"[Ex-NBA Player] Jason Caffey has paid millions of dollars in child support, amounting to 95 percent of what he was ordered to pay, and now they want to jail him for the 5 percent he has been unable to pay."

A tough gig for Dr. Ned Holstein of Fathers & Families on Nancy Grace, but he held up well. I've little sympathy for men who have a bunch of kids by a bunch of different women, but I also hold the women involved responsible. As Holstein notes, while the men are vilified, the mothers "garner money, public support, respect as courageous single mothers, and victimhood status."

More than this, I have a big problem with calling a guy who has apparently paid millions of dollars in child support a "deadbeat dad."

Nancy Grace, however, was enjoying beating up on Caffey (pictured) and other so-called "deadbeat dads." To read more and to watch the debate, click here.

Some of you may remember that Nancy Grace was one of the media's lead witch hunters during the Duke University Lacrosse "rape" case. To learn more, see my blog post CNN's Nancy Grace & the Duke Lacrosse Case.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.  

Tiger Woods: 'I love my dad and I miss him very much' (Video)

"My dad was out there today, keeping me calm...I love my dad and I miss him very much."

Tiger Woods' father Earl died in 2006 at age 74. In this video clip, Tiger Woods talks about how much his late father Earl meant to him, as he accepts his 11th major golf trophy.

Eugene Robinson wrote in the Washington Post:

"Earl Woods did much more than raise a supremely talented golfer. In an age when it's rare to read a sentence with the words 'African American' and 'father' that doesn't also include 'absent' or some other pejorative, Earl and Tiger Woods were the world's most visible, and inspiring, counterexample. 'He was the person I looked up to more than anyone,' Tiger Woods said following his father's death, and even the world's biggest cynic had to know he meant every word.

"To me, the two defining aspects of Tiger Woods's career have been his supernatural ability to make a golf ball do impossible things and his relationship with his father. Two moments stand out: The Sunday afternoon in 1997 when Tiger became the first black man ever to win the Masters and cried like a little boy in the arms of his father, who was there against doctor's orders after almost dying in heart surgery. And the Sunday afternoon in 2005 when Tiger won his fourth Masters and cried again, because Earl Woods, for the first time, had been too sick to come to the course and root him on."

To watch the video of Tiger talking about his dad, click here.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

Steve Moxon: Have Women Been 'Oppressed' Historically?

"It’s neither in pre-, nor late-medieval, but in recent history that supposed incontrovertible evidence exists that the lot of women was as the ‘oppressed’.

"Flagship status goes to the issue of the vote…[but] it turns out that the real struggle for the franchise was that of ordinary men – who paid the taxes and were drafted into the armed forces to fight the wars their taxes paid for. These were the people who for centuries, millennia even, were denied democracy, not women."
 
Norman L., one of the top blog commenters on this site (see the "Top Commentators" rankings in the right-hand column of my home page) is a big fan of The Woman Racket (pictured) by Steve Moxon. Moxon makes the point that because people are judged in large part by their "mate value," most men, being of low-status, have always been the victims of deep-rooted prejudice.

Norman sent me several excerpts from the book which I think are thought-provoking. One of them--"Historical Blindsight"--is below.

I don't buy Moxon's overall argument here, because I think there's been plenty of oppression of women in history, a portion of which continues today. However, he certainly makes an interesting point. And I think Moxon and I would agree that there's been far more exploitation of poor/low status men by wealthy/powerful men than there's been exploitation of women by men.

The Woman Racket - Chapter 7: Historical Blindsight

The position women are in today is so obviously a good one that those who argue men have ‘power’ over women usually resort to pointing out how clearly women were disadvantaged in the past. Mere mention of the vote or of marriage or child custody in times not so long ago, closes down debate. But it doesn’t take much probing beneath the surface of what apparently used to be the lot of women, to see that very far from disadvantage, women enjoyed privilege…

It’s a mistake to view the past through the eyes of today. Our own perspectives imposed, anachronistically, on the behavior and thinking of people in former times is unfair. It would be silly to take our notions of social justice in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries and, finding such principles not apparent in Victorian and earlier times, to then castigate society in earlier periods for unfairly disadvantaging women. Disadvantaged compared to whom? You have to make comparison with others at the same time, and take account of what was then feasible.

