Marriage: Still the Safest Place For Women and Children

by Robert E. Rector, Patrick F. Fagan, and Kirk A. Johnson, Ph.D.
Backgrounder #1732

The institution that most strongly protects mothers and children from domestic abuse and violent crime is marriage. Analysis of ten years worth of findings from the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS), which the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has conducted since 1973, demonstrates that mothers who are or ever have been married are far less likely to suffer from violent crime than are mothers who never marry.

Specifically, data from the NCVS survey show that:

* Married women with children suffer far less abuse than single mothers. In fact, the rate of spousal, boyfriend, or domestic partner abuse is twice as high among mothers who have never been married as it is among mothers who have ever married (including those separated or divorced).
* Married women with children are far less likely to suffer from violent crime in general or at the hands of intimate acquaintances or strangers. Mothers who have never married--including those who are single and living either alone or with a boyfriend and those who are cohabiting with their child's father--are more than twice as likely to be victims of violent crime than are mothers who have ever married.

Other social science surveys demonstrate that marriage is the safest place for children as well. For example:

* Children of divorced or never-married mothers are six to 30 times more likely to suffer from serious child abuse than are children raised by both biological parents in marriage.

Without question, marriage is the safest place for a mother and her children to live, both at home and in the larger community. Nevertheless, current government policy is either indifferent to or actively hostile to the institution of marriage. The welfare system, for example, can penalize low-income parents who decide to marry. Such hostility toward marriage is poor public policy; government instead should foster healthy and enduring marriages, which would have many benefits for mothers and children, including reducing domestic violence.

Violence Against Mothers



The DOJ's National Crime Victimization Survey collects data on victimization through an ongoing survey of a nationally representative sample of Americans. The survey defines violent crime as rape, sexual assault, robbery, aggravated assault, and simple assault. Domestic or intimate abuse is defined as violent crimes performed by a spouse, former spouse, boyfriend, or former boyfriend.3

Ten years of NCVS data (from 1992 to 2001) reveal interesting patterns among mothers (ages 20-50) with children under the age of 12.4 Specifically:

*Never-married mothers experience more domestic abuse. Among those who have ever married (those married, divorced, or separated), the annual rate of domestic violence is 12.9 per 1,000 mothers. Among mothers who have never married, the annual domestic violence rate is 26.3 per 1,000.

Thus, never-married mothers suffer domestic violence at more than twice the rate of mothers who have been or currently are married. (See Chart 1).

* Never-married mothers suffer more violent crime. The NCVS provides data on total violent crime against mothers with children under the age of 12. Total violent crime covers rape, sexual assault, robbery, aggravated assault, and simple assault committed against the mother by any party. Total violent crime covers violence against mothers by former and current spouses and boyfriends as well as by relatives, acquaintances, and strangers.

As Chart 2 shows, ever-married mothers with children suffer from overall violent crime at an annual rate of 38.5 crimes per 1,000 mothers. Never-married mothers with children, by contrast, suffer 81.0 violent crimes per 1,000 mothers.




Thus, never-married mothers experience violent crime at more than twice the rate of ever-married mothers. Based on these data, the institution of marriage best shelters mothers from the specter of violence.
* These differences in crime rates across married versus single mothers are statistically significant.5

Violence Against Children

Rates of victimization of children vary significantly by family structure, and the evidence shows that the married intact family is by far the safest place for children.6 (See Chart 3.) Although the United States has yet to develop the capacity to measure child abuse by family structure, British data on child abuse are available. These data show that rates of serious abuse of children are lowest in the intact married family but six times higher in the step family, 14 times higher in the always-single-mother family, 20 times higher in cohabiting-biological parent families, and 33 times higher when the mother is cohabiting with a boyfriend who is not the father of her children.



When an abused child dies (see Chart 4), the relationship between family structure and abuse gets stronger: It is lowest in intact always-married families, three times higher in the step family, nine times higher in the always-single-mother family, 18 times higher in the cohabiting-biological parents family, and 73 times higher in families where the mother cohabits with a boyfriend.



What Policymakers Should Do

In legislation and social policy, the government should not penalize parents for marrying. Given the rising evidence that non-married mothers and their children are at greater risk of violent crime and abuse, government policy should not encourage--either directly or in unintended ways--single motherhood and cohabitation.

Yet that is what is being done in many of America's means-tested welfare programs. Because mothers and children are safest from harm within a married family, policymakers should begin the work of implementing policies to reduce the bias against marriage in welfare programs and to strengthen marriage as the primary institution for raising children.

Members of Congress should support President Bush's proposal to spend $300 million per year on efforts to rebuild marriage among the poor. It is the first serious proposal in this regard ever to come before Congress. His suggestions, if adopted into law, would begin the necessary work to reconstruct the institution of marriage, which failed welfare policies of the past have undermined. Now that the first stage of welfare reform--rebuilding an ethic of work--is well underway, Congress should support the President as he focuses on the second important stage: rebuilding a culture of marriage in American society.

Members of Congress should begin to reduce and eventually eliminate the penalty against marriage in most means-tested welfare programs. For example, they could issue a joint resolution indicating their intent to achieve this goal. Then they could request that the Department of Health and Human Services submit a list of options that would be good candidates for this reform.
Conclusion

In establishing programs to help those who need assistance, the question before Congress should not simply be whether or not to fund a program, but how much its policies would improve the well-being of adults and children. Social science data clearly show that mothers and children are safest and thrive best in a married family. It is time for the government to adopt policies that reflect this knowledge and rebuild, rather than undermine, the institution of marriage.

Robert E. Rector is Senior Research Fellow in Domestic Policy, Patrick F. Fagan is William H. G. FitzGerald Research Fellow in Family and Cultural Issues, and Kirk A. Johnson, Ph.D., is Senior Policy Analyst in the Center for Data Analysis, at The Heritage Foundation.

Bob Herbert's Fact-Free Op-ed: Women Uniquely at Risk of Violent Crime

August 10th, 2009 by Robert Franklin, Esq.

