N is for No Accident

Pete the Patriarch dropped by to say hi in a post, and wondered if I might add a link to his blog in my list of links. Honestly, I can't because I find him too vitrolically anti-feminist.

Doesn't mean that he might not have reason to have become so vitrolic or that he doesn't sometimes have a point, or good stuff:

One entry that struck me in particular was The Reversal of 'This was no accident', which links to two stories - one is about getting tricked into fatherhood, and perhaps marriage via men.style.com, and includes the following nifty bits:

Imagine for a moment this perfectly plausible scenario: You've had a steady girlfriend for a year or so and everything's going great. You still hold hands at the movies. Friends tell you you're good together. You're both around 30 years old and making plenty of money, maybe living together, but you're nowhere near considering fatherhood. And though you occasionally get the feeling that her biological clock is set far ahead of yours, she tells you she's "safe," so you don't worry. Why would you? It's not as if you'd just picked her up on Dollar Margarita Night at Señor Frog's. But one morning she tells you something has gone wrong. Unlikely as it sounds, she's pregnant-and she wants to keep it. What she doesn't tell you, though, is this: She wasn't being safe all along. She wanted to have that baby— and the way she saw it, this was the only way to make it happen.

Here's how a scenario like that played out in real life. Jody (not her real name), a 32-year-old account manager for a major New York ad firm, decided to speed things along with her boyfriend two years ago by getting pregnant without telling him. "It's not about trapping the guy," Jody says. "That's kind of old-fashioned. Yeah, you want him to be into it, but there are other ways to get a guy to commit. If you're smart and in a good relationship, it's just about the fact that you want a kid." Even in her circle of young, urban, and gainfully employed friends, Jody says, this particular brand of subterfuge isn't exactly condemned the way one might expect. In fact, it's sort of, well, normal. "I see and hear people talk about it, and I understand. I get it," she says, "and I don't even think it's that manipulative. It's more like, 'Hey, the timing is right for me. I got pregnant—oops! Well, it's here, let's have it.' I think that's more the way it is now than it was back in the day when you had to marry someone before you got pregnant. Marriage doesn't matter now."

"Trapping" the guy is "old-fashioned"? "Yeah, you want him to be into it?" "It's just about the fact that you want a kid?" "Marriage doesn't matter now."

What amazing quotes. The idea that trapping a guy is old-fashioned - we don't do that anymore - perhaps we don't have to - because "Marriage doesn't matter now." True - it doesn't - you don't have to be married to pay child support, do you?

No, you don't.

And "I don't even think it's that manipulative. " No - not manipulative at all to put someone in the position of having to choose between having a child you don't want and are not ready for, or killing an unborn infant and traumatizing your partner. WHAT?!?!?!! I can hardly think of a more manipulative thing that you could do.

But that isn't the way many women see it no, according to the article: "some women, particularly ones in stable relationships, don't see this as trickery at all—it's more like a nudge."

Wait, there's more:

"A lot of us feel like it's not even really fair that men should get to vote, considering they could be 72 and, with a little Viagra, have another baby," says Vicki Iovine, author of The Girlfriends' Guide to Pregnancy. "For us women, it's really a limited window. We know that boys who grow up to become men don't necessarily want to be men. They like to be boys. And so women say, 'You know what? He's gonna just have to snap out of it—and my pregnancy will be the thing to do it.'" The end, says Iovine, sometimes justifies the means. "Any guy with a heart and soul, and preferably with a job, once he sees the baby on the sonogram or hears the heartbeat, will melt," she says.

It apparently just isn't fair that men have any say in the disposition of their genetic material, or their potential fatherhood, or the inevitable financial drain that they will suffer when they are railroaded into either marriage, or support. Of course, the coin looks very different on the other side. Remember the feminists arguing that women need to choose, so that they don't have to be forced into poverty, lose opportunity, education, options, so that they aren't enslaved to their wombs? Well now they have that freedom, but men are enslaved to their wombs. Very Nice.

The article continues to touch on Matt Dubay, but then tells us the story of 'Jeremy':

Jeremy, a 35-year-old technical consultant and musician in New York [...] thought he'd found himself a nice girl. He had just split with his longtime fiancée but explains that this new woman was saying all the right things—even when it came to practical matters. She was on the Pill. She was pro-choice. So she and Jeremy (who's using a fake name) enjoyed a couple of months of unprotected intimacy.
Then things got weird. She mysteriously quit drinking. She disappeared for days at a time. She told him she was considering going off birth control, though she assured him she hadn't yet. By July, Jeremy had had enough and broke things off. Then in August, he says, she told him she was pregnant and was keeping it. "She was pregnant all of May, all of June, and all of July," Jeremy says. "I said, 'Why didn't you tell me about this sooner?' She's like, 'I didn't want you to influence my decision.' Something that has potential impact on me for the rest of my life, she doesn't want me influencing her decision!?"

More than a year and $6,500 in legal fees later, Jeremy has a 7-month-old boy he's never met, a child-support case pending, and a judge who's less than sympathetic toward his allegations of contraceptive deceit. Even his own attorney told him he'd better ditch that dream of becoming a full-time musician and focus on the computer gig that he'd hoped would only supplement his income: "She was like, 'You know what? You gotta be a man. You're gonna have to have a job 40 hours a week, and you need to support this child—this is your responsibility and your obligation.' And I'm thinking to myself, like, 'How is all of this my responsibility and my obligation when none of this was my choice?'"

Jeremy's hell is only beginning, but let me direct you back to The Reversal of 'This was no accident' - where Pete relates the story of a man who beat 'the system'.

And in case you think this is all fantasy, paranoia and misogyny remember that "The National Scruples and Lies Survey 2004 conducted in the United Kingdom found that 42% of the women in the survey said they would lie about contraception in order to get pregnant, regardless of the wishes of their partners." Add to that that between 10% and 30% of children tested to determine paternity turn up as being "someone else's", and you start to understand how horrifically wrong it is that over 100,000 men - mostly earning at or below the poverty level - are imprisoned for non-payment of support every year.

A comment at Noli Irritare Leones captures the evil of the system well:

First, I have it on good authority from a lady friend of mine that she knows of several women who have been quite candid about getting pregnant for the child support. I was personally horrified to hear this being so candidlty admitted. Prior to hearing this I would have dismissed the idea as an urban legend and it seems a disgusting commodification of humanity. But it’s not irrational given the fact that child support can quickly run up to over $1,000 per month tax free. At those child support figures, being casual about birth control can pay better than a minimum wage job. For example, one local Fresno “celebrity” has two children by two different men. Given that the fathers were medical professionals, she was probably pulling in $30,00 to $40,000 per year tax free from child support. Certainly this is a substantially better gig than working two minimum wage jobs like some women I know.

In the USA, Men are Slaves, Women are Owners. Get wise, or get out of the country, I say.

My best to you in your struggles...

-M

Update: Pete is now linked. I was wrong to deny him. Thanks. See: Pete the Patriarch

Technorati Tags: Bias Misandry Equal Rights Men's Rights Gynocracy Divorce Civil Rights Legal Rights Choice For Men Reproductive Fraud

Z is for Zed

Ran into Zed in the city the other day. Hadn't seen him in a while. He'd been out of work for a long time, doing odd jobs, whatever. But here he was in a suit.
I was like "What's up with the monkey suit? Got a real job?"
And he relates that he has just landed a great job, and had just started paying off his ex - but he looks so depressed.
I am like; "So why the long face?"
and he tells me; "The job requires travel, lots of international travel."
And I am like; "- so, you like travel, better than living in your car like you have been, no?"
But he says; "When I went to the passport agency, they told me I can't get a passport until my arrears are paid - and I am going to be paying arrears for years. -Ha! Arrears for Years. - I am going to lose this job."

