Source: https://mkg4583.wordpress.com/tag/civil-rights/
Timestamp: 2019-04-24 20:17:54+00:00

Document:
Although government promotes itself endlessly as our indispensable “protector” and principle guardian of our Constitutional Rights, it’s not true.
Nevertheless, that self-promotion has effectively conditioned most Americans to believe our Constitutional Rights are respected and vigorously protected by government and public servants. Unfortunately, only a few people realize that government does not automatically protect our Rights, that our inclination to trust government is dangerously misguided, and that our ignorance of our Rights encourages government to abuse those Rights.
The relationship between any government and its citizens is, and has always been, at best, ADVERSARIAL: individual Rights are inversely proportional to government power. The more power the government has, the fewer Rights you have. Government can’t grow in size or power except at the cost of our individual Rights and freedom.
The founding fathers also realized that all governments seek to expand their powers and are therefore driven to diminish their citizen’s Rights. Hence, the Constitution was written to both limit government and maximize our individual Rights.
In truth, the American Constitution is essentially an anti-government document.
The Constitution’s principle purpose is not simply to specify our individual Rights, but to shield us from the single organization that will always pose the greatest threat to those Rights: our own government. That’s why we have three branches of government, checks and balances, elections every two years, the opportunity to call constitutional conventions, the Right to jury trials, and the Right to keep and bear arms – each political mechanism was designed to empower the public to restrict government and thereby to protect the people against government’s inevitable urge to tyranny.
If the principle enemy of any people is their own government, and if the principle defender of the American people is the American Constitution, then it follows that the first enemy of our government is our Constitution. Government understands this conflict, but tries to conceal it from the public by claiming to be the only interpreter and protector of the Constitution.
But if only the government interprets the Constitution, then those interpretations are typically biased to empower government — the Constitution’s archenemy — at the expense of the people.
3) That the only party able to truly protect and defend YOUR Rights is YOU.
Sound far-fetched? It’s not. Even the courts agree.
The individual Rights guaranteed by our Constitution can be compromised or ignored by our government.
Note the verdict’s confrontational language: “fighting”, “combat”, and most surprising, “belligerent”. Did you ever expect to ever read a Federal Court condemn citizens for being “passive” or “ignorant”? Did you ever expect to see a verdict that encouraged citizens to be “belligerent” IN COURT…?
Better go back and re-read that extraordinary verdict. And read it again. And commit it to memory, for it succinctly describes the essence of the American legal system.
The court ruled that the Constitutional Right against self-incrimination is NOT automatically guaranteed to any citizen by any government branch or official. Moreover, despite the government’s usual propaganda, this Right is NOT available to all persons: It is not available to the “passive”, the “ignorant”, or the “indifferent”. Nor can this Right be claimed by an attorney on behalf of his client. The Right against self-incrimination is available only to the knowledgeable, “belligerent claimant”, to the individual willing to engage in “sustained combat” to FIGHT for his RIGHT.
2) Lacks the courage to fight for his Right. Therefore, anyone who trusts the courts (or even his own lawyer) to protect his Constitutional Right against self-incrimination is a fool and may pay a fool’s price.
If one of our Constitutional Rights is only available to citizens who are both knowledgeable and belligerent, how are the balances of our Rights any different?
Fundamentally, if you don’t know your Rights, the court is under no obligation to inform you, or to protect your Rights. Even if you know your Rights, but lack the guts to fight for them, again, the court is not obligated to protect you. If you are superior to the Government, then why SHOULD they be obligated to inform their Master? Ignorance of the law is NO EXCUSE! In the same respect, if the executive or legislative branch violates the Constitution, it is our duty to fight to restore the limitations provided by the constitution.
In fact, your ignorance or passivity legally empowers your adversary to exploit you in court. If the opposing side tries to railroad you and ignore your Constitutional Rights, the judge is not obligated to protect your Rights. This is particularly true in cases where your opponent is the government (a District Attorney, for example, or the I.R.S.). This is seen repeatedly when the sheep are led into our courts, sheared, bled, and butchered under the kindly gaze of the presiding judge.
That’s the way our courts really are: The ignorant and the passive can be routinely railroaded and abused without ever understanding that the cause for their abuse is their own ignorance or cowardice.
Our cowardice and fear of the courts typically entices us to “play nice” with the judge. But that’s exactly the wrong strategy because by “playing nice”, we become accomplices in our own destruction. By not objecting and defying the courts, we implicitly approve, validate, and accept whatever injustice the court cares to dispense on our lives. By not fighting, we give the government license to destroy us.
The key to a successful defense of our Rights is not to kiss up to the judge with yes-your-honor’s, no-your-honor’s, and pray-the-court’s, but to stand up and belligerently defy the system.
Given that the government does not defend our Rights, what’s a reasonable person to do?
Clearly, we must do SOMETHING, for as Edmund Burke said, “The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.” But apathy isn’t simply a function of cowardice or indifference; “apathy” is a synonym for “ignorance”.
Ignorance makes the public more “manageable” in the courts and in confrontations with the government. Insofar as government naturally seeks to expand its powers at the expense of the citizen’s Rights, government has a vested interest in the public’s ignorance and consequent apathy. The interest in expanding its powers encourages the government to provide little, no, or even false, education on what our Rights should be.
So first, you must learn your Constitutional Rights. If you don’t know what your Rights are, you can’t “fight” for them.
Second, given the reality of American education, you can’t rely on the state to teach you anything other than basic vocational training. Therefore, you must study your rights, learn about law, history and EDUCATE YOURSELF.
Third, teach your friends and neighbors. It’s not enough to know YOUR Rights. You must also know and respect your neighbor’s. Like-wise, your neighbor must learn to know and respect his, and you’re Rights, too. Our chances of compelling government to concede our Rights are hugely improved when the general public also understands and respects those Rights.
Fourth, knowledge alone is not enough: once you know your Rights, find the courage to fight for them. Courage (“belligerence”) is the final requirement to secure your Rights. Fight for YOUR Rights, and more, learn to respect others, no matter how seemingly bizarre, who also fight for THEIR Rights. Make no mistake — anyone who’s fighting for HIS Rights, is also fighting for YOURS. He’s entitled to your respect.
Fifth, don’t trust the government. Recognize the true nature of a citizen’s relationship to government is ADVERSARIAL. All governments naturally seek to expand their powers at the cost of their citizen’s Rights, both nationally and internationally. This has been true since time began and will not change in this life. You have what they want: personal power (and as consequence, freedom from government authority). Trusting the government has already enslaved us. It is up to us to break these bonds and restore true liberty and freedom.
The most effective tyrannies begin by luring their subjects with carrots. Only later, after the people are addicted to government and weak, will they use the stick to compel public obedience.
America thrived for nearly two centuries based on the Constitution’s mandate of limited government/maximum freedom. But limited government demands personal self-reliance. As government has grown in size with the carrots of welfare, entitlements, and special interest programs, the public has become increasingly dependent of the government, and the nation has declined.