It's predictable as the sunrise. No sooner had the echoes of George Sodini's gunshots died away than they were replaced by the diligent tap-tap-tapping of keyboards. Feminists and their apologists leapt as one to their desks and began churning out the same sermon we've heard for years now: George Sodini's brutal slaying of three women in a Pennsylvania exercise class was not the act of a lone deranged man, it was the act of all men; it was the act of a male-dominated culture that so loathes women it turns a blind eye to their injury and death. Women are uniquely victims, uniquely threatened by ravening men who prowl the land searching for the next one who shows a weakness or errs in judgment. Here endeth the lesson.

The latest to commit the requisite public auto da fe is Bob Herbert here (New York Times, 8/8/09). An intelligent space alien, reading his op-ed would never guess that, far from being uniquely targeted by crime, women and girls are uniquely protected from it. A two-minute jaunt through the Bureau of Justice Statistics website shows that 61% of violent crime victims are men. Our space traveller would never imagine that incidents of violent crime of all kinds have been plunging over the past 16 years to their lowest rate since we began gathering data. How would he know that a woman's chance of being raped is one-fifth what it was in 1973?

The space alien wouldn't know these things because Bob Herbert doesn't mention them. He doesn't because the facts don't fit with the false yarn he's spinning. Herbert seeks to instruct us and he uses mythology to do it.

That's clear enough to even a casual reader, because the facts Herbert relies on to make his case...well...don't. Take a look. The article consists mostly of that time-honored rhetorical crutch of high school students everywhere - the unsupported assertion. For example,

We’ve seen this tragic ritual so often that it has the feel of a formula.

I wrote, at the time, that there would have been thunderous outrage if someone had separated potential victims by race or religion and then shot, say, only the blacks, or only the whites, or only the Jews. But if you shoot only the girls or only the women — not so much of an uproar.

We have become so accustomed to living in a society saturated with misogyny that the barbaric treatment of women and girls has come to be more or less expected.

We profess to being shocked at one or another of these outlandish crimes, but the shock wears off quickly in an environment in which the rape, murder and humiliation of females is not only a staple of the news, but an important cornerstone of the nation’s entertainment.

The mainstream culture is filled with the most gruesome forms of misogyny

Really? Killing women and girls is a "cornerstone of our nation's entertainment?" The "barbaric treatment of women and girls" is "more or less expected?" There hasn't been "thunderous outrage" at the Sodini killings? Herbert provides no support for these frankly loony claims for the good and sufficient reason that he has none.

Perhaps realizing that an actual fact might serve his cause, he searches for one, but alas, in vain. He tries the mass murder in 2007 at Virginia Tech University, but even his misrepresentation of the facts of that tragedy don't do the job. The fact that Seung Hui Cho shot both men and women, completely at random, deflects Herbert from his mission not at all. The fact that Cho, at the time of his rampage, had been diagnosed for many years as so mentally ill as to require medication and hospitalization goes unmentioned. Nor does Herbert tell us that the targets of Cho's violent anger were not women, but "rich kids" and "deceitful charlatans," according to Cho's diary.

That Herbert wants us to believe that Cho's slaughter has something to do with misogynistic culture only shows how desperate he is for material. Does it occur to him that, if this culture is as dominated by men who are as violently hateful toward women as he would have us believe, that our misogyny isn't very effective? How does he square those beliefs with the fact that women are now and, as far as our data show, always have been, far less likely to be hurt or killed in any way than are men? I guess men must be as incompetent as the commercials say we are.

Claims of collective guilt for the wrongdoing of single, deranged individuals is a dangerous game indeed. As an African-American male, you'd think Bob Herbert would understand that. How can a man who's appropriately criticized racial profiling by the police, turn on a dime and engage in gender-profiling himself. Herbert wants us to believe that not just George Sodini, but men in general, are guilty for his crime. Someone should remind Herbert that that includes him.

Young Father Fights Long, Hard Battle Against Adoption Agency to Raise His Own Daughter

Babies are often given up for adoption against the father's will or by evasion and deceit, which are often winked at by authorities. Putative Father Registries are often used to circumvent fathers' rights.

Below, Fathers & Families Board Member Robert Franklin, Esq. reports on a particularly egregious case involving a young father. Young fathers are continually vilified for their alleged refusal to take responsibility for their children, but this case provides an excellent example of just how many roadblocks are often thrown up to separate fathers from their children.

Robert writes:


Cody O'dea and Ashley Olea had a brief sexual relationship when they lived in Wyoming. At age 18, she turned up pregnant. Cody immediately told her that he wanted to help raise the child. A few months later, Ashley told Cody that she had miscarried. They split up and he moved to Idaho.

Still more months later, a friend informed Cody that Ashley was then eight months pregnant and making plans to place the child for adoption. She was still in Wyoming, but working with an adoption agency, LDS Family Services, in Montana.

Cody immediately contacted Ashley and reasserted his desire to have custody of the child. He also filed the appropriate form with the Wyoming Putative Father Registry. He also filed with the Montana Putative Father Registry. He wrote a letter to the adoption agency telling them that he would not waive his parental rights.

Cody spoke with two people including a supervisor at LDS Family Services, informing them of his intention to get custody of the child. Eventually, LDS decided to not continue with the adoption process and wrote Cody a letter saying so.

On July 15, 2006, Cody received a strange call from Ashley which, according to him, went as follows:


Ashley: You will listen and you will not speak. First of all I want you to stop harassing me and that includes your mother. I am in Utah. You will not father this child. You will pay child support until the child is in College. You will never see this baby. Do you understand?

Cody: No, I do not understand, does this mean you are planning to keep the child?

Ashley: Do you understand what I’m saying?

Cody: No, I don’t understand, does that mean you are keeping the child and not giving it up for adoption?

Ashley: If you understand what I have told you, that is all I have to say.
Then she hung up. Notice that she mentioned nothing about placing the child for adoption. In fact she strongly suggests the opposite. And the ruse worked. Cody thought that, since he had filed with the registries of Wyoming and Montana, and gotten LDS to back off, that he had successfully blocked the adoption. To him, Ashley's phone call meant that she'd changed her mind and would keep the child.

But that was wrong. Ashley's call was almost certainly prompted by an attorney. Her statement that she was in Utah constituted legal "notice" to him that perhaps an adoption would occur there. Therefore, he then became obligated to file with Utah's registry and begin paternity proceedings. In fact, unknown to him, he had only 20 days to do so.

