3) Advocates for male victims of domestic violence have done fine and effective work.

4) As Shakespeare noted in The Merchant of Venice, “At the length truth will out.”

When confronted with the unwelcome news that women are as much a part of family violence as men are, feminists use several evasion tactics. One is to claim that the data is faulty, though that has largely worn thin and has been replaced with claims that female violence is somehow “different,” or more justified. That one is also starting to wear thin, too. (See Dr. Langhinrichsen-Rohling’s views in ‘Every time we tried to say that women’s intimate partner abuse is different than men’s, the evidence did not support it’)

Another one–not new, but increasingly prominent–is to say that evidence of women’s violence is being misused to promote a misogynist agenda. A subset of this latter argument is what I’ve described as the “Feminist Intentional Walk”–when feminists ignore credible men’s advocates and instead quote some obscure loony in order to discredit all of us.

One example of this can be found in Janice Kennedy’s recent Ottawa Citizen opinion column We can’t help victims of violence if hatemongers hijack the agenda (5/25/08). Kennedy grapples with the fact that a recent study found that a significant amount of men are victims of domestic violence.

Kennedy could have quoted or cited any one of dozens of credible advocates on the subject, but since her intent was to stigmatize rather than edify, she reached way, way down and came up with an individual named Kirby Inwood. No, I’d never heard of him either, but his website features gems like this:

“I have consistently found women lawyers to generally be the scum of the earth.”

“If you don’t like what I say, you must be a blind, feminist bigot or a male collaborating white ribbon wimp.”

Kennedy adds that Inwood was once convicted of “assault on his wife and infant son.” (I don’t know the details on the case, and it is possible it was one of those domestic violence railroad jobs.)

Anyway, in palming off Inwood’s comments as somehow representative of men’s activists, she writes, “There are many public purveyors of misogyny, but one colorfully venomous Canadian example sums them up. Kirby Inwood.” She adds, “The ‘men’s rights’ activists, are going to gobble [the new report] up and spit it out again in a malignancy of poisonous deceit.”

So instead of quoting the many, many experts who have researched and quantified women’s family violence, we’re instead supposed to focus on this obscure loony. That’s weak journalism on Kennedy’s part, to say the least.

[Note: If you or someone you love is being abused, the Domestic Abuse Helpline for Men and Women provides crisis intervention and support services to victims of domestic violence and their families.]

London, England–From Family’s fury as girl, 12, allowed to have sex-change operation without against father’s wishes (Evening Standard, 5/25/08):

“A huge ethical row has erupted over a judge’s decision to allow a 12- year-old girl to have a sex change that will turn her into a teenage boy.

“The child’s father, who is separated from her mother, is outraged at the prospect but despite his objections the taxpayer-funded sex swap has already got under way.

“His daughter, who cannot be named because of her age, is already having hormone treatment in Australia in what is one of the first such cases involving a child so young…a relative of the child claimed the girl had been ‘vindictively brainwashed’ by her mother into making the decision to have the change.

“A cousin who stayed with the girl’s family for two and a half years said yesterday that after a bitter break-up the mother had used the child to ‘get back’ at the father.

“‘She’s been brainwashed from an early age,’ said the cousin, who has to remain anonymous to protect the Victorian girl’s identity.

“‘The mother drilled into the girl from an early age that she would have preferred a boy.’

“Now the father, who considers his daughter is far too young to make a decision on her gender, is appealing to Melbourne’s legal fraternity for help in fighting the case after he ran out of money to afford representation in opposing the sex swap request.”

A few thoughts:

1) I think this girl is way, way too young to be making a decision like this. I know that the proponents of this believe that by doing it now, they can make it much easier for her to change from a female into a male. On the other hand, there is no way that a 12-year-old is capable of making an informed, intelligent decision on a matter this grave and important.

2) I believe that for any decision of this magnitude, there has to be agreement between the parents, assuming that both parents are fit. For one parent to be able to do this against the will and the objections of the other parent is wrong.

3) I would very much like to know more about the allegations that the girl’s cousin makes about her being alienated from her father, brainwashed at an early age, and cut off from half of her family.

