This interesting Australian parenting/child abuse PSA shows males in a worse light than females, but it does at least make a tangible effort to be gender-balanced.

I would have liked it more if they had cut out the last scene, or if they had made it gender neutral, or included both genders.

The PSA is "Children See, Children Do." To watch, click here.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

Thanks to Damon, a reader, for sending it.
 

Parental-Alienation-Awareness.com Stop Parental Alienation--a terrible form of Child Abuse. Nine states have now officially recognized Parental Alienation Awareness Day. To learn more, go to Parental-Alienation-Awareness.com.

The Rogue Wallet: a Scientific, Stylish Solution Sometimes great ideas come in unexpected shapes. The Rogue Wallet, the only wallet with a revolutionary curved edge, is designed to fit comfortably in your front pocket. Carrying your wallet in your front pocket makes sense for many reasons, in particular because doing so alleviates back pain caused by sitting on a traditional wallet. Inventor Michael Lyons designed the Rogue Wallet specifically with this purpose in mind. www.roguewallet.com

His Side with Glenn Sacks Radio Commentary: Ned Holstein on New Research on Move-Aways

My recent His Side with Glenn Sacks radio commentary for KLAA AM 830 in Los Angeles discusses some new research on post-divorce moveways. These move-aways are often a devastating blow to the relationship between children and their noncustodial parents. Ned Holstein, MD, MS, Executive Director of Fathers & Families, recently complied some new research on the issue.

To listen to the commentary, click here.

To learn more, see my blog post Ned Holstein on New Research on Move-Aways.

His Side with Glenn Sacks radio commentaries are broadcast daily on KLAA AM 830, a 50,000 watt talk station in Los Angeles and Orange County. KLAA AM 830 is owned by Arte Moreno, owner of the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.

From 2003-2005, His Side with Glenn Sacks ran in a syndicated talk show format in Los Angeles, New York City, Boston, Seattle, and other cities. To listen to show archives, click here.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

'I'm rumblin' in this JCB. I'm 5 years old and my dad's a giant sitting beside me' (Music Video)

"Well, I'm rumblin' in this JCB. I'm 5 years old and my dad's a giant sitting beside me.

"And the engine rattles my bum like berserk, While we're singin, 'Don't forget your shovel if you want to go to work!'

"My dad's probably had a bloody hard day, But he's been good fun and bubblin and jokin' away, And the procession of cars stuck behind are gettin all impatient and angry, but we dont mind. An' we're holdin' up the bypass, Me and my dad havin' a top laugh" 

The JCB Song by the band Nizlopi  is a sweet song by a man talking about spending time with his dad when he was a kid.  To say that we need more of this in our culture would be the understatement of the century.

To watch the music video, click here. Thanks to George, a reader, for sending it.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

His Side with Glenn Sacks Radio Commentary: The Disappearing Dad

My recent His Side with Glenn Sacks radio commentary for KLAA AM 830 in Los Angeles discusses Indianapolis Star cartoonist Gary Varvel's so-true-it's-painful depiction of the fatherless modern American family (pictured). The picture in the upper left of the album is the saddest of all.

To listen to the commentary, click here.

To learn more, see my blog post So Heartbreaking and So True.

His Side with Glenn Sacks radio commentaries are broadcast daily on KLAA AM 830, a 50,000 watt talk station in Los Angeles and Orange County. KLAA AM 830 is owned by Arte Moreno, owner of the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.

From 2003-2005, His Side with Glenn Sacks ran in a syndicated talk show format in Los Angeles, New York City, Boston, Seattle, and other cities. To listen to show archives, click here.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

The Feminist Majority's 'This Is What a Feminist Looks Like'

The video below is the Feminist Majority Foundation's 'This Is What a Feminist Looks Like' promotional video. The video features several celebrities and numerous others proclaiming their loyalty to feminism, and explaining what feminism means to them.

The views of what feminism is sound a lot more like what feminism is supposed to be than what it really is. If modern feminism was closer to the former, it would not meet nearly as much opposition, including from me.

As a whole the video is reasonable enough, and is probably an effective public relations tool for the Feminist Majority Foundation. There is, however, one short part of the video which annoyed me--anybody care to guess what it was?