This is America, boys and girls. It’s more than a piece of land; it’s a political miracle — the only nation in the world with an anti-government Constitution. But this miracle is conditional and dependant on the knowledge, courage, and self-reliance of its citizens. Freedom will not flourish in a nation of ignorant fools and irresponsible weaklings. To live free takes knowledge, nerve, and personal responsibility.
Is it the U.S. Government’s responsibility to protect and uphold its citizen’s constitutional Rights?.
SACRAMENTO – Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has signed legislation making California the first state in the nation to establish a right to counsel for low-income people in critical needs civil cases where shelter, sustenance, safety, health or child custody are at stake.
AB 590, one of more than 700 bills that were piled on his desk awaiting action as he tried to find an end to the state’s water woes, was signed Sunday.
The National Center for State Courts has found more than 4.3 million Californians represent themselves in civil court proceedings, largely because they cannot afford a lawyer.
Under the law, the Judicial Council is required to establish one or more pilot programs in selected courts across the state for three-year periods.
The pilot program will run from July 1, 2011 until July 1, 2017 and will be funded by a $10 increase in certain court fees, including issuing a writ for enforcement of an order or judgment, issuing an order of sale and filing and entering an award under Workers’ Compensation Law.
To pass the bill, Feuer altered its mechanics, agreeing to divert the revenue it creates to fund court operations during this tight fiscal year. In two years, the revenue from the increase will begin funding the pilot program.
The Assembly passed the legislation by a vote of 52-26, while the Senate passed it 23 to 13.
“The system is based on the rule of law and the when you have people without representation, the courts become clogged and with the cuts in Legal Aid this solution was really needed,” she said.
Clare Pastore, USC law professor and co-chair of the Right to Counsel Subcommittee in California Access to Justice, said the system starts a process of eliminating the advantage financial resources can provide in legal disputes.
“We’d be appalled on the idea on the criminal side that someone could be brought to trial and stand trial, without ever having a lawyer,” Pastore said. “But that was the state of the law 40 years ago.
One day, the idea that someone could lose their job, children, health insurance – all without entitlement to lawyer – we’ll say that was equally barbaric.
“The system isn’t supposed to be a contest based on resources,” she added.
If the pilot program is successful in California, Pastore she wouldn’t be surprised to see other states implement it as well.
A similar bill was taken up two legislative sessions ago and the governor earmarked $5 million for it, but the measure didn’t pass the Legislature.
Jesse Choper, a professor of public law at UC Berkeley School of Law, said he was surprised the bill got the go-ahead this session, given the state’s budget crisis.
Choper said the question of right to counsel has been dissected for almost than 50 years, since Gideon v. Wainwright required those accused of a crime the right to a court-appointed lawyer.
New Law Creates Right to Counsel.
Has a judge violated your constitutional rights? Have you been discriminated against by being treated differently than other people in similar situations by reason of race, religion, national origin, gender, sexual preference or political opinion? Have you lost certain rights without a meaningful hearing or even an opportunity to be heard?
Have you been deprived of any other constitutional protection? Have you been subject to Court action for the purpose of intimidating you from exercising an opinion, or practicing your faith? Don’t let them get away with it.
injunctive relief – a command or order to do something or refrain from doing so.
As a general rule, however, judges cannot be held liable for money damages for acts done in the exercise of his judicial function, within the limits of his jurisdiction, no matter how erroneous, illegal or malicious his acts may be. (48A Corpus Juris Secundum §86) A minority of decisions have held that if an inferior judge acts maliciously or corruptly he may incur liability. Kalb v. Luce, 291 N.W. 841, 234, WISC 509.
Federal Civil Rights statutes, and possibly Bivens actions, appear to offer the best path for redressing constitutional grievances with state and federal judges, respectively, in Federal Court. As a practical matter, such cases will usually be brought by pro se litigants. Neither the politics nor economics of law practice permits lawyers to pursue such cases nor makes them affordable except to a small elite of citizens.
However, lawyers who do successfully sue state judges in federal court in Title 42 U.S. Code § 1983 cases can recover attorney’s fees from judicial defendants provided they can show time sheets kept contemporaneously with their work.
Properly drafted complaints need not be prepared by a lawyer. All that is required is a very fundamental understanding of a few basic constitutional principles and a typewriter and paper. Handwritten complaints can also be filed in court.
II. Plaintiff brings this suit pursuant to Title 42 U.S. Code § 1983 for violations of certain protections guaranteed to him by the First, Fifth, Eighth, Ninth and Fourteenth Amendments (select which apply) of the federal Constitution, by the defendant under color of law in his/her capacity as a judge in the Superior Court of (****) County.
Be aware that the issue of whether federal judicial officers can in fact be sued under this authority is unresolved, but my opinion is that there is a strong implication in the affirmative based on the language in many cases.
III. Plaintiff (Your name) is a natural person residing at (Your address), (County), (State).
The burden of proof is upon the plaintiff to show that the defendant judge acted unconstitutionally or outside of his/her jurisdiction. If the judge engaged in an egregious discrimination against males in a divorce court, minorities in state criminal cases, members of an unpopular religious group in confrontation with government authorities and treated suspiciously in court or members of a “fringe” political group, these situations can give rise to a claim of denial of equal protection under the Fourteenth Amendment.
If a judge permits an ex parte attachment, i.e. seizure of real estate without giving you notice of a hearing in a state court proceeding, this is a deprivation of property without due process, violating the Fifth Amendment as well as the Fourteenth Amendment.
Ex parte restraining orders forcing men or women out of their homes based on abuse allegations in state courts are a primary and rampant example of violations of constitutional rights today, and certainly actionable in federal court.
The first ten amendments of the Bill of Rights are self explanatory. Violations of any of the rights described in these amendments give rise to causes of action, both against state judges under Title 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and arguably against federal judges in Bivens actions.
Pro se litigants should give a clear and concise description of what happened in chronological order, identifying the judge, the date, time, and place of his or her action, and specifying which acts violated which constitutional amendments.
The complaint finishes with a section entitled “Prayer for Relief.” In such a case you can ask for an injunction ordering another judge to so something, or to refrain from doing something. Successful use of these suits has been made to nullify attachments, end incarcerations, declare laws or court practices unconstitutional and scare the heck out of black robed tyrants with gavels. See Pulliam v. Allen, 466 U.S. 522 (1983).
1. Issue injunctive relief commanding defendant to . . .
2. Issue declaratory relief as this Court deems appropriate just.
3. Issue other relief as this Court deems appropriate and just.
4. Award plaintiff his costs of litigation.
I have read the above complaint and it is correct to the best of my knowledge.
Complaints are filed in the Civil Clerk’s Office in the United States District Court for your district.
Federal rules now allow for service of process by certified mail. You will be required to serve the defendant judge and also your state attorney general if you are suing a state judge.
The pro se road will be easier if you study the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, obtain a Black’s Law Dictionary and familiarize yourself with legal research methods. You must also read the Local Rules of the Federal Court where you are suing, and learn Constitutional law fast.