And it's true - in many states, if you owe even one dollar in support money, you can't get a passport. Just another way the Dred Scott decision is still very much alive in US Law. - Just another way in which men are enslaved here. And they want to keep you enslaved. No earning money for you - they will take away your professional licenses, your ability to travel, your posessions, and 65% of what you earn, and demand that you try and take out loans to pay off your 'arrears'. All prior to hearing (not trial - no, no trial for you). Slavery, pure and simple.

It is great to be part of the patriarchy, isn't it?

My best to you in your struggles,

M

Technorati Tags: Bias Misandry Equal Rights Men's Rights Gynocracy Divorce Civil Rights Legal Rights Presumption of Innocence Passports Freedoms Civil Liberties

M is for 'More Equal'

The Onion, the comedic revision of the news, inadvertantly sounded a true note this past week when they published "DNA Evidence Frees Man after 15 Years Of Marriage". For men in the system, the humor is bitter. Without irony, men are informed that in the courts there is equal representation, and equal rights, and then the judge turns to the woman's attorney and says 'the burden of proof is on the defendant [he means the man] in these cases'. I have heard it with my own ears.

Women posters on this very blog have indicated that my experience may not be everyone's, but this is not about experience - it is about the law - and the law is clear:

Child support and Alimony are treated as judgements - being good against property and income to 65% of your income stream - without trial or hearing. What that means is your assets and your income will be siezed.

Child support and Alimony disputes do not appear in front of a jury - you get one biased judge.

Legal fees are almost always paid by the man by tradition - the law says that 'ability to pay' is used to help determine who pays - and this would by itself force the man to pay, but the fact is that if you are indigent (Been There!) they still heap the fees on you. So guess what, it is ALWAYS worth a woman's while to take men to court, irregardless of the facts.

And of course, there is no court appointed representation for you when the court has reduced you to penury. You stand alone, possibly still paying your ex's legal fees.

Oh, and bankruptcy does not apply to support and alimony payments.

And as we noted above, the burden of proof falls on the 'defendant'. That means that you will be lucky to be able to prove your ex's income, while she gets to drag all of the last couple year's bank statements out of you, and go over your every expense. Once the court hearing is over, if you managed to retain any money in any account, she will get the sherriff to attach to it.

But consider, why did the judge say 'the burden of proof falls on the defendant?' Surely he meant 'the burden of proof falls on the person claiming changed circumstances', or some similar thing. But the fact is, under the conditions of our legal system, a man would almost never show up in court against a woman: You are considered guilty before hearing (not trial), and you get to pay her fees, and you bear the burden of proof. A man stands no chance in this court - and would never choose to pead a case in this kangaroo court.

So the judge said just right - the burden of proof falls to the defendant, who is always a man.

But back to The Onion article - in which a man was forced to play husband for years until DNA evidence freed him. If you haven't seen it, compare it with the real life case of Steve Barreras recently publicized by Wendy McElroy at Hate Male Post. Steve is 'a corrections officer in law enforcement' - you would think if anyone could get a fair shake it would be him. Right? In 1999 he got divorced, and his ex quickly claimed that she had had a child by him, and demanded and got support. Steve would like, reasonably, to see the kid. But the ex doesn't want him to. Turns out she made up the kid. HOW LONG DO YOU THINK IT TOOK FOR HIM TO PROVE THE KID DIDN'T EXIST? It took till the end of 2004. Over four years of slavery for a child who didn't exist, because the burden of proof is... wait for it... The Man's. Oh, and there is a falsified DNA test involved too, and a kidnapping... Read the article, it is a priceless example of the way the system works - and most of us probably wouldn't get the kind of consideration that Steve got, as an officer.

My best to you in your struggles.

-M

Technorati Tags: Bias Misandry Equal Rights Men's Rights Gynocracy Divorce Civil Rights Legal Rights Presumption of Innocence Steve Barreras Freedoms Civil Liberties

G is for Good

Not everyone is promoting a negative image of men, or looking to take advantage of us. There is much that is good in the world, if we look to find it, even in these dark times.

The other day, for instance, my daughter came home with a new purchase - a T-shirt that says "My Dad Rocks!" in large, glittery letters. My beloved, who was shopping with her, attested that she had to really search to find one that didn't say 'My Mom Rocks!'. The store was Target. So, they might be stocking way more 'My Mom Rocks!' shirts, but they did stock some 'My Dad Rocks!' shirts. Good for Target! Now give us some balance...

And then, a few days later, I was eating some yummy prepackaged potato salad, and some German potato salad, all bought from the same store. And I wanted to glance at the ingredients, but the product name caught my eye. It was "Grandpa's Steakhouse Potato Salad" and "Grandpa's German Potato Salad" from Garden Fresh Foods. Apparently someone at Garden Fresh Foods thinks that Grandpas might be able to cook, and that other people might think so too. Bravo, Garden Fresh Foods of Milwaukee, Wisconsin!

And while I am celebrating good things, I want to celebrate my current wife, and all second wives. They buy into a world where their privacy is routinely violated, they accept pre-broken families, distraught children, evil ex-wives, and men whose financial contribution is little to naught, supporting us until our ex-wives decide to get on with their lives, which is most often never... ...and effectively supporting the excesses of our ex-wives. Knowing what I know now, I am not sure I would ever blame a woman for deciding not to date a divorcee. We are damaged goods, our entire financial future resting on the whim of an ex-wife in whose interest it is to keep us continuously poor and under their thumb. The legal system affords ex-wives a 'legal', free slave, and free enforcement through probation. So simple, so easy, so legal... - few people can withstand that kind of temptation. And second wives buy into that world, truly, marrying for love.

A blessing and a shout out to second wives, everywhere.

BRAVO TO YOU! BRAVO, INDEED!

My best to you all in your struggles,
-M

R is For Reporting, and Revenue, and Roadkill

As a divorced ex-highly-paid employee, I have to document my job searches carefully - it is required that you do this or the court will decide that you chose intentionally to lose your job or remain unemployed - (remember 'guilty until proven innocent' is the standard for divorced men) - and are not actually doing a real search.

And the documentation requirements are huge. Additionally, in this day and age, if you are persuing several jobs at once, with a number of vendors, corporates, and recruiters, it is hard to remember to follow up on an appropriate basis.

So voilla, a database was built to carry out this task for me, tracking my contacts, reminding me to follow up, and generating reports for the evil judge, and my evil ex's lawyer. To the right you see the current main menu. It is a pretty nifty toy, I must say myself, generating emails directly to my prospective employers and recruiters, tracking each communication, and spewing out lawyer-intimidating reports on demand.

So as my job search, and abuse by my ex drags on, but I thought I would make this tool available to other disenfranchised men who certainly have the same problem that I do, trying to prove that they are seeking work, and having to prove that they are not guilty of 'slacking'. (something that only becomes a crime once your ex decides she doesn't want you in the house anymore.) So drop me an email at t9fgelo02[ at ]sneakemail.com in case you want to try out this tool, or learn more about it - see more screen shots - or example reports.

As for licensing it, I'll give you 20 days free, and then it goes into resist-mode until you pay up. I know that if you are needing this thing, you are poor and abused, so let's call it $50 if you can afford it. I can use the money, really.

If you can't afford it, write me a really sad email, and I will license it to you for free. Just remember me in your prayers.

And even if you don't need to document your search (heck, who am I kidding, if you are reading this here, you probably will find that you need to do this sooner or later), this tool is a great way to track your contacts and follow up properly.

Think of it like ACT!^TM for the unemployed. ...Except way cheaper. And maybe it can help you avoid being legal roadkill in justifying your job search.