Despite Cody's repeated efforts to comply with the law and assert his parental rights, a Utah court approved the adoption in 2006. A different agency, the Adoption Center of Choice, provided the adoptive parents. Neither they nor Ashley notified Cody that the adoption had taken place. The Adoption Center of Choice contacted the Wyoming Putative Father Registry and ascertained that Cody had registered there and was asserting his parental rights. Apparently, that made absolutely no difference to the Adoption Center of Choice.

Cody then filed a paternity suit in Utah, but it was too late. His twenty days had passed. The Supreme Court of Utah has just ruled that all his efforts to be a father to his child were meaningless. It was solely his failure to comply with Utah's 20-day period that destroyed any hope he had. He will never see his child; he will never be her father in more than the biological sense.

The United States Supreme Court has called parental rights "far more precious than property rights." But when it comes to a father's rights, those are mostly just words. In the real world of family law, in this case, adoption law, they have next to no meaning.

Let's look at what happened in the Cody O'dea case. His child's mother decided she didn't want the child with whom she was pregnant, so she lied to Cody, telling him that she had miscarried. That Cody discovered her lie, was, for Ashley, an inconvenience, but little more. She shopped for an adoption agency in one state, abandoned that idea and located another in another state. The new agency was willing to overlook the fact that it knew perfectly well that there was a father who wanted custody.

In short, a few well-placed lies, an unscrupulous adoption agency, and an unscrupulous attorney combined with a young father who failed to know the laws of a foreign state, added up to the denial of his parental rights. You remember those; they're the ones that are "far more precious than property rights." But when those rights are placed, not in the father's hands but in the mother's, abrogating them turns out to be simplicity itself.

Robert's piece continues here. Cody's website can be accessed here--it contains many of the case's documents. As for the anti-father bias of adoption agencies, take a look at the second part of paragraph two of this letter from an agency to Cody.

On How to Raise a Happy Child and Keep Your Sanity

By J. Green

Like most “modern day” children, I was unforgiveably spoiled as a child. The youngest in my family, I was coddled, soothed and nursed for the most part. Grit and fortitude I also learned, but for the most part I was handled with kid gloves and to my parents good fortune I was an easy child to rear. This belies what I later learned was the key to parenting as taught to me by my own child: beatings are they key.

I can already hear the sighs and groans of so many naïve, inexperienced mothers and hesitant, would-be fathers out there. Gasp! No! Beatings are inhumane and violent! You are teaching the child violence and you are abusing him! To disabuse you of any visions of savage physical attacks, allow me to clarify. By beatings I mean spanking. And by spanking, I mean, for the most part, a few light taps on the derrier, the likes of which wouldn’t seriously harm a baby dove.

For you see nearly everyone under the age of 50 misses the point of spanking. Spanking is not really spanking. In the words of the late Jackie Gleason “that was just an attention-getter.” As anyone with two eyes and kids knows, standing still and making idle chatter and empty threats demonstrates your willingness to DO nothing and that is the best way to be ignored and run roughshod upon. You are literally volunteering to be your children’s whipping post, their own personal Welcome mat.

To understand this, you must first accept the fact that you children are 42 times as smart as you by the time they are 3 or 4; if they are girls, subtract 2 from that number. Lesson 2, your kids are not darling kids, they are young, budding animals. You’re an animal too, but years of fluoride and too little science in school has led you to forget that fact. We are all animals and these ones are smart and always seeking out their own best interest, including testing your limits constantly, especially when you’ve had a hard day and are not prepared. They get you when you are weak and beaten down; they have nothing but time, energy, and cunning. Accept it: you are already beaten.

You are weak and they are strong, but there is hope yet. You are older and more sophisticated, so you will reason with them. This is tantamount to climbing up a telephone poll slicked with axle grease. You will get nowhere and waste a lot of time. Yet everyone tries. Its as if there is a bag of money and sex at the top of the poll and everyone needs to be shown they can’t get it even if they try. Your child loves your attention and talking, nay, negotiating, over how much they will get of what they want is fine by them.

Success is not always arrived at pleasantly. This is no different. You must think of living before we had society. Think of the time of hunter gatherers and the brutality of nature. This encompasses thousands of years. Combine this with the fact that the modern day couple has 20 minutes a day of free time. Now we have arrived at our solution, the same one your parents, grandparents arrived at 80 years ago: spanking.

You are going to cut through the bull that kids use like a drug dealer uses heroin to keep their addicts in line. You are going to DO something. This your kids will understand – you outweigh them by 150 pounds. No animal on earth is ignorant of that fact. If they are, they are soon eaten by something else. Your child’s animal instinct will command them to respect you like you never imagined. Talk and you’ll talk for a lifetime. Spank and you’ll save the rainforest with the oxygen kept in the atmosphere. Tasks are done the first time you ask when spanking has been established and is brandished for effect.

Now you think your kids will hate you and fear you. Think again. Your kids will always love you and now, what’s more, they will respect you. Why? Because you are showing them that you know them and you won’t play their games and insist they perform their best. Every kid alive is elated to perform their best. You are helping them through their fear and anxiety and frustration at not wanting to brush their teeth and go to bed on time. When they are spending more time playing and doing more things themselves, they can only be happier – after all, wouldn’t you be? Recruits to military boot camps are miserable for the first 9 weeks. And after that? Then they’re proud. Proud of themselves and the capable, respected people they have become. This is no different.

Now this is how to spank: offer the child the choice to do as you say. They will ignore you. Fine. Tell them if they don’t do it, you will do something: you will spank them. They will look at you hard and think, then go back to ignoring you. Pick them up and put them across your knee and lower their pants, they will panic and beg and plead and squirm – don’t give in. This is about your credibility and your credibility will insure peace later. Spank them a few light times on the naked butt. They will scream as if you just cut their heart out with a dull spoon. You will feel bad. Toughen the eff up. You are an adult. You know they are fine and the screaming is a tactic and nothing more. You have tactics too and its time for brass tax.

The next time you ask them to do something they will ignore you. Tell them you will spank them. They will not move. Stand up. They will dash off like lightening to do your bidding. There you have it: the laws of disincentive. The law of nature. They can hurt you or help you. Right now, I can guarantee you that your kids are using the laws of nature AGAINST you. Why? Because they are tiny, little, results-driven organizations. They get what they want. You don’t. Kids play hardball: they know when to play helpless and needy and they know how to manipulate you. Kids can be easy and sweet and innocent and delightful - just not while they’re being spanked.

