Commentary on RACHEL ALEXANDER's rachel alexander rachel alexander
How Fathers Can Win Child Custody conservative truth CONSERVATIVE
"A work in progress from IntellectualConservative.com rachel alexander rachel alexander rachel alexander
First draft - August 14, 2005" rachel alexander rachel alexander intellectual conservative truth conservative truth conservative truth

Prefatory note: Rachel Alexander (?) [http://heh.pl/&1yp] has written the premier article outing the ignorant beliefs, selfish motives, demented premises, and specious claims to children's and family well-being of the father's rights movement, which article she claims to be working into a book. It's difficult to believe that the article is not a parody. At any rate, she has posted on her website the caveat that it is only a draft, so we've downloaded and saved the entire page lest it get changed or pulled. Meanwhile, it's just so loaded with stuff that invites discussion and response that, in order adequately to comment within the context, we've had to repost nearly the entire thing here. Nevertheless, we do urge you to read the entire article at the intellectualconservative.com website, above, as well as some of her (or their) other articles, in order to get a truly good feel for the uber-religiose confused mindset and third-world Dark Age fanatical crap these people aim to drag this country into. So thank you, Rachel Alexander for validating much of what liz has said about the father's rights movement and about what religion does to the brain. (Love the name, too... the "intellectual conservative" -- for a website apparently designed to proselytize half-wits...)

Below, Rachel Alexander's text is in blue, and liz's comments are in red. All emphasis created with bold typefont has been added, as have all links in the blue text to pertinent additional articles. In addition, interlineating commentary has necessitated making paragraph breaks that are not in the original. Finally,

CONGRATULATIONS, RACHEL ALEXANDER!!! rachel alexander rachel alexander
You are the first female men's rights shill to make The Pig Page! rachel alexander rachel alexander
CONSERVATIVE TRUTH CONSERVATIVE TRUTH CONSERVATIVE TRUTH CONSERVATIVE TRUTH CONSERVATIVE TRUTH CONSERVATIVE TRUTH

How Fathers Can Win Child Custody rachel alexander rachel alexander conservative truth conservative truth
"A work in progress from IntellectualConservative.com rachel alexander rachel alexander conservative truth conservative truth
First draft - August 14, 2005" rachel alexander rachel alexander conservative truth conservative truth conservative truth conservative truth

Introduction rachel alexander rachel alexander conservative truth conservative truth

So you have a child with a soon-to-be ex-girlfriend or ex-wife, and you are wondering what is going to happen to your children. The first thing you need to be aware of is this: The laws and family court system are not set up fairly towards fathers. The laws are set up to award custody to the parent who has had the most involvement so far raising the child, which means the parent who has worked the least - this is virtually always the mother.

"Ex-girlfriend?" Aw, how... meltingly compassionate and tolerant, coming as it does from the ultra-conservative preserve-marriage and condemn-unwed-sex crowd. Isn't it special how the same anti-welfare set who concocted and pushed for the enactment of the unwed father child support laws, and other draconian enforcement measures in the vain hopes of cutting out what they call "government entitlements" (no, it wasn't "feminists") now pander to these very same men whose issues they caused? (Let's scapegoat the ubiquitous lazy sluts who get pregnant and "don't work.")

What is "work" anyway? It would appear that Rachel thinks that going to law school or writing articles and fronting websites purveying neocon propaganda and biblical fundamentalism constitutes "work," whereas caring for children is not "work" and is something on the order of, oh say, sunning at the beach. Is the determinant of "work" whether one is getting paid? Are daycare workers doing it for free? If caring for children and maintaining a household isn't "work" then why do nannies and cooks get paid? Is it only "work" when someone cares for a child who is not theirs, or cooks for individuals they aren't obligated to feed? If this is the case, then why don't these people hold the corollary consistent opinion that these are not "his" children but "hers?"

Of course, there are plenty of unemployed and under-employed fathers who are neither bringing in money nor supporting their spouse's career, nor functioning as homemakers or primary caregivers -- they're just not working much, period (see, below, psychological "projection"). Perhaps Rachel merely is echoing the mindset of these kinds of freeloaders, or perhaps merely the widespread lack of cognition of other individuals who have spent so little time on their own ever solely responsible for the hands-on daily care of children that they honestly don't know what is "work" and what is not.

