Paul Burt, a reader, sent this to me.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

New Column: Equal Rights Amendment Yes, Women's Equality Amendment No

My new co-authored column, New Column: Equal Rights Amendment Yes, Women's Equality Amendment No (Louisville Courier-Journal, 4/15/07), criticizes supporters of the ERA for changing the ERA's name to the "Women's Equality Amendment." Many of the injustices based on gender today work against men and fathers. The ERA, which seeks to end any bias or discrimination based on sex, is appropriate. The WEA, which ignores many of the worst gender-based injustices, is not.

The column, which I co-authored with family law attorney Jeffery M. Leving, appears below.

New Column: Equal Rights Amendment Yes, Women's Equality Amendment No
By Jeffery M. Leving and Glenn Sacks
Louisville Courier-Journal, 4/15/07

The recent reincarnation of the Equal Rights Amendment was a good idea--until its backers decided to change the name. The ERA has been reintroduced into both the House and the Senate, and has over 200 congressional co-sponsors.

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A group of fathers are childish idiots in this new Vermont Teddy Bears Mother's Day commercial.

Beyond their standard TV dad foolishness (a child is smarter than they are, they can't do anything right, etc., yawn, etc.),  one father exclaims, "My wife raised five kids!"

Huh? And where were you? Exactly where TV wants to pretend fathers are--absent or useless.

Also, note the consistently idiotic expression of the central father in the blue shirt. To watch the video, click here.

'My Ex-Husband is a Good Man--We Have a Great Working Relationship in SPITE of the Courts

I've been very critical of divorced or separated mothers who do not respect their children's relationships with their fathers, and who try to drive the fathers out of their children's lives. I consider this to be America's greatest unrecognized social problem. However, I believe it is also important to praise and recognize those divorced or separated mothers who do the right thing and protect the bonds their children share with their exes.

One example is Maureen Novak of Irving Park, Illinois. Maureen saw my co-authored column  Child Support System Ignores Dads' Economic Reality (Chicago Sun-Times,
4/14/07) a few weeks ago and wrote the newspaper a letter called "Sticking up for dads" (4/29/07):

"Thank you for the commentary April 14 ["Child support system ignores dads' economic reality"] by Jeffery Leving and Glenn Sacks. I am a divorced mother of one, remarried to a wonderful father of two, and I want to say that my ex-husband is a good man. We have a great working relationship in spite of the courts. My current spouse is not so lucky -- his situation is more along the lines of what the commentators described.

"It was so nice to see someone stick up for the dads' situation for once. You never see sympathy for them and what they must endure. It's terrible to stand by and watch firsthand what women are legally able to do to a man financially and emotionally.

"Maureen Novak, Irving Park"

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

To read the rest of the column and discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

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Sandra James had every reason to feel happy and contented when an envelope arrived through the post. Blessed with an adored baby girl from her marriage to second husband Tom, and enjoying every moment of her maternity leave, life seemed sweet indeed.

She recalls smiling as she opened the envelope and started to read the letter inside - but the memory of what came next still leaves her shaking with emotion.

There, in scrawled handwriting, screamed the word "Slut."

As she read on in horror, each new sentence was seeped in venom and vitriol - accusing her of sleeping around and being an unfit mother to the child she adored.

An immaculate 35-year-old mother-of-three, Sandra recalls: "I was shaking so much that I could hardly read. By the end of the letter, I was crying my eyes out. It wasn't just the crazy accusations themselves which were so upsetting - it was the amount of hate behind them."

But these were no rantings from an anonymous stalker. The author of the poisonous missive was, in fact, Tom's former wife - who had signed the letter - furious with Sandra for having found love with the husband she had dumped years earlier.

"I feel as if I am fighting a battle all the time - and she has come so close to breaking me," says Sandra. "The only thing which keeps me going is my love for Tom, but sometimes I even ask myself if life would be easier if I just raised the children alone, without having to face the ex-wife from hell.

"Apart from the abusive letters she has sent to my home, she has also sent letters to my boss and my parents, claiming that Tom is not the biological father of our little daughter, Amy, and that I am not a good mother.

