Child Custody Crisis:
27 March 2009
There is little doubt that eloquent organized feminist extremism, and highly subjective family courts are the major threat to the right of children to be raised in their father custody.
Under no fault divorce, equality is the rule: Either spouse can terminate a marriage without the other spouse's consent and without any fault committed by the cast off spouse or even alleged by the spouse initiating the estrangement.
When it comes to determining child custody, however, sexism is the rule. By making allegations of fault against the father, the mother can usually get the family court to grant her their children and his money.
Despite Supreme Court decisions upholding the fundamental right of fathers to the care, custody and control of their children, and despite a very high standard that the government must meet in order to terminate parental legal rights, fathers are routinely denied due process when it comes to determining child custody after estrangement.
Family courts use a highly subjective rule called the best interest of the child as recommended by court appointed child custody evaluators or psychotherapists. There is no requirement that they have any first hand experience with raising children, and they are allowed to use their own personal prejudices to recommend outcomes.
Family courts routinely rubber stamp child custody evaluators who recommend mothers custody with the fathers getting so called visitation only every other weekend. This is despite the mountain of social science research which proves that the best interest of the child of estranged parents is usually to give the child equally shared parent time.
(a) Children who feel close to their fathers are significantly more likely to enter college and significantly less likely to have a child in their teen years, be incarcerated, and show various signs of depression.
(b) Young males are significantly more likely to engage in criminal activity when raised without a father, and even more likely to do so if they live in a neighborhood with a high concentration of fatherless families.
(c) Father involvement is considered a significant factor in developing empathy, the ability to understand how others feel.
(d) Children of involved fathers are more likely to receive appropriate healthcare and less likely to be injured.
(e) Father involvement is equally important for the behavioral outcomes of boys and girls.
Yet, family courts typically rule as though fathers have no value except their money, and routinely banish fathers who have not been proven to have committed any misdeed from the lives of their children, except for every other weekend, causing intense feelings of deprivation and depressive behavior.
Westminster courts are presumed to be based on an adversarial system with each side arguing its best case, subject to standards of due process, evidence and proof. Somehow, that doesn't function in family courts.
Some lawyers advise mothers to manipulate the process by using a three step technique: (1) make domestic violence or child abuse allegations, (2) demand full custody, (3) collect large amounts of child support.
If the father objects to this process, the mother can make more accusations. The evaluators then call it a high conflict estrangement and give custody to the mother, declaring that shared parenting won't work.
If the father doesn't acquiesce, he is reprimanded by the court for not buying into the process. In trying to defend himself against accusations, the father is denied the basic rights of a criminal defendant such as presumption of innocence and the necessity that the accuser provide proof beyond a reasonable doubt.
Family courts force fathers to submit to interrogations and evaluations by court chosen child custody evaluators. Fathers are forced to pay the high fees of these private practitioners whom they have not hired, whose services they do not want, and whose credentials and bias are suspect.
The children are also subjected to these evaluators who attempt to turn the children against their fathers in unrecorded interviews.
One of the most unpalatable aspects of family court procedure is the sentencing of fathers to attend re-education classes and psychotherapy sessions to induce them to admit fault and to indoctrinate them in government approved parenting behavior. The court approved psychotherapists report back to the court on the father's supposed progress, and his attendance at these Soviet-style re-education sessions must continue until he conforms.
A cozy relationship exists among lawyers and court approved psychotherapists who recommend each other for this highly paid work of making evaluations, counseling, and conducting re-education classes. The psychotherapists refuse to challenge each others recommendations or question their competence, and the lawyers refuse to cross examine them, because they all want to continue the profitable practice of referring business to each other and collecting fees from fathers who are desperate to see their children.
It cannot be right that a estranged father has fewer legal rights to his children than the mother. While it has to be accepted that there are many abusive and violent men, there are far more caring and loving fathers, sometimes in very difficult circumstances, who need equality within the law.
Whatever the outcome of a child residency case, it must be in the interest of an equal society that both parents start with a level playing field when they attend the family Courts.
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