The video can be seen here.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

Rocky & His Wife

One of the things I like the most about the movie Rocky Balboa (2006) is the way Rocky feels about his late wife Adrian. He speaks of her reverently and visits her grave often, always bringing fresh flowers.

Adrian loved Rocky for who he was, instead of resenting who he wasn't. She cherished the things he did, as opposed to carping about the things he didn't do.

In return, Rocky was loyal and kept his affection and love for her, even after he became famous and could have traded her for a "better" woman, as some men do. There's a kind of working man's dignity to Rocky's affection for her that is very touching.

In the previous clip from the movie that I blogged about (see Some Great Fatherly Advice from Rocky Balboa) Rocky reminds his son "don't forget to visit your mother." The next day they both meet by chance at Adrian's grave.

In the clip below, Rocky is thinking about Adrian on their anniversary, revisiting the ice skating rink where they had met many years before. He's with Paulie, Adrian's brother.

To watch, click here.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

When Women Attack Men, the Men Deserved It

Yes, it's just a comic, but it's indicative of the societal norm that when women attack their husbands/boyfriends/exes, it's no big deal because, after all, they deserved it.

From Dana Summers' comic Bound and Gagged.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

Website Outages and a Plague of Locusts...

I apologize for the website outages we've been having--our hosting company, 1and1, has been having a problem with UDEV, and it has led to outages throughout their servers for many weeks. Supposedly the problem is being resolved.

In addition to repeated web outages, I've been laid up with the flu and have had no strength for the past several days, and the previous week I was in a car accident.

If anybody has any miracle cures for my flu or my website, I'd be happy to hear them...

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

Steve Moxon: 'A naturally-evolved prejudice against men can be shown experimentally'

"[A] naturally-evolved prejudice against men can be shown experimentally if you arbitrarily label or describe individuals to distinguish between them according to social status, and then get strangers to look at or assess their behavior. 

"They will underestimate and ‘do down’ the lower-ranked individuals, and even elevate those of higher status...this sets up a profound prejudice against the great majority of males, because status is how men (but not women) are judged."
 
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--The Real ‘Power’--is below, along with Norman's comments.

The Woman Racket - Chapter 3: The Real ‘Power’
 
‘Power’ and ‘dominance’
   
“Our mistaken beliefs about the sexes are derived from a false idea about 'power.' Men supposedly exercise some sort of ‘power’ over women. But it is never properly explained what this ‘power’ is. It alternates between being either some essence of man, or something that is not inherent in men but instead is to do with a historical invention of what men are, or supposedly should be. The latter is the idea that somehow masculinity is not natural, but results from contamination by a cultural virus, and to such an extent that men have become the embodiment of it. The opposing and simultaneously-held position is that masculinity is natural.
 
“The point is that these two mutually-contradictory views have to be held together, because masculinity can hardly be universally inculcated in men by society if the basis is not in man in the first place. Society is only the representation of human psychology, after all. The notion falls at this very first hurdle, but nevertheless it currently holds sway to underpin all discussion about the sexes, virtually unquestioned. This supposed cultural and psychological ‘patriarchy’ is reckoned to be the basis of our current social ills…
 
The ‘folk prejudice’ against men
 
“[A] naturally-evolved prejudice against men can be shown experimentally if you arbitrarily label or describe individuals to distinguish between them according to social status, and then get strangers to look at or assess their behavior.  They will underestimate and ‘do down’ the lower-ranked individuals*, and even elevate those of higher status...this sets up a profound prejudice against the great majority of males, because status is how men (but not women, as I will explain) are judged...

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

Girls Playing Sports Against Boys

Holly Bowne's story Feminism may go too far in girls vs. boys (Detroit Free Press, 3/28/08) and my blog post Holly Bowne: 'I saw a female player punch one of our boys in the back of his head...my son's face was smashed into the boards by another' reminded me of an incident that took place with my son at a skateboard park several years ago.

I used to take my son Saturday mornings to go skateboarding, but one time when we went they were filming a children's show there. My son and the others were encouraged to be the audience/extras for the show.

It turned out that it was one of those Saturday kids' shows, and it was about this great girl skateboarder who was the victim of boy skateboarders' sexism. The sexism was that the boys didn't believe that a girl could or would really do dangerous skateboard stunts. The boys were, of course, made to look like fools for this belief.