4) Assuming the father is as this article portrays him, he has been placed in a horrible position. I’m sure he probably feels that if the girl could just come to his house and be with him, dad could take care of his little girl and all of these other weighty, adult issues would be resolved. He probably believes that it never would have come to this had he been allowed to be a regular part of the girl’s life. That may or may not be correct, but that’s probably how he feels.

Thanks to James, a reader, for sending me the story.

Los Angeles, CA–“[Shared Parenting] is an issue which knows no bounds. It is neither the domain of conservatives or liberals, poor or wealthy, and pays no attention to ethnicity or sex. Our issues cross all demographics and our goals are shared, and should be supported, across all sectors of our society.”–Mike McCormick, Executive Director of the American Coalition for Fathers & Children

ACFC President Dr. Linda Nielsen, author of the book Embracing Your Father, recently penned a pamphlet called Shared Parenting: Facts and Fictions. Some of the “Facts and Fictions” Nielsen lists include:

“Fiction: Most children are satisfied with the amount of time they spend (or spent) with their fathers after their parents divorce.

“Fact: The vast majority of children say they want – or wanted – more time with their fathers after their parents stopped living together. Kids want more shared parenting.

“Fiction: As long as the mother has enough money, children don’t pay a price for having too little or no contact with their father.

“Fact: Kids with too little fathering are more likely to have problems throughout their lives related to father absence than kids whose fathers remained actively involved after the parents stop living together.

“Fiction: Shared parenting is bad for infants or young children because they should not be separated overnight from their mother.

“Fact: Very young children should not be away from either parent for more than a few days and are able to spend nights in each parent”s home.

“Fiction: When parents share parenting, children are worse off financially because their dad pays much less child support.

“Fact: Fathers who share parenting are the most likely to pay child support, spend additional money on their kids, and contribute to college educations.”

To read the full pamphlet, including Nielsen’s list of research citations, click here.

Nebraska–We’ve often discussed anti-father bias in Child Protective Services cases. Fathers are frequently marginalized and deprived of custody of their children when their wives/ex-wives/ex-girlfriends abuse their children. This terrible Nebraska case detailed below is another example. In the case, a mother abused her daughter and child protective services took the girl. There were no accusations of abuse against the father. Nevertheless, they deceived and manipulated the father into relinquishing custody of his daughter. The girl was left fatherless — can anyone guess what’s going to happen to her? Surprise, surprise
— without her father, the girl’s life, in the words of the Nebraska Supreme Court, “spun out of control.” She lived the life that so many fatherless girls live — doing drugs, running away from home, getting pregnant at a young age, etc. Justice in these types of cases is rarely done. In this one, justice came, but it came too late. An important finding for fathers The Nebraska Supreme Court said the girl had been “deprived of her right to a relationship with her father.” One attorney noted: “The ruling reinforces the principle that children have a right to a relationship with their parents, as well as parents having rights to their children.” In other words, the Nebraska Supreme Court has agreed with the central argument we put forward — absent parental unfitness, children have a right to a relationship with both their parents. The story is below–thanks to Les Veskrna, MD, Executive Director of the Children’s Rights Council of Nebraska, for sending it. Court says state erred in family meddling BY MARTHA STODDARD Omaha World Herald, 5/24/08 LINCOLN — A child welfare worker who wrongfully talked a Kimball, Neb., man into giving up his daughter for adoption must pay damages to the girl, the Nebraska Supreme Court ruled Friday. The high court agreed with the Kimball County District Court that Kelly Case, a caseworker for the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services, deprived the girl of her right to a relationship with her father without due process. As a result, the high court said, the girl”s life “spun out of control.’ The girl, identified only as Amanda C., began doing drugs, ran away from her grandparents” home, gave birth to a child out of wedlock and struggled financially. “The evidence shows that the relinquishment that Case wrongfully orchestrated was a substantial factor in Amanda”s downward social spiral,’ the Supreme Court said. The high court upheld an award of $150,000 in damages and $64,697 in legal and other costs to Amanda. Case was defended in the matter by the Attorney General”s Office and an HHS attorney. The state likely will pay the award.