All my best to you in your struggles,
M

Technorati Tags: Bias Misandry Equal Rights Men's Rights Gynocracy Divorce Civil Rights Legal Rights Presumption of Innocence Due Process Freedoms Civil Liberties Contact Management Job Hunt Software Documenting Your Search Voluntary Unemployment Voluntary Underemployment

A is for Activism

I HAVE been out of touch!

Look at this huge group of class action suits, ambitiously scoped to cover the entire USA and encourage joint custody, and battle the unconstitutional civil court system.

I don't have time to post at length on it, just found out about it myself - but go, find your State and County, (NJ Here) and get involved! If this just got attention for the situation of men, it would be a win, and if it got kids their fathers back, it would be a HUGE win.

And while you are at it, click on the image above, and get yourself a t-shirt that tells it all!

Best,
-M

Technorati Tags: Bias Misandry Equal Rights Men's Rights Gynocracy Divorce Civil Rights Legal Rights Trial by Jury Presumption of Innocence Due Process Freedoms Civil Liberties

L is for Legal System

It is amazing what a wonderful legal system we have.

The rights afforded citizens in a court of law are amazing and impressive - consider:

The right to be considered innocent until proven guilty - this enables citizens to defend themselves with their full resources at their disposal, until such time as they are actually proven guilty. If they are not a threat to society, or a flight risk, they can construct their defense with a lawyer from the comfort of their own home, and continue earning money at their job while their case proceeds. Compare this to other countries, or the way things were in the west prior to the spread of the concept of individual rights, where a citizen was often incarcerated until such time as his case was heard, and his family and friends had to provide for his upkeep.

The right of legal assistance for the poor - making legal representation available to all citizens, irregardless of financial station. Sure, an expensive lawyer will get you a better hearing in court, but if your case is good, there is little that even a great lawyer will do to undermine it.

The right to a trial before a jury of your peers - citizens don't have to prove that they are perfect to some high-and-mighty judge, but to a bunch of people drawn from local citizenry. If your opponent in the case can't convince these people that what you did was a crime (or more likely, that they wouldn't have done the same thing), you are off scot-free.

The requirement that convictions be made when the jury finds you guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. It can't just seem reasonable that you did a bad thing; your opponent has to prove it.

The right to be protected against unreasonable search and seizure - the court can't take your possessions, income, and hunt through your papers and residence, unless there is a good reason to suspect that you have committed an actual crime.

The right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment - your punishment should be appropriate in severity, relative to punishments for other crimes that are comparable and worse.

The right to 'due process' - that you will be granted a trial before jury, that this trial will occur in as speedy a fashion as possible, and that you will have an opportunity to make your case freely in this trial.

We have watched, recently, as even terrorists and terrorist supporters have enjoyed and used these rights to battle the US Government in cases here in the NorthEast - enjoying legal representation, enjoying trial by jury, enjoying the presumption of innocence until they are proven guilty - often finding themselves free on bail, and financially unencumbered prior to their trial - if their malevolence, danger to the public, and likelihood of flight was not of an extreme and obvious danger.

Of course - this is the REST of the court system I am referring to. Not the family or 'civil' court. Not the court that divorced men find themselves in when they need to dispute a divorce matter.

In this court, the man is assumed guilty until proven innocent - your divorce agreement, should you run afoul of it, is entered immediately as a judgment against you. Your assets are seized. Your income is garnished to 50, 60, 65% of your gross income. If you are on unemployment, and your ex is well employed? They take it anyway. Note that a convicted felon (one found guilty in a trial in front of an impartial jury) with a judgment against him is rarely garnished more than 10% - that would be cruel and unusual. But not for a man. Not for an ex-husband, no - apparently cruel and unusual doesn't apply to men.

Your personal papers and other materials are all subject to subpoena too - there need be no actual showing of likelihood that you committed some crime - no, that is criminal court you are thinking of. In civil court, you are subject to a total probing of your assets and holdings. You are assumed to be guilty, and must prove your innocence. You might think that there would be some balance in this - certainly you would have the right to subpoena your ex and put her through the same pain you have to go through. Think again. You will be lucky to get her tax return or pay stub. And in many cases I have seen, perhaps the majority of cases - the man doesn't even get that. Her relative income and wealth seems to have no bearing on your argument that you need relief in this 'civil' court.

And note, you are being punished - losing your assets, your income, and your privacy, before trial. Oh, and by the way, you don't get a trial in front of an impartial jury - you get a hearing in front of a judge - a hearing in which you must show by the preponderance of evidence that you did the right thing.

And that hearing usually will be well over a year in the future. Because they will want to first find you in violation of litigant's rights, and force you to liquidate any assets you might have, and force you to take out loans you can't afford to pay them - and force you to pay the legal fees of your ex through this process, and force you to go to 'economic mediation'. (A waste of time because your ex will never accept anything other than every penny specified in your divorce agreement.) All serving to extend the period of time which you are being punished before having anyone actually make a determination in your case, based on your circumstances. (Remember, you don't get a trial, just a hearing.)

And once they have pauperized you - while you are living in a broken-down car under a bridge - do you think that the court system grants you a lawyer to help prepare your case? No. That's for actual criminals. You are worse than them, you don't get any such help - you are a divorced man.

So yes, our legal system, and the rights afforded us by our system of government are amazing. Perhaps some day, someone will get around to re-applying those rights to divorced men.

But if the last 60 years of history is any indication, things are likely to go the other way.

My best to you in your struggles,
-M

Technorati Tags: Bias Misandry Equal Rights Men's Rights Gynocracy Divorce Civil Rights Legal Rights Trial by Jury Presumption of Innocence Due Process Freedoms Civil Liberties

F is for Frivolous

My apologies for my long hiatus. I was depressed, and couldn't face the fight for a while. I am still not sure how much posting I am going to do here, but I need to return to it, it is a needed ministry.

Personally, I remain chronically under-employed per the court system, while my ex remains very well employed and only having our children part of the time, while probation sucks 65% of my income away to enable her to enjoy a 100k$+ per year lifestyle.

Another court date looms, but I have no expectation of relief. I will again hear the broken record of the court system stating that 'unemployment and underemployment are no grounds for reduction in alimony or child support'.

The fact that I have my children half the time, and the fact that I live at or below the poverty level, will have no bearing, nor will her luxuriant lifestyle and income.

What promted me to post today, and inspired my title was Glenn Sacks writing to let us know that Matt Dubay has been denied his effort to get something resembling 'choice' or 'equal rights' for men. For those who don't want to click through to read, Matt was unhappy to be stuck with a $500/month support bill for a child he didn't want, from a girl who swore that she was physically incapable of having a child. So he sought some equal representation under the law. Fairness.

See, a woman can choose birth control, like a man, but here is where the similarity ends. Once conception occurs, a woman can choose:
To have a 'morning after' abortion by taking a pill or a shot.
To have abortions at later phases of the pregnancy.
To abandon the child without liability at a police station, hospital, etc.
To put the child up for adoption

But for some reason this lack of responsibility is only for people who have vaginas.

You can't choose like Eve, unless you can concieve.

The court, however, was having nothing of this outrageous 'equality of the sexes' claptrap.
U.S. District Judge David M. Lawson dismissed the case without it even being heard.
Lawson called the suit "frivolous, unreasonable and without foundation."

Yes, equality for men is certainly without any standing in the family court system. No news here, nothing to see, move on, move on....

Dubay says that he may continue to fight, but we all know how difficult it is to fight city hall. I pray that he does, and that he gets more of a hearing than he did from the misandrous Judge Lawson.

I wonder though. If Dubay underwent a sex-change operation... ...Could he merely claim that he wanted to exercise his right to coose?