I had children with the world’s biggest children-excuse-creator. She enjoys our 7 year old son very, very much. Everyone remarks about how well behaved he is and how polite and considerate he is. Why? Because when he was pushing the two of us around at the age of 2, I figured out his ways and spanked him half a dozen times. It doesn’t take much: kids are not slow learners. His mother nearly went hoarse reasoning with him until I rolled up my sleaves and did the dirty work. My young, foolish, gentle friends who have children? They are worn, miserable shadows of themselves at the tender age of 30. Their children use them like the dishrags they resemble. Their kids run the house. Others play with me and my son in relative peace, order, and harmony. Later, they visit other young people with kids only to return breathless and wide-eyed, exclaiming “Those children were complete ANIMALS!” No one knows better than children what an animal is. Your delusion that they are anything else enables their behavior, mocks your intelligence, and gives the keys to the asylum over to the inmates.

God did not design your world to be run by a 32 pound dictator. Spank. Spank well. Spanking is right. Spanking is good. And spanking is better for everyone, especially the kids.

J Green

Child Support Doubled and Tripled

Who Cares, Right? Its only divorced men. "Mad" dads. Then again, wouldn't this make you mad?

Fathers & Families Files Lawsuit to Stop New Massachusetts Child Support Guidelines
December 31st, 2008 by Ned Holstein, MD, MS

Fathers and Families has filed suit in Federal District Court in Boston to stop the scheduled January 1 implementation of new Child Support Guidelines. The suit seeks a temporary injunction halting the use of the new guidelines until a full hearing can be held. It will be heard before Judge D.P. Woodlock on Monday, January 5 at 10 AM in courtroom 1.

Fathers & Families’ attorney Gregory Hession of Springfield argues that the new guidelines were not formulated using the actual costs of raising a child, as required by federal law, and are thus “arbitrary and capricious.” The pleadings before the court assert that the process used to put together the new guidelines violated the due process and equal protection rights of the payers of child support, as protected under the United States Constitution. Additionally, the state bypassed the normal legislative process by having a secret committee prepare them and a single judge declare them to be law, in violation of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights.

The new guidelines will cause almost all child support orders to increase substantially — when all factors are considered, middle-class recipients will enjoy a standard of living almost double that of payers who earn about the same amount. In some cases, child support orders will triple, even in cases in which the payer is poor and the child is economically comfortable because the custodial parent earns over $100,000. And in high income cases, the child support order for one child could be nearly $50,000.

Fathers & Families Executive Director Ned Holstein, MD, served on the commonwealth’s Task Force that recommended the new guidelines, but authored a minority report dissenting from the main recommendations. Dr. Holstein said, “The new guidelines will harm children. Kids want to live with both parents after divorce, and we want them to be well cared for in both homes. But these new guidelines will create a ‘castle versus a hovel’ situation for kids. These increases are radical and unexplained. They come at the worst possible moment, just as a bad recession is causing people to lose their jobs or suffer declining incomes. Our lawsuit is a way of saying, ‘Let’s pause and reconsider the wisdom of these controversial changes at this moment.’”

Someone Notices Massachusetts Divorce Mania

By Elizabeth Benedict
June 13, 2008

FORGET KAFKA. Welcome to Massachusetts. In the 1980s, it was known as Taxachusetts. These days, it's known as the state whose divorce laws are so out of date that many people decide against marrying here - or marrying anyone anywhere whose alimony obligations originate here. I'm one of them. Two divorce lawyers tell me that the state's laws are so extreme they have "a chilling effect on marriage." Prenups offer no guarantees. Judges routinely ignore them.


Cathy Ortiz, a secretary in Fairhaven whose husband is out of work, was ordered in 2007 to make alimony payments from her own paycheck to his ex-wife - who has a full-time job with benefits. The husband, Ernest Ortiz, is suing the state, arguing that these laws are unconstitutional. Oral arguments were heard yesterday in Appeals Court.

Alimony law is largely case law, not statute. Many legislators are shocked to hear the feudal details, unique to Massachusetts. But not shocked enough to reform the law.

The laws are gender neutral, but the facts are not: 96 percent of alimony payers are men, who often must give 30 to 40 percent of gross earnings to educated and sometimes employed women. Alimony does not automatically end or decline at retirement, even after an ex-wife has gotten an equitable share of marital assets. This applies in no-fault divorces, to the middle-class, and to millionaires.

Alimony is usually ordered until the recipient dies or remarries, even for couples in their 30s and 40s. Judges who set time limits may be overruled on appeal. When children are involved, the court usually awards only child support, about 30 percent of a father's income, which ends when children turn 23. Then mothers frequently receive alimony at the same or higher levels, for life.

Many highly skilled workers who took time off to raise children - nurses, paralegals, financial analysts - are often not expected to work again, even if they divorce at 40. Some judges push them to work again; many don't.

Instead of remarrying, which would end their alimony, many women live with boyfriends and become the lifelong charges of their ex-husbands - and, only in Massachusetts, of their ex-husbands' new wives, whose resources are routinely and circuitously considered in determining alimony awards.

The case law is so murky, lawyers disagree on how it works. Some deny it happens. One says it's common, another "an anomaly." Bottom line: Women who marry men with alimony obligations may have even paltry earnings and assets considered when a husband loses a job or retires and tries to lower or end his payments. In 2003 a second wife put her disabled 8-week-old child into daycare to get a menial job to support her family and her husband's ex-wife - a nurse - when his business failed following 9/11. The court refused them any relief.

In 2007, a group of modestly paid second wives whose incomes were directly used to calculate payments were so incensed that they formed The 2nd Wives Club, a partner to Mass Alimony Reform. The groups support HR 1567, modeled on California's law, which was introduced earlier this year to update and codify the state's alimony rulings. A day of heartbreaking hearings turned up no opposition, but the bill was sent for further "study," a polite form of death.

The Massachusetts and Boston Bar Associations have created a task force to study problems stemming from lifetime alimony, but it will be months before their recommendations, if any, will be made public. They may eventually support new guidelines for judges, not new legislation, which would clarify and simplify. They prefer ambiguity and case law, which produce more billable hours.