Mothers, of course, don't receive paychecks. It's true that some wives are the happy recipients of a wealthy pampered lifestyle of leisure, but that's not women who (see below) are married to men earning $45,000 a year and who ostensibly are motivated by the hope of getting a few hundred dollars a month in child support.  It's our understanding that slaves in the antebellum south weren't paid either, so we wonder why, inasmuch as (by the implied definition) they weren't "working," slaves would have had a problem with their lot.

Not to mention that many mothers do also work in paid employment. In 55% of married households, wives bring in half to all of the family's income (Whirlpool study, 1995). See the research.

More as we continue, but this entire article sounds like it's trolling for a following of those who, for one reason or another, don't have a clue what either child care or homemaking entails. (Or else Rachel Alexander is just a moron, alternate hypothesis, albeit not a mutually exclusive one.) As for whether the family court system and laws are biased against men, why, just the fact that a man who is not married to a woman and has not supported her could get rights to the fruit of her body and efforts by the mere fact that once he discharged some viable sperm someplace other than the shower drain is itself proof that the bias isn't against men (and that capitalist theories apparently don't extend to women.).

"Salary.com estimates that if motherhood were a paying job, today's full-time moms would make an estimated $131,471 a year. That sum is based on a 100-hour workweek, with a base pay of $43,461 for 40 hours, and $88,009 in 60 hours of overtime. But since moms are not compensated for their efforts, their contributions to society tend to be taken for granted." http://www.motherhoodproject.org/study/dailynews.php

This usually guarantees that the mother will receive custody of the child, and since child support is mandatory, that you will be paying several hundred dollars in child support to her each month. Now does this make sense? It only makes sense in the past, when you were still together - in a typical relationship, the mother worked less because she stayed at home more with the children, therefore it made sense at that time that she was with the children the majority of the time. But after you have both split up, and she no longer has the option of working less hours, and in fact must get a job that will most likely pay less than yours, why should she still be seen as more fit to take care of the children?

Yes, circular reasoning makes so much sense... rachel alexander rachel alexander conservative truth conservative truth

Overlooking the illogic, it would appear that Rachel is trying to say, essentially, that the only reason mothers usually are the children's primary caregivers is that they do not earn as much as the men do. Why would that be? Are women as a group inherently less capable of becoming educated and earning money? Are women inherently less talented, prone to childlike dependency, or just lazy? Or is their time being spent in unseen and unappreciated ways? Mothers incur measurable sacrifices and costs for which they ought to be reimbursed. Lay aside flawed "child support" theory. Perhaps Mother should be getting reparative alimony, an idea apparently not even on the page in Alexander's "reasoning," except for the suggestion (below) to offer marginal rehabilitative "alimony" as a ploy to trick women into "voluntarily" giving up custody once he's bullied her to her knees with frivolous court pleadings, and picked fights, and generally stressed and strung her out financially...

If she is working full-time (or should be, since she is now single), and making less money than you, how does that qualify her as a better parent than you? If she is working full-time, she won't be able to spend any more time with the child than you if you are working full-time.

Does experience, effort, and a track record not usually render someone more qualified?

(Wait a sec...!  What is this "or should be, since she is now single" shit?
Being married was a valid reason not to work in outside employment, but doing the same job
caring for children and their home suddenly isn't upon a divorce? Why was the woman being supported during the marriage? The "intellectual conservative" equates marriage with prostitution!)

Rachel does not seem to have a clue what a being a parent entails, let alone what a good parent is. If a given father is a better parent, why then during marriage would he so negligently have left his children in the care of a lazy woman who neither "works" nor is a better caregiver for the children? Because it was just more convenient? Because he's a control freak and when she was his unpaid subordinate it was okay, but not otherwise? (And it's really not about the kids.) Or just a cheap use? (Apparently character isn't related to parenting in the "intellectual conservative" point of view.) As for mothers, there are a hell of a lot of easier ways to "earn" "several hundred dollars a month" than to endure pregnancy and spend 24/7 being the primary caregiver of a child.

