Major Network Drops Domestic Violence Show

Some good news from Ned Holstein of Fathers & Families, one of the leaders of the campaign against PBS's Breaking the Silence: Children's Stories:

"Some pessimists believe that our battle against PBS' airing of Breaking the Silence, an unbalanced piece of anti-father propaganda, was at best a tie. After all, the film was aired hundreds of times around the country. There have been private screenings for judges and legislators. And despite the findings of its own ombudsman, PBS has stonewalled, still claiming that the film is sound.

"The pessimists miss the larger picture: that you can only judge victory or defeat by what comes next. For the first time we stopped a respected media outlet in its tracks, forced it to reassess its production, and caused it to commission a new film this spring.

"Now comes this news: a major network has dropped plans to produce a similar domestic violence segment on a major 60 Minutes-type show it airs, even though it has a sensational and tragic 911 audiotape of a terrified woman hiding in a closet as her ex-husband breaks into the house, searches for her and shoots her. (Something this awful deserves to be aired, but not in a format that tars all divorced men or misrepresents what the police and courts are actually doing.)

"This had all the earmarks of another hack job. The producer had asked Lundy Bancroft, one of the domestic violence extremists who is featured in Breaking the Silence, for stories of police who were unwilling to enforce a restraining order, and of judges who were dismissive of a woman's complaints. A woman who is sympathetic to fathers' organizations approached the producer with a true domestic violence horror story, who was very interested until he found out the victim was a man, at which point he dropped the matter. It didn't look good.

"Mark Rosenthal and I called the producer two months ago to discuss his plans for the segment, and to try to educate him about the complexities of the subject beyond a simplistic 'man bad, woman victim' formulation. To the producer's credit, he was willing to engage in a conversation, but it was hard to believe we had changed his mind or that he could resist airing the dramatic 911 tape.

"Now we hear that no such segment is in preparation. Is this guaranteed true? Will it be produced later? Did our offensive against PBS cause this? We don't know, but it is hard to believe that the well-publicized uproar about Breaking the Silence that you created with your letters and emails had nothing to do with it.

"I call that a victory."

Ned Holstein, M.D., M.S.
Fathers & Families
nedholstein@fathersandfamilies.org 
 

Some Vindication for Boy Advocates

My longtime readers know that I (and others) have been screaming about the boy crisis in education for years. I'm a former teacher and I've written numerous columns on the issue. My biggest gripe is the way our school system absolutely refuses to meet boys where they are. The result is what I call "Boys' Fall from Eden"--they go from preschool, where their boyish energy is (usually) accommodated, into kindergarten where they are "bad" if they can't sit still for long periods of time the way the girls can. In my column Start of School Very Different for Parents of Boys, Parents of Girls (Albuquerque Journal, 9/10/04) I wrote:

"The educational establishment has reacted to the boy crisis in education in a way reminiscent of Bertolt Brecht's famous poem about calls to reform or dissolve the unpopular government of East Germany: the government found it difficult to reform itself, so would instead choose to 'dissolve the people and elect another.'

"Similarly, rather than reform a system woefully out of touch with boys' real world natures and needs, our schools find it easier to demand that boys be something other than boys."

The boy crisis was the biggest reason we launched our Campaign Against 'Boys are Stupid' Products in 2003--to learn more, see my column Why I Launched the Campaign Against 'Boys are Stupid' Products (Los Angeles Daily News, 2/4/04).

During this period boy advocates have often been opposed by feminists who insist that boys are doing just fine because most CEOs are male. Even researchers on the subject were afraid to accurately report their own findings for fear of being labeled anti-female. I debated a couple researchers on this in the Los Angeles Times last year--see my column New Study of Youth Shows It's Boys Who Are in Crisis (3/20/05).

Now, however, the boy crisis has no finally gone mainstream with Newsweek's new front page article The Trouble With Boys and the surrounding public dialogue.

Glenn Discusses Boy Crisis in Education on Air America's Charles Goyette Show (Audio Available)

I discussed the boy crisis in education on the Charles Goyette Show on Air America KXXT AM 1010 in Phoenix, Arizona on January 25, 2006.

To listen to the interview, click here--the interview with me starts at 20:27.

Outrage Funded by Your Tax Dollars

We've discussed before the way domestic violence laws are slanted sharply against men. As I noted in my co-authored column Domestic Violence Lawsuit Will Help Secure Services for All Abuse Victims (Los Angeles Daily Journal, San Francisco Daily Journal, 12/28/05), "While police intervention often works for abused women, abused men understandably fear that once the police are involved, their wives will accuse them of being the abuser and it is they who will be believed. Draconian arrest policies often direct police to make an arrest, and police are often pressured to arrest the man."