Beyond the injustice of divorce court without end, these laws create two classes of women: those considered too fragile to work and those whose labor is necessary to help support them. In the home of the country's preeminent women's colleges, and home to the most celebrated women in American history, these laws need to change.

Elizabeth Benedict is a novelist and journalist.

Slanted Justice

Man, Woman Commit Same Crime--She Gets 6 Months, He Gets 20 Years
January 21st, 2008

It can be problematic to compare sentences in different cases, particularly if the jurisdictions and/or laws are different or if plea bargains are involved. Still, it is sometimes of use, such as in discussing the sentencing disparities between whites and blacks and the sentencing disparities between men and women.

Jack, a reader, sent me the two articles linked below. In one, a woman caretaker scalded a boy (pictured) with bathwater.

His toes may need to be amputated, he may not be able to procreate, and he has severely infected, oozing wounds. Prosecutors say that after scalding the boy the caretaker forced him to do chores, even though he had first and second-degree burns. She didn't take him to the hospital for several days. Her sentence? Six months.

In the second article, a man did the same thing to his live-in girlfriends' son (minus the chores and with taking him to the hospital hours later instead of days)--and got 20 years.

In Honor of MLK

I AM A MAN.

From the Garbarge Worker strike for higher pay:

डॉलर प्लुन्गेस सोम More

फ्रॉम इन्फ़ेक्तिऔस् Greed

http://paul.kedrosky.com

Time to Fire a Few MBA Professors

Outgoing Yale School of Management Dean Jeff Garten has some sensible comments on why M.B.A. schools are failing. He's right in what he says below, but I have zero hope anything will change:

Q. Are you a critic of how your own students have been educated?

A. I think the current model of business school education needs to change dramatically. I think there should be different criteria for tenuring faculty. Right now, a professor would get tenure on the same qualifications as he or she would if they were in a department of economics or a department of history. What business schools need to do is add some criteria for promotion. One of them should be some real-world experience, in the same way that a doctor teaching at a medical school would have had to see patients.

Q. What percentage of business school professors have had experience in real companies?

A. I would say it's minuscule. This is a very radical proposal. But let me give you a second. Business schools need to have a two-track faculty, with the second track being a clinical faculty, that is, people who may not have the academic qualifications to get tenure or even do real academic research, but who would bring into the classroom the world of practice and experience.

I couldn't agree more strongly that a root of the problem is that almost all business school professors have no business experience. And the incentive system is completely cock-eyed, with it being an embarassment that business schools treat promotion & tenure decisions as if biz school profs are lab physicists. Then again, all Garten's twin-track approach will likely do is create a caste system inside schools, with the insiders hoarding power and control over the "mere" clinical faculty who, the dumb bastards, actually know what they are talking about. Craziness.

Enriching Some Women and Ruining Others

Top Ten Things I've Learned as a Second Wife


bridal couple by "janetb"


1. All people are created equal, but we don't remain so. At some point, some people become more entitled than others. And remain so.
2. The "justice system" is misnamed. There is precious little justice in our system. Politics, bribes, self-aggrandizement, and agendas are everywhere. Justice is hiding in the closet from them.
3. "Firsts" are priority. Not in every case, no, but no judge has ever cut alimony to the rich first wife, so the innocent children of the second marriage can have a fighting chance. My own children were used as a liability to my husband when his ex-wife decided she only wanted to work part-time.
4. Guilt is a terrible justification. "How could you leeeeeeave me?" and the like has cost men more money than all monster trucks combined.
5. "Judicial discretion" is the broadest term I've ever heard. There is nearly infinite judicial discretion in our system, yet no judicial accountability. Judges and courts are "rated" by how many of their decisions are overturned, so the appellates will decline to overturn in the name of "judicial discretion."
6. Nice guys often do finish last. Everyone else tramples them.
7. If anyone gives a damn, hang on tight to them. True friends and loved ones — people who will stand by you — are precious beyond words.
8. It's not the first marriage that's for love. That was his practice run. It's this one, that's withstood so much, that was for love.
9. You don't marry for money; you divorce for it. Dr. Sanford Braver, as quoted at MenWeb, says, "on average, mothers are more satisfied with divorce settlements than fathers," and "75 percent of fathers thought it [the court system] was slanted in favor of mothers — and more than a quarter of mothers agreed!" In an informal survey here at SecondWivesCafe, 63% of the ex-wives had more disposable income than the ex-husbands.
10. Finally, I didn't have A CLUE what I was getting into! 'Nuff said.

Stepmoms Get Dumped on with Dads

Ask any family therapist, and they’ll agree: the stepmother generally has the most challenging role in these new families. There are plenty of reasons for this, starting with history. One research group found some 900 stories referring to the concept of an “evil stepmother,” the most well known of these “Snow White” and “Cinderella.” Certainly there are stepmothers that do terrible things (as there are biological mothers that do). And the myth is becoming less acceptable as more and more women take on the stepmother role. But it’s still true that stepmothers have an uphill battle on almost every front.


The role of a stepmother is exceedingly complex. A stepmom can get whiplash trying to negotiate her way around competing interests and attempting to find a path through veritable mazes of paradox. Stepmoms often have all of the responsibilities of parenting (think cooking, cleaning, laundry) but none of the legal rights. Stepmoms may constantly be trying to find the middle ground between being a child’s pal and being a disciplinarian. Those who feel no love for their stepchildren are seen as cold; those who do can be accused of “trying to take the place of the biological mother.” In short, being a stepmom means pleasing some of the people only some of the time.


A stepparent’s role in a family is unique in that it is born of loss. A child has lost a natural parent due to death or divorce; the natural parent may be in the child’s life all the time, or may be gone, but a child’s dreams of having “the perfect family” have been shattered, and a stepmom is the living proof of that fact.


A stepmom’s relationship with the biological mother can range from friendly to neutral to downright hostile.


“I consider myself very lucky,” says Claire, whose household contains her two children and her husband’s two children, all under the age of nine. “At first, my stepchildren’s biological mother was really angry. But over time she realized that I take good care of the kids, and now we are best friends.”


Not everyone is so fortunate.


“When I first got married I had this fantasy that the biological mother and I would be friends and would co-parent this child together,” says Kyra. “Now, several therapists later, our two households can communicate only via lawyer -– and even now there are blowups. I wish that she could at least appreciate that her son and I have a loving relationship, but I sometimes think she’d rather that I be a terrible person to give her an excuse for hating me.”


