From: jsw@cray.com (Jon S. Wood)
Subject: Mn TASK FORCE; GENDER FAIRNESS1
Keywords: 
Reply-To: jsw@cray.com
Organization: Cray Research, Inc.
Date: 7 Jan 93 15:08:59 CST

 
 Read the following excerpt from the Mn Task Force on Gender Fairness 
in the Courts, Mn State Supreme Court and tell me feminist dogma is
rampant in Government. 


From the Gender Fairness Task Force, Mn State Supreme Court:
 Page 863. Issues of Family Law: Joint Custody



 Martha Fineman, Professor of Law and Dirrector of the Family Policy
Program of the Institute for Legal Studies at the University of
Wisconsin, argues that court imposed joint custody is unfair to
mothers in that it has been advocated by fathers' rights groups as a 
solution to the historic failure of non-custodial parents-usually
fathers-to pay child support:

   Join custody...empowers fathers as a group without requiring
   any demonstration of responsibility...in no other area does the
   law reward those who have failed in their duties as an incentive
   for them to change their behavior. 21

      Fineman, Dominant Discourse, Professional Language, and Legal
               Change in Child Custody Decisionmaking, 101 Harv. L
               Rev. 727, 759 (1988)

 Professor Carol Bruch of the Martin Luther King, Jr. School of Law
at the University of California at Davis, comments that, "although
proponents of joint custody argue that joint custody enhances both
paternal involvement and paternal financial support, research 
results do not as yet support these claims." She notes the "growing
consensus in the research literature that disapproves of joint
custody orders that are entered into over the objection of one
parent." 22

    Bruch, And How are the Children? The Effects of Ideology and 
           Mediation on Child CUstody Law and Children's Well-being
           in the United States, 2 Int'l. J.L. & Fam. 106, 19 (1988)

 And a longitudinal study of families involved in long running 
custody disputes, performed under the auspicies of the Center for
the Family in Transition, has found significant emotional behavioral
problems in children who spend time with both disputing parents.
The authors caution against encouraging or mandating joint custody
where the parent's are in conflict.  23

   Paper presented by Janet R. Johnston Ph.D., Research Director for the
         Center for the Family in Transition, to the 45th Annual Meeting
         of the American Orthopsychiatric Association (Mar. 30, 1988).



******

Note their reasoning on joint custody:

 Since mom and dad don't get along it only makes sense to make the man
 suffer even greater alianation.  Smells like a stinky fish answer to
 me? 

What is the agenda of the Center for the Family in Transition group? 
Anyone willing to bet me that this is a "women's" organization? Notice
how they discovered emotional behavioral problems in children who spend
time with both disputing parents? Would anybody dare bet me this same
group would NOT recognize the social and behavioral problems of 
children in "single" households, but somehow blame it on .... poverty, 
men not paying child support, men dumping poor mothers etc. 

On what basis does Ms Bruch conclude that their is a growing consenus
against joint custody in research literature (I would bet she knows
Janet Johnston Ph.d.) and how does one parents' objection to joint
custody have any thing to do with the judges descision?

 Let's face it honey, joint physical custody is growing as fast
as the guidelines are going up. Why do these pseudo-academics ignore
this fact when discussing trends and why do their answers appear
to be so anti-father? 
Newsgroups: alt.child-support