Rachel also does not seem to have a clue why mothers might want to retain custody of their children. Perhaps it is because they care more about their children and actually want the "better parent" to continue caring for them. If "several hundred dollars a month" (what a whopping sum!) were a compelling motivation, why would mothers ever stay home in the first place with their children, rather than dumping those would-be career-destroying burdens off into the care of someone else so that they then can go ambitiously further their education and financial well-being? Why would they have children at all? Are women just not very bright compared with men? Short-sighted? Are women (or, perhaps, rather, mothers) somehow inherently inferior and defective beings in ways that men are not? (Well, yes, according to the Bible, but we digress...) Is it just being coupled that induces them into sloth or habituates them into a child-like status of dependency (like a bad side effect of having men around)? Would these be the very same women who ostensibly file frivolously for all those divorces and are just itching to dump their husbands at the first possible chance, and then go out and "have to" get low-paying jobs, supplemented by, of course, those windfalls of "several hundred dollars a month?" Are they not able to earn "several hundred dollars" in far less than a month of working, even if they "get a job that will most likely pay less than" the father's job?

If you believe that you are the better parent, you need to read this guide and find out everything you need to know in order to have the best chance at obtaining full custody.

If he is such the better parent, then he already would have been doing the bulk of the parenting and have been the primary caregiver during the marriage (or "relationship."). Notwithstanding the above horseshit, many mothers in fact do both. They both work full time in outside employment AND still are their children's primary caregiver. They do it all. Even when they work fewer hours in paid employment, more often than not, they still put in far more overall hours doing "work." See the research.

If you choose not to get full custody of your child, not only are you in for a lifetime of emotional headaches but a lot of child support - which you will find does not all get spent on your child.

"Several hundred dollars a month" wouldn't purchase one full-time babysitter making minimum wage. It wouldn't buy two weeks' worth of a decent cook and maid service, let alone someone also to do the shopping, schedule-keeping, errand-running, and so forth.

And no amount of money could purchase (not even a breath about what children need in the entire "intellectual conservative" article) one-on-one time and attention for the child spent by that person to whom the child is most attached and to whom that child in turn is the most important person in the world. (Maybe the "intellectual conservative" goal is to raise a pliable labor force of emotionally needy and personality-disordered persons who in adulthood will be desperately seeking out and loyally cling to membership in groups to fulfill what is lacking inside them... uhm... wouldn't that be good for big corporate employers? notions of "patriotism?" fanatical political and religious cults? the military?)

What is this father going to do, give up his almost-thousand-dollar-a-week income in order to stay home with his kids and thereby save on paying "several hundred dollars a month" to their mother? Or hire the help via daycare plus cleaning, shopping, cooking, and chauffer service etc. in order to save "several hundred dollars a month" in child support? Marry a second wife and use her as free labor? Palm the job off on a girlfriend or his own mother? Or do children really just not need any parent around?

As we continue reading Alexander's article, we wonder: is it pandering... fear-mongering... sympathizing with nincompoops... or just inciting? Can she herself possibly believe this drivel? What was the purpose of the article? To proselyze the disgruntled labor class and their wifmons? Keep them preoccupied with unproductive emotional issues so that they don't pay too much attention to economic politics? Promote control-the-masses biblical drip? Or all three? Or is Rachel just a moron...

It is almost impossible to get an accounting required of the money - only in extreme circumstances like blatant drug abuse by the mother will the court require a custodial parent to track what they spend their child support income on. The amount of child support you will end up paying as your child grows up is enough to buy a nice house. Let's say you split up with your ex, and you have two children together, ages 1 and 4. The court orders you to pay $500/mth per child, based on your $45,000/year income, until the children turn 21 (some states end child support when the child turns 18, and others require it through age 21 and beyond). By the time your children are grown, you will have paid $444,000 in child support. The main cost of raising a child is childcare; outside of childcare (which ends around age 12), do you really believe that $1,000 is being spent on your two children each month? If you think you are subsidizing your ex, you are right. The main reason why the system is set up this way? The government would rather have you subsidize her than pay for her going on welfare. And the feminists have convinced the lawmakers and judges in society that women shouldn't have to work to support their children if they don't feel like it.