I watched as they filmed the dangerous skateboard stunts that the girl would do to show what sexist idiots the boys are. A teenage girl went up to the top of a tremendously tall ramp, got on her skateboard, and bent down to begin. Then she stopped, and her stunt double came on, similarly dressed.

The stunt double did a bunch of amazing stunts, and I said to my son, "Wow, that girl can really skate!" Then I looked a little closer and saw that it wasn't a girl at all--it was a boy dressed to look like a girl.

In other words, the point of the show was to make fun of the boys for thinking that a girl couldn't or wouldn't do dangerous skateboard stunts, and in order to film it, they had a boy do all the dangerous skateboard stunts for the girl. Nice, huh?

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

The Feminist Dissident: 'Sexism Makes It Harder for Hillary Clinton to Win'

"[I]n the political arena, you can get away with being nastier to women, as women, than you can being nasty to black as blacks...[there is a] sexist gauntlet that Hillary Clinton has had to run in this primary campaign...

"It doesn’t take a trained feminist theoretician to deduce that much of the hostility directed at Hillary has a sexist tinge...[Hillary] taps into all sorts of sexist anger at, and fear of, women."--Dan Oppenheimer, The Feminist Dissident  

The purpose of "The Feminist Dissident" is to give feminists a chance to speak directly to my audience, and my audience to debate the issues with them in a civil manner. To read previous entries, click here.

The first two contributors to this are male feminist bloggers Dan Oppenheimer and Jamie Berger of the blog Masculinity and its Discontents. If you are a feminist and are interested in submitting a blog post, please email me at glenn@glennsacks.com.

On Katha & Hillary
By Dan Oppenheimer

In my first post for Glenn, I didn’t focus much on what’s perhaps the most significant reason that I associate myself with feminism. It’s that there are some feminist writers whose writing has been meaningful to me, and whose insights have enabled me (I believe) to understand the world more deeply.

One of my favorite feminist writers, over the years, has been Katha Pollitt. I’ve been reading her since my father first bought me a subscription to The Nation in my freshman year of college, and have rarely been disappointed (I used to get annoyed that she seemed so annoyed by Christopher Hitchens, but these days I’m thinking that maybe she knew the Hitch better than I did).

She’s smart. She’s funny. She’s passionate. She’s willing to be vulnerable (in her latest book of essays, for example, she writes at great length on her capacity for self-deception).  And, above all, her perception of political reality has helped illuminate mine in a way that’s felt valuable.

Take this recent column, for instance, in which she disagrees with feminist icon Gloria Steinem about whether, in the contest for the presidency, being a woman or being black is more of a handicap. She writes:

"I’ve written many times about sexist attacks on Hillary Clinton as an old, ugly, castrating witch-and-what-rhymes-with-it, but Gloria Steinem’s New York Times op-ed in defense of her, 'Women Are Never the Front-Runners,' was not helpful, to put it mildly. 'Gender is probably the most restricting force in American life,' Steinem wrote. 'Black men were given the vote a half-century before women of any race were allowed to mark a ballot, and generally have ascended to positions of power, from the military to the boardroom, before any women (with the possible exception of obedient family members in the latter).' Yes, black men got the vote first, although they could be lynched for using it. Shirley Chisholm, the black Congresswoman who ran for President in 1972, did famously write, 'Of my two handicaps, being female put many more obstacles in my path than being black.' But Barack Obama is only the third black senator in the modern era; Deval Patrick is only the second black governor. It may be true, as Steinem suggests, that 'the sex barrier [is] not taken as seriously as the racial one.' But that doesn’t mean the racial barrier really is less serious. It just means that the public expression of racism is beyond the pale in a way that the public expression of misogyny is not."

There’s a lot going on here, from my perspective, that’s good. There’s the recognition of the complexity of the matter. There’s the courageous, if gentle, dissent from Gloria Steinem, a dissent that only helps to open up space in the feminist discourse for disagreement. There’s the felicitous writing (“Yes, black men got the vote first, although they could be lynched for using it” is a wicked sentence). And there’s the precision of her location of the important distinction: in the political arena, you can get away with being nastier to women, as women, than you can being nasty to black as blacks, but that’s just one fault line in the complicated matrix of challenges that any political aspirant faces.