Using a lawyer as a coach is helpful. Bear in mind that your lawsuit is disfavored because it is against a judge. Nevertheless, our system of “justice” is in such tough shape that suits against judges are a socio-political necessity.
Complaints should be photocopied, disseminated to the legislature, the media and political action groups.
Perhaps the cumulative impact of these suits will bring a healthy radical change for the American people.
The author is an attorney in private practice in Boston.
The right to publish this article off-line in print, or via CD-ROM, floppy diskette, tape, laser disk, or any other media, electronic or otherwise, can only be granted by the author and must be in writing. Online usage is unrestricted as long as this article, including the byline, copyright notice, publisher’s address, and limited license, is published in its entirety.
New CoSponsors in the House – and Senate!
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE / July 27, 2009 / Washington, D.C. – A Constitutional Amendment to protect the parent-child relationship introduced by U.S. Rep. Pete Hoekstra, R-Michigan, has reached 110 co-sponsors in the House.
The Parental Rights Amendment (H.J.Res.42) would state explicitly in the U.S. Constitution that parents have a fundamental right to raise their children as they see fit, while protecting against abuse and neglect. Threats to the parent-child relationship include potential Senate ratification of the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child and the erosion of fundamental parental rights in our federal courts.
More information on the Parental Rights Amendment can be viewed at http://www.parentalrights.org.
In addition, we also received word that Senator Coburn of Oklahoma has signed on as a cosponsor of S.J. Res. 16, the Parental Rights Amendment in the Senate. This brings our total in the Senate to three (3) – a slow but important start.
While there is no way to track the direct effects of your calls and emails and our visits last week, it is safe to assume that at least some of these cosponsors would not have signed on before the summer break without this contact. When we visited Congress last week, everyone we spoke to was already aware of the Amendment – a major change from just four months ago! Our thanks and congratulations to you for your efforts to bring this vital issue to the attention of your Senators and Congressmen. With help like yours, we will win!
No Restraint on Restraining Orders by Stephen Baskerville, Ph.D.
The increased use of restraining orders in alleged domestic violence cases is being advocated in states across America. In Maryland, one proposal would allow court commissioners rather than judges to issue protective orders.
The Washington Post calls it an “unlikely subject for controversy” and validates this assessment by ignoring voices of opposition. Indeed, no national debate has ever taken place on restraining orders. Yet it is time the public understands the danger they pose to constitutional rights.
The real purpose of restraining orders is not so much to prevent violence as to eliminate one parent during divorce proceedings. This is now common knowledge in legal circles.
Elaine Epstein, former president of the Massachusetts Women,s Bar Association, writes that “allegations of abuse are now used for tactical advantage” in divorce courts and that restraining orders are doled out “like candy.” “Everyone knows that restraining orders and orders to vacate are granted to virtually all who apply,” and “the facts have become irrelevant,” she reports. “In virtually all cases, no notice, meaningful hearing, or impartial weighing of evidence is to be had.” Yet a government analysis found that fewer than half of all restraining orders involved even an allegation of physical violence.
Restraining orders are an indispensable tool to keep the regime of unilateral (or “no-fault”) divorce in business, because they prevent involuntarily divorced parents from running into their children in public places. Anyone can attend a child’s first communion or little league game, after all, anyone but their forcibly divorced father, who will be arrested if he shows up.
How restraining orders can prevent violence is unclear. Violent assault is already criminally punishable. A father whose wife obtained a protective order against him was, according to the St. Petersburg Times, “enjoined and restrained from committing any domestic violence upon her.” But is he not thus enjoined and restrained to begin with, along with the rest of us? The conclusion seems inescapable that the purpose is not to protect anyone from violent fathers but to protect the power of divorce practitioners from peaceful ones.
In fact, restraining orders very likely create violence, since forcing a parent to stay away from his or her children can provoke precisely the violence it ostensibly intends to prevent. “Few lives, if any, have been saved, but much harm, and possibly loss of lives, has come from the issuance of restraining orders,” Dudley District Court Justice Milton Raphaelson wrote last year in the Western Massachusetts Law Tribune (only upon his retirement).
A report just released by the Heritage Foundation confirms that the safest arrangement for mothers and children is a married, intact family. “Marriage dramatically reduces the risk that mothers will suffer from domestic abuse,” concludes the report.
By providing a tool to tear families apart, restraining orders are creating the very problem their promoters claim to be solving.
Dr. Baskerville teaches political science at Howard University.
No Restraint on Restraining Orders by Stephen Baskerville, Ph.D..
Narcissistic Personality Disorder/Borderline Personality Disorder women rarely make it easy to end a relationship with them. Once you finally decide you can no longer take the emotional abuse, the threats, accusations, outrageous demands, bullying, projection, projective identification and gaslighting, you probably feel a sense of relief. Then the maw of hell opens and the BPD/NPD woman ratchets her nasty behaviors a thousandfold.
Typical behaviors include: distortion/smear campaigns (lying to your friends, family and anyone who’ll listen in order to turn them against you); parental alienation (turning your children against you by badmouthing you, lying about you and putting you into no-win situations); and projection (blaming you for the rotten abusive acts that she is committing—for example, she engages in parental alienation and then accuses you of taking your anger out on the children).
Facing these threatening behaviors can be terrifying, which makes it all the more difficult to end the relationship. These women become unpredictable, wild animals when they sense they’re losing control. They don’t care about the collateral damage they inflict. They’ll bring the house down right on top of themselves if they think it will punish you.
I guess my question is, “Where do I go from here?” I posted some of my experiences (under the name, fromCOtoAZ) previously on your blog. Your advice was very helpful and completely correct. Unfortunately, I didn’t adhere to your advice and got sucked back in. My ex promised she was seeing a therapist and that things would change. She finally admitted her words are hurtful and cause a lot of damage. I gave her one more chance to see if things really would change or if it was just window dressing.
Things were fine the first month, then they shot straight back to what they were by the second month. She has no problem throwing anyone under the bus if you try to hold her accountable. She blames others for her problems, even her kids. While we were together, I offered to buy her a car since she totaled her previous one in an accident. Even though I can’t afford it, I was willing to do it for her and her kids. Long story short, she blows up at me. Most girls would say, “thank you, what a guy.” Not her. She HAS to find something wrong with the offer, some reason to be offended, some reason to be completely negative and angry.
The profanity comes in waves, degrading words spew like bile, and it happens every time. It’s always someone else’s fault. So I finally had enough – again – and broke up with her. Now she’s playing the victim and it’s all my fault in her eyes. Here’s the dialog we had tonight. It’s a great example of how our “discussions” (my attempt) turn into fights (her attempt).
So here is my question to you: My nephew got into a fight with his girlfriend and hung himself when he was 21. I also made a very poor decision earlier in my life and considered suicide. Trust me. She knows suicide is very personal to me. I’m not asking you to have a crystal ball, but I’m scared that she’s serious. Then again, and I don’t mean to sound like a callous jerk, she could simply be playing that card because she knows it’s the ONE thing that will get my attention over anything else. So where do I go from here?