Despite this, a substantial percentage of those arrested for domestic violence are women. Feminists mulishly insist that only men abuse, so when women are arrested they claim it's only because--get this--violent men are manipulating the domestic violence system and making false accusations. Because women never abuse and can never do wrong, women who are arrested for DV are called "victim-defendants."

A particularly outrageous example of this is a recent statement from Jeff Rapkin, the staff attorney for the Center for Abuse and Rape Emergencies of Charlotte County. Rapkin is one of the many anti-male domestic violence "experts" being funded by your tax dollars. In the article More male victims of domestic violence are speaking up (Charlotte Sun-Herald) he is quoted as saying:

"Ninety-nine percent of men who have their wives arrested for slapping or hitting them are using the criminal justice system and the threat of arrest to make sure his wife prepares the meatloaf exactly the way he wants it...Fifty percent of the women I have talked to in jail, who were arrested for domestic abuse, did not want me to argue for a bond. They didn't want to go home. They told me they were at least free from the abuse while in jail....The only good thing about police arresting the women at domestic calls is that it takes the women out of the abusive home for at least a night."

To write a Letter to the Editor about Rapkin's comments, click here.

And I Thought I Got Nasty Mail...

Take a look at some of the hate mail Fox News commentator/columnist Michelle Malkin receives here. (Warning: foul language). One example:

"You're just a Manila whore shaking your ass and waiting for the Republican fleet to come in, aren't you? You've even got the lip gloss about right. Maybe if you love sailor long time, he bring you home to big American house? I don't think so. Just like in Manila, Honey, they'll pass you around..."

And another:

"Surely you are a big put-on. Did some minor Republican operative purchase a mail-order bride and train her to do this?"

And those are the less repulsive letters. Most of them were written by men--what gentlemen...

Good News for Italian Children

According to Joint custody to be Italian norm:

"The Italian Senate gave the definitive green light Wednesday to a new law that strengthens the access and custody rights of divorced fathers.

"The legislation makes joint custody of children the norm when parents split up. This means single-parent custody - which usually goes to the mother - will now only be granted in a minority of cases .

"'Finally, both parents will have equal rights and responsibilities with respect to their children when there is a separation,' said Justice Undersecretary Jole Santelli. 'And the children will have the inalienable right to maintain solid relations with both the mum and the dad.'"

Apparently Italian feminists haven't yet had a chance to explain to Italian politicians that most fathers are wife-beaters, child molesters, and deadbeats whose relationships with their children merit neither recognition nor protection. The ironic part about feminist misleadership is that for the vast majority of women, shared parenting is a good deal. If and when mom gets over her terminal vindictiveness, shared arrangements mean more freedom and less work. Best of all, her sons have a much better chance of not ending up on drugs or in jail...

An Interesting View of Female Criminals from a Corrections Officer

A corrections officer saw my old column Female Murderers Seen in a Different Light: Society Prefers to View Violent Women as Victims (Pasadena Star-News & Affiliated Papers, 7/5/01) and wrote me an interesting letter:

"In regards to your article on this topic I feel I must put in my two cents worth. Being a former Corrections Officer and having worked as a counselor with abused children I have to agree with you as to how the media perceives this issue and also how the noted psychologists that study these women see it...

"[Today] all of these so-called experts have come up with a new name for every condition that men and women experience and to make it sound like a large portion of the world population is a victim in one way or another. We no longer need to accept blame nor feel guilt for any wrongdoing--we just have to say we are a victim and walk away. I have heard that term used so many times in the prison system that it made me sick of the term and immune to it. Everyone was a victim it was not their fault. They blamed their family, society, the boss at work, a  co-worker, their wife or husband, and in some case their children or siblings. Not once did I ever hear anyone say 'Yeah I screwed up it was  my fault and I deserve to be here.'

"I have read numerous studies on female criminals and they all lead us  down the same path, they were abused, they suffered from severe PMS or PPD, they did not have the skills to deal with a child or a relationship. I have had female inmates say it was not their fault, their husband/boyfriend made them do it because he always picked on them for the way they did or did not do things, therefore they were psychologically abused to the point of wanting to kill...

"I have seen female inmates that when you look into their eyes there is no life in them nor any warmth of any kind, they are cold and dark and at times even I feared what they could do if given the chance. These women had no heart or soul and they cared for no one not even themselves. So spare me, the courts, and the taxpayers the time and money on theories and excuses and let the punishment fit the crime."