Lynnette, the custodial stepmom of three elementary school children, had a similar experience when her stepchildren’s biological mother lost custody of them.


“I didn’t know how to function being the object of such intense and systematic hatred,” she says, but adds, “the children were a little unruly, but they are wonderful -– sweet, absolutely dear.”


Relationships between stepparents and stepchildren can vary greatly. There truly are some children that “only a mother could love,” and there are stepmothers that behave badly and give their stepchildren good reason to dislike them. Sometimes a stepmom tries her best, but is faced with a “team” made up of her husband and stepchildren, against which she’s always losing.


Other stepmoms and stepkids just “click.”


“I love my stepdaughter as if she is my own,” says Rebekkah. “She’s sweet, smart, funny, pretty, and talented. We actually enjoy being together, and she’s never given me that ‘You’re not my real mom’ crap. But I give so much of the credit to her, for being the kind of person she is – frankly, she’s an easy kid to love.”


A big reason why the rate of divorce among second marriages is extraordinarily high is that the husband and wife often argue over the children. Jane is a clinical social worker and a stepmom as well. She knows from personal experience how important it is to keep the marital relationship strong. “My husband and I have always known that we were together because we loved each other, not because we wanted a pseudo-family,” she says.


Jane emphasizes the need for the children’s father to promote the stepmom as a parent figure within the household, deserving of respect. “When I would have a little struggle,” says Jane, who has two stepchildren, “I was supported by my husband. Still, it took time to acclimate.”


Many husbands, she says, want their wives to be pals with the children –- an unrealistic wish. And many “experts” on stepparenting say that stepmoms should never discipline their stepkids. But discipline is not punishment; it’s a form of teaching and can be done in a positive way.


“‘Discipline’ comes from the word ‘disciple,’” Jane says. “It’s about directing them in the way they should go. Children need the adults in their lives to be parents, not friends.”




pinkline


Teresa Paprock is a freelance writer, co-author of two books, and the editor of a parenting magazine in the Midwest, as well as the stepmom of a 13-year-old boy.

Let Fathers In - They Want In. They Deserve In

in 2003 the legislature created the Illinois Council on Responsible Fatherhood to identify obstacles that impede fathers' involvement in their children's lives and devise strategies to remove them. The Council's report will be released next month. Its two central recommendations involve family law and child support.

"The Council's first recommendation is to reform the family law system to eliminate anti-father gender bias and facilitate responsible father involvement...A related problem identified by the Council is the scarcity of affordable and pro-bono legal services for low-income fathers. The state represents custodial parents free of charge in child support matters, and many programs provide free legal aid to mothers. By contrast, when a father seeks to enforce his visitation rights, block a move, or dispute a questionable child support arrearage, he is on his own...

"Many Illinois fathers who can play an important and positive role in their children's lives face needless obstacles. Policies based on blaming and punishing dads may make good political sound bites, but they are counterproductive for society, and hurtful to children and the fathers they love and need. The Council believes it's time for policymakers to take a fresh look at dads."

Needless Suffering by Children

"...according to a long-term study conducted in the United States and in New Zealand and published in Child Development, a father's absence greatly increases the risk of teen pregnancy. The study found that it mattered little whether the child was rich or poor, black or white, born to a teen mother or an adult mother, or raised by parents with functional or dysfunctional marriages. What mattered was dad.

"A Journal of Marriage and Family study found that the presence of a father was five times more important in predicting teen drug use than any other sociological factor,
including income and race. A published Harvard review of four major studies found that, accounting for all major socioeconomic factors, children without a father in the home are twice as likely to drop out of high school or repeat a grade as children who live with their fathers.

A Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency study concluded that fatherlessness is so predictive of juvenile crime that, as long as there was a father in the home, children of poor and wealthy families had similar juvenile crime rates.

"Adult children of divorce realize dads are important. A published Arizona State University study found that more than two-thirds believed that, after divorce, 'living equal amounts of time with each parent is the best arrangement for children.'"

The Plain Truth

The rates of the four major youth pathologies--teen pregnancy, teen drug abuse, school dropouts and juvenile crime--are tightly correlated with fatherlessness, often more so than with any other socioeconomic factor.

For example, according to a long-term study conducted in the United States and in New Zealand and published in Child Development, a father’s absence greatly increases the risk of teen pregnancy. The study found that it mattered little whether the child was rich or poor, black or white, born to a teen mother or an adult mother, or raised by parents with functional or dysfunctional marriages. What mattered was dad.

A Journal of Marriage and Family study found that the presence of a father was five times more important in predicting teen drug use than any other sociological factor, including income and race. A published Harvard review of four major studies found that, accounting for all major socioeconomic factors, children without a father in the home are twice as likely to drop out of high school or repeat a grade as children who live with their fathers. A Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency study concluded that fatherlessness is so predictive of juvenile crime that, as long as there was a father in the home, children of poor and wealthy families had similar juvenile crime rates.

Adult children of divorce realize dads are important. A published Arizona State University study found that more than two-thirds believed that, after divorce, "living equal amounts of time with each parent is the best arrangement for children."

All family law and legislative battles over child custody issues involve the same fight--fathers want more time with their children, and their opponents fight to limit their role.

For example, several major branches of the National Organization for Women, including New York and Michigan, have recently issued Action Alerts against Shared Parenting bills. These Alerts rallied NOW’s supporters against moderate legislative attempts to help dads remain a part of their children’s lives after divorce or separation. NOW’s playbook is simple—portray divorced dads as a threat to their children’s well-being.

In this there is great irony—according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' new report Child Maltreatment 2004, when one parent is acting without the involvement of the other parent, mothers are almost three times as likely to kill their children as fathers are, and are more than twice as likely to abuse them. Nevertheless, in both New York and Michigan NOW’s scare tactics succeeded.

Excuses4Violence

"I was scared." Fine if you're in the woods looking at a bear, but what about when you try to hit an innocent human being with your car?

Assistant U.S. attorney backs over her boyfriend, twice

The January 7, 1999, issue of the Denver Post reported that an assistant United States attorney, Stacey L. Ross, age 34, was charged with first-degree assault for allegedly running over her live-in boyfriend twice. Her 26-year old partner suffered a lacerated liver, dislocated shoulder, and other injuries. Apparently he tried to stop her from leaving because he didn't think she was in any condition to drive after an argument on New Years Eve.