"The main cost of raising a child is childcare." Apparently Rachel Alexander doesn't realize that children eat. Or wear clothing. Or need shoes. Or need beds, linens, hot water... books, toys... educational activities... medical or dental care.... to be transported anywhere. Or even a roof over their heads (we guess they somehow can live in an apartment suitable for a single adult without taking up any space.) Either this woman really is a moron or else she thinks her readership falls into that intellectual category. (Not to mention there aren't many families these days in which men earning only $45,000 a year are able to support nonworking wives who put children into daycare in order to spend their time playing tennis and doing lunch.)

Rules of Winning Child Custody

If you are in the process of splitting up with your ex and custody has not yet been determined

This is the best place to be at, since once custody has been awarded to a mother, it is much more difficult to reverse the status quo legally. It is important to get an aggressive attorney immediately, because the legal process favors mothers from the beginning. Some fathers rights advocates recommend handling the legal battle on your own, learning the system and acting as your own lawyer. However, this may not be the best approach. An experienced attorney has learned all of the intricate rules and knows the system. They have gone to 3 years of law school in order to learn the ropes.

"Get an aggressive attorney." Someone who has made it through law school. Like Rachel? Do you think that when someone has put time and experience for years into doing something, that experience counts? (Do you think that maybe if Alexander had an iota of relevant life experience to apply to her word smithing that she might not have blathered "the main cost of caring for a child is childcare?")

Do you really think that you can learn more in a few months than they have learned in a several years of training and experience? When you consider how much money you have to lose in child support over the years until your child turns 18 or 21, and the amount of emotional stress you will go through all of those years if your ex wins custody, and the fact that the court system is stacked against fathers, do you really think it's wise to handle your case without the assistance of an attorney?

Let's get the angry men whose brain synapses already are misfiring even more worked up. Plus, we throw in the ready alibis as to why they didn't get custody... so if they don't get custody, they will be super-enraged, and blame those nasty feminists for all their problems, fall for fundamentalist nonsense parrotted on conservative** political websites, vote into office incompetent puppets such as GWB, and generally align like sheep with the "intellectual" agenda of throwing the United States back into feudal times in which a relative handful of landowners live comfortably on their fiefdoms peopled with peasants to work the fields or be their packmules and cannon fodder in money-motivated crusades.

** "conservative" -- a term that, like "capitalism," does not apply to women's and children's lives, but to
a theory of politics designed to keep rich men in power and poor men (the ones who have to
conservative truth conservative truth march off and die in war or work in their factories) beholden to the company store.

It is in the judges' best interest to adhere to the status quo provided for in the law, which is to award custody to the mother.

How is it "in the judges' best interest to adhere to the status quo"? How does this benefit the judge? Judges? (Is this a metaphor for something?) What's the superlative of "half-wit?" Quarter-wit? Witless?

Mistakes will be held against you and used to block you from proceeding with your case. Spelling and grammatical errors are looked down upon by the courts - you don't look like a smart father who should be raising your children if you can't take the time to make sure the pleadings you submit to the court are free of spelling and grammar mistakes... If you can, convince your ex to let you keep the children at first. The judge will be much more likely to allow you to keep the children if you are the one who takes responsibility of them after you break up. Once you have split up with your ex, you will need to file some kind of a motion to establish a custody arrangement... If you can, file first, because it will give you a slight advantage. You can probably find the papers on your state court's website, or, as recommended below, hire an aggressive attorney to file for you.

Do the "intellectual conservatives" hold classes in how to use the internet and media to manipulate the ignorantii? "Use good spelling, and convince the ex to let you keep the children."  How?  Oh yeah, we forgot... Alexander also is against protection for women from domestic violence, because, she has opined, there already are laws on the books to protect people from being beat up (never mind that these laws don't adequately deal with circumstances in which the perp would be entitled to live in the same house -- his home -- as the person he beat up -- her home -- while he's out on bail awaiting trial.)

Perseverance - Money and Emotional Stress Will Wear Your Ex Down

Although the child custody laws favor women, and although your ex may have free legal help from one of those government funded organizations that provide free legal help to low-income women who claim they are victims of domestic violence, you can still overcome this unfair disadvantage through sheer perseverance.

What government-funded organizations would these be that give all this free custody litigation help to mothers? Please tell us, and list lists and name names of organizations, so that we will know where to send the scores of women who contact us every week begging for assistance. (See, above, re getting the cannon fodder foaming at the mouth and throwing their loyalty to the controlling politