There’s hope for Michigan

A bill has been entered in the Michigan House of Representatives to make Equal Parenting the default parenting arrangement. Judges can overrule the default only on the basis of “clear and convincing” evidence that Equal Parenting wouldn’t be in the best interest of a child.

http://michiganradio.org/post/bill-would-make-shared-custody-mandatory-priority-family-court-judges

This is a powerful bill. The requirement of clear and convincing evidence is necessary to stop the painful, and wasteful arguing over who is better or worse deserving of being a parent. If you are a parent before separation, you are a parent after. There is no valid reason for depriving children and parents of their full relationship because of separation of the parents.

The bill was introduced by Representative Runestad, who happens to be the chair of the House Judiciary Committee. This means the bill’s sponsor in a very powerful position to see it gets the full service it deserves. We can expect harsh words and tactics to be applied against this bill and Representative Runestad. On the other hand, Ex-fathers wants to encourage those who work to overcome the terror of the family court. You can help, a simple message to Rep. Runestad will let him know there is support behind him in this:
Email: JimRunestad@house.mi.gov
It doesn’t matter where you live, whatever state or country, we can show Michigan we are all united for Equal Parenting.

Coal for Canada’s Leaders

Canada’s family law system is family hostile, child abusive, and extremely misandric. Perhaps for Christmas Canada’s Rulers will get nothing more than lumps of coal from Santa in their stockings. Thanks to Paulette MacDonald for giving us this.

Dear Santa,

My name is Paulette MacDonald and I am a Family Justice Advocate\Activist in Canada and that came to be once I witnessed first hand the devastation that occurs in the hands of our “secret” Family Court House’s. – and all I want for Christmas is equal, shared parenting at the onset of divorce or separation. Tall order, I know but I’m confident together we can do it. …

Read all of Paulette’s letter to Santa:
London Free Press online — Dear Santa

A judge decries false accusations — finally

Retiring judge Justice Collier of Australia says, “The worst are those mothers who direct false allegations of abuse against former partners. … They’re difficult to disprove. The allegation lingers there.” He says he had trouble sleeping when making decisions after sexual abuse accusations were made.

According to the story, the judge is unhappy about retiring in such times after having had a rewarding career on the bench. Apparently the judge kept a magic wand. ”I wished I could wave that magic wand and say, ‘Be nice to each other’,” Justice Collier said. It is his belief that if parents would just be nice to each other there would be no need for difficult family-court decisions.

Although we don’t agree that false accusations are anywhere near new, it’s good to see at least one judge talking about them, even if it’s only when leaving the bench. He says he even lost sleep over them. Based on the current situation of the separation of fathers and children by Family court, you have to wonder if there is any sentient being on the bench in Family Court. Of course, (I guess to be able to get some sleep) the judge blames the parents rather than the Divorce Industry in which he has played a major role. Of course there is no mention of serious punishment for the evil doers, though.

If judges would only follow the simple rules:
– impose equal parenting as the standard (always of course In the Best Interests of the Child)
– punish recalcitrant parents — that magic wand can deal a severe caning

False abuse claims — new court weapon

Supreme Court of Canada report misses the whole point

According to the story as released by the Globe & Mail (Toronto), the Supreme Court of Canada has commissioned a report on family law “out of concern that justice is fast becoming inaccessible to a vast proportion of the country”. Unfortunately, the report totally ignores the fundamental human rights of parents and children. Although the report says, “estranged spouses and their children are seriously damaged by the adversarial system”, its only solution is to further abuse parents by putting them through quasi-judicial proceedings with no guarantee that they will continue to be meaningful parents to their children. Speeding up injustice is not justice.

Apparently the report suggests that judges lawyer and law schools must embrace a culture of mediation and settlement. Mediation and settlement will do nothing to stop the current bias against fathers in Family Court. Mediation in fact will be the tool that will be used to further subjugate fathers to their children’s mother just as is happening now.