I can’t stay with her just because she threatens to kill herself. She’ll never stop being abusive and demoralizing and yet I don’t want to have that on my conscience if she does it. When I had ny own brush with suicide years ago, it was my decision, poor as it was, and I accept full responsibility. She would never see it as her choice. It would all be my fault. What should I do? This girl (”girl” -she’s actually a 43-year old woman with 3 children!) scares me in so many ways, but this is the scariest.
1. Your first mistake was going back into the rabid lioness’ den (i.e., reuniting). It happens though. You wanted to give it one more college try. I understand. You stuck your hand into the fire again and got burned. This is a valuable lesson. Remember it.
2. Your second mistake was offering to remain friends with this woman. You cannot, not, NOT remain “friends” with these women. If you don’t share a child, the healthiest thing is a clean break (or as clean as you can get with a woman like this), which means no contact.
3. You’re using too many words with her (Mike’s email responses to Susan were very long). These women don’t process dialog/conversation like the rest of us. Crafting long, factual explanations–especially ones that don’t fit with their distorted version of events–are completely lost on them. Even if it seems like she’s reading or listening, she’s just scanning for specific hot-button code words that she can twist around, distort, and blow completely out of proportion in order to use your words against you. These women should become professional taffy pullers. Their ability to distort facts so that they fall in line with their distorted emotional reasoning is unparalleled.
4. Never agree with these women’s insults and name-calling. Appeasing these women by agreeing with them in order to get them to stop the verbal abuse (i.e., shut up) is usually a bad idea. They take it as a green light to keep going and that their behavior is acceptable. You can’t humor these women. It only amps them up.
5. When they invoke the authority of a therapist, attorney or some other professional it means they’re getting desperate. It’s like saying, “I told mommy/daddy/teacher on you and boy are you in trouble now!” It’s a control/manipulation/shame/fear tactic. No competent therapist would encourage a patient to emotionally blackmail a spouse, boyfriend, girlfriend, ex or family member by threatening suicide.
In fact, Psychologists adhere to the Tarasoff vs. the Regents of the University of California ruling, which means they have a duty to protect their patients from harming themselves or others. This includes breaking confidentiality by contacting the authorities or having them voluntarily/involuntarily hospitalized if the Psychologist decides the patient has intent, the means and a plan to kill herself.
I highly doubt she even showed your emails to her therapist. Then again, perhaps she did and that’s why Bonnie is recommending inpatient treatment. Furthermore, just like NPD/BPD women twist around things that you say and do; they also twist what their therapists say if it helps them to control and abuse others. Additionally, if Bonnie criticized you it’s probably because your ex has given her a highly distorted account of your relationship.
6. You are NOT responsible if this woman takes her life. Period. This is classic emotional blackmail. Don’t bite on it. If you’re really worried about her, call or email her therapist and let her decide if Susan needs to be pink papered. Forward Susan’s emails to her therapist. State you understand she can’t discuss or even acknowledge that she’s treating Susan, but you’re worried that she may harm herself and her children by exposing them to her parasuicidal threats and possible gestures. Mention your experience with your nephew and that’s why you feel obligated to notify her. And truly, Mike, that’s all you’re obligated to do.
I apologize if my feedback comes across as harsh, but for goodness sake, I feel violated reading her attacks on you secondhand. Do you have a therapist or someone who can help you set and maintain your boundaries and figure out what attracted you to Susan and what makes you susceptible to woman like her? If not, I strongly encourage you to focus on that instead of being friends with Susan or having anything else to do with her.
The Tories are shortly to unveil a far-reaching policy to put marriage at the heart of family life.
A high-powered team of lawyers commissioned by Iain Duncan Smith’s Centre for Social Justice is to issue a report later this month which is expected to shape Conservative policy on the family.
It is said to recommend a sweeping overhaul of the law to strengthen marriage, including moves to make divorce more difficult and promote marriage preparation classes and ‘family relationship centres’, as well as tax breaks for married couples.
Condemning the modern mantra that marriage is merely a ‘lifestyle choice’, the report is expected to say that there is overwhelming evidence that marriage brings many benefits to couples, children, the wider family and the nation as a whole.
If the Tory Party accepts these recommendations, it will be an enormous and hugely overdue step in the right direction.
The family is the building block of society. If the institution of the family is broken, society breaks with it.
That is what has happened in Britain over the past four decades as part of a deliberate attempt by the ‘progressive’ intelligentsia to reshape society around the unrestrained gratification of adult sexual desire under the banners of ‘ liberation’, ‘equality’ and ‘rights’.
As a result, nearly half of all babies are now born outside marriage; Britain has the highest rate of teenage pregnancy in Europe; and women and children are at far greater risk of sexual and physical abuse.
Children from fractured homes do worse in general in every single area of their lives.
As the High Court judge Sir Paul Coleridge recently observed, the family courts are overwhelmed with cases involving damaged, miserable or disturbed children.
Yet for years the evidence of this catastrophe has been swept under the carpet or denied outright by those pushing this agenda.
Anyone who drew attention to it was pilloried as a bigot who wanted to turn back the clock to some mythical ‘golden age’.
Marriage was progressively undermined. With divorce court judges deciding they were no longer prepared to make judgments about who was to blame for the breakdown of a marriage, divorce soared.
All stigma and shame were removed from unmarried motherhood. Cohabitation numbers took off, fuelled by a tax and welfare system which provided incentives for couples to live apart while married couples were penalised.
If the Tories are now really going to tackle all this properly, it would be an act of conspicuous political leadership.
And to his credit, David Cameron has said consistently that he intends to do so.
The problem, however, is that his intention to repair the family is undermined by his support for gay rights.
His apology last week for the Tories’ original support for ‘Clause 28’, the totemic attempt to stop councils from distributing gay propaganda in schools, provoked widespread scorn – not least from many gays who understandably regarded it as patronising and cynically opportunistic.
And it has also promoted a demeaning war of words between Labour and the Tories about whose agenda is more ‘pink’ than the other.
The far more serious point, however, is that the gay rights agenda undermines marriage.
The Tories insist that this is not so and that the two sit happily together. Promoting gay rights, they say, is merely about ending intolerance. It is irrelevant to family breakdown, which is a heterosexual problem.
Undoubtedly, the overwhelming reason is the collapse of constraints on heterosexual behaviour. But it is surely wrong to deny any connection.
The key point is the difference between homosexuals as individuals and the ‘gay rights’ lobby.
A liberal society should be tolerant of gay people. It is good that social attitudes are now far more relaxed. People’s sexuality should be an entirely private matter and should not be the cause of prejudice or, worse still, aggression towards homosexuals.
But is the gay rights agenda really about tolerance, or is it about trying to stop heterosexuality being the behavioural norm?
Because it entails treating gay relationships as identical to heterosexual ones in every respect, any differences – over marriage or adoption, for example – are damned as discrimination and bigotry.
As a result, what started as a decent intention to eradicate intolerance has turned into intolerance as morality has been stood on its head.
Thus opposing gay adoption on the grounds that children need a replica mother and father is denounced as ‘homophobic’.