Now, let me take Glenn Sacks to task - consider this comment from his newsletter:

I don't consider Dubay's conduct particularly admirable, and he ain't father of the year. However, he does have a good point. And it is also appropriate to question the conduct of his child's mother, Lauren Wells. Everyone is angry at Dubay for not wanting to pay child support, but why is it that nobody chastises Wells for bringing a child into such an unenviable situation?

Let's get to the point. Dubay never wanted to be father of the year. The man didn't want to be a father, period. His genetic material was used, against his will, to make a child. Now the person who stole and misused his genetic material is enslaving him, and the court thinks that this is o.k. He gets to fork over money to a lying, stealing, and misappropriating ex-girlfriend to support her lifestyle for the next 18 or more years and is told that asking to be treated at least as well as a woman would be in the same situation is 'frivolous' and has 'no standing'.

This man is not to be criticized because he didn't stand up and say 'I want to be a hero - I want to act like a true father even though I conciously decided that this was not the right thing for me.' (Never mind that the court only wants his money, not him as a father.) He should be honored for recognizing his limits and calling. Which was not to be scammed into fatherhood.

One of the big problems with seeking rights for men, is that there is this concept that men should be held to a higher standard - that men should always be the hero. Men are just people like women are - and the two sexes need to be held to the same standard.

It's called E-QUAL-I-TY. EQUALITY. Practice saying it. No one is expected to be a hero. Everyone is held to the SAME standard.

Saying that Dubay is 'not father of the year' when he was defrauded of his chance at having his children be legitimate - when his genetic material was stolen and used to create a child against his will - is not helpful.

Glenn goes on to make another similar faux-pas in his newsletter - arguing against accontability for how child support is spent (never mind alimony).

"'There is no accountability for how the money is used. They [mothers] use it on hairdressers, fingernails, the new boyfriend,' said Philip Lutz, a Center City father of one who heads Philadelphia's chapter of Fathers' and Children's Equality, which lobbies for equal custody and offers support groups for noncustodial parents."

This is a poor argument. Most divorced or separated mothers aren't wasting child support on luxuries. They have a right to enjoy life, and shouldn't have to account to their ex-husbands or anybody else for every dime they spend. There certainly are exceptions, of course, when the mothers really are wasting the money and the children's needs are not being met. In such cases courts can and should intervene. But the average divorced mother getting $1,000 a month in child support is not living high on the hog any more than the average divorced dad is living it up with his Porsche and trophy wife.

Again Glenn is trying to be 'reasonable' and living to a standard that ignores the reality of the situation. In my and many, many other men's support/alimony lives we find ourselves reduced to abject poverty, poverty that Glenn recognizes elsewhere in his newsletter, while the woman who we support spends her money on trips and luxuries - not on necessities for the kiddoes. I know men who live in their car, who go from day to day trying to scrape together enough for food. Accountability would be a welcome first step - and let us not forget those women who get preganant for the specific purpose of 'locking in' a man. It happens, and frequently. And if the first man isn't successful enough, they lie and name another. What was the statistic of women who would lie to get pregnant? Somewhere like 60%, as I recall.

Accountability and responsibility are the keywords here. Women need, first of all, to be held responsible for their actions. And this means supporting THEIR OWN children. If they want a man to help, they have to work to keep him around. If the court system is going to make men (and far too often random men) slaves to women who purportedly had children with them, then they AT LEAST should ensure that the women actually spend the money on necessities for the children. Why not have the men pay into the food-stamp program, and give the women food-stamps to help feed the kids? If we are going to enslave men, it sounds like one way to be sure we aren't rewarding criminal women for their crime. Which is what we do now.

And Glenn - get over the hero thing. It's soo 1950s.

My best to you in your struggles.

-M

Previously on this topic: R is for Roe-v-Wade for Men

Update: Fundamentalist WingNut quips:

Remember "every child, a wanted child"? Let's apply that equally.

I had totally forgotten that slogan. My-oh-my how the times have changed!


Technorati Tags: Fathers Rights, Bias, Choice For Men, Misandry, Equal Rights, Men's Rights, Gynocracy, Divorce

N is for New Rules

In a prior post, I suggested that men’s situation had degraded to a point where something must be done...

- that men must adopt a new way of living in order to make life worthwhile for them.

Traditional values, like hard work, careful saving, marriage, home ownership, entrepreneurship, and the like have been turned into weapons to enslave and ruin us. The government seems to care little about what happens to us, and in fact derives significant financial and political gain from attacking us and burdening us further. The old ways are not working. What to do?

DISCLAIMER: I am not responsible for what happens if you take the following advice. I think that you will have perfectly lovely lives if you do what it says here, but you may not. I myself will not be following this advice, having found one of what I believe is those few responsible women for my second long term relationship, and not wanting to abandon my hopes for career, and my care for my children. However, the below is strongly incentivized by our government, and therefore MUST be the ‘right thing’ to do.

OK, on to the ‘new rules’ for men:

I propose a bit of Role Reversal: Men need to stop being the responsible party. Get in touch with your female side (ok, out of deference to the many responsible women out there, I will say ‘the stereotypical female side’) – and take care of yourself, and don’t worry about tomorrow…

1. Get out of the Rat Race: Men tend to work hard at dangerous jobs with longer hours, so that they can be financially successful. But that earning capacity will just be turned against you when you face the almost inevitable divorce. And the high-stress jobs lead to our early demise. Don’t do it. Find a low-wage, low effort, non-dangerous job. Don’t worry that this means that you can’t afford the best things, because these things only exist under the current system to be taken from you. You say you can’t do it? Too many debts and responsibilities? Declare bankruptcy. Restructure. Get yourself into a simple, low-cost lifestyle. When your divorce comes, or your child-support order arrives, you won’t be able to bankrupt yourself out of those debts any more. Do it now.

2. Stop being the Big Kahuna: You don’t need to pay for expensive dates, houses, cars and so-on. Some who are pro-male say that we should continue to insist on paying for our dates because in this way we can find out who is so feminist as to refuse to let us pay and filter them out. The problem with relationships and divorce is not the radical feminists though. MOST marriages end in divorce. MOST are filed for by women and MOST end up with the man paying. What I am trying to say is that you can’t filter out the temptation. If you are financially successful, the temptation to cash out will always be there, and sooner or later, you as a partner are going to be much less valuable and more annoying to your spouse than half your net worth, plus your house, plus the future labor that you will contribute through alimony and support as an abject slave. No, let your dates pay their own way, and don’t worry about acquiring things. Acquire experiences instead.

3. Be a Spender, Not a Saver: Save only enough to get you through a short unemployment period, a brief downturn in the business, put food on the table for the next month or so. You will be able to live better if you spend all your money on yourself – think clothes, clubs, and sporting events. Fly somewhere every couple months. Take weekends at the shore. Use it as you go. Let someone else worry about retirement and the like. If you have it, it can (and likely will) be taken. So who needs wealth that is only going to pad someone else’s nest? Enjoy. ...There's a reason grasshoppers don't drag food back to their nest. They know that they are going to be snuffed out in a few months anyway. It's the same with you. No one cares about your health, or your well being, and it is only a matter of time before you kick. Why lay up stores for some woman to enjoy after you are worm-food?

4. Don’t own stuff: Don’t have assets. If someone dies and leaves you a chunk, or insists on giving you something, have them set it up in a trust that gives you use of it, but not ownership or control (and maybe your friends/kids/whomever gets use after you kick). Trusts don't need owners, you know. Remember, everything that is yours can be taken away from you. Everything that is not yours, you can enjoy without fear of loss.

