Reporter Ashby Jones of The Wall Street Journal reports as follows:
"Some of the biggest battles over child custody are playing out not in courtrooms, but in statehouses.
Prompted partly by fathers concerned that men for too long have gotten short shrift in custody decisions, about 20 states are considering measures that would change the laws governing which parent gets legal and physical control of a child after a divorce or separation.
The laws generally encourage judges to adopt custody schedules that maximize time for each parent. Some of the measures, such as those proposed in New York and Washington state, take an additional step by requiring judges to award equal time to each parent unless there is proof that such an arrangement wouldn’t be in a child’s best interests.
Critics of these bills contend that they threaten to take discretion away from judges and risk giving leverage to abusive men. They also say the laws are poorly targeted because typically the only custody cases that end up in court are ones in which former spouses are too hostile toward each other to effectively practice shared parenting anyway."
For the rest of the article, please click on the link below:
Personally I believe the critics of these bills are more on target than the proponents. Especially, though not exclusively, in high income, high conflict divorce case state forums. In the case of Connecticut particularly Fairfield and Hartford counties - the pockets of wealth - the ability for the statistically greater number of higher earner Husband/Dads, the ability to buy off the total system (lawyers,judges, GAL's, etc) is pronounced and skewed in their favor - more often than not as an adjunct motive to inflict lasting harm on the Wife/Mother as part of their total scorched-earth battle strategy (and usually tied to diminishment of alimony/child financial support in addition to inflicting emotional denigration and abuse). All of this is not only transparent to the mere casual observer, it is highly predicted and ENCOURAGED by judges in these particularly wealthy judicial districts. One can only assume there must be a massive kick-back scheme afoot in such cases; what else would motivate shameless judges to rule so blatantly outside sheer gut common sense, equity, and the usual fact patterns in the face of (usually too) trumped-up, financial feeding frenzy, and obvious biases in the plethora of these cases? In the vast statistical majority of these cases, the MAN with the money is the perp...and NOT because he TRULY believes he's acting in the best interests of his children (of whom he largely regards as a "cost" item to be contained, or worse, a "tool" for his pathological ego at the expense of the prior-to-legal-proceedings nurturing Mother who was doing her "job" just fine, thank you, until he elicits the cloak of the Court to further his nastiness). There is a reason why most children, in most cases, are best left with the Mother primarily, with appropriate visitation rights and schedules, and decades of historical precedence was correct in that establishment. 99% of Mothers are DNA disposed to do their child rearing responsibly and lovingly, and do. Can't quote that same statistic for the Father/Men, who may be loving enough, but DEFINITELY often lack all the necessary and duty-bound, unselfish "children first" protective and nurturing skills (not many great Mr. Moms out there or there would be alot more of them).
ReplyDelete