This is exactly the mistake we make though. We’re blinded to the possibility that conceptions of social justice as they were at different periods in history may have secured the optimum benefits to women under the constraints that were then operating; and that in no sense were women ‘oppressed’, nor men unduly favored. It turns out that, if we take the blindfolds off, it’s apparent not just that people at the time perceived that women were not disadvantaged, but that indeed women were as privileged throughout history as they are today. The privilege that women enjoy is not contingent on any historical factors, but is biologically based.

It’s neither in pre-, nor late-medieval, but in recent history that supposed incontrovertible evidence exists that the lot of women was as the ‘oppressed’. Flagship status goes to the issue of the vote…[but] it turns out that the real struggle for the franchise was that of ordinary men – who paid the taxes and were drafted into the armed forces to fight the wars their taxes paid for. These were the people who for centuries, millennia even, were denied democracy, not women. Where women had a direct interest, they have always had the vote. So it was that from time immemorial women have been enfranchised in their local communities, and when issues that concerned women moved up to the national women, then women were given the parliamentary ballot in an historical blink of the eye.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here. 

Feminist Blogger: Society 'Robs the Hearts of Men'

Misguided feminists do occasionally acknowledge the problems men face in our society, under the rubric of PHMT (Patriarchy Hurts Men Too). I don't agree with their line of thinking, since I think the American patriarchy is a joke. (Under what "patriarchy" could a man be thrown out of his own house and cut off from his own kids on a restraining order, without even so much as a hearing, just because his wife claims, without any evidence, that he threatened her?)

OK, enough about that. I do like to compliment feminists when they try to be fair and understanding, and here's an example. In "Robbing the Hearts of Men," a recent blog post by blogger "PortlyDyke" of the popular feminist blog Shakesville, she writes:

"It's long been my view that sexism and misogyny do every bit as much damage to men as to women....I believe that the very things that men complain about -- needing to be 'the strong one', 'the provider', the 'bread-winner' -- are a direct result of sexism and misogyny which attempts to cast human beings in rigid gender-based roles from which they believe they cannot escape.

"I believe that the very things that men complain about -- feeling under- or un-appreciated, misunderstood, or unseen -- are compounded by the fact that the gender-based role of the guy is to be 'strong and silent' -- to "suck it up and be a man" -- because, if he's doing that, how are we supposed to know what's going on inside him?

"I think that, at the level of basic existence as a human being, any privilege obtained by being male in this culture is probably cold comfort when you consider the real toll that sexism and misogyny take on those who identify as, or are considered Man/Male/Men/Males.

"Here's one of the ways that I believe this toll is taken:

"In our society (at least), the following traits are considered primarily "female/womanly":

"Tender, Emotional, Vulnerable, Receptive, Passive, Compassionate.

"(OK -- you can argue with me about this if you want, but I challenge you to ask 10 people who you know to listen to these words read aloud -- without prepping them beforehand about the context of your query -- and ask them to assign the words as either Male or Female. I'm not saying that this is "what is so" about men and women, I'm saying that this is the overwhelmingly common cultural perception/expectation.)

"This is where the toll is paid:

"If you are living in a misogynist, sexist society where privilege is awarded automatically by virtue of manliness/maleness or perceived manliness/maleness, and therefore, being womanly/female is an undesirable (if not despicable) position, then you are going to work hard to avoid the culturally-acceptable traits of womanliness.

"This, I believe, is one of the tragedies of sexism for men in our culture -- the abrogation of their right to "have a heart" -- a full-range emotional body.

"Men feel -- because they're human. They experience moments of tenderness, and vulnerability, and emotion (yes, emotions other than rage) -- as well as moments of compassion, and receptivity, and passivity.

"The problem is: They can't express that without looking like a woman. Which, in a sexist, misogynist society, would be a bad thing. A thing that loses you jobs, and gets you called "pussy", and "mangina", and subjects you to suggestions that you "sit to pee" -- which would all be BAD, because being anything like a woman/female human is BAD.