"The personal abuse is bad enough, but there are also the grasping demands for money. She sees Tom and me as an open chequebook, and the situation is so bad that just last week I sank on to the kitchen floor and just sobbed in desperation."

The above is a quote from a new book about second wives. When fathers complain of vindictive, "hell hath no fury" ex-wives who destroy their relationships with their children and extort money from them, they're called misogynists and woman-haters. This book gives great detail on these exes--from the perspective of women. And since it's women, maybe someone will listen.

The quote is also another example of a phenomenon I've seen many times. Sometimes people will admit that "hell hath no fury like a woman scorned" is sometimes true, but they will only apply it to women scorned. I've often asserted that sometimes the woman dumps the man, and then is bitter that he finds someone else. It's insane, but it happens a lot, and the above is another example.

The full article is The nightmare of marrying a man with a bitter ex wife: Join The Second Wives Club (Daily Mail, [Britain], 5/11/07).

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

Avalon on Catalina Island, where my wife and I eloped and spent our honeymoon 15 years ago, is threatened by a massive wildfire. This is bad news because, beyond the usual reasons, we had hoped to do a second honeymoon there next year.

We got married on a cliff overlooking the Bay that is pictured to the right, and spent many days at that beach. Near my desk I have a picture of the two of us there, with my wife looking so beautiful in her white dress. I'd put it with this blog entry, but she insists that I don't do that sort of thing, and I have to respect her wishes.

The eloping/honeymoon was a really nice experience, and is one reason why I often recommend that couples elope rather than endure stressful, fun-for-everybody-but-the-bride-and-groom weddings.

Avalon is a quiet, pleasant little city whose roads are so small that there are no cars, only golf carts. Fortunately the firefighters are making progress--see the Associated Press' Firefighters gaining as blaze chars resort island.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

Another female "revenge" commercial. In the Cadillac commercial "Khakis" a female boss revels in humiliating and intimidating her male subordinates--and only her male subordinates.

Adweek, one of the two leading advertising industry publications, evidently thinks it's great, naming the commercial one of its Best Spots of the Year 2006.

To watch the commercial, click here.

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

Thanks to Tom, a reader, for sending me the ad.

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New York Yankee star shortstop Derek Jeter often dates beautiful women, and a common story in the media is how "lucky" Jeter is. In November The Onion published the satirical piece Derek Jeter Dating Jessica Biel, Repeatedly Reports Derek Jeter (11/30/06):

"NEW YORK--According to his teammates, other MLB players, Yankee management, friends, relatives, his old college professors, and any random stranger with whom he has come into contact during the past two days, Derek Jeter is dating former 7th Heaven star Jessica Biel.

"'Last night, me--me, Derek Jeter--and the beautiful, charming Jessica Biel were laughing, talking, and, yes, kissing in a dark corner of the hip L.A. nightclub Hyde,' Jeter told reporters from the New York Daily News, New York Post's 'Page Six,' Us Weekly, Star, National Enquirer, New York Times, London Free Press, Cleveland Plain-Dealer, and 128 other national and local publications Sunday.

"'Just thought you all might want to know--we're an item. Yup, it's official. We really hit it off, she is incredibly sexy, and we will be attending a party together this Saturday night at Club Element in case you want to take pictures. Can you believe this?!' Jeter added that, although he was upset about not winning the AL Most Valuable Player award, he 'doesn't see Justin Morneau dating anyone who was named Esquire's Sexiest Woman Alive in 2005.'"

The latest example of this can be seen in www.AskMen.com's new Beauty Pageant: Derek Jeter's Girlfriends. I'm not a great fan of beauty pageants and rating women's looks, etc., but that's not my point here. Speaking of Jessica Alba (pictured above), Jeter's current romance, Askmen.com writes, "Derek Jeter sure struck gold when he landed this sultry senorita."

My point, in case you haven't guessed it, is this--why is Derek Jeter so "lucky"? Jeter beat out odds of a million to one to become one of the best players in baseball and a future Hall of Famer. Alba, Biel and the others were...what? Born to be beautiful, and they didn't screw it up by getting out of shape. OK, good for them. But while Jeter is the beneficiary of great athletic ability, he's an intelligent player who has had to work vastly harder (and in a dangerous profession), and has achieved far more than any of these women. How exactly is he the "lucky" one to have a romantic relationship with them?