Los Angeles, CA–The West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals just made a good ruling on the issue of jailing child-support debtors. As we’ve discussed on many occasions, while it is certainly true that there are fathers who do not come through for their children, many child-support obligors are punished and even jailed simply because they are too poor to pay the child-support that the family law system demands of them.

The California Department of Child Support Services itself recently recognized this in a report — to learn more, see Glenn’s co-authored column New LA County Campaign Against ‘Deadbeat Dads” Unfairly Targets Low-Income Fathers (Los Angeles Daily News, 3/26/08).

Court–Even in Child Support Cases, the Burden of Proof Is Still on the Prosecution

One of the ways that child-support obligors’ rights are violated is that in some cases the burden of proof has been shifted from the state — where it normally lies in criminal prosecutions — onto the debtor. The result has at times been de facto debtors prisons for child-support obligors. According to this story:

“West Virginia legislators violated state and national constitutions when they forced fathers facing felony child support charges to prove they couldn’t pay, the Supreme Court of Appeals decided May 23.

“The Justices unanimously erased a law stating that in child support prosecutions ‘the defendant’s alleged inability to reasonably provide the required support may be raised only as an affirmative defense, after reasonable notice to the State.’

“The law ‘unconstitutionally shifts to a defendant the burden of disproving an element of the offense,’ Justice Robin Davis wrote. ‘We have previously observed that it is a foundation of criminal law that the State must prove all the elements of a crime beyond a reasonable doubt.’

“The law violates due process under Article III of the West Virginia Constitution and the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution, she wrote.”

The full article can be seen at Justices say Legislature wrong on felony child support (West Virginia Record, 5/29/08).

An Unsympathetic Defendant

While we support this Court’s ruling, we’re not terribly enamored of the defendant in whose favor of a court ruled. Gabriel Stamm was ordered to pay a whopping $167.52 a month in child support. Apparently he claims he was unable to pay it, and maybe that is true, but it seems unlikely.

Every day we deal with child-support obligors who, at least as the facts are laid out in this article, are far more sympathetic than Gabriel Stamm. On a larger level, the important point is the legal principle, and its impact on child-support obligors as a whole, as opposed to the defendant in this particular case.

Ottawa, Canada–Background: Evan Stark (pictured) is a prominent feminist advocate for domestic violence victims and the author of Coercive Control: How Men Entrap Women in Personal Life (Interpersonal Violence) and numerous other DV books. I’ve discussed his work many times–to learn more, see my recent blog post Prominent Hard-line Feminist Shows Some Class, Apologizes for Calling Me a ‘Notorious Right Wing Nut Case’ or click here.

Stark was an opponent of our successful Campaign Against PBS’s Father-Bashing Breaking the Silence in 2005.

The good Dr. Stark is at it again, this time trying to get a killer off on “Battered Mother’s Dilemma” and “Battered Wife Syndrome”–despite the fact that the killer mom was “not sexually nor physically abused by her husband.” In other words, she’s a battered wife except for the fact that, um…she wasn’t battered.

From Wife ‘felt like a hostage,’ expert testifies (Ottawa Citizen, 5/30/08):

On the night Teresa Pohchoo Craig killed her husband, she was caught in the coils of a psychological trauma called Battered Mother’s Dilemma, a court heard yesterday.

Dr. Evan Stark, author of Coercive Control: How Men Entrap Women in Personal Life, testified that Jack Craig systematically isolated, controlled and degraded his wife over the course of their 12-year relationship.

In a report prepared for the defence, Dr. Stark said Mrs. Craig also suffered from Battered Wife Syndrome and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, although Mrs. Craig was neither sexually nor physically abused by her husband.

Uh-huh. The section below is particularly humorous:

Mrs. Craig faced the sort of terrible choice that defines Battered Mother’s Dilemma, [Stark] said. She could either leave the marriage for her own safety and freedom or protect her son’s well-being by staying with her abusive husband. He also said the dilemma was “the primary dynamic” leading up to the killing of Mr. Craig…

Mr. Craig, 54, died of stab wounds on March 31, 2006. Mrs. Craig is charged with first-degree murder. Dr. Stark described how Mr. Craig frequently told his wife it was, “My way or the highway,” and she could leave at any time.