"Bad and wrong.

"Eve-In-The-Garden-Bad-Apple Wrong.

"Condemning-The-Entire-Human-Race-To-An-Awful-Existence Wrong.

"This is one of the tolls of sexism and misogyny for men -- they are robbed of their hearts...

To read more and to discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

 High School Boy Suspended for 2 Days for Taking Phone Call from Dad--a Soldier in Iraq

As a former high school teacher, I can understand teachers' annoyance with cell phones and phone calls, but the school seems to have really overreacted here. Thanks to Kelly, a reader, for sending the story.

Student suspended for answering call from dad in Iraq
KXAN, 4/15/08

AUSTIN, Texas (KXAN) -- A call from a parent stationed in a war zone has landed a Texas high school student in hot water, and his mother is asking the school to ease up on the punishment.

The Copperas Cove High School sophomore received an urgent call from his father and was suspended after taking the call during class.

Master Sgt. Morris Hill is a world away in Iraq, so he had no idea that a simple call from the battlefield to his son, Brandon, would land the 16-year-old in a heap of trouble.

"He called me during class, because that's the only time that he could," said Brandon Hill, suspended for using a cell phone. "I answered the call as I was walking out of class. The teacher followed me out and said, ‘Oh what are you doing?' I said my dad was calling from Iraq, and I know he needs to talk to me."

At the high school, which is 85 miles from Austin, students are not allowed to carry cell phones.

Yet Pat Hill said before her husband left for Iraq, he made a special arrangement with the assistant principal.

"He had spoken with Mr. Fletcher," said Pat Hill. "He thought there was an agreement understood that if he called either Joshua or Brandon at school, that everything was fine.

Brandon Hill was sent to the office and suspended for two days for answering his father's call.

"It's crazy with everything that's going on," Brandon Hill said.

"If this would have been the last phone call from my husband, and he's in trouble for it and then has to deal with something happening to his dad that would be even harder," Pat Hill said. She added that she was outraged her son was suspended, and then it took a week to get a meeting with the principal.

Read the full article here.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

3 Deserving Dads, but Only 1 Gets to Be a Father...

In my recent blog post Father of Newborn 'Did Everything One Would Hope a Man in His Position Would Do'--but It Wasn't Enough, we discussed the case of an embattled California father, Jorge C., who fought a long, hard and ultimately unsuccessful battle to be a father to his baby boy.

The boy's birth was hidden from him and the mother gave the child up for adoption after, according to one judge, she had “engaged in a web of lies.”

The case was reminiscent to varying degrees of both the Anna Nicole Smith/Larry Birkhead/Dannielynn paternity case from last year and the Mark Huddleston case in New Mexico. Of the three cases, the only father to be reunited with his baby was Larry Birkhead (pictured), and that only occurred because the baby's mother died.

I co-authored a column on Birkhead and Huddleston last year--Anna Nicole Dispute Shows System's Flaws (Chicago Sun-Times, 3/10/07, Detroit News, 3/20/07). It appears below. Isn't Birkhead's little daughter beautiful? Reminds me of when my girl was that little--those were the days...

Anna Nicole Dispute Shows System's Flaws
By Jeffery M. Leving and Glenn Sacks

Behind the Anna Nicole Smith circus lies an important truth about fathers’ rights. The long line of opportunistic men who have lined up to be Smith’s baby’s dad since Smith’s death has diverted attention from the case’s key fact: photographer Larry Birkhead, Smith’s ex-boyfriend, has a legitimate claim to paternity. He has been thwarted for several months by the same legal maneuvers which are often employed to separate fathers from their children.

Long before Smith died and her estate became an issue, Birkhead had filed for a DNA test to determine the paternity of Smith's baby. In December he told the Associated Press, "I am the father of Dannielynn and I think this is...a crime. I expect to be reunited with my daughter." Birkhead says he and Smith had picked out baby names, shopped for items for the baby, and had put their thumb prints in a baby book as the child's parents. Nevertheless, the baby has lived at the home of Smith and her attorney/boyfriend Howard K. Stern in the Bahamas since birth.