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

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I was at first pleased to see the article Looking at female domestic violence (The Laconia Citizen, 5/7/07), which discusses "A talk sponsored by the Family Violence Prevention Council highlighted the issue of female perpetrators of domestic violence." I thought perhaps someone in the government-funded domestic violence community might be actually taking domestic violence against men seriously. I was, of course, to be disappointed.

The article is below, but the payoff sentence is "there were three categories that female offenders can be put under: self-defense, which they do not treat; a history of trauma; and those offenders who fit the male profile, with no past history of abuse."

In other words, when women hit, it's probably because they're acting in self-defense or have been traumatized by a man in the past. When a man hits, however, it's not self-defense or a result of a psychological trauma--it's just because he's bad. This is despite the fact that research clearly shows that a substantial minority of domestic violence is committed by women against men, and that women use weapons and the element of surprise to balance the scales.

The most outrageous part of the story is this:

"Walderich and DiBartolomeo also said that there were many gender differences between male and female aggressors and that it often could be seen in how society treats women and men who offend.

"'The media pays more attention to females who offend than males,' she said. 'There's longer jail time for women.'"

That is a preposterous statement--it is very difficult to even get police to arrest female abusers, much less prosecute them, much less give them jail time. When a woman attacks a man, it is more likely that he will be arrested, not her.

Looking at female domestic violence

By LORI INGHAM

A talk sponsored by the Family Violence Prevention Council highlighted the issue of female perpetrators of domestic violence.

Dr. Jennie DiBartolomeo and Dr. Denise Walderich of the Relational Resources Counseling Center in Manchester spoke about the sex differences between male and female perpetrators of domestic violence, and their development of a model to determine the category that the perpetrator fit under in order to get treatment.

Laconia District Court Clerk Diane Lane said that the invitation came at a time when the Belknap County courts were finding that more women were being tried for domestic abuse but that there was no program in the area to treat them.

"Initially they may appear in court and be assigned to go through batterer's intervention, but we don't have one for the female offender," she said.

Walderich said that, in her treatment of patients, she noticed that female offenders were often of a different mindset than male offenders and that the model for males could not be applied to females.

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

I highly recommend addiction expert Doug Thorburn's monthly Addiction Report. His most recent issue has an interesting commentary on "Girls Gone Wild" founder Joe Francis, who we discussed recently. Thorburn thinks that addiction may explain some of Francis' problems, excesses and alleged crimes. Thorburn writes:

"'Girls Gone Wild' founder Joe Francis, 34, has been indicted on two counts of tax evasion following his arrest on a contempt-of-court citation stemming from a civil case in Florida, where he is being held. The tax charge alleges he deducted more than $20 million in false business expenses on corporate returns in 2002 and 2003, including $3.78 million for building a residence in Punta Mita, Mexico (the northernmost point in the Bahia de Banderas, where Puerto Vallarta lies). The federal grand jury indictment also alleges he used offshore bank accounts to conceal income. His attorney, Jan L. Handzlik, said the indictment was unwarranted and should be, at most, a civil dispute.

"The question a Drug Addiction Recognition Expert(TM) can help answer is, what might Joe Francis be capable of? If he is tentatively identified as having the disease of alcoholism, the DARE knows he is capable of anything, including tax fraud, and is far more likely (by roughly a ten to one ratio) to commit such crimes than a non-addict. Francis, it turns out, is not a non-addicted Hugh Hefner wannabe. He screamed expletive after expletive at a Los Angeles Times reporter who asked him about an incident in which he was accused of non-consensual sex. He also falsely accused the reporter of having a crush on him and an ax to grind because she was 'jealous and angry.'"

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

Background: In 2005, feminist gender scholar Peggy Drexler released her anti-father book Raising Boys Without Men: How Maverick Moms Are Creating the Next Generation of Exceptional Men. I criticized Drexler and her assertion that lesbian parents are better for boys than straight parents in my columns Are Boys Really Better off Without Fathers? (San Francisco Chronicle, 8/31/05) and Raising Boys Without Men: Lesbian Parents Good, Dads Bad (World Net Daily, 9/10/05).