5. Be careful in dating: Your dates mostly don’t need to know where you live, or work, or your last name, or your home phone number. You should have a throw-away cell phone for your dating only, or be willing to change numbers frequently. Go to their place for those quiet evenings, or go out. You can say your place is a wreck, or you are embarrassed by it, and that you like their place better anyway. If they push for more info about you, say that you prefer to keep things casual until you know each other better, or even say that you were sued for palimony by someone who hardly knew you once, and you want to be safe until such time as things get more serious. Change the topic to more about her. “Can’t we just enjoy our time together?” “Focusing on what I do sounds so materialistic.” “I’m just a poor sausage deliveryman/hose installer/pipefitter/cable layer – heh heh.”

6. Remember that dating is something you do for you: Don’t go for dates that you will not enjoy. Don’t spend for her unless you really want to go and in particular have *her* there, and she can’t afford it. If she wants to be with you, she will find the bucks. Spending for a date is *not* a payment for sex you expect to have. You should be happily honest that you date more than one person at a time, and should not feel guilty about this. How else to find the right person? Why would you commit exclusively to someone who is not ‘the one’? Why would you put so much pressure on each date to be successful, and leave yourself high and dry when a dating relationship sours?

7. Marry Up: You should earn less than she does. If she earns less than you do, and you really like her, you arrange it to earn less. If you aren’t willing to make that sacrifice, or she isn’t willing to accept you poorer, then probably she wasn’t the one. If you finally decide to get married, don’t worry about prenups. You aren’t earning anything, you have no assets, and prenups mostly don’t work anyway. In marriage, let her bring home the bacon. It’s a worthy calling in life to earn money, to work hard. Men have been doing that and getting punished for it for years. Let her do it. It is also a very worthy calling to shop. Enjoy the latter, let her do the former.

8. Only have Kids with a Real Keeper: Don’t have kids in a relationship you aren’t sure about, where the love isn’t overflowing. If your wife quits to stay home with the kids, you have to quit too. Live off welfare or whatever until she goes back to work. If this causes a divorce, it will have been worth it, because it shows what mattered to her in the first place; not you, but your wallet. Also, it will be much harder for a judge to order alimony against a man who became unemployed by choice at about the same time his wife became unemployed by choice.

If you follow these rules, it just shouldn’t be worth anyone’s while to sue you for anything, let alone alimony or child support, and instead of being someone else’s patsy, you will have had a fun, relaxing, and stress-free ride through life, instead of a continual struggle to pay your “mussus massa’s” support. People will probably think of you as a loser, or a deadbeat, but you will be laughing as they die early of heart attacks and drag their sorry posteriors through divorce court.

My best to you in your struggles,

-M

Technorati Tags: Fathers Rights, Bias, Wage Gap, Life Expectancy, Misandry, Equal Rights, Men's Rights, Gynocracy, Divorce

W is for What to Do?

Men live in a horrific world, in many ways. If we even associate exclusively with a woman, she can hit us with palimony, if a crime is committed, we are the first suspects, more likely to be convicted, and get longer, harsher sentences.

We work longer hours, at more dangerous, and less pleasant jobs, and suffer more job-related casualties, for less benefits, and for less pay, once the hazards, hours, benefits, and other factors are weighed in.

Unlike women, our special education needs are not considered, our culture and ways of thought are ignored (no men’s studies programs at colleges) and we are slighted in the media and in entertainment as lowbrows and deadbeats.

Our medical needs attract less money, and, no surprise, we die early.

If we reproduce, willingly or not, and even if we do not reproduce, we are held responsible for the support of children, and their deadbeat mothers (who don’t want fathers around, just checkbooks)...

...While these same mothers had at their disposal a variety of abortion, adoption and other methods to avoid any responsibility for their kids.

Yet still, men are basically good eggs, look for true love wherever they may find it, and trust their partners. Paul McCartney is a prime example. He hooked up with Heather Mills, a girl from the wrong side of the tracks, with a shady history. Many said that she was just after his money. Yet Paul declined a prenuptial agreement, and now, a scant four years later, Heather is filing for divorce. Analysts think she will get ¼ of his over one and a half billion dollar fortune. THE PAYOFF IS ALMOST TWO MILLION DOLLARS FOR EVERY WEEK SHE WAS MARRIED TO HIM. And this is of course not including support for the child that she had with him, or alimony. Men in England and Ireland are horrified. Of course, it would likely be worse here in the States, where she would likely get half his assets. (hat tip MensActivism.Org)

Divorcing your spouse used to be a bad thing, a terrible thing to do. Especially where children were involved. Yet today, it is a very profitable venture if your male spouse is financially well-heeled. Our government has effectively created a situation where divorce is very, very, very rewarding. They are rewarding something that is a crime against children and men. Ethically, no one should benefit from harming others, and yet this is what our current laws do – they reward women for taking advantage of men.

So what to do? I think that men need new set of rules, a new way of working with the system, because the old way is not working anymore, and because I am becoming more and more confident that ‘the pendulum’ is not going to swing back our way any time soon, no matter how much noise we make and how we vote. There is too much money to be taken from us, and too many rights have been given away already.

I will be writing a post outlining my new set of rules shortly, but for now, I will give you this teaser:

“Simple Role Reversal.”

My best to you in your struggles
M

Technorati Tags: Fathers Rights, Bias, Wage Gap, Life Expectancy, Misandry, Equal Rights, Men's Rights

T is for To Look At

We live in an interesting world.

I apologize for not commenting on it more, but I am busy being a slave to my ex.

Just yesterday, I got yet another missive from the local probation department informing me that they were trying to take more money from me. Never mind that they already were taking the maximum allowable under law, 50-60%, far more than the maximum 10% a convicted criminal would be subject to. If I wasn't living already below the poverty level, it would be laughable. Actually it still is laughable, because there is nothing else to do about it.

Today, like so many days, was spent strugging to be able to support my evil ex, who demands more than I can earn, and figuring out how to keep my home for another few months. You who haven't lived as a divorcee have no idea how horrible it is. I can't imagine ever advising anyone to get married at this point in my life.

The scariest part is that my ex, like many others, insists it isn't personal. Just business. Ruining the rest of my life is just business. While she earns big-bucks, she also gets to take me to the cleaners every week, irregardless of my income or situation. And it is just business. Not personal. She doesn't need it, I can't afford it, but it is just business.

Because the state of New Jersey allows it, and because she can.

Just the practical, day-in-and-day-out business of misandry.

But anyway, things to look at:

Our friend John Doe has coined a good, useful and important word Patriphobia. So many of us are hated, ejected from our lives and families, rejected from the world and society. Why are divorced men so evil? Because divorced women need them to be. I think Patriphobia has a use, but perhaps not exactly the one John Doe is thinking of. I think that what John is pointing to is misandry. Patriphobia is what inspires VAWA, and encourages judges to give temporary restraining orders. Hating men is misandry.

In other news...

Imagine stalking your ex, putting on rubber gloves, a camoflage outfit, getting a high-powered rifle, and then shooting your spouse. What would a man get in terms of sentance if he did that? This woman (Claire Margaret MacDonald) got a license to kill.

As her husband lay bleeding to death on the ground, MacDonald stood over him and berated him for five minutes, telling him how she "hated him for making me do this".
MacDonald then tried to cover up her crime by telling police that a rabbit-shooter had threatened her husband the previous day.
Only when police began questioning her children did MacDonald change her story and claim she was a battered wife.
[...]
During the trial in the Victorian Supreme Court, MacDonald's defence counsel, James Montgomery, told the jury how Mr MacDonald had "totally dominated" his family, and in particular his wife, through "physical, verbal, psychological and sexual intimidation". Unfortunately the allegations could not be tested in court as Mr MacDonald was not around to refute or challenge them.