Rather than allow the DNA test, Smith and Stern apparently decided to use a common ploy in paternity cases—they stalled. If the DNA test is delayed long enough, by the time biological paternity is established the judge deciding custody will likely decide that Stern is the baby’s “psychological parent.”

Judges are understandably reluctant to remove infants from the care of the only parent or parents they've known, regardless of actual paternity. Stern is many things, but he isn’t stupid. He knows that in child custody cases the baby is like the football in a football game—whoever has possession is in control.

This tactic is frequently employed in adoption cases...

To read more and to discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

Actress Michelle Rodriguez--Anti-Male Bigot?

Ann Friedman, editor of the prominent feminist blog www.feministing.com, praises a recent statement from actress Michelle Rodriguez in this new blog post:

"I wasn't surprised to read [Michelle's] awesome response to repeated prying questions from journalists about whether she's secretly into girls. She explains:

"'I picture [the journalists] turning into pigs, slime coming out the side of their mouth, and I picture them jerking off. I don't answer those questions.
 
"'I just keep it to myself and it's nobody's business. If I wanna f**k a girl, a boy, a dog, that's my business...What do you care who I'm dating? I can tell when somebody just wants to know about sex. And it makes me sick."

I'm considerably less enthusiastic about these comments than Friedman is. While I certainly defend Michelle Rodriguez's right to date men or women, have sex with men or women, and yes, marry a man or marry a woman, I'm not crazy about her description of male journalists "turning into pigs, slime coming out the side of their mouth, and...jerking off." I have several objections:

1) It's very dehumanizing. Journalists can be annoying, but they're human beings, not pigs or perverts.

2) The gender double standard. Were a male movie star to describe women journalists in an equally insulting way, the mainstream media would be all over it, including www.feministing.com, and the guy would be lucky to save his career.

3) She's stigmatizing male sexuality. Men are visual, men like pretty women, men want to have sex with pretty women. Nothing wrong with it.

4) Michelle Rodriguez is wealthy and famous in large part because she is beautiful. It hardly seems fair for her to then be full of rage because men see her as sexy and are interested in her sex life. The public is interested in the sex lives of Hollywood celebrities. Rodriguez has every right to not answer the question, but little justification in being so offended by it.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

Heroic Teen Boy Saves Kindergartener from Pit Bull Attack

A salute to 17-year-old Cody Phillips, who saved a five-year-old boy from a pit bull attack.

Teen saves child from dog attack
By DEON HAMPTON
Tulsa World, 4/15/2008
 
The 5-year-old apparently scaled a 6-foot fence and entered a yard containing pit bulls.
 
A Tulsa teen saved a child who was being attacked by a pair of pit bulls Saturday afternoon, authorities said.
 
Cody Phillips, 17, was cleaning the garage when he heard his mother scream, "They're attacking him."
 
"Him" was a 5-year-old boy who had wandered into a neighbor's yard.
 
Phillips, a Union High School student, rushed to the child's aid, scaring the dogs away.
 
"He's a hero," said Sgt. Jeff Davis.
 
Tulsa police responded to a dog-bite call in the 3700 block of 142nd East Ave. at 4 p.m., Davis said.
 
The boy, whose identity wasn't released, sustained multiple bites on his head and legs, officers said.
 
He was taken to a nearby hospital in good condition, Davis said.
 
Apparently, the boy, who lives two homes from Phillips, climbed over a 6-foot fence and into an adjacent yard where the two dogs were, police said.
 
Officers shot and killed one of the dogs, Davis said.
 
The other was taken to Tulsa Animal Shelter where quarantine tests for rabies will be conducted, he said.
 
If the tests are positive, the boy will have to undergo a series of rabies shots, Davis said.
 
Phillips and his mother, Shannon Ash, were cleaning the garage when Ash heard the boy screaming from next door.
 
Phillips rushed from the garage and jumped over his neighbor's fence to help the boy, Ash said.
 
"Blood was all over his head and legs," Phillips said.
 