He was standing behind the car when she backed over him the first time. He was then on his hands and knees in a daze in the driveway when she backed over him again. Sheriffs deputies found him pinned beneath a Mazda driven by Ms. Ross.

Her defense attorney claimed he was threatening her, that she was terrified, and trying to get away. One may reasonably ask if that were so, why did she back over him the second time?

Ms. Ross, who had been with the U.S. attorney's office since September, 1997, was reported to be on leave from her job.

Violence a Double-Edged Sword?

Why do we view violence against women as particularly heinous and violence against men as permissible?

Why is violence in any form simply not contrued as disgusting. Why is it acceptable to see a male victim of violence but not a female victim of violence?

Is a female victim of domestic violence easier to pity when she's attacked by a heterosexual male partner instead of a homosexual female partner? What's the difference. Are not both instances horrifying?

The NY Times ran an article today called Living to Tell (http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/14/books/review/14roach.html?_r=1&oref=slogin) about a book written by a woman who was unforgivably and heinously attacked and assaulted by a man using both a pickup truck and axe on June 27, 1977. The two were camping. There is absolutely no excuse for this attack. None whatsoever.
The following is an excerpt from the article:

"Jentz needs this controlled calm because she is not merely, with this book, condemning her attacker. She is condemning American culture, one of easy violence that glorifies "the badass outlaw," that values "self-gratification, impulsivity and irresponsibility, and rewards preening narcissism." She is condemning violence against women and a society-wide indifference toward its ubiquity, what she calls our "passive complicity."

Sorry - "society-wide indifference toward its [violence towards women] ubiquity..."? And what constitutes indifference? Anyone would be sick to their stomach to read the details of her attack. But how is violence against women any more heinous or repugnant than violence against men?

I would like to ask Ms. Jentz if this instance is any less deplorable:

"Gold Coast woman Jeanette Anne Cameron, 46, pleaded guilty in the Queensland Supreme Court to three counts of fraud and one count of grievous bodily harm with intent.

Supreme Court Justice Margaret White today sentenced Cameron to eight years jail.

The court was told that on April 12, 2004, Cameron's partner, Brian Edwards Spencer, suffered a stroke and entrusted Cameron with $3500 cash to mind from his concreting business.

Instead of banking it, as she promised Mr Spencer she would do, Cameron kept the money for herself.

Furthermore, the court was told, friends of Mr Spencer gave Cameron $2200 that they owed Mr Spencer, but instead of banking it, she kept the money.

When Mr Spencer was released from hospital he went to live with Cameron, who nursed him back to health while assuring him his money wasn't too far away.

During this time, Mr Spencer was giving Cameron rent money for their Gold Coast property, but Cameron wasn't banking it and eventually the pair was served an eviction notice.

On November 26, 2004, the day Mr Spencer was due to pick up his "deposited" money from the bank, Cameron approached Mr Spencer from behind while he was having breakfast and smashed him in the head with a hammer.

She hit him at least twice, possibly three times, the court was told.

Mr Spencer managed to wrest the hammer from her, but not before he had suffered a fractured skull.

"This was a despicable attack on a helpless man," said Justice White.

The court was also told Mr Spencer was not the only person from whom Cameron stole.

In May and June of 2002 she stole a credit card from a previous tenant of the house she was renting and ran up debts totalling $3846 on items of clothing, luxury goods and sporting equipment."

Man4Abuse and Harrassment

Nick Tarzia, a Fathers & Families member who lives in Stamford, Connecticut, has filed a lawsuit against a former Massachusetts girlfriend who took out a fraudulent restraining order against him. He has charged her with defamation and slander, abuse of process, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and other wrongful actions. Jeffrey Denner, a well-known Boston attorney, represents Mr. Tarzia.

Mr. Tarzia is a successful businessman in Connecticut, and was Vice President of the Stamford Board of Education. He was also active in charitable and educational endeavors.

In September, 2003, he began dating C.M., a resident of Wellesley, Massachusetts. He noticed that she was violently jealous when she suspected possible relationships with other women. She spied into his private affairs, and occasionally swung at and hit him, according to his court complaint. He never retaliated in any manner.

Mr. Tarzia ended the relationship in late December, 2003. Over the next two months, C.M. telephoned him at least 80 times, threatening to tell other people that he had been convicted of using cocaine (contrary to the facts), as well as other threats and demands. Some of the calls were hang-ups used to harass him.

On February 26, 2004, Mr. Tarzia went about his business in Connecticut as usual. On that day, however, C.M. sought and obtained an exparte 209A restraining order in Dedham Court in Massachusetts. Among other things, she accused him of following her in his car.

At the ten day hearing before Judge Lynda Connelly, Mr. Tarzia presented at least ten sworn affidavits from individuals who had observed him in and around Stamford, Connecticut the entire day. He also presented store receipts with date and time indicating the same thing. Nevertheless, Judge Connelly granted the restraining order.

At considerable expense, Mr. Tarzia returned to court in October, 2004. At the hearing, C.M. admitted that some of her prior sworn statements were false. Moreover, Mr. Tarzia was able to produce witnesses and documentation in support of his case, including cell phone records. The cell phone records indicate that C.M. telephoned him at least twice on February 26 (the day she obtained the restraining order). More important, they indicate the physical location of the cell phone when used, and these showed without question that he was in the Stamford area the entire day. The Dedham District Court vacated the restraining order (something that might not be easy today, as a result of the terrible recent decision by the Massachusetts Appeals Court in Mitchell v. Mitchell, of which we recently informed our readership.)

In the meantime, however, someone had leaked information about the claimed drug conviction and the restraining order to the Stamford newspaper. Mr. Tarzia was forced to resign from the Stamford Board of Education because of the false allegations and damage to his reputation.

He is now fighting back in court.

Fortunately for Mr. Tarzia, he has not shared a home, assets or children with C.M. If he did, he could not possibly retaliate against her spiteful actions without adverse consequences in the family court, typically, that he was "controlling," or was trying to harass her. Moreover, any money damages he might win from her would only come back out of his own pocket later, when the court found that her impoverishment required him to give her more assets, child support or alimony.