Imagine a rapist claims to work for the local health department to trick an eight-year-old into letting the rapist into the house. Then the rapist rapes the 8-year-old at knifepoint. Does this person get bail? If she is a woman, and the victim is a boy, the bail is $1500. Anyone see this on the news? No? Gee, wonder why? Didn't happen in some dark part of the 3rd world. It happened in Rochester, NY.

We are all concerned that there are not more male role models in schools, and that boys don't succeed in school in part because there are no men there. Women who have spoken to me cannot imagine how a man would ever take a job in a school given the current environement of misandry. Dr Helen points out that many parents reinforce this problem by requesting female teachers, thus making the man in such a role even more rare.

Hey! The Equal Opportunities Commission is sleeping at the switch! Here is a worksite, (hat tip Eternal Bachelor) without a single woman! I am sure the story is the same at worksites across the US. What's up? Shouldn't construction employers be 'encouraged' to hire a certain percentage of women? Huh?

But I'm not done with the Eternal Bachelor website, no far from it, he informs us that the courts have put men on notice that they may be held responsible in the future for the suicides of women - it's being called 'psychological manslaughter'. Can't make this stuff up. The man in this case was actually tried for it. Nice. Welcome to the gynocracy.

Did you all see this? Men travel far more for business than women do. Twice as much, actually. Gee, wonder why? Think it has ANY impact on that 'wage gap' we keep hearing about?

Or how about this from Mensactivism.org. Apparently it's twice as easy to fire a man as a woman. That just might contribute to the wage gap too. If you can't fire them, you'd better pay them less to make up for their unproductive months, years, decades...

Or how about this widely cheered study that women pretty much outlive men everywhere, including a pithy catchquote: "Women who seek to be equal with men lack ambition."
If I celebrated 'the fact' that women lived shorter lives than men, wouldn't that be not only sexist, but just plain evil? I thought so.

My best to you in your struggles

M

Technorati Tags: Fathers Rights, Patriphobia, Parental Alienation, Bias, Wage Gap, Women Murderers, Life Expectancy, Misandry, Equal Rights, Men's Rights

H is for How-to Update

from smh.com.au 'sam and the city' on 'why men won't commit'

I was afraid to get married in Australia. It took me long enough to get what little assets I had - I can't afford to lose them. (Literally - at age 42, with ever diminishing chances of employment, I would probably never amass as much again.)
But in China I felt free to marry. Over here, the rules are different. If a girl marries a man, and they part - she isnt' entitled to any assets he had before the marriage. Not the car, not the house, anything. Right away this eliminates a lot of gold diggers (Of course not all girls are gold diggers. But women are not some mythical morally superior race to men. They also have their share of mercenary , merciless monsters.) So I felt safe to get married and I did. If Australian divorce laws were fairer maybe more men would commit. Vitriolic tales of what SHE did or what HE did don't help much; there will always be bad eggs. But I suspect the reason most men don't want to get married in Australia any more is that it just doesn't make financial sense.

--------------
Those of you with an asset base that you seek to protect from the screw-thy-neighbour derth of opportunistic people in this world these days, its not that hard to do.
1. shut up already... DONT discuss personal finances. This used to be normal, now people tell you how much they earn and how much their house is worth 5mins after meeting. Nitwits.
2. Use legal protection structures, like a trust. Go see a lawyer and accountant. Best money you will ever spend. Take their advice and FOLLOW it. BTW, a trust or company is the simple ,ost effective way to effectively self determine support obligations. Contracting/consulting/temping is rife these days. Look for a way to make that happen.
3. Accumulate a private nest egg. Call it a fighting fund, a get out of jail free card, a way to survive a rainy day. Whatever. Just do it. Use cash, precious metals/gemstones, collectibles, and keep them stashed away from your place of abode.
4.Hold assets in the name of an impecably trusted 3rd party, like your parents, siblings, close friends of 10-20yrs+.
5. Travel before you settle down. See whatthe world has to offer, in financial terms. There are plenty of ways to sure up your balance sheet thru foreign fiscal centres. If you qualify for dual nationality, then definately get that second passport and of course, shut up about it.
6.there is a whole bunch of other stuff you can do. All of which becomes obvious over time as you look thru open eyes.
Such a strategy is all very unfortunate, l agree. Yet the world is what it is. We all gotta survive it. Folks are lurking about just looking for an excuse to sue and fleece a deep pocket. USA is already a hopelessly predatory and latigious society and its spreading to the land of OZ.
Watch your back and cover your ass(ets). That FREES you up to LOVE someone, for however long it lasts. Nothing is forever, not even life itself. Let go of that delusion, you will be mucj happier for it.
Peace.

-----------------------------
Here's a snapshot of four Sydney men, all my friends:
J. Engaged at 28 to an aussie girl. She gets pregnant to his brother. He swears off girls forever but finally gets married at 42 to an asian girl. Married eight months, very happy.
D. Married to an aussie girl at 21. Discovers a week later that her "pregnancy" was fake to trick him into marriage. Devastated because he thought he was going to be a father. Divorced six months later when he discovers she is cheating on him. Finally remarries at 41 to a Chinese girl. Married now for 2 years, sadly looks like they will break up too.
G. An engineer. Owns his own home, earns 90K a year. Didn't have a girlfriend for more than a decade. (He's a little fat and not handsome.) Finally at 31 met a Phillipines girl over the internet who also turned out to be a engineer! Now married for 9 months, very happy, first child due soon.
M. An electrical engineer. Owns his own house. Two years ago went to China to teach english. Now happily married to a chinese girl.
Whatever side of the debate you may be on, men seem to be voting with their feet.
-----------------------------

CM is for Cuban Men

If you know a Male Suicide victim, it is very likely (about a 66% chance) that this person who killed themselves was also a victim of divorce. This is not a reflection on the 'instability' of men, but rather a reflection of how "The courts in the United States are in a position now whereby money is given to the woman, [and] the man is forced to pay alimony, child support. The man is also asked, in some cases, to vacate the house. [...] If a man loses custody of the children and the woman keeps those children, there are situations whereby she may not allow the man to see the children, and that causes some depression," (Augustine Kposowa speaking to CBS News, 2000)

Well today, we have word via Babalu Blog that men wear divorce even more painfully in Cuba. Babalu Blog refers us to Wall Street Cafe which tells us that 2.6 men kill themselves for every woman. The message of Wall Street Cafe and Babalu is political - they blame communism for the plight of Cuban men - and I am sure that they are at least partly right. - Men, who are supposed to support the family, are put in a difficult to impossible situation in a country where captialism, the ability to work harder to achieve greater income, is illegal.

According to the Basic Health Indicators of a 2005 report by the OPS, Cuba had an18,1 rate of suicides in each 100.000 inhabitants during the 2000-2005 period, far from the second place occupied by Uruguay with 15,9 and very far from countries like Peru with 2,3 and Guatemala with 1.9.

Cubans suicides index for 2005 in 26.4 for the men and 9.8 for the women. In absolute numbers, the greatest amount of suicides which take place in Cuba affects the 25 – 34 age group, followed by the 35-44 group.

“By the hopelessness, the social atmosphere without horizons, a sort of collective depression that impels to escape via the suicide route”, assured to the New Herald a sociologist Cuban investigator who works for the ministry of Public Health.

Is there a divorce factor too? What is divorce like in Cuba?

Well, first of all, Cuba has a high divorce rate, 3.54 divorces per 1,000 inhabitants - (the US has 4.1 divorces per 1,000). Although the rate per individual sounds lower than the US, the rate per marriage is higher - About 70% of marriages end in divorce.

But divorce itself should not lead to increased suicide, if men are treated fairly and allowed access to their children. The word on the street though, is that Cuban men are not - they lose their houses, their assets are split 50/50 with their ex, and their incomes are nipped down about 10% per child. Add to that that divorces can be had for as little as 5 pesos by a notary public, with no hassle, and you have a situation where women can put already hard-pressed men into a hopeless situation.