Interestingly the report notes that “cuts the family legal aid have a disproportionate effect on women and children, …”. This is a red herring. First of all, women receive the bulk of legal aid. Legal aid is seldom available to fathers. Consequently, when legal aid is cut women continue to receive a far larger cut than men do. More importantly, the more obvious “disproportionate effects” are the disproportionate loss of parenting by fathers, and the astronomically disproportionate amount of child support paid by fathers. All of which happens to fathers who are more than willing and able to look after the children themselves. And indeed, poor fathers even end up paying mothers who are more than capable of supporting of the child, even to the extent of sending the child to day care when the father is available to look after the child.

The simple facts of the matter are, that Mr. Justice Thomas Cromwell, the head of the Committee on Access to Justice in Civil and Family Matters, has failed to recognize the fundamental human rights of parents to raise their children. There is no reason why good parents should have to fight to have an equal parenting role after their separation. If the Supreme Court were simply to put its much touted role of supporting substantive equality there would be no need for the fuss about the problems with mediation and payments and most importantly lawyers, family courts, and, of course, judges.

Apparently the report admits that estranged spouses and their children are seriously damaged by the adversarial system. Yet there is nothing in the Globe and Mail article to suggest that the court is accepting any responsibility for the decades of damage for which it is responsible. When we stop to consider the extent of the damage done to the individual parents, to their children, and to society by this maniacal family-law regime that has been ripping families apart without the slightest indication that it has any understanding of justice or human rights, with no feelings for the victims, with nothing but the financial gain of the divorce industry in its sights, and that there is to be no justice for any of those victims that have gone before, we must be outraged, we must take action, we must demand restitution.

It’s not that justice is fast becoming inaccessible, it’s that justice is impossible for the vast majority of fathers in Canadian family law, just as it is in most of the Western world. Until the family-law courts accept that the only principle upon which a parent can be denied their parenting rights and the child can be denied its equal parenting rights is the abuse or neglect of the child, and the courts cease to preach the unachievable, undefinable, unjust and irrational mantra of the “best interest of the child”, there can be no justice in a family-law court. And this applies equally to fathers and mothers and all other child caregivers.

Gentlemen, in spite of the seemingly favorable rhetoric, this is not a step in the right direction, this is another divorce-industry challenge to fathers. Prepare yourselves.

Supreme Court Chief Justice calls for family law overhaul

“Child’s best interests? It’s a sick joke” — Matt O’Connor

Matt O’Connor, founder of the British pressure group Fathers 4 Justice has summed up the situation of family courts in language we all can understand:
“follow the money”
“A wicked deceit”
“Like banksters and gangsters”
“family law is so rotten to the core”
“our family courts which are blighting the lives of an entire generation”
”they are rapaciously gobbling up taxpayers money”
“an orgy of greed at the expense of desperate dads and broken children”
“Nobody on these committees is above being pulled into a sordid pit of moral squalor, greed and amorality”
“selling dads down the river again and again and again”
“lay the blame at the feet of collaborators”
“they profit directly from a production line of misery”
“They know the price of everything. And the value of nothing”

This is exactly the kind of language we need to be serving the “collaborators” at their every turn, through any means available.

It’s only when we get the message across about the real issues of family law, the “wicked deceit”, the “moral squalor, greed”, that we will see the tide turn on those collaborators. But no amount of tinkering with the law will ever put an end to the racketeering of the collaborators. As Matt says they have been “selling dads down the river again and again and again”. And, to use Matt’s figure, that’s 30 years of victims of these perpetrators. These victims cannot be forgotten. They must see justice done, which means restitution. Only when we see restitution for separated fathers and children (and any other victims of the collaborators) will the agony be put to an end. It’s a simple case of ‘follow the money’. Once the money goes to the victims there will be no more incentive for the collaborators. When fathers get their dignity, families and finances back the collaborators will live in shame.

For Ex-fathers the motto must be simply ‘show me the money’.

Orgy of greed