Does Glenn Need Some 'Testicular Fortitude'?

Apparently not everybody enjoyed my recent comments here that "Over the past three decades women and feminists have locked men into endless double-binds, where whatever men do, they're wrong. However, on a much smaller scale, men's activists have begun to lock women into double binds, too." One activist wrote:

"Let's analyze the mutually self serving arrangement. Feminists like to be bi-sexual. They can satisfy their hunger for sex with a man or woman. They conspire with the Machiavellian corporate elite types to take over America, enslave as many men for profit as possible, "capitalize" upon created social policies that facilitate "the creation of the man criminal" as they load us all up on the train to Auschwitz. Never fear--reproduction is just a suave corporate metro sexual away, and to make it fun and exciting, she'll have 2 or 3 of her girlfriends join her. Then they can be gold diggers together.

"AGENDA 21 and the Feminist call to exterminate mass numbers of men reducing the overall world population of males down to 10%.

"Hey the remaining guys won't mind, that's 9 babes to a guy, and all will be kings with harems.

"Come on Glenn, quit acting like a faux men's commentator, let the ladies know a good man gets the door for them, and show some TESTICULAR FORTITUDE.

For Hitlery Clinton's sake!"

Column: Letterman Case Shows Problems with Restraining Orders

My recent co-authored column, Letterman Case Shows Problems with Restraining Orders (Albuquerque Tribune, 1/17/06), explains the way many men's lives are being devastated by the use of restraining orders based on false or unsubstantiated domestic violence claims. The Letterman case is an example of how readily these orders are handed out. Family law attorney Jeff Leving and I wrote:

"A Santa Fe, New Mexico judge recently granted a temporary restraining order against TV talk show host David Letterman for a woman who alleges that Letterman--who works in New York City and whom she has never met--has mentally harassed her through his TV broadcasts. According to Colleen Nestler, Letterman has caused her 'mental cruelty' and 'sleep deprivation' for over a decade, and has used code words and gestures during his broadcasts to show her that he wanted to marry her and train her as his co-host.

"The woman, who also claims that Letterman and fellow celebrities Regis Philbin and Kelsey Grammer have been conspiring against her, requested that Letterman stay away from her, not 'think' of her, and 'release [her] from his mental harassment and hammering.'

"Letterman's attorneys were able to get the order dropped, and the judge--who apparently never thought to suggest to Nestler that she use the 'off' button on her TV--has made good fodder for gossip columns and news of the bizarre. However, the case also demonstrates a much larger though rarely discussed problem--it is far too easy to get a restraining order based on a false allegation."

To learn more about problems with restraining orders and the domestic violence system, see:

• My column VAWA Renewal Provides Opportunity to Stop Destruction of Innocent Cops' Careers (Ft. Worth Star-Telegram, 7/19/05)

• My column Domestic Violence Treatment Policies Put Abused Women in Harm's Way (Daily Breeze [Los Angeles], 11/7/05)

• My co-authored column Domestic Violence Lawsuit Will Help Secure Services for All Abuse Victims (Los Angeles Daily Journal, San Francisco Daily Journal, 12/28/05)

• My column Domestic Violence Series Substitutes Emotion for Facts
  (San Francisco Chronicle, 4/8/05)

• My column New Report on Maternal Homicide Crisis: Myth-Making and Manbashing (Lexington Herald-Leader, 1/3/05)

• My column Baseball Player's Domestic Violence Arrest Demonstrates How Men are Presumed Guilty in Domestic Disputes
  (Los Angeles Daily Journal, San Francisco Daily Journal, 8/8/02)

Also, listen to the His Side shows:

• Congress to Vote on Renewing Anti-Male Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) (7/3/05)

• Restraining Orders: Saviors of Abused Women or Child Custody Tactic? (2/27/05)

• Schlafly on VAWA, Fathers' Rights, and Conservatives' Failure to Defend Fatherhood & Families (7/24/05)

• Oprah Whitewashes Clara Harris' 'Murder by Mercedes' (5/1/05)

• Police Officers Unite to Defend Their Livelihoods Against False DV Allegations (4/10/05)

Girl Says Abuse Claims Were Coerced by Mom During Custody Fight

We've discussed on many occasions the terrible problem of mothers using false charges of child molestation against fathers during custody fights.  The makers of Breaking the Silence deny that this problem exists, of course. In my co-authored column PBS Declares War on Dads (World Net Daily, 10/20/05) I wrote:

"Canadian Senator Anne Cools, one of the few public officials in North America knowledgeable about family law, calls this tactic 'the heart of darkness.' The accusations are often used--very effectively--to deprive fathers of a meaningful role in their children's lives after divorce or separation. Reginald Brass, president of My Child Says Daddy, a parenting organization which works with young African-American fathers in Los Angeles, says:

"'We have many young fathers who are fighting in the courts to see their children or to get joint custody over a mother's hostility or objections. If the man has a daughter, we always warn him that at some point the mother will probably accuse him of sexually molesting his daughter. We see it every day.'