But hasn’t that been precisely the problem which the Tories are now – to their credit – trying to address in heterosexual family life, that children do need a mother and father and that family life has been wrecked by those who strenuously pretend otherwise?
Gay rights activists claim that ‘lifestyle choice’ means gay relationships should be treated identically to heterosexual ones.
But the core reason for family breakdown is precisely the view that marriage is merely a ‘ relationship’ for people to choose or not from a menu of alternative lifestyles.
However, marriage is not a ‘relationship’ but a unique institution for safeguarding the upbringing of children.
It has to be protected in turn by a web of law and custom, tradition and attitudes. That web has been destroyed by the ‘all lifestyles are equal’ doctrine.
The collapse of sexual norms has destroyed the bulwarks around marriage. And the gay rights agenda is very much part of that process.
What is particularly worrying, moreover, is that any attempt to say so is demonised as ‘homophobic’. As a result, traditional Christians are now being discriminated against.
At the weekend the Bishop of Rochester, Dr Michael Nazir-Ali, called upon homosexuals to ‘repent and be changed’, which drew the immediate charge that he was promoting intolerance.
But since Christianity holds that sexual relations should be restricted to a man and a woman inside marriage, aren’t those who want to stop Christians upholding their own doctrine displaying intolerance?
It is heartening that real prejudice against gays is now so much less than it was. But how sad that gay activists are now perpetrating a mirror image of the intolerance once shown to them.
Shouldn’t the Tories be defending Christians, the bedrock faith beneath the values of this country, against such bullying?
It will take great courage to tackle the causes of family breakdown. Even now, the progressive establishment is determined to bury the truth.
A two-part programme for the BBC by the respected journalist John Ware about ‘The Death Of Respect’, which identifies family breakdown as an important reason for the rise of aggression, incivility and crime, has been moved by channel controllers from a prime 9pm slot to the ‘graveyard’ 11.20pm time because it is considered to be ‘too dark’.
The real reason is surely that its message runs counter to the libertine ‘group-think’ of progressive opinion.
That’s why such circles will try to paint the Tories as heartless and bigoted over their attempt to promote marriage.
David Cameron should hurl that insult straight back. It’s those who have destroyed marriage and with it the lifechances of countless children, not to mention the health and welfare of abandoned women and men, who are the truly heartless and bigoted.
The Tories are showing courage on marriage. They must be careful this doesn’t turn into incoherence.
Hooray! The Tories are backing marriage – but they’re wrong to pretend all relationships are equal | Mail Online.
For many years those who faced divorced proceedings accused a physical or sexual abuse against a child were stripped on Constitutional due process rights accorded to those accused of a crime in criminal court.
Now, for the first time, the bill that was introduced to strip the use of Parental Alienation out of the family court proceedings has gone a step further – the use of any “non-scientific” theories would not be considered in custody proceedings, but parents who falsely accuse a parent of physical or sexual abuse will be under the scrutiny of local District Attorney’s offices.
This bill would protect children from real abuse, but also protect falsely accused parents by allowing for criminal rules of evidence in court, which might also go on to include criminal rules of procedure including jury trials for those falsely accused. It would also open up malicious prosecution cases against parents and especially the attorneys for tampering with witnesses, namely children.
Accusing an individual of a felony, or enticing others (such as your children) to accuse others would subject you to criminal prosecution yourself, since most accusations are false.
California Legislation: AB 612 (Beall): Custody and visitation: nonscientific theories..
However, California Legal Codes give a free pass to false accusers, but not if “substantial evidence” is found that a false accusation was made during custody proceedings.
section, “person” includes a witness, a party, or a party’s attorney.
at least 15 days after the order is served.
other remedy provided by law.
Losing a parent, at any age, is difficult and painful. It clearly marks the “end of innocence” for us as children. Our aloneness and vulnerability become painfully clear.
Most of us face this emptiness as a natural consequence of our own aging process. If we are lucky, the tragedy and loss of a parent is forestalled until we have created alternate sources for unconditional love. That often helps us to put the pain into some sort of acceptable perspective.
However, when this type of loss occurs prematurely, there is often no opportunity for reflection, or guides willing and available to help instruct us in a healthy mourning process. So we just react to our misfortune in the best way we can at the moment.
Then as adults, as we raise our own children, the weight of the loss begins to really sink in, especially as we share in our children’s important moments of joy and sadness.
That’s when we again remember that our parent wasn’t there at our recital, or when we broke a leg, or when we first had our first period, our first love, our first baby .
These types of thoughts and unanswerable questions usually aren’t for the normal “light of day.” They’re the questions in the back of our minds, the ones we don’t ask ourselves anymore.
It’s only when we’re finally sitting with our therapists, complaining of being so fatigued, or of the emotional distance we feel towards our kids or our spouses, or complaining about how little help and support we get — that the picture really begins to come into focus.
She wasn’t there for you when you needed her and it really hurt you, but you were never allowed to let it show. There’s still a part of you that needs to cry about it, that needs to mourn, to feel the loss and vulnerability in order to truly heal.
This is when we need someone to tell us that it’s okay to feel sorry for ourselves. To assure us that we won’t really fall apart and to help us give ourselves permission for what we might think of as gross self-indulgence. Then we can begin to lift the heavy veil of avoidance, which we have used to blind our senses and avoid mourning until now.
The adult orphaned child, who scurries around busying herself with every conceivable errand and chore, being the perfect worker, spouse, and parent, of course has no time for such self-indulgence.
Self-indulgence is the type of word often used to describe what we think (and reinforce ourselves to think) about our permitting ourselves to feel!
How did little Elaine avoid and cope with the pain? She just kept busy and made her mom proud. Her mom probably became like the “Alamo” for her, her own personal rallying cry. Do it for mom — be smart, be good, be beautiful, be nice…you get the picture. She became her own mommy way before her time.
Elaine probably cried herself to sleep on many occasions missing her mom, or would find herself staring at her friends and their parents, wondering, what must it be like? Would she be different, better, more understood if Mom was still around?
And when it comes to protecting her own kids now, no sacrifice is too large.
All of Elaine’s energy has unfortunately been directed towards “not feeling the pain.” Whether it’s chemical dependency, “workaholism,” depression, rage, or an addiction to being busy, they all have one goal in common: not feeling the pain.
One of the key elements for recovery and repair was avoided in this scenario by pushing the pain inducing-feelings and memories away. Ironically, the one thing that we must do in order to really heal and grow is mourn.
When is the right time to do this and how long is normal?
Everyone is different, and all of us heal in different ways. Some need to be alone and remember, others to think and write and others just to talk about it.
Children, who don’t have the varied faculties of expression at their disposal that we do as adults, need to be encouraged to “act-out” their feelings positively through drama, drawing, and listening to others mourn.
But if Elaine couldn’t mourn as a child, it is not too late for her to mourn now. And if she does, she might be surprised at how much she grows, at how much freer she feels.
She might even learn to sit down.
Marc Garson is a clinical psychotherapist with 14 years of clinical experience.