What’s also appealing to me, in this column, is the excellently concise job she does summarizing the sexist gauntlet that Hillary Clinton has had to run in this primary campaign. She writes:

"The media are hopelessly sexist and relentlessly trivial. So much we’ve learned from the mass hysteria over Hillary Clinton’s 'emotional moment' in New Hampshire. (Seattle Post-Intelligencer columnist Robert L. Jamieson: 'She morphed into a "compassion brand"--like, irony of ironies, Kleenex'; New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd: 'Can Hillary Cry Her Way Back to the White House?') Even Southern charmer John Edwards couldn’t resist observing that a commander in chief needed 'strength and resolve'—a view echoed by Fox commentator Dick Morris ('There could well come a time when there is such a serious threat to the United States that she breaks down') and given full misogynous display by nationally syndicated cartoonist Pat Oliphant’s 'Madam President Meets the Bad Guys,' portraying a dumpy, tearful Hillary surrounded by Osama, Kim Jong Il and similar. All this fuss over a welling of the eyes so brief that if you blinked your own you’d miss it. I have moments like that every day! This was the Dean Scream all over again: a nano-nothing whipped into a self-congratulatory media typhoon."

It doesn’t take a trained feminist theoretician to deduce that much of the hostility directed at Hillary has a sexist tinge...

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

My daughter found a 60-year-old book of Bible stories among our many books, and has been asking me to read it to her as a bedtime story lately. When we came to Genesis 39--the story of Joseph and Potiphar's Wife--I had to laugh. I guess women ruining men's lives by making false accusations isn't anything new.

The passage is below. The painting is of Joseph rebuffing Potiphar's Wife's advances--an act which stripped him of his good job and landed him in prison.

Genesis 39: Joseph and Potiphar's Wife

1 Now Joseph had been taken down to Egypt. Potiphar, an Egyptian who was one of Pharaoh's officials, the captain of the guard, bought him from the Ishmaelites who had taken him there.

2 The LORD was with Joseph and he prospered, and he lived in the house of his Egyptian master.

3 When his master saw that the LORD was with him and that the LORD gave him success in everything he did,

4 Joseph found favor in his eyes and became his attendant. Potiphar put him in charge of his household, and he entrusted to his care everything he owned.

5 From the time he put him in charge of his household and of all that he owned, the LORD blessed the household of the Egyptian because of Joseph. The blessing of the LORD was on everything Potiphar had, both in the house and in the field.

6 So he left in Joseph's care everything he had; with Joseph in charge, he did not concern himself with anything except the food he ate.
Now Joseph was well-built and handsome,

7 and after a while his master's wife took notice of Joseph and said, "Come to bed with me!"

8 But he refused. "With me in charge," he told her, "my master does not concern himself with anything in the house; everything he owns he has entrusted to my care.

9 No one is greater in this house than I am. My master has withheld nothing from me except you, because you are his wife. How then could I do such a wicked thing and sin against God?"

10 And though she spoke to Joseph day after day, he refused to go to bed with her or even be with her.

11 One day he went into the house to attend to his duties, and none of the household servants was inside.

12 She caught him by his cloak and said, "Come to bed with me!" But he left his cloak in her hand and ran out of the house.

13 When she saw that he had left his cloak in her hand and had run out of the house,

14 she called her household servants. "Look," she said to them, "this Hebrew has been brought to us to make sport of us! He came in here to sleep with me, but I screamed.

15 When he heard me scream for help, he left his cloak beside me and ran out of the house."

16 She kept his cloak beside her until his master came home.

17 Then she told him this story: "That Hebrew slave you brought us came to me to make sport of me.

18 But as soon as I screamed for help, he left his cloak beside me and ran out of the house."

19 When his master heard the story his wife told him, saying, "This is how your slave treated me," he burned with anger.

20 Joseph's master took him and put him in prison, the place where the king's prisoners were confined.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

Feministing: 'Immigration agent rapes woman seeking green card'

In the leading feminist blog feministing.com, Jessica Valenti writes:

"This is going to ruin your afternoon. Just a warning. Isaac R. Baichu, 46, began calling a 22 year-old Colombian woman after receiving her cell phone number at a green card interview last year.