"When a father who has daughters does succeed in getting a desirable custody arrangement over the objections of a recalcitrant mother, it is common practice among family law attorneys to advise the father that a charge of sexual abuse may be coming. According to a study conducted by Douglas J. Besharov and Lisa A. Laumann and published in Social Science and Modern Society, the vast majority of accusations of child sexual abuse made during custody battles are false, unfounded or unsubstantiated.

"Cools, a prominent feminist who led Canada's battered women's shelter movement during the 1970s, explains:

"'There's a plethora of cases where the mother falsely accuses the father of sexually abusing the child. The accusation is made in order to gain advantage in custody disputes. Governments are enormously reluctant to look at it. I've studied this extensively and I've placed on the Canadian Senate record 52 cases where there was a finding that the accusations were false, and there are countless more. Studies have shown that under these circumstances false accusations far outnumber truthful ones.

"'It's a terrible, terrible thing--for the fathers and for the children who've lost their fathers. Some of those men will never recover and they have spent every penny left to them to try to extricate themselves. And I've seen elderly parents who've spent every dime of their retirement to try to help their sons get out of these horrible situations.'"

As you know, we extensively covered the high-profile Bridget Marks case, wherein a woman who had been found by five judges to have coached her little girls to believe that they had been sexually molested by their father was treated like a heroine and a victim by the media. (To learn more, click here).

The following ABC News article discuses another nightmarish case--Texas Girl Says Abuse Claims Were Coerced by Mom: Cousins Jailed for Molestations She Now Claims Never Happened. According to ABC:

"Sixteen-year-old Stephanie Arena longs for a normal girl's life, but she is haunted by the fact that she sent her teenage cousins to prison for a crime she now says they didn't commit.

"The sordid story began when Stephanie, just 7 years old at the time, was caught in a bitter custody battle between her parents, LaVonna and Stephan Arena. Worried that she'd lose her daughter, LaVonna took Stephanie and her brother from their home in Texas to a Florida homeless shelter. She then justified the abduction by telling social workers her kids were being molested.

"Stephanie now says her mother used her as a tool to pry her family apart and to get her father to drop his custody claim.

"'I am responsible for putting them in prison, and now that I am older and I can understand the consequences of my actions, I need to step up and do what I have to [to] make things right'...

"Stephanie has been trying to 'make things right' since she was 11, writing letters of apology to both brothers in prison.

"But perhaps her bravest moment came when she went public with her story and returned to court, two years after accusing her cousins. She faced the same judge and prosecutor and told them she had lied to them when she said her cousins molested her...

"It appears, however, that LaVonna's accusations are part of a troubling pattern. Police records and family testimony suggest that on three different occasions she has falsely accused other family members of abusing her kids, including a charge against Stephanie's father, Stephan Arena.

"I believe it was in 2000 she accused me and John and Michael again -- while they were incarcerated," he said.

"...[LaVonna's] live-in boyfriend dropped a bombshell, however, explaining to 20/20 by phone that LaVonna would like to tell the truth and explain why she made Stephanie lie. But, her boyfriend said, 'LaVonna is afraid she would go to jail.'

"Stephanie says it's that kind of attitude that leaves her bitter."

One more interesting point--they write "Worried that she'd lose her daughter, LaVonna took Stephanie and her brother from their home in Texas to a Florida homeless shelter. She then justified the abduction by telling social workers her kids were being molested." In other words, ABC is so afraid of offending women that they must immediately include an excuse for this woman's horrible crime--"worried that she'd lose her daughter." It's nonsense anyway, because fit mothers rarely "lose" their children (no, shared custody is not "losing your child"). And why is it that when a father loses custody and gets the see your kid every other weekend shaft, nobody says he has "lost his kids"?

How Much Slack Does Jeff Reardon Deserve?