This may have led to an interesting twist - Cuban women are complaining that their men are only interested with women with good jobs - i.e. women who would bring something to a marriage, and who might have something to lose in a divorce (hat tip La Neuva Cuba):

Still single, she[Maricel Acebo] does have complaints about men. Too many care only about money, she said. "The men say, 'What do you do?' And if you say you're a housewife, they shrink back and won't talk to you. But if you say you work for a good company, then it's, 'Yeah, that's the woman I want,' " said Ms. Acebo, a night security guard who earns $7.69 per month in a country where the average monthly salary is $12.

Somehow, men waking up to the fact that their wife MUST work so that they don't get destroyed financially in a divorce and focusing on that financial aspect seems darkly amusing. Turnabout IS fair play, no?

My best to you in your struggles

M

Drilling a bit deeper: from Dominican Today: Anguish Drives Cubans to suicide

Related posts:

On Suicide:
S is for Suicide - Revisited
S is for Slavery
B is for Bravery
R is for Relentless Persuit
D is for Dynamite
O is for Over the Edge

On The Evil that is done to Men in Divorce:
Why Alimony is Wrong
Other Ways Alimony is Like Slavery
Further Bankruptcy Rights Revoked for Men - Making Divorce Even More Like Debt Servitude
P is for Paternity - or how to catch yourself a slave
D is for Divorce - 'the financial haircut club for men'
D is for Dance of Death - a bit on Perry Manley and others

Technorati Tags: , Men's Rights Gender Bias Gynocracy Divorce Suicide

P is for Pendulum

I keep hearing from well-meaning people that the law's current outrageous treatment of men is 'like a pendulum'. Their comment usually goes like this:

"The law used to treat women really badly, but now the pendulum has swung and has granted more rights to women, and perhaps it has swung too far, and eventually it will swing back."

Well, I have heard it too often as of this point, and am starting to wonder how much truth is in this truism.

Oh, Sure, women didn't have the vote, and couldn't inhereit property, IN THE 1800s, and couldn't own property separately from their husband, BEFORE 1850.

But by 1895, the Gynocracy was apparently in full swing:

Up till quite recently [...] advanced persons, were supposed, as a matter of course, to swallow that conventional lie of modern civilisation – the theory of “woman the victim of man’s oppression.” This dogma, which, like the doctrine of Manchester school, that the ideal of human liberty is attained under the capitalistic regime of free industrial and commercial competition, has dominated the thought of the Anglo-Saxon race for two generations and has been the chief instrument in effecting a revolution which has placed the whole judicial and administrative machinery of the country at the disposal of one sex oppress the other (in all causes, i.e. into which the sex question prominently enters.) Let us look at the present condition of this so-called “victim.”

While under our present marriage laws the wife is under no obligation to maintain the husband, not even though she have money and he be destitute (saving the ratepayer’s right to be recouped for his maintenance in the workhouse) the husband is bound at criminal law to maintain his wife in comfort under all circumstances. Hitherto exception has been made in the case of adultery on the part of wife. Now, in a Bill before Parliament this last reservation is proposed to be virtually abrogated by a “caoutchouc” paragraph which enforces “alimony” where the husband can be shown by his defect or “misconduct to have contributed to the adultery. “

Thus, if a man has ever had a dispute with his wife or even come home late, as in a recent case, he will presumably have, “by defect or misconduct, contributed to the adultery;” just as now if a man ever had words with his wife and raised his voice above its normal pitch or come home late he may deemed to have committed technical cruelty entitling the said wife to separation or divorce with “alimony.”

2. A wife is perfectly free to leave her husband at will, and he has no remedy (Jackson case). If a husband leaves his wife she can compel him to surrender to her a third of his income or earnings, and for desertion, i.e., for leaving her without money, he can be punished with hard labour.

3. A husband is further liable for her debts and her civil delinquencies (torts).

4. A husband cannot obtain relief against a wife for any act, negligence, or language of hers, while for any one of these considerations she can get judicial separation, exclusive rights over the children, if any, and a third of his income or earrings for herself, with so much per head in addition for each child. Thus if a man gives his wife an unfriendly pat on the cheek with his open hand she can get established comfortably for life on the fruits of his labour; if, on the contrary, she smashes his head in with a poker she may be fined five shillings which the injured husband has to pay; and should he succeed in obtaining a separation it is only on, condition of his keeping the virago in comfortable idleness.

A little illustration will bring home to the reader this complete serfdom of the husband to the wife under our marriage laws. A man, not long ago, obtain the offer of employment in America. His wife did wish him to go. Not having any money or work home he insisted. The wife who had money of own, and to whom he moreover gave £25 with promise of more on his arrival at his destination, went straight to the Guardians, had him arrested on board ship at Southampton, dragged before the magistrate, and sentenced to three months hard labour. The sentence was subseqently quashed after the man had been in gaol and was ruined. Most feudal barons would surely have been satisfied with such powers as this over their “villeins.”

At criminal law it is a well-known fact which anyone may verify by the records of the courts that women enjoy an almost complete immunity for all offences committed against men, as such. For assault, perjury, and blackmailing practised on men, women are virtually never even prosecuted, let alone convicted. On the other hard, savage and vindictive laws, savagely and vindictively enforced by judges are dealt out to men for the most trifling assaults or other offences committed against women. In fact it seems that the express aim of the modern political woman and her “Women’s” Associations is to deprive men of the last shred of protection against criminal women with a view of giving the latter every facility for exercising their calling.
[...]
Such is the present position of advantage enjoyed by women by virtue of their sex. Such are the facts as opposed to the popular “legend” on the subject. Space forbids my further analysing the present subjection at law of men to women in this article, which is the more unnecessary as I have elaborated the subject in further detail elsewhere.

-E. Belfort Bax The Woman Question, Justice, 27th July, 1895, p.6.

Given the above, which pretty explicitly sounds a little less bad than our situation today, I wonder:

What, exactly, is the period of this purported pendulum?

-I would have to assume that it has been continuing upwards since 1895, meaning that it will take 111 more years for us to get back to the situation that we had in 1895.

-And perhaps 200 years before we get to a point resembling equal rights for men?

I am sorry, I just don't have that kind of time. What is more the pendulum analogy sounds very patronizing:

-Urging us to 'be patient' with a system that has been out of control for over One Hundred and Eleven years. Justice delayed is justice denied. We need justice in OUR lifetimes.

-Or perhaps encouraging us to see our suffering as some sort of 'payback' for inequities that occurred almost 200 years ago. Perhaps this explains why a female murderer is sentenced on average to ONE SIXTH of the time a male murderer is? NOT.

I am sorry that bad things happened in the past. We are supposed to have left punishing the children for the sins of the father, or in this case, the great-great-grandfather, in the Old Testament.

In the 20th and 21rst Centuries we are supposed to all be treated equally under law. Unfortunately, it just isn't true, and hasn't been for a long time.

My best to you in your struggles.

-M

Technorati Tags: Men's Rights Gender Bias Gynocracy Divorce Male Privlege Male Power Patriarchy

O is for Over the Edge

Broken Bread directs us to yet another man (Herbert Chalmers) driven mad by the hopelessly abusive family-destroying court system.

We must all say we don't condone his behavior (he murdered 4 and raped a woman in his rampage), but we cannot forget that he was without hope in a system that gives no quarter. A 'clerical error' caused 50% of his paycheck to be withheld since his monthly support number was increased by 540% in what is being called a 'clerical error' .