"He hinted, she said, at his power to derail her life and deport her relatives, alluding to a brush she had with the law before her marriage. He summoned her to a private meeting. And at noon on Dec. 21, in a parked car on Queens Boulevard, he named his price — not realizing that she was recording everything on the cellphone in her purse.

"'I want sex,' he said on the recording. 'One or two times. That’s all. You get your green card. You won’t have to see me anymore.'

"Before she left his car, he demanded oral sex to 'know that you’re serious.'"

Valenti says "he raped her" and criticizes the New York Times article for not labeling it "rape," but instead saying that "he got his way."

Valenti's comment is fair enough, but it seems to me that, assuming the crime did occur as described, the accurate description might be "rape under color of authority." Any lawyers here know the answer?

The full blog post is Immigration agent rapes woman seeking green card.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

Fathers & Families News Digest, 4/8/08

Below are some recent articles and items of interest from Fathers & Families' latest News Digest.

Former state employees sentenced to probation in child-support thefts (Statesman Journal, 3/31/08)

Missouri senator still fighting for dads' rights (MyFoxKC.com, 4/1/08)

Ex-wife who tried to have husband killed contests fees (Maryland Daily Record, 4/1/08)

Computer error on child support disrupts finances of local family (Akron Beacon Journal, 4/3/08)

Father old to cough up 24000 pounds for unknown daughter (Kent Online, 4/3/08)

Mom tries for support money but state gets it first (Quad-Cities Online, 4/4/08)

Bill ensures those in military will not lose child custody (KCRG, 4/4/08)

Child support payments fall in with economy (Times Daily, 4/5/08)

Market slump makes divorce more difficult (San Francisco Chronicle, 4/6/08)

Quickie divorce now just a simple click away (news.com.au, 4/8/08)

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here, or visit the Fathers & Families blog here.

'The lesbian biological mom does to her ex exactly what heterosexual mothers so often do to their ex-husbands...'

Over the past year I have written a column and several blog posts on the issue of the rights of lesbian “social mothers”–women who agreed to employ a sperm donor so that they could have children with their lesbian partners, who are the biological mothers.

I do believe that children fare best when they have both a mom and a dad, and that fathers offer much to children that mothers don’t provide. However, this is not possible in lesbian couples.

When two lesbians agree to have a child together, and when the child has bonded with both his or her biological mother and his or her social mother, I believe that the relationship between the child and the social mother should be protected. I also believe that the biological mother has a responsibility to her children and to her former partner to hold up her end of the deal with the partner with whom she created the child, and that courts should hold her to her commitment.

These cases are now becoming routine--when the relationship goes sour, the lesbian biological mom does to her ex exactly what heterosexual mothers so often do to their ex-husbands--drive her out of her child’s life. When heterosexual women do this our society makes excuses for them and assumes that the ex-husband must have done something bad to merit it. With these lesbian breakups we can see the truth much clearer--some women (straight or gay) are vindictive, and this vindictiveness drives them to purge their exes from their children’s lives.

In this case, the lesbian couple legally committed themselves to having joint custody, and now the biological mother is trying to employ the Ohio ban on gay marriage in order to deprive her ex of a role in their child's life.

Woman Argues Ohio Anti-Gay Amendment Bars Ex From Sharing Custody
365Gay.com, 3/26/08

(Columbus, Ohio) An Ohio woman says the state's ban on same-sex marriage is grounds for barring her ex-partner from sharing custody with her son."

Thursday the Court of Appeals will hear her case. Last June a judge in Columbus ruled that the amendment has no bearing on a signed agreement between Denise Fairchild and Therese Leach that they would share custody of the boy, now aged 11.

The dispute over custody began in 2005 after the women ended their relationship.

After their son was born in 1996, both women parented him. In order to ensure that Leach had a protected legal relationship with the child, the two women signed a joint custody agreement.  Such agreements were approved by the Ohio Supreme Court in 2001. 

That same year an Ohio court approved the joint custody agreement stating they would share custody.

After Leach and Fairchild broke up, Fairchild sought to terminate the custody agreement, citing the 2004 state amendment limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples.
In addition to banning same-sex marriage the amendment, known as Issue 1, says the state "and its political subdivisions shall not create or recognize a legal status for relationships of unmarried individuals that intends to approximate the design, qualities, significance or effect of marriage." 