"I was running so fast that I spooked the dogs and they ran in an opposite direction," he said.
 
"If it wasn't for Phillips, the child would have sustained more injuries," Davis said...
 
Read the full article here. Thanks to Bernie, a reader, for the story.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.
 

New Policy--The Word 'Nazi' Is Hereby Banned from My Blog (Part I)

"Godwin's law: As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one...Godwin's law is often cited in online discussions as a caution against the use of inflammatory rhetoric or exaggerated comparisons, especially fallacious arguments of the reductio ad Hitlerum form."--Wikipedia

Take a good look at the picture of Hitler--it's the last time you'll see or hear of him on my blog. I have long grown weary of Nazi analogies from blog commenters--we've had 750 different ones in the past year, according to my blog software.

I am banning the word "Nazi," "feminazi," and the name "Hitler." There are several reason for this:

1) The analogies are almost always spurious and often silly.

2) Reflecting the weakness of the American educational system and America's insularity, the individual involved usually does not know anything about the Nazis themselves, but simply doesn't know of any other tyrant to substitute, or thinks that other readers won't know of any. Usually "Nazi" is simply a way of saying "evil," with no particular reason to cite the Nazis in particular.

3) My family came from the town of Bialystok, once in Russia and now in eastern Poland. It was one of the first cities hit when Hitler invaded Russia on June 22, 1941, and the city was completely leveled. Between that and the Holocaust, most of my family was wiped out. When I visited Bialystok in 1984, I had my family's old address and other information, but the city had been so leveled and rebuilt that the information I had made no sense to anybody. Comparisons between this and anything happening to anybody in the United States today are beyond ludicrous.

Ned Holstein on the Polygamist Ranch Case: 'Texas officials have no explanation for the whereabouts of the 38 lost boys'

Background: In his recent blog post Texas Polygamy Case: 'Boys as Young as 13 Are Expelled from Group & Left to Fend for Themselves', Ned Holstein of Fathers & Families wrote:

"Recent news reports about a Texas polygamist compound highlight the abuse of underage girls by compelling them to marry men two or three times their age under threat of excommunication.

"But very little attention has been paid to the abuse and neglect of the boys. Even those as young as 13 are frequently expelled from the compound and forced to fend for themselves without education, friends, or adult guidance..."

Ned has done some further investigation into this issue, including questioning Texas officials about the whereabouts of the 38 'Lost Boys'. His newest post on the issue is below.

The 38 Lost Boys of Texas
by Ned Holstein, MD, MS
San Angelo, Texas--On Tuesday, I asked whether the state of Texas had any concern for underage boys who are expelled from polygamous sects. Today I have the answer:  No.

All children under age 18  --  numbering 416 children  --  were removed from the Yearning for Zion Ranch (YFZ). Of these 416, only 27 are teenage boys. The law of averages tells us there should have been about 65 teenage boys. Thus, there are about 38 missing teenage boys. Most likely they were expelled by sect leaders prior to the official raids.

But the state of Texas apparently has no concern about 38 young boys left to fend for themselves. Today I spoke with Chris Van Duesen, a spokesperson for the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services. According to him, there are no lost boys roaming the streets of Texas  -- the problem does not exist. He told me that if young boys were being expelled, the state would somehow know about it. Although boys are expelled in Utah, Van Deusen says it doesn’t happen in Texas. He has noticed that most of the children from YFZ are girls, but has no explanation for this peculiar fact. There are no plans to look for expelled boys...

Read more at Holstein's full post here.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

In Defense of Janet Jenkins, Lesbian Mom

According to Virginia Supreme Court to Weigh in on Lesbian Couple's Custody Battle (CNSNews.com, April 15, 2008):

"The Virginia Supreme Court will hear oral arguments Thursday in a case involving a lesbian couple fighting over who gets full custody of a five-year-old girl. Janet Jenkins, former partner of Lisa Miller, is suing for custody of Miller's biological daughter even though Jenkins is not an adoptive or biological parent.

"Jenkins and Miller (pictured with their baby) entered into a Vermont civil union in 2000 while living in Virginia. Miller got pregnant through artificial insemination from an anonymous donor and gave birth to her daughter in Virginia. The relationship eventually ended."