But Mr. Craig warned his wife that if she left, he would get custody and she would never see their son again. “She felt like a hostage,” Dr. Stark said.

The dad would get custody? On what planet?

Hope this gig pays good, Evan…

Thanks to Jeremy Swanson for the story.

Los Angeles, CA–In my co-authored column Have Anti-Father Family Court Policies Led to a Men’s Marriage Strike? (Philadelphia Inquirer, (7/5/02) six years ago I postulated that men were on a “Marriage Strike” because of the way they get manhandled in divorce. A new study supports that view. According to Reuters’ Men prefer being solo over a bad marriage: study (6/2/08):

[Carl] Weisman, 49, conducted a survey of 1,533 heterosexual men to research a book aiming to give women an insight into why some smart, successful men opted to stay single — and help lifelong bachelors understand why they are still the solo man at parties.

He concluded that most men were not afraid of marriage — but they were afraid of a bad marriage.

“Men are 10 times more scared of marrying the wrong person than of never getting married at all,” Weisman told Reuters in a telephone interview.

“This is the first generation of people who have grown up with bad divorces. People assume there is something wrong if you don’t marry but these are men who have made a different choice and not given in to social pressures”…

But while 72 percent of respondents said they were not afraid of marriage, about half of them said the situation that scared them most was marrying the wrong person…

Weisman also found that financial issues, both positive and negative, played a large part in men’s fear of commitment…

“[T]hose who are financially sound were terrified what a bad divorce could do to them.”

Another one the study’s findings, and a sad one, is this:

“Those with little money said they would have nothing to offer a partner, with some suffering self-esteem issues and withdrawing from the dating pool,” said Weisman.

One thing I found a little surprising is this:

Weisman said his research blew away any idea that single men were unhappy.

“A compelling issue was how many of them had found contentment in a never-married life,” he said. “They had created lives full of careers, friends and ambitions. It was not like they walk around all day worried about not being married.”

I’m of the general opinion that marriage and fatherhood is a good thing for men, and that unfortunately it has been poisoned to some degree by our anti-male family law system. Perhaps more of these bachelors are happy being single, as this research suggests.

One thing that disappointed me about the study’s findings is this–men apparently worried about losing their money in divorces but not losing their kids. This means either one of two things, neither of them good:

1) The men weren’t that concerned over losing their kids.

2) The men didn’t realize how common it is for fathers to lose their kids.

Below are some recent articles and items of interest from Fathers & Families’ latest News Digest.

Who gets custody of the dog is complicated, ‘hotly contested’ (USA Today, 5/28/08)

Wife of actor Bill Murray files for divorce (Associated Press, 5/29/08)

Deadbeat parents to pay up (Rocky Mountain News, 5/31/08)

Critics say CPS failed to foresee nuances (Houston Chronicle, 5/31/08)

If junior has your DNA, judge”ll order you to pay (Boston Herald, 6/1/08)

R.I.: Pay child support before cashing in lawsuit payments (Associated Press, 6/1/08)

Woman Forced To Pay Child Support For Adult Son (WFTV.com, 6/1/08)

Child Support Agency ‘reformed’ after 20yrs (ABC News, 6/2/08)

Baldwin to advise divorce hell couple (Metro.co.uk, 6/2/08)

London, England–From Family’s fury as girl, 12, allowed to have sex-change operation without against father’s wishes (Evening Standard, 5/25/08):

“A huge ethical row has erupted over a judge’s decision to allow a 12- year-old girl to have a sex change that will turn her into a teenage boy.

“The child’s father, who is separated from her mother, is outraged at the prospect but despite his objections the taxpayer-funded sex swap has already got under way.

“His daughter, who cannot be named because of her age, is already having hormone treatment in Australia in what is one of the first such cases involving a child so young…a relative of the child claimed the girl had been ‘vindictively brainwashed’ by her mother into making the decision to have the change.

“A cousin who stayed with the girl’s family for two and a half years said yesterday that after a bitter break-up the mother had used the child to ‘get back’ at the father.