Attorney Andrew J. Thompson has written an excellent article in support of Sen. Evan Bayh new try at passing the Reponsible Fatherhood Act. This bill was defeated in 2006, when it was co-sponsored by Senator Barack Obama… hopefully we can make some in roads into keeping fatherhood and parenting issues after divorce as a national isssue, and perhaps even get some Senate sponsors for HJ Resolution 42, the Parental Rights Amendment sponsored by Congressman Pete Hoekstra.
Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh joins Arkansas Sen. Blanche Lincoln and Illinois Sen. Roland Burris in sponsoring the Responsible Fatherhood and Healthy Families Act of 2009. A similar bill is being introduced in the House of Representatives by Rep. Danny Davis – IL.
On the one hand, Sen. Bayh deserves commendation for his leadership on the issue, helping to bring national attention and focusing on the importance of children knowing and spending time with their fathers. As a successor to his own father as a US Senator from Indiana, Sen. Bayh is well aware of the value and importance of a father’s involvement in his children’s lives.
By consistently elevating this message into the public forum, Sen. Bayh does a great service to American families. He has followed the lead of an earlier Indiana Sen., former Vice President Dan Quayle, in keeping the discussion alive concerning the importance of fathers’ roles in their children’s upbringing.
The bill also has some provisions that will be very helpful in reducing some of the inefficiencies incurred by the government’s intervention with poor families, and helping to put more money directly into the pockets of needy families, particularly those in two parent households – a model we should encourage and foster.
Unfortunately, however, if the goal is to help increase the involvement of fathers in their children’s lives, it badly misses the mark in most of its provisions, and may in fact help extend the continuing assault on fathers’ ability to act as parents in their children’s lives.
Often the consequence of charges of domestic violence are the complete alienation of parent and child, financial costs that cannot or will not be paid nor recovered, and this often results from minimal, sometimes even ex parte hearings, with no jury and a standard of proof that requires nothing more, in most cases, than the suggestion of fear on the part of the accuser.
Even where a Temporary Restraining Order is an appropriate remedy, it should not be allowed to be used as a tool for the future alienation of fathers and children. The point of the law is to help preserve the bond between children and their fathers and the law should be designed to promote these relationships.
If there is any temporary period of separation between a child and parent, the law should require both parents to participate in a process of restoration and reconciliation of the parental relationship. A father cannot be responsible if he is to be excluded from the family mix.
These changes will make the law better, stronger and more effective in accomplishing the goal of healthy families with responsible fathers.
Andrew J Thompson is an attorney practicing in Indiana. Please visit Thompson Legal Services today for any assistance you need with family law related matters.
Responsible Fatherhood and Healthy Families | Family Law and Fathers.
More Democrats than Republicans are supporting the Mother’s Act. The increased campaign funding to Democrats may well explain this turn of events. For the last eight election cycles the pharmaceutical industry has contributed far more to Republicans than Democrats. In the 2006 cycle the percentage was 28% to Democrats and 70% to Republicans, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonprofit group that tracks political funding.
But the Democrats were close to matching the Republicans for the 2008 cycle with $5,099,942 to Democrats compared to $5,680,871 to Republicans, which is probably why the Democrats would allow such an obvious drug marketing scheme to be implemented.
“The Mothers Act, while appearing like an Act of benevolence, is a dangerous and unnecessary measure that will result in the further over-prescription of drugs that are already grotesquely over-prescribed,” says Kate Gillespie, one of the lead attorneys handling SSRI birth defect lawsuits and Paxil suicide cases at the Los Angeles based Baum, Hedlund, Aristei & Goldman law firm.
“Take out politics and Big Pharma and the push for this legislation just doesn’t make sense,” she states.
“For politicians, a much safer issue than pushing drugs for pregnant mothers is promoting the expansion of medical treatment for postpartum depression,” according to Dr Levine.
Mother’s Act – infant |LawyersandSettlements.com.
WASHINGTON – The U.S. Supreme Court today ruled that school officials violated the constitutional rights of a 13-year-old Arizona girl when they strip searched her based on a classmate’s uncorroborated accusation that she previously possessed ibuprofen. The American Civil Liberties Union represents April Redding, the plaintiff in the lawsuit, whose daughter, Savana Redding, was strip searched by Safford Middle School officials six years ago.
Savana Redding, an eighth grade honor roll student at Safford Middle School in Safford, Arizona, was pulled from class on October 8, 2003 by the school’s vice principal, Kerry Wilson. Earlier that day, Wilson had discovered prescription-strength ibuprofen – 400 milligram pills equivalent to two over-the-counter ibuprofen pills, such as Advil – in the possession of Redding’s classmate. Under questioning and faced with punishment, the classmate claimed that Redding, who had no history of disciplinary problems, had given her the pills.
After escorting Redding to his office, Wilson demanded that she consent to a search of her possessions. Redding agreed, wanting to prove she had nothing to hide. Wilson did not inform Redding of the reason for the search. Joined by a female school administrative assistant, Wilson searched Redding’s backpack and found nothing. Instructed by Wilson, the administrative assistant then took Redding to the school nurse’s office in order to perform a strip search.
In the school nurse’s office, Redding was ordered to strip to her underwear. She was then commanded to pull her bra out and to the side, exposing her breasts, and to pull her underwear out at the crotch, exposing her pelvic area. The strip search failed to uncover any ibuprofen pills.
The strip search was undertaken based solely on the uncorroborated claims of the classmate facing punishment. No attempt was made to corroborate the classmate’s accusations among other students or teachers. No physical evidence suggested that Redding might be in possession of ibuprofen pills or that she was concealing them in her undergarments.
Furthermore, the classmate had not claimed that Redding currently possessed any pills, nor had the classmate given any indication as to where they might be concealed. No attempt was made to contact Redding’s parents prior to conducting the strip search.
The case, Safford Unified School District v. Redding, was appealed from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which found the strip search to be unconstitutional. A six-judge majority of the appeals court further held that, since the strip search was clearly unreasonable, the school official who ordered the search is not entitled to immunity. In today’s Supreme Court decision, despite deeming the strip search of Redding unconstitutional, the Court found that the school officials involved are immune from liability. The decision leaves open the possibility, however, that the Safford Unified School district could be held liable.
The ACLU and ACLU of Arizona were joined in the case by Bruce Macdonald, with the law firm McNamara, Goldsmith, Jackson & Macdonald, and Andrew Petersen, with the firm Humphrey & Petersen.
In addition, a broad constellation of adolescent health experts and privacy rights advocates filed friend-of-the-court briefs in support of Redding, including the National Education Association, National Association of Social Workers (NASW), CATO Institute, Rutherford Institute, Goldwater Institute and Urban Justice Center, among others.
American Civil Liberties Union : U.S. Supreme Court Declares Strip Search Of 13-Year-Old Student Unconstitutional.
Motherhood has fallen prey to the psycho-pharmaceutical complex. If new legislation known as the Mother’s Act becomes law, the drugging of infants through pregnant and nursing mothers will no doubt increase.