I explained, "It's one thing to be respectful of gays and gay parents. It's quite another to engineer a deceptive study and use it to assert that lesbian families are a better environment in which to raise boys than heterosexual families."

Drexler just penned a column for Newsweek titled No Such Thing as An 'Average' Family (5/14/07), in which she writes that boys raised by single mothers or lesbian couples are "more in touch with themselves, more concerned with the feelings of others than you might expect from teenage boys." This is a light version of the anti-male bias which runs throughout her book. In one of my columns on the book I wrote:

"In the book's opening pages Drexler's message is one of tolerance for various family forms, as she notes that lesbian and single mother families 'can' effectively raise boys. But Raising Boys soon devolves into outright advocacy of lesbian parenting. In Drexler's world, lesbian families--protected from fathers and their toxic masculinity--are the best environments in which to raise boys. Married heterosexual mothers try their best, but the positive influence these hapless moms try to impart to their children is overwhelmed by that of the malevolent family patriarch.

"According to Drexler, lesbian moms are 'more sophisticated about how they teach their sons right from wrong' than heterosexual couples, and there are 'real advantages for a boy being raised in this new type of family.' Heterosexual mothers don't measure up in 'moral attitude,' and are less likely than lesbian moms to 'create opportunities for their sons to examine moral and values issues.' This in turn slows the 'moral development in their sons.'

"Furthermore, Drexler asserts that boys raised by lesbians 'grow up emotionally stronger,' 'have a wider range of interests and friendships,' and 'appear more at ease in situations of conflict' than boys from 'traditional' (i.e., father-present) households.  Fatherless boys 'exhibit a high degree of emotional savvy...an intuitive grasp of people and situations.' Best of all, sons of lesbian couples are much more willing to discard traditional masculinity than boys trapped in heterosexual households.

"For example, Fiona's son paints his nails, while both of Maria's sons dance ballet. Ursula's son chose sewing and cooking for his electives in 7th grade. Kathy's son has rejected playing baseball as being 'too competitive'--no surprise, because in their local, father-led baseball league, 'the better players get more playing time.'

"Yet Drexler's research has obvious flaws. For one, the families she studied were middle to upper class, older women who volunteered to have their lives intimately scrutinized over a multiyear period--an unrepresentative, self-selected sample.

"More importantly, her research suffers from confirmatory bias--Drexler saw what she wanted to see. Drexler is not an objective social scientist, but instead a passionate advocate for lesbian mothers.  She calls the 'maverick mothers' raising sons without men 'avatars of a new social movement,' and says her book's 'stories, voices, data, and findings will reassure, hearten, and empower' them. Her research did not measure objective indices of child well-being, such as rates of juvenile crime, drop-outs or teen pregnancy. Instead Drexler personally conducted interviews of mothers and their sons and made subjective judgments about their family lives. It is not surprising that Drexler found lesbian families to her liking. In fact, her dogged determination to see only good in lesbian couples and problems in heterosexual ones at times reaches absurd proportions.

"For example, though Drexler doesn't seem to notice, her lesbian moms, particularly the 'social' (i.e., nonbiological moms), cheerfully endure insults and disrespect that no parent should ever tolerate. Carol's son calls her 'stupid.' Bianca's son calls her 'lazy.' Martha's son hops into her bed and effectively tells Martha tough luck, sucker--go sleep somewhere else. Thankfully, in each case progressive lesbian mom dealt with the problem through patience and talking. By contrast, dad--who Drexler usually portrays as being overly strict--would probably have had junior pull weeds in the yard for a few hours as he waves goodbye to his PlayStation. He is (sigh) sadly unenlightened.

"For Drexler, boys raised by lesbians are a better breed than those raised by heterosexual couples. One day when Drexler was struggling to hold on to her briefcase and her bags, 11 year-old Damien saw 'that I needed help and immediately offered it.' Drexler is taken aback--a boy being helpful and caring? She notes 'when I thought about it later, it clicked in my head: This is a boy being raised by two moms.'"