“‘She’s been brainwashed from an early age,’ said the cousin, who has to remain anonymous to protect the Victorian girl’s identity.

“‘The mother drilled into the girl from an early age that she would have preferred a boy.’

“Now the father, who considers his daughter is far too young to make a decision on her gender, is appealing to Melbourne’s legal fraternity for help in fighting the case after he ran out of money to afford representation in opposing the sex swap request.”

A few thoughts:

1) I think this girl is way, way too young to be making a decision like this. I know that the proponents of this believe that by doing it now, they can make it much easier for her to change from a female into a male. On the other hand, there is no way that a 12-year-old is capable of making an informed, intelligent decision on the matter this grave and important.

2) I believe that for any decision of this magnitude, there has to be agreement between the parents, assuming that both parents are fit. For one parent to be able to do this against the will and the objections of the other parent is wrong.

3) I would very much like to know more about the allegations that the girl’s cousin makes about her being alienated from her father, brainwashed at an early age, and cut off from half of her family.

4) Assuming the father is as this article portrays him, what a horrible position he has been placed in. I’m sure he probably feels that if the girl could just come to his house and be with him, dad could take care of his little girl and all of these other weighty, adult issues would be resolved. He probably believes that it never would have come to this had he been allowed to be a regular part of the girl’s life. That may or may not be correct, but that’s probably how he feels.

Thanks to James, a reader, for sending me the story.

St. Louis, MO–Aaron, a reader, sent me this touching story about a remarkable young woman whose single dad saved her from drugs and an alcoholic mother:

Her past leads push for school for homeless
By David Hunn
St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 5/16/08

Set aside, for a moment, that Stephanie Kilstein is creating a charter school for homeless teens in the city. And that she spends every free minute canvassing civic leaders and businesses to support a plan that just might work.

Today is not about that.

Kilstein is graduating from Washington University this morning with a master’s in social work. And, in this season of graduations, her own path onto this old wood stage inside Graham Chapel is worthy of discussion, by all accounts.

Kilstein, just 22, is being awarded not her first, but her second higher degree. At 18, when most are graduating high school, she was teaching migrant fifth-graders. At 16, she entered college, finishing in just two years.

And at 12, she ran away from home, for just the first of many times.

Kilstein’s past is one of a broken and chaotic suburban family in Pennington, N.J. It passes through despair, rehabilitation, rebirth and, now, her singular drive to reclaim others like her.

It’s a story told by a family, partially healed, and reunited for this graduation. The Kilsteins, their friends and even local law enforcement describe it this way:

Mom drank so much she disengaged for days at a time. Dad, a state bureaucrat and then a policy analyst for a national drug company, left before dawn, and returned after dark. Eventually, he moved out, got a small place across town, and did his best to be there for his children.

Still, for much of junior high and early high school, Stephanie cared for her three younger brothers. She picked them up from school when they were sick. She cleaned the house, served up noodles and tuna fish sandwiches, and, generally, acted much older than she was.

“Hanging out at her house was really fun,” remembered childhood friend Elise Thompson. “There was no real parent supervision.”

The Kilstein home was the kind of place mothers don’t want their kids to visit, the kind of place local police still remember.

But the troublemakers, the druggies and drinkers found solace there. They hid in closets, fleeing parents and cops. They sat on the couch, ate pots of macaroni and cheese, and smoked.

“They felt safe because they knew what we were going through,” said Stephanie’s mother, Laurie Kilstein. “We were the haven for the runaways.”

The eighth grade was the last year Stephanie completed.

By the start of high school, Stephanie was skipping class, stealing toilet paper from gas stations, and coming home drunk night after night. She ran away when she tired of the pressures of home and returned to clean up.

After months, her father went to her school.

“There was an amazing substance abuse counselor at the high school who I went to speak to and just said, ‘Um, I am seriously afraid if we don’t intervene soon that something terrible is going to happen to Stephanie,'” said her father, Saul Kilstein.

Together, they sat her down and gave her two options: Go to a home for runaways in nearby Trenton. Or go to rehab.