Congress has rightfully refused to pass this bill for eight years. The official title is currently the “Melanie Blocker Stokes Mom’s Opportunity to Access Health, Education, Research, and Support for Postpartum Depression Act of 2009.” This is S. 324.
The legislation was introduced in the House during the 110th Congress on January 4, 2007, by Illinois Democrat Bobby Rush and later reintroduced into both bodies of the new Congress in January 2009, after the bill died in the Senate last year.
Democratic Senator Robert Menendez from New Jersey, home to a large number of drug companies, and Richard Durbin (D-IL) are the main sponsors of the bill in the Senate.
However, he only mentions screening and treatment for postpartum depression. The true goal of the promoters of this Act is to transform women of child bearing age into life-long consumers of psychiatric treatment by screening women for a whole list of “mood” and “anxiety” disorders and not simply postpartum depression.
Enough cannot be said about the ability of anyone with a white coat and a medical title to convince vulnerable pregnant women and new mothers that the thoughts and feelings they experience on any given day might be abnormal.
The constant watching and barrage of questions such as are you depressed, are you anxious, are you moody, are you fearful of motherhood, are you sleeping well, are there changes in your eating habits, will predictably have the net effect of convincing many women that normal thoughts and emotions are a sign of mental disorders.
While mania, psychosis, agitation, hostility, anxiety, confusion, depression and suicidality are often cited as “symptoms” of mental illness, many of the same exact “symptoms” are listed as side effects on the warning labels for antidepressants, antipsychotics and anticonvulsants.
All of these drugs are now being prescribed to treat the “mood” and “anxiety” disorders that women will be screened for if the Act becomes law. In the case of pregnant women, no psychiatric drug has been FDA approved as safe for use.
The newly recruited customers will be stigmatized for life with labels of the most serious forms of mental illness simply because they are unlucky enough to become pregnant in the United States, where serious disorders lead to major profits from the prescribing of multiple classes of psychotropic drugs.
On September 1, 2008, Medical News Today ran a headline for a study that stated: “Americans Show Little Tolerance For Mental Illness Despite Growing Belief In Genetic Cause.” The study by University of Pennsylvania sociology professor Jason Schnittker showed that while more Americans believe that mental illness has genetic causes, the country is no more tolerant of the mentally ill than it was 10 years ago.
The study explored tolerance in terms of: unwillingness to live next door to a mentally ill person, having a group home for the mentally ill in the neighborhood, spending an evening socializing with a mentally ill person, working closely with such a person on the job, making friends with someone with a mental illness or having a mentally ill person marry into the family.
Family fragmentation costs taxpayers at least $112 billion annually in antipoverty programs, justice and education systems, and lost revenue, according to a report released last week. Astonishingly, the report’s publisher, Institute for American Values, is using these findings to advocate even higher costs, through more federal programs.
As welfare and child support enforcement programs show, there is zero proof that further government intervention into families would be a good investment for taxpayers.
After more than a decade of welfare reform, out-of-wedlock births remain at record highs, and married couples now comprise less than half the nation’s households. “The impact of welfare reform is now virtually zero,” says Robert Rector of Heritage Foundation.
Welfare reform, as currently conceived, cannot possibly make a difference. Out-of-wedlock births no longer proceed only from low-income teenagers. Increasingly, middle-class, middle-aged women are bearing the fatherless children. This excludes children of divorce, which almost doubles the 1.5 million out-of-wedlock births.
The problem is driven not only by culture, but by federal programs not addressed by welfare reform—such as child support enforcement, domestic violence, and child abuse prevention—which subsidize single-parent homes through their quasi-welfare entitlements for the affluent.
It’s not called the welfare “state” for nothing. Even more serious than the economic effects has been the quiet metamorphosis of welfare from a system of public assistance into a miniature penal apparatus, replete with its own tribunals, prosecutors, police, and jails.
The subsidy on single-mother homes was never really curtailed. Reformers largely replaced welfare with child support. The consequences were profound: this change transformed welfare from public assistance into law enforcement, creating yet another federal plainclothes police force without constitutional justification.
Like any bureaucracy, this one found rationalizations to expand. During the 1980s and 1990s—without explanation or public debate—enforcement machinery created for children in poverty was dramatically expanded to cover all child-support cases, including those not receiving welfare.
This vastly expanded the program by bringing in millions of middle-class divorce cases. The system was intended for welfare—but other cases now account for 83% of its cases and 92% of the money collected.
Contrary to what was promised, the cost to taxpayers increased sharply. By padding their rolls with millions of middle-class parents, state governments could collect a windfall of federal incentive payments. State officials may spend this revenue however they wish. Federal taxpayers subsidize state government operations through child support. They also subsidize family dissolution, for every fatherless child is another source of revenue for states.
To collect, states must channel not just delinquent but current payments through their criminal enforcement machinery, subjecting law-abiding parents to criminal measures. While officials claim their crackdowns on “deadbeat dads” increase collections, the “increase” is achieved not by collecting arrearages of low-income fathers already in the system, but simply by pulling in more middle-class fathers—and creating more fatherless children.
These fathers haven’t abandoned their children. Most were actively involved, and, following what is usually involuntary divorce, desire more time with them. Yet for the state to collect funding, fathers willing to care for them must be designated as “absent.” Divorce courts are pressured to cut children off from their fathers to conform to the welfare model of “custodial” and “noncustodial.” These perverse incentives further criminalize fathers, by impelling states to make child-support levels as onerous as possible and to squeeze every dollar from every parent available.
Beyond the subsidy expense are costs of diverting the criminal justice system from protecting society to criminalizing parents and keeping them from their children. The entitlement state must then devise additional programs—far more expensive—to deal with the social costs of fatherless children. Former Assistant Health and Human Services Secretary Wade Horn contends that most of the $47 billion spent by his department is necessitated by broken homes and fatherless children. One might extend his point to most of the half-trillion dollar HHS budget. Given the social ills attributed to fatherless homes—crime, truancy, substance abuse, teen pregnancy, suicide—it is reasonable to see a huge proportion of domestic spending among the costs.
These developments offer a preview of where our entire system of welfare taxation is headed: expropriating citizens to pay for destructive programs that create the need for more spending and taxation. It cannot end anywhere but in the criminalization of more and more of the population.
Stephen Baskerville is Research Fellow at the Independent Institute, Associate Professor of Government at Patrick Henry College, and author of Taken Into Custody: The War Against Fathers, Marriage, and the Family (Cumberland House, 2007).
Family preservation is one of the most intensively-scrutinized programs in all of child welfare. Several studies — and real world experience — show that family preservation programs that follow the Homebuilders model safely prevent placement in foster care.
An experiment in Utah and Washington State also used a comparison group. After one year, 85.2 percent of the children in the comparison group were placed in foster care, compared to only 44.4 percent of the children who received intensive family preservation services.
And still another study, in Minnesota, found that, in dealing with troubled adolescents, fully 90 percent of the control group children were placed, compared to only 56 percent of those who received intensive family preservation services.