From One Very Wild Pitch: Did drugs make a star hurler rob a jewelry shop? (Newsweek, 1/9/06).

"By Christmas Day, Jeff Reardon was a physical and emotional wreck. The former star relief pitcher was struggling through a second holiday season without his son Shane, who died of a drug overdose in 2004 and would have turned 22 last Thursday. 'I miss you more than ever,' Reardon wrote in a November entry to a Web memorial for Shane. To help numb the pain, Reardon, 50, was taking at least five antidepressants, his lawyer says. That was on top of four or five heart medications he was prescribed after an angioplasty operation on Dec. 23.

"The day after Christmas, Reardon went to a nearby mall in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. Though he told his wife and two surviving kids that he was going to buy a coffeepot, instead he entered a jewelry store and slipped a sales clerk a note demanding cash and jewelry and claiming that he had a gun, according to a police affidavit. The store manager gave him $170 in a bag. After leaving, Reardon--who in fact had no weapon--saw a security guard in the parking lot, went up to him and surrendered. 'I completely lost my mind,' he wrote later in a statement to police. 'I flipped on my medications.'

"[Reardon]...was sinking deep into depression. Over the summer in Massachusetts, where Reardon has family, he would spend hours in his room with the shades drawn, says his mother, Marion Cavanaugh. 'He just couldn't get over' Shane's death, she says, and even began contemplating suicide. Last month, says Cavanaugh, Reardon spent a week in a psychiatric facility. Just before Christmas, a psychiatrist prescribed him three new antidepressants. 'He was on too many pills,' says Cavanaugh."

Some of my thoughts on the case:

1) I think it is fair to be concerned in this case that a wealthy white celebrity is getting (or might get) preferential treatment. I certainly doubt that a poor, middle-aged black man who did the same thing would get much sympathy or slack from law enforcement.

2) I was never fan of Reardon's, so I do feel I can judge him objectively. It was apparent to me throughout most of Reardon's career that he was badly overrated. He was a good example of a guy who built up a big reputation by racking up a lot of "saves," even though an average pitcher in the same situations would have saved most of those games. The hardest bullpen job is getting out of a starter or previous pitcher's jam--it's relatively easy to pile up one inning saves, as Reardon did.

3) One incident from his career I do remember clearly, and it doesn't speak favorably of us baseball fans. It happened in Montreal (where Reardon pitched for the Expos) in 1982 or 1983. Reardon's wife was honored at the stadium for some charity work she had done. Reardon had been pitching poorly around that time, and when his wife's name was announced for the charity work, the fans actually booed her. Nice going guys.

4) Reardon is wealthy and famous, but not all wealth and fame is the same. Some people are wealthy and famous for doing great services to humanity--certainly Reardon isn't one of them. On the other hand, many people are famous and/or wealthy because they were born into money, were lucky, or are just riding on their good looks. I guess Paris Hilton qualifies on all three counts. Reardon isn't one of them, either--the man earned his wealth and fame through hard work and an ability that few have.

5) When I was in my early 20s a friend of mine committed suicide. My friend had had a lot of conflicts with his father. We were told that his father was very rigid and demanding. (At the time I believed this, though as the father of a teenager I'm a lot more skeptical now when I hear fathers being described as strict or demanding). It's been almost 20 years but I can still clearly remember the pain etched in his father's face at the funeral. I doubt I'll ever forget it.

6) Were one of my children to die--particularly in such a senseless way--my grief would be so overwhelming that I might have a hard time keeping my sanity, too.

My conclusion: perhaps I'm a sucker, but I definitively think Reardon deserves some slack.

Sharing Power in the Home

There's an interesting interview with Paul Coughlin, author of No More Christian Nice Guy: When Being Nice--Instead of Good--Hurts Men, Women, and Children, on Crosswalk.com here. I found the section below about sharing power in the home particularly noteworthy. Coughlin says:

"Men don't have much of a say in their homes....Their wives usually control most if not all of their social schedule. And some wives misuse this power by cutting out their husband's friends and sometimes their family. This is abuse by another name.

"Wives have not been encouraged to restrain their verbal strength the way husbands have been told to control their physical strength. Wives shouldn't misuse their verbal superiority when arguing. They should withhold this strength in order to make their verbal disagreements more fair and beneficial for everyone involved.

"Some women don't understand or appreciate masculinity given how an entire generation has been raised to be suspicious of men. Fathers must not allow this lack of appreciation of masculinity to be unleashed upon their sons."

Best Wishes,
Glenn Sacks
GlennSacks.com
HisSide.com

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