Lawyers for Fairchild argued in Franklin County's domestic relations court that the amendment extends to adoption.

Magistrate Darrolyn Krippel ruled that the amendment to the state constitution could not apply in the case

"Granting custody of a minor child to a nonparent is done every day," Krippel said in a written opinion.

The judgment noted that family courts regularly settle custody disputes between unmarried people and even people of the same sex.

"The granting of custody to these nonparents is not against public policy," Krippel's ruling said.

Read the full article here.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

Dr. Warren Farrell's Shared Parenting Evidence Kit--What You Need to Win Shared Physical Custody Dr. Warren Farrell, a top expert on children of divorce now offers a complete evidence kit to help you win shared custody.  The DVDs, audio CD and electronic files summarize the best scientific research available collected over decades.  Scientific research has proven that children do far better with near equal time with both parents with minimal conditions.  This video set was developed to educate parents, judges, lawyers, psychologists and other divorce professionals. Most judges are doing exactly what is worst for children with sole-custody.  Submitted as evidence this will maximize your chances. Divorce Reform groups call(508) 381-1450 to use as fundraiser. www.BestInterestofChildren.org

Help for Michigan Dads Michigan family law attorney Mindy L. Hitchcock has experience fighting for noncustodial parents against Michigan's abusive FOC. Her holistic approach to divorce gets results for her clients while avoiding the scorched earth approach to law that leaves families emotionally and financially devastated. Lady4Justice.com

Shull Case Update: Another Outrageous Example of the Female Criminal Justice Discount

Background: Conscientious Virginia judge James Michael Shull (pictured below), who smoked out a woman who sought to extend a restraining order based on false charges of domestic violence, was removed from the bench last fall by this Virginia Supreme Court ruling. Not only was Shull railroaded, but he has been the target of widely-disseminated misleading reporting.

To learn more about the case, see my blog posts In Defense of Judge James Michael Shull (Part I), Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V, Part VI, and Part VII, read my co-authored newspaper column defending Shull here, or click here. 

The lying mother who cost Judge Shull his career abducted her child from the custody of her ex-husband in February, and her case appeared on America's Most Wanted. On February 22, Huffman-Giza had been found guilty of welfare fraud and sentenced to prison. However, instead of going to prison, she was given two years supervised probation. From America's  Most Wanted:

"According to police, Brayden was taken by his biological but non-custodial mother, 32-year-old Tammy Huffman-Giza the weekend prior, when Brayden's father brought the child over to her apartment in Coeburn, Va. for a visit.

"Cops say when the father went to pick up Brayden, the apartment was empty -- except for a letter Huffman-Giza allegedly penned before taking off with the child. In the letter, police say Huffman-Giza wrote she had met someone named 'Richard' online, and that she'd made plans to go to London, England to meet him. Police have issued a felony warrant for Tammy, charging her with child abduction."

Huffman-Giza was caught on February 27 and the 8-year-old boy returned. Below is an update from a reader who lives in Wise County, Virginia:

"Glenn--I have just learned that Tammy Huffman-Giza was let out by Wise County, Virginia authorities, ostensibly to get medical treatment. She then absconded from the jurisdiction and is believed to be in Kentucky. They are apparently trying to keep this quiet. However, to let a woman or any prisoner out of jail with her history seems ludicrous."

Letting her out is not "ludicrous"--it's the female criminal justice discount. Let's briefly recap:

She was caught in a bald-faced lie, falsely claiming domestic violence when she had in fact cut herself. None of the parties in the case on any side even disputed that she had lied.

She had attempted to defraud the court in order to deprive a father of his children. None of the parties in the case on any side even disputed that she had tried to defraud the court.

She had a rap sheet as long as your arm, a small part of which is displayed above.

Judge Shull conscientiously did what he needed to do to protect vulnerable children caught in a very difficult situation.  Shull was removed anyway by a decision of the Virginia Supreme Court last fall.

Having been let out of a jail sentence, Tammy Huffman-Giza returns the favor by adducting her son, attempting to kidnap him to England. She is caught.

She is let out of jail as a temporary favor to her, and she flees to another state.

This is the woman Judge Shull tried to protect two young children from. This is the woman who cost Judge Shull his career.