Some agencies are now using IFPS to help make sure children are safe when they are returned home after foster care. Here again, researchers are beginning to see impressive results. In a Utah study, 77.2 percent of children whose families received IFPS help after reunification were still safely with their birth parents after one year, compared with 49.1 percent in a control group.
Critics ignore all of this evidence, preferring to cite a study done for the federal government which purports to find that IFPS is no better than conventional services. But though critics of family preservation claim that this study evaluated programs that followed the Homebuilders model, that’s not true. In a rigorous critique of the study, Prof. Ray Kirk of the University of North Carolina School of Social Work notes that the so-called IFPS programs in this study actually diluted the Homebuilders model, providing service that was less intensive and less timely. At the same time, the “conventional” services sometimes were better than average. In at least one case, they may well have been just as intensive as the IFPS program – so it’s hardly surprising that the researchers would find little difference between the two.
Furthermore, efforts to truly assign families at random to experimental and control groups sometimes were thwarted by workers in the field who felt this was unethical. Workers resisted assigning what they considered to be “high risk” families to control groups that would not receive help from IFPS programs. In addition, the study failed to target children who actually were at imminent risk of placement.
Some critics argue that evaluations of family preservation programs are inherently flawed because they allegedly focus on placement prevention instead of child safety. But a placement can only be prevented if a child is believed to be safe. Placement prevention is a measure of safety.
Of course, the key words here are “believed to be.” Children who have been through intensive family preservation programs are generally among the most closely monitored. But there are cases in which children are reabused and nobody finds out. And there are cases — like Joseph Wallace — in which the warnings of family preservation workers are ignored. No one can be absolutely certain that the child left at home is safe — but no one can be absolutely certain that the child placed in foster care is safe either — and family preservation has the better track record.
And, as discussed in Issue Paper 1, with safe, proven strategies to keep families together now widely used in Alabama, Pittsburgh, and elsewhere, the result is fewer foster care placements and safer children.
Indeed, the whole idea that family preservation — and only family preservation — should be required to prove itself over and over again reflects a double standard. After more than a century of experience, isn’t it time that the advocates of foster care be held to account for the failure of their program?
1. Carol Berquist, et. al., Evaluation of Michigan’s Families First Program (Lansing Mich: University Associates, March, 1993). Back to Text.
2. Betty J. Blythe, Ph.D., Srinika Jayaratne, Ph.D, Michigan Families First Effectiveness Study: A Summary of Findings, Sept. 28, 1999, p.18. Back to Text.
3. State of Michigan, Office of the Auditor General, Performance Audit of the Families First of Michigan Program, July, 1998, pp. 2-4. Back to Text.
4. Mark W. Fraser, et. al., Families in Crisis: The Impact of Intensive Family Preservation Services (New York: Aldine De Gruyter, 1991), p.168. Back to Text.
5. S. Wood, S., K. Barton, C. Schroeder, “In-Home Treatment of Abusive Families: Cost and Placement at One Year.” Psychotherapy Vol. 25 (1988) pp. 409-14, cited in Howard Bath and David Haapala, “Family Preservation Services: What Does the Outcome Research Really Tell Us,” Social Services Review, September, 1994, Table A1, p.400. Back to Text.
6. R.S. Kirk, Tailoring Intensive Family Preservation Services for Family Reunification Cases: Research, Evaluation and Assessment, (www.nfpn.org/resourcess/articles/tailoring.html). Back to Text.
7. I.M. Schwartz, et. al., “Family Preservation Services as an Alternative to Out-of-Home Placement of Adolescents,” in K. Wells and D.E. Biegel, eds., Family Preservation Services: Research and Evaluation (Newbury Park, CA: Sage, 1991) pp.33-46, cited in Bath and Happala, note 3, supra.Back to Text.
8. R.E. Lewis, et. al., “Examining family reunification services: A process analysis of a successful experiment,” Research on Social Work Practice, 5, (3), 259-282, cited in Kirk, note 6, supra.Back to Text.
9. R.S. Kirk, A Critique of the “Evaluation of Family Preservation and Reunification Programs: Interim Report,” May, 2001. Back to Text.
10. A. Heneghan, et. al., Evaluating intensive family preservation services: A methodological review. Pediatrics, 97(4), 535-542, cited in Kirk, note 6, supra.Back to Text.
11. Kirk, note 6, supra.Back to Text.
Do children do best with one parent over another? Or does biology determine who is the better parent?
If you ask the feminists of the 70s who wanted to be free of restrictive child-rearing and assume an equal station in the workplace and politics, the answer to the first question would be no. Why would feminists give up their biologically superior position of motherhood, in which a mother is the primary caregiver, in favor of a job? What narcissists mother would do that?
And yet, today, if you ask the very self-same feminists who are leading the charge to narrow sole-custody of children in divorce proceedings to a woman based on some “biological advantage” the answer to the second question would be yes.
Upon this, you have the creation of a legally untenable position given to women based on gender. To get around “having your cake and eating it, too,” state family law has created the “imaginary world” of the “primary parent” dictum, which guides family law today, which is just a primary rehashing of “tender years doctrine”, both of which do not have the legal merit whatsover, nor the empirical research to support either.
But if you go back to the Maternal Deprivation nonsense, you quickly find the empirical research that throws this theory back into the area of “junk science” where it belongs. Maternal Deprivation is both empirically wrong and a sexist theory.
“Although Bowlby may not dispute that young children form multiple attachments, he still contends that the attachment to the mother is unique in that it is the first to appear and remains the strongest of all. However, on both of these counts, the evidence seems to suggest otherwise.
* Schaffer & Emerson (1964) noted that specific attachments started at about 8 months and, very shortly thereafter, the infants became attached to other people. By 18 months very few (13%) were attached to only one person; some had five or more attachments.
* Rutter (1981) points out that several indicators of attachment (such as protest or distress when attached person leaves) has been shown for a variety of attachment figures – fathers, siblings, peers and even inanimate objects.
Critics such as Rutter have also accused Bowlby of not distinguishing between deprivation and privation – the complete lack of an attachment bond, rather than its loss. Rutter stresses that the quality of the attachment bond is the most important factor, rather than just deprivation in the critical period.
* Mothers are the exclusive carers in only a very small percentage of human societies; often there are a number of people involved in the care of children, such as relations and friends (Weisner & Gallimore, 1977).
* Ijzendoorn & Tavecchio (1987) argue that a stable network of adults can provide adequate care and that this care may even have advantages over a system where a mother has to meet all a child’s needs.
* There is evidence that children develop better with a mother who is happy in her work, than a mother who is frustrated by staying at home (Schaffer, 1990).
There are many articles relating to this nonsense, and how it has been refuted. The original theory was promulgated by John Bowlby. Bowlby grew up mother-fixated because he did not have a relationship with his father. See why here.
Psychological research includes a shocking history and continuation of maternal deprivation experiments on animals. While maternal deprivation experiments have been conducted far more frequently on rhesus macaques and other monkeys, chimpanzees were not spared as victims of this unnecessary research.
Maternal Deprivation applies to monkeys only.

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