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

The Michigan National Organization for Women just put out an Action Alert opposing HB 4564, the Michigan Shared Parenting Bill. NOW writes:

"Joint custody is more expensive, as it presupposes the maintenance of two households with sufficient room and necessities for the children."

In other words, it's more economically efficient for the child to live with mom in a household dad finances, and for the child to see dad in a park on Sundays and no more. This is hardly in the best interests of children. And since NOW is interested in economic efficiency, I would argue that it's more economically efficient to not get divorced to begin with, but since the vast majority of divorces are initiated by women, NOW is not about to come out against divorce.

Last year NOW successfully bottled up HB 5267 in committee. In my co-authored column HB 5267 Will Help Michigan's Children of Divorce (Lansing State Journal, 5/28/06), I explained:

"The Michigan House Committee on Family and Children Services will soon consider a family law bill which will amend the Child Custody Act of 1970 to protect the loving bonds children of divorce share with both parents. Sadly, today Michigan family courts often allow these bonds to be needlessly damaged or destroyed.

"HB 5267 is primarily sponsored by Rep. Leslie Mortimer (R-Horton), who has been joined by 10 other legislators. When parents cannot agree on custody arrangements, the bill instructs courts to order joint custody unless there is clear and convincing evidence that one of the parents is unfit, unwilling, or unable to care for his or her child. A mediator will then help the parents draft a shared parenting plan based on each parent having substantially equal time with their children. The principle behind the bill is difficult to dispute--as long as both parents are fit and there are no extenuating circumstances, they should both share in parenting their children.

"While the Michigan State Bar's Family Law Section, the Michigan National Organization for Women, Domestic Violence Escape, Inc., and others have come out against the bill, joint custody is endorsed by a growing consensus of mental health and family law professionals, and research establishes that joint custody is what's best for kids...

"Michigan NOW also asserts that HB 5267 will 'further impoverish children of separated or divorced parents' because in Michigan, as in most states, the amount of physical time divorced parents spend with their children and the concomitant expenses are calculated into the child support obligation. These fears are also unwarranted.

"Research demonstrates that joint custody leads to higher rates of child support compliance. This isn't surprising, since parents who are permitted little role in their children's lives have less motivation to make sacrifices for them. Also, under the current system noncustodial parents are often forced to wage expensive court battles in order to protect their time and relationships with their children. These parents end up supporting lawyers instead of kids.

"While Michigan NOW is correct that there are fathers who put their pocketbooks above their children's best interests, they ignore the obvious converse. If a dad may seek 40 or 50% physical time with his children simply to lower his child support obligation, doesn't it also hold that a mother may seek 85% physical time in order to increase it?

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

A new study shows that child abuse increases in military families after the military parent deploys. Strangely, the study's authors apparently don't publicly reveal who--the mother or the father--is doing the abusing.

Since most military service personnel are men, the answer is apparent. Nevertheless, from press reports one might get the impression that it is military fathers doing the abusing, when it is usually their wives.

Below is a letter from Donald Kearly, M. A., a reader who is a psychology resident at the Medical College of Georgia.

"Mr. Sacks,

"There is a news item that is popular in the media related to a recent article in the American Journal of Epidemiology that reports an increase in substantiated child abuse in families where a military parent is deployed. This link provides an example of the articles that have appeared:

Deployment Stress Ups Child Abuse - Psych Central News. This news story describes research from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill that suggests incidents of child abuse and neglect increased significantly in families where a parent is in the military and deployed away from home. This is important information, particularly to those of us who work with soldiers who have served in Iraq. It could lead to better support and treatment to those military families at risk.