Somehow, the Massachusetts courts must get serious about the harm that is done by fraudulent restraining orders. In addition to the obvious harm to Mr. Tarzia, those people who truly need protection from an intimate partner are imperiled when the time of the police and courts is wasted on fraudulent cases such as this.

Equality That Isn't

There are more women in college, then men. Let's really think about this for a moment. This means - NECESSARILY - that of all the people corporations will have to recruit from, there will be a very good chance that more recruits will be women than men. Think of how powerful education is. It is the stepping stool to good, well-paying employment. Without education, well-paying employment is extremely challenging if not all together impossible. Look at the minorities in this country: blacks, hispanics, etc. They have been given sub-standard education for decades and their comparatively lower earning power, lower-paying jobs, and lack of representation in the professional fields reflects this.

How long until the lower proportion of well-educated men and higher proportion of well-educated women impacts the corporate world. It only follows that even more and more women will be making money AT LEAST comparable to men and the trend reflects that at some point the vast numbers of college-educated women will result in women, as a class, having better career opportunities than men.

The dual-income family has been the standard FOR A LONG TIME. With women as educated OR MORE educated than some men, earning just as much, or more, and having well-paying careers, WHY ARE MEN PAYING 90% OF THE CHILD-SUPPORT EXPENSES, especially given the fact that should a woman decide to have a child out of wedlock (1 out of 3 births are out of wedlock) her decision to have the child results in someone else paying half of their take home pay in child support for the next 20 years!

Is there any decision you or I have the luxury of making that results in someone else paying for our decision to the tune of hundreds of thousands for 18 years?!?!? I mean a married and divorced couple is one thing, but 1 in 3 out of wedlock births means that many women are CHOOSING to have their child in a relationship that could dissolve tomorrow or could already be dissolved and yet, while the decision to have the child is their's alone, the obligation to pay for it is seemingly his alone - does that sound incongruent to you? It does to me.

PBS filmed a fathersandfamilies meeting recently. There were a surprising amount of men that were stay at home dads FOR YEARS while their wives ran dental practices, small businesses, worked as executives, lawyers, etc. And when they divorced, the women received custody of the children and the man was forced to pay child support to the tune of $12,$1300/month when he hasn't worked for years and when HE WAS THE PRIMARY CAREGIVER!

It's a lot more prevalent than most realize. The news doesn't cover it, but if you dig into the statistics, the truth emerges.

British newspapers have been reporting on a baby-gap in England. Women aren't having children or are having them MUCH later in life because they can have their own careers and make middle to upper-middle class income.

It's time we realized than men and women are just equal human beings and that divorce means 50-50 split on EVERYTHING from assets to responsibility for child care.

Reservists Do Battle in Family Court

Most reservists called upon to serve in Iraq and Afghanistan have paid a big price: a significant reduction of their wages as they transferred from civilian to military jobs, separation from their loved ones, and of course the risk of battle wounds or death. Regrettably, on their return home, those who are divorced fathers could face other grievous penalties: loss of their children, financial ruin, prosecution as "deadbeat dads" and even jail.

Child-support orders for reservists are usually based on their civilian wages. When they are called up to active duty that burden doesn't decrease. Few can get court modification before they leave, modifications are seldom granted anyway, and even if a father applied for modification before deployment the debt continues to grow until the case is decided much later. Military fathers cannot get relief when they return because federal law forbids courts from reducing child-support debt retroactively. Once the arrearage reaches $5,000, the father becomes a felon subject to imprisonment and forfeiture of his driver's license, professional licenses and passport.

Likewise, there is no forgiving of interest and penalties on child-support debt even though it is sometimes incurred as a result of human or computer errors. States have a financial incentive to refuse to reduce obligations because the federal government rewards states with cash for the "deadbeat dad" dollars they collect.

Laws granting deployed service personnel protection from legal actions at home date back decades, but they are ignored in family court. Child kidnapping laws do not protect military personnel on active duty from having their ex-wives relocate their children.

This injustice to reservists serving in Iraq and Afghanistan should be remedied by Congress and state legislatures before more fathers meet the fate of Bobby Sherrill, a father of two from North Carolina, who worked for Lockheed Martin Corp. in Kuwait before being captured and held hostage by Iraq for five terrible months. The night Sherrill returned from the Persian Gulf he was arrested for failing to pay $1,425 in child support while he was held captive.

In February, a Wilkes-Barre, Pa., judge sentenced 28 men to jail for failure to pay small amounts of child support, one as little as $322. One common punishment for falling behind in court-ordered payments is to seize a man's driver's license. This can cost him his job. Yet he is still required to make child-support payments and can be thrown in jail if that proves to be impossible.

The New York Times recently exposed the ridiculous case of truck driver Donald Gardner, who was left penniless after a 1997 car accident put him in the hospital for three years. When he tried to return to work, he found that the state had suspended his driver's license because he owed $119,846 in child support.

The Times reported that, as of 2003, fathers allegedly owed $96 billion in child support. However, 70 percent is owed by men who earn less than $10,000 a year or have no wage earnings at all, so we have a $3 billion government bureaucracy working to get blood out of a turnip.

The most bizarre part of the system is that child- support payments are not required to be spent on children and are not based on any estimates of their needs or expenses. Support orders come from court- created formulas based on the income of the father, while the mother is allowed to treat child support like any other entitlement, such as welfare or alimony.

Although there are no official statistics, it is estimated that more than 100,000 fathers are jailed per year for failing to make child-support payments. Another perverse feature of the system is that child- support payments are in no way related to whether a father is allowed to see his children or whether his visitation rights are enforced.

Debtors' prisons were common in colonial times, but they were abolished by the new United States government, one of the great improvements made on English law. Then the new nation adopted bankruptcy laws to allow people a fresh start when they are overwhelmed by debt. However, child- support debts cannot be discharged in bankruptcy.

The Bradley Amendment, named for former U.S. Sen. Bill Bradley, D-N.Y., takes us back to the cruel days of debtors' prisons. It requires that a child-support debt cannot be retroactively reduced or forgiven, and states enforce this law no matter what the change in a father's income, no matter if he is sent to war or locked up in prison, no matter if he is unemployed or hospitalized or even dead, no matter if DNA proves he is not the father, and no matter if he is ever allowed to see his children. Charles Dickens famously said, "The law is an ass."