I've covered this case on numerous occasions. After their breakup, Miller, the biological mother, moved to Virginia with their daughter Isabella, won sole custody, and excluded Jenkins from the girl’s life. Miller’s actions read like a checklist of what heterosexual women sometimes do to the fathers of their children, including: move the child far away; deny the noncustodial parent the opportunity to visit or co-parent the child; make an unsupported, dubious and oh-so-convenient accusation of abuse against the noncustodial parent; and pretend that the noncustodial parent is out-of-line or acting against the child’s best interests by wanting to continue the relationship with the child.

In my co-authored column, Ruling in Vermont Same-Sex Child Custody Case: Lesbian Moms, Divorced Dads in Same Boat (Rutland Herald & various others, 12/10/06), I supported lesbian social mom Janet Jenkins in her struggle to remain a part of her daughter's life. I wrote:

"In a highly-publicized new decision, a Virginia appeals court ruled recently in favor of a lesbian social/non-biological mother in her custody battle against her child’s biological mother. The former couple, Lisa Miller and Janet Jenkins, joined in a same-sex civil union in Vermont in 2000 and had a child together in 2002. After their breakup, Miller, the biological mother, moved to Virginia with their daughter Isabella, won sole custody, and excluded Jenkins from the girl’s life.

"Opponents of gay marriage, gay activists and the media have focused almost exclusively on the new decision’s impact on same-sex marriage. Lost in this, however, is the fact that the case is a textbook example of one of America’s greatest social problems—the refusal of many divorcing mothers to allow their children to continue to have a relationship with their former spouses.

"During Jenkins’ and Miller’s same sex-union Jenkins did everything she could do to be a good parent to their child. She was involved with the pregnancy from the beginning, was present in the delivery room, worked to support the family, and played an important role in Isabella’s life. Following their breakup she was granted visitation rights but Miller refused to comply. After the new ruling, Miller's side vowed to further appeal the case to deny Jenkins access to the girl. Miller says she does not want Jenkins to have any visitation rights, and has not allowed her to see their daughter since 2004.

"Increasingly, other lesbian social mothers are suffering similar injustices. For example, in the A.H. v. M.P. case currently before the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, the trial court ruled against A.H., a lesbian social mother, who had been the primary breadwinner for her partner M.P. and their young son. After separation M.P. sought to minimize A.H.'s role in the boy’s life, arguing that since A.H. was not the child’s primary caregiver, she should not receive joint custody of the boy...

"The problems heterosexual mothers create for their children and their ex-partners have been largely ignored, partly due to misleading stereotypes of abusive and/or 'deadbeat' fathers. Today fit, loving, lesbian social mothers like Jenkins and A.H. and their children face similar mistreatment. Ladies, welcome to the club."

To learn more, see my blog posts Lesbian Mom Describes How She Got the Dad Treatment, Part I & Part II.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

Four More States Proclaim April 25th as Parental Alienation Awareness Day

The Parental Alienation Awareness Organization/ www.Parental-Alienation-Awareness.com has made more progress in gaining recognition of Parental Alienation, as three new states now recognize Parental Alienation Awareness Day--Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, and New York. This brings the total to 13 U.S. states, as well as Bermuda.

To learn more about Parental Alienation Awareness Day, visit the Parental Alienation Awareness Organization's website www.Parental-Alienation-Awareness.com. To learn how to get involved, contact Sarvy Emo at Tel: 416-840-5654, Fax: 866-232-8134 or at info@parental-alienation-awareness.com.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

A Men's Rights Activist's Craigslist Personal Ad

Jim, a men's activist and a reader, recently sent me a personal ad that he put on Craigslist about a year ago. The ad he wrote is reprinted below. Jim says, "Funny thing is, I didn't get a single reply."

I suppose some readers will think the ad is great, but frankly what I see is a guy throwing a ton of unfair stereotypes and anger at his potential dates, just as feminist-minded women so often throw their anti-male prejudices and bitterness at men. Back in my dating years I didn't