I wonder how the Virginia Supreme Court feels about it now?

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

Dayton Rape Case: Acquitted Man Is Publicly Named but Accuser Isn't

"A Darke County jury has acquitted a Dayton man accused of raping a woman after he arrived to turn off the power to her home. Ali Drew Warner, who works for a DP&L contractor, had been indicted in November on a felony count of rape and a felony count of aggravated burglary.

"Warner was stopped by a deputy Oct. 30 when he drove by his alleged victim's house on Grubbs-Rex Road less than 40 minutes after she called 911 to report the assault. He was later arrested. According to a court document, the 32-year-old woman called DP&L to verify the disconnect order after Warner showed up at her residence unannounced. She said Warner then ordered her to hang up the phone.

"She asked how to avoid having the power disconnected. She said Warner told her she could have sex with him. When she refused, he allegedly raped her. She suffered minor injuries, according to the sheriff's office. Her 2-year-old daughter was home at the time.  

"Warner, 27, was released Thursday after nearly five months in jail. The jury deliberated about 90 minutes before finding him not guilty on both counts."

Barry, a reader, writes:

"Of course no mention of the suffering Warner went through in his five months of jail or what his family had to go through.  All because a woman didn't want her power disconnected."

I would like to think that the prosecutors had good evidence before they decided to prosecute, but these days that's far from a given. The short time to acquit doesn't give one much confidence in the prosecution's case.

It sounds like a he said/she said case, but I don't know the details. Barry's point is a fair one, though--if it was a false charge, it's a terrible injustice that Warner had to spend five months in jail over it. Also, he is publicly named (and humiliated), whereas his accuser's identity is not disclosed.

To be fair, Warner does have a prior criminal record which includes break-ins, and he was only being held on $10,000 bond.

The full article is Man accused of rape acquitted by jury (Dayton Daily News, 3/28/08).

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

This Dad Sounds More Like a Hero than a Criminal

"When a 15-year-old girl sneaked out of the house for the umpteenth time to meet her drug-dealing boyfriend at a party, her father went after her in his truck.

"He spotted her at a pay phone near their home outside Picton, Ont., and told her to get in. She refused, and he grabbed her by the shirt and shoved her into the truck. They headed home, but the girl took off again and made it to the party. The parents managed to get their daughter home later, but only after calling police for help.

"The shirt-grabbing incident didn't end there. The father, who can't be named to protect his daughter's identity, was charged with assault, setting off a two-year legal battle that tested the limits of how far a parent can go to discipline a teen under the Criminal Code. "Judge Griffin...convicted the father on one assault charge.

"'I held my head up and stuck by it and hoped for the best,' he said yesterday.

"He appealed to the Ontario Superior Court. In a ruling made on March 13 and released yesterday, Madam Justice Cheryl Robertson overturned the conviction and ruled that Section 43 did apply to teenagers...

"The judge noted the family's difficult history with the girl, their third child. She had been rebellious for years, and the parents had won a restraining order against the boyfriend, who had a history of drug abuse and violence. At one point, the parents found letters from the boyfriend instructing their daughter to 'kill the sluts when nobody is around,' the judge noted...

"Crown attorney Hilary Whitmey said she has not decided whether to appeal the ruling.

"The father hopes his legal saga has ended. His daughter, now 17, is back at home and things are going somewhat better, he said. When asked if he had any advice for parents facing similar problems, he replied:

"'You got to do what you think is best for them. ... It's really tough, I'll tell you, it's really tough.'"

Let's see, she's running away to be with her violent, drug dealer boyfriend and dad goes and grabs her and brings her back home. For this, he has spent the last several years trying to stay out of jail. Gives you a pretty good clue as to why we have so many screwed up kids.

The father said it all--when you have kids, "You got to do what you think is best for them."

The full story is Father knows best: Dad cleared of assaulting rebellious teen daughter (Globe & Mail, 4/1/08)--thanks to Jeremy Swanson for sending it.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

New Law Will Punish Men Based on How a Woman 'Feels'

"Bar managers and store owners face large-scale compensation claims if their customers ogle their barmaids, waitresses or check-out staff. New sex discrimination laws also mean that landlords who allow loud sexist jokes or banter among drinkers could be taken before a tribunal.