This article indicates that the amount of arrears that Chalmers had in 1977 was entered as his monthly support number in 1998. He normally had to pay $133, and this was increased to $724.92 . Apparently that error went uncorrected from 1998 on.

Hm. More of mine is withheld than that... Guess his state is not as cruel as NJ. Happily, I don't feel any urge to freak out, but then, I haven't been abused by the state since 1998, like Chalmers was.

Broken Bread comments: "[...] try living on 50% of your after-tax salary sometime. I had to do it for three months, eating rice and beans and charging groceries on my credit card while I watched my daughter go with her mother to Paris for two weeks. To live like that is to live in a constant state of rage. Chalmers obviously couldn't make ends meet, had no way of reaching child support enforcement officials, and couldn't see any way out. "

This is the thing that drives so many men to suicide, murder and worse. You are put in an untenable situation, and the state keeps taking more, and more. You automatically become a felon if you flee to another state, and of course you lose your kids. Your passport is likely revoked, so leaving the country is hard too, assuming you have any assets to do that with. It is almost exactly like being a black slave in the Antibellum US South.

Some knuckle down under the pressure, and scrape along, and somehow, some way, make it work.

Some fail at that and spend months in jail as a deadbeat dad, until some family member or friend pays the state-sponsored blackmail to get them out.

Others spin out of control or eventually snap, and it is no suprise that the behaviors, violence and criminal acts that follow are not rational.

How do you expect anything to behave when you back it into a corner and give it no way out. You may start with a rational, moral, normal person, but you can end up with a desparate animal.

Was what Herbert did ok? No.

Was it the right thing to do? No.

Do we understand how he got there? Yes. It is very, sadly, very clear how he got there.

Some will claim that this man was just a criminal and nothing more. Probably people saying this have never been enslaved. Not everyone can take it.

No matter how you view this case, one must admit that without state-enforced slavery to ex-spouses, Herbert Chalmers would likely still be alive, along with the four people he murdered,
-and one woman would not be suffering from the trauma of rape.

-M

Update 26-Apr-06: MensActivism.Org points us to This Article - which tells us that Chalmer's kids WERE ALL GROWN AND EMANCIPATED. Which just goes to show what I have been told so many times - there is no escape, ever. Here his kids were all grown, and he is still a slave, with his payments increasing yearly, living on $200 every two weeks.

Update 26-Apr-06: I see the following from the St Louis Post-Dispatch that strikes me as interesting to men:

Citing confidentiality concerns, the Department of Social Services has blocked reporters’ requests for information about Chalmers’ case, though a St. Louis judge opened a narrow window Thursday by agreeing to unseal part of the court record.
[...]
State records obtained by the Post-Dispatch indicate that a payment of $600 in back child support was received on his account with the state on March 30, with a $75 payment on March 7 and a $10 payment on Jan. 10.

Haynes was due to receive all of that money. A $600 check was cut or sent March 31, and a $10 check was dated Jan. 11. State records showed one more check, for $75, dated April 24, 2006 — six days after Haynes’ death.

So the portion of the record released shows a very good correspondence between what Chambers paid, and what Haynes recieved. So for the brief period that the court has let us see, there is no fraud in the payment system. Men have often complained that payments made to child support services do not reach their ex-wives.

Another thought has occurred to me though - here we have a man who has claimed that some of the children that he was being charged support for, and had been charged support for for many years, were not his. And here we have payments inappropriately being taken from him, and made to the mother of these children, long after the children have reached majority.

Sooo, what does the ethical person do when they recieve payments that they do not deserve, especially payments that they know come from someone who can ill afford it? Yes, I am blaming one of the victims: Chamber's ex-partner who was content to accept the enslavement of her ex-partner well beyond even what our misandrous courts had ruled. Did she deserve to die? I cannot bring myself to say that, but I do expect that she is in hell now, and well deserving of it.

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Men's Rights

T is for Two-Hundred-Twenty-Six-Thousand Children

An estimated 1,000,000 children's parents divorce every year.

In 1/3 of those cases, allegations of violence have been made in the case.

An estimated 80% of those alegations are false - meaning that out of 1,000,000 children of
divorce each year, over 260,000 of them have a parent who makes a false accusation of divorce.

In 85% of cases, custody is awarded to the mother.

So at a minimim, the custody of 226,666 children per year is awarded to women who brought false charges of violence against the father of the children.

Note that it is far more likely that the 1/3 of cases where a restraining order or other allegation of violence has been made lead to a custody award to the mother. So in fact, the 226,666 number is low.

Either way, over Two-Hundred-Twenty-Six-Thousand children have their custody awarded to a parent who lies about domestic violence every year.

That's over six hundred every day.

That's about twenty-six every hour - near one every two minutes. (Well, probably one EVERY minute during the day, as family-destruction courts don't run in the wee hours of the night.)

But you may say 'well, some of those restraining orders may be issued against women at the request of men' - true enough, but it is a vanishingly small number: Consider the following from Media Radar's: Without Restraint: The Use and Abuse of Domestic Restraining Orders - few men are foolish enough, in this day and age, to call police, or expect any support from the judiciary in a domestic violence matter [emphasis mine]:

Gender Bias in the Issuance of Restraining Orders

If a man has been assaulted by his intimate partner, he should be able to obtain an order of protection. But a double standard may thwart this request.

This is borne out by research. In Massachusetts, one analysis examined all domestic ex-parte hearings held in the Gardner District Court in 1997. The analysis found that 34% of requests from men were deferred or turned down, compared to only 10% of requests from women.

According to Oregon attorney Ron Johnston, “I believe many general practice attorneys who don’t specialize in domestic relations would hesitate before trying to get a restraining order for a man, whereas there would be no hesitation at all for a woman under the same set of circumstances.”

Mr. Johnston’s statement is based on the fact that in Portland, the protective orders once featured the following gender-biased language: The respondent in this order is the natural/legal father of the below named minor children” [emphasis added].

A father suffered repeated assaults by his wife, on one occasion requiring medical treatment for his injuries at the local emergency room. Afraid for his children and for himself, he sought a restraining order. At the time of court hearing, he brought photographs of his injuries, medical documentation of his emergency room visit, and a copy of the police report. The judge’s explanation for denying the man’s request was: “Well, you have to expect one knock-down drag-out fight per divorce.”

When Abuse Victims Themselves Are Accused of Being Perpetrators

Legal bias is not the only reason that male victims are often reluctant to seek restraining orders. There have been reports of abused men who, upon requesting help from law enforcement officials, found themselves accused of being the perpetrator.

In one case, a woman severely bit her husband on the shoulder and chest. After showing the judge pictures of his injuries, the man was granted a restraining order. The next day the woman went before the same judge and, even though she had suffered no injuries, she claimed to be in “fear” for her life, saying that the man was the real abuser. On the basis of that unsubstantiated allegation, the judge reversed the original order against the wife and issued an order against the husband.

As family violence expert Murray Straus put it, “There are a growing number of complaints that attempts by men to obtain police protection may result in the man being arrested.”

A Washington State attorney gives this disturbing advice with regard to domestic violence: “Don’t call 911 unless you are bleeding and she still has a weapon in her hand. Too many men who have called 911 for help have ended up being arrested for DV.”

When government programs ignore the actions of perpetrators and encourage the arrest of victims, that’s a sure sign of a justice system turned upside down.

None of this is news to us, but is an appropriate lead-in to ask you all to respond to RADAR's call for action to defang the venomous snake that is the restraining order, removing at least this one weapon from the anti-family and anti-male forces that seem to control the judiciary to the great suffering of our children and our brothers.

Print out their resolution, and write a brief note on the top and fax it to your representatives in congress. Get the world out that this is hurting real people, real children, real men, NOW.

Hat tip to the ever-vigilant Men's Activism.Org

-M

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