"I examined the original article titled Effect of Deployment on the Occurrence of Child Maltreatment in Military and Nonmilitary Families, (Rentz, D. E., Marshall, S. W., Loomis, D., Casteel, C., Martin, S. LO. & Gibbs, D. A., 2007).  In my opinion, the research and article seem very well done with excellent methodology. However, there is a variable that is curiously missing from the report; the gender of the abusing person or perpetrator.  The author report that the majority of substantiated abuse comes from the non-military, thus non-deployed parent. They state in the discussion: 'Nonmilitary caretakers perpetrated the largest proportion of substantiated maltreatment in military families. Particularly, nonmilitary caretakers in military families were responsible for the majority of the maltreatment reported from December 2002 to April 2003, which coincides with an increase in the rate of maltreatment, the greatest percentage of soldier departure, and the lowest percentage of soldier returns. This finding further suggests that the stress of war extends beyond the soldier to the family left behind.' (Rentz, et.al. p. 1205)

"Since the majority of soldiers deployed are male, it would seem probable that most of the abusers are female. I am not making this as a statement of fact; rather it is purely conjecture on my part.  I wonder why the authors did not report a gender breakdown of the military and non-military parents. Surely they had access to that information, but they make no mention of it or even why they did not include it.

"I fear that the popularity of this news story will lead to false conclusions regarding the role of military fathers in child abuse. I'm sad to think that some commentators may blame the male soldiers, suggesting that they are off having an adventure in the military while their families suffer, or that they come back from deployment and immediately abuse their children. It is possible that the majority of perpetrators are female, although the researchers make no mention of the gender ratio.  That information would also have been valuable to persons involved with support and treatment of military families.

"Donald Kearly, M. A.
Psychology Resident
Medical College of Georgia / VAMC Consortium"

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.

Normally there is a strict double standard with domestic violence--domestic violence by men against women is a terrible crime, whereas domestic violence against men is a joke, or is not taken very seriously.

I guess we're making some progress, because Baltimore Orioles announcer Rick Dempsey (pictured right as a player in the 1970s) is actually in trouble for making a joke about a man being the victim of domestic violence.

Dempsey has apologized, and I'm glad that he's not going to lose his job over it, but it is nice that it created something of a furor. The story is below.

O's TV host sorry for domestic violence wisecrack

ESPN.com news services

BALTIMORE -- Rick Dempsey is apologizing for attempting to crack a joke about domestic violence on the air during a telecast of a Baltimore Orioles game on Saturday.

Dempsey, a former Orioles catcher and coach who usually hosts the team's pre-game and post-game shows on Mid-Atlantic Sports Network, was making his first appearance of the season in the broadcast booth during the Orioles' game against the Cleveland Indians.

During the third inning, Dempsey and play-by-play man Gary Thorne were joined in the booth by Laura Giuliani, the wife of Orioles left fielder Jay Gibbons. Giuliani was promoting a fundraiser the next day intended to help fight domestic violence.

Gibbons is hitting .213 as of Wednesday, and Dempsey tried to put Gibbons' slump at the plate together with his wife's charity.

"Laura, will this kind of help Jay in the domestic violence area? If he doesn't start getting a few more hits, you might grab him around the neck and rough him up a little bit," Dempsey said, according to The Baltimore Sun. "[Is] this money going to go to help him a little bit with maybe some of the hospital bills or something like that?"

To that, Giuliani replied, "I don't know, Rick. I don't think I'm encouraging that. I'm definitely not ..."

"Not going there?" Dempsey interjected.

"Not going there," Giuliani replied.

"All right, I'll domestically violate him if he doesn't start getting some more hits," Dempsey said, according to The Sun.

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

Jerry Schaefer of Long Beach, CA didn't like my recent co-authored column "CA Legislators Vote to Protect Pets from Domestic Violence but Deny Services to Male DV Victims" (Long Beach Press-Telegram, 4/21/07), which opposes a law recently passed by the California Senate Judiciary Committee. He recently wrote a letter to the Press-Telegram--published, remarkably--apparently cheering women who abuse men. The letter is:

"Mike McCormick and Glenn Sacks are worried that men are getting the short end, that all the focus is on men battering women, while women are pulverizing men. And the poor guys have nowhere to go. There are only two facilities in the whole state that accept male victims.

"What they're afraid to say is that men are up against the ropes. Women are finally figuring out their silly little games, realizing how weak-kneed they really are and putting them in their place. Men cannot stand women standing up for themselves. They'd rather women knew their place, like they do in Taliban country.

"Jerry Schaefer, Long Beach"

To discuss this issue on my blog, click here.