"The regulations say that bosses are responsible for protecting their staff from sexual harassment by customers - and that those who fail to do so can face unlimited compensation claims. They mean that a pub landlord could be sued if a bar worker complains about being called 'love', or over customers telling each other off-colour jokes.

"Restaurant managers or hoteliers risk action if staff object to backchat from diners or guests asking for a date. Lawyers said yesterday that businesses will need to show they have tried to clamp down on sexual harassment of workers by customers if they are to guard against the risk of compensation claims...

"The regulations were pushed through by Women and Equalities Minister Harriet Harman, who has powers under European legislation to amend discrimination law.

"Miss Harman has used a statutory instrument that does not require a division or debate in Parliament. Complying with the rules is likely to cost 'micro and small' businesses more than £10million, according to an assessment by the Government Equalities Office...the regulations - which will come into force on Sunday - have sweeping implications for employers, especially in the pub, restaurant and hotel trade...

"The rules allow tribunals to award unlimited damages for injury to feelings if a case is proved...The kind of behaviour that amounts to harassment will be for a tribunal to decide. If an employee can prove she was hurt or upset, being called 'love' or 'darling' repeatedly might be enough to win compensation."

Great. We get:

1) Another way a man is right or wrong based not on his objective behavior but instead on how a woman "feels."

2) A new way to punish men and scold them for their alleged misbehavior.

3) Another way for feminist attorneys to shake down business owners.

The architect of this is England's arbiter of mortality and feminist avenger Harriet Harman, Women and Equalities Minister (pictured).

Perhaps the least surprising sentence in the whole article is "Harman has used a statutory instrument that does not require a division or debate in Parliament." No kidding.

The full article is Don't call the barmaid 'love', by order of Harriet Harman (Daily Mail, 3/31/08)

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

Daughter Wants a Checkbook Reunion with Her Dad

Below is a recent letter I received via my Family Law Help Form:

"I am writing in reference to myself. I am thirty-years-old. I just recently met my alleged father last year. He now wants to take a DNA test.

"He has never gave me one penny. My question is--if he is the father, is there anything I could do as far as back pay? If he has any property or assets, would I be entitled to anything?"

What a touching father-daughter reunion...

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

Readers Again Fire Back in Brandweek over Anti-Male Advertising

"Background: Brandweek Magazine is one of the largest publications in the advertising world, and it has repeatedly covered the problem of anti-male advertising, as well as our efforts to combat it. To learn more about Brandweek's commendable coverage, click here.

Brandweek Senior Reporter Mike Beirne got it right in his recent piece about men and fathers in advertising--Marketers used to venerate the father figure. So why are they making him look like such an ass? (3/3/08). Beirne discusses our campaigns against anti-male advertising and quotes several authorities in the advertising world who sympathize with us. He also details numerous anti-male/anti-father ads, largely the ones we've covered and criticized on this blog over the past year.

Several of our readers--including Deborah Sbarra, Rick Panditaratne, Peter Hackmeister, and Darrin Albert--wrote Letters to the Editor which were published in Letters: Dads Deserve Better Deal In Today's Advertising (Brandweek, 3/17/08). Panditaratne wrote:

"Regarding the portrayal of dads in the media and Spike TV channeling its attention to dads:

"It's about time that dads received their due respect for loving and raising their children. We do just as much as women today, but it rarely gets noticed.

"It's always the negative stereotypes that are promoted in the media. For too long we've been neglected, mocked and ridiculed. I am appalled and outraged at the lack of positive influences of men in the media.

"I realize why men are shying off of marriage and complain about our family law system. It's all directly related to the way men are perceived in what we hear, read and see. I hope dads will keep fighting to make things positive for their sons and daughters."

Hackmeister wrote:

"Far too often when something is on TV, an advertisement, or a movie, or a regular show, and the male is shown in an unflattering way, I cringe.

"My standard response is: If the roles of the sexes were reversed, would this have made it to television? That should be the acid test.

"If you can reverse the sexes and it will still play well, than it is OK. But often the answer is, if that was a woman was in that role, they would never show it. This is a simple test, and all agencies should learn it."

All the letters can be seen at Dads Deserve Better Deal In Today's Advertising (Brandweek, 3/17/08)

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

Best Wishes,
Glenn Sacks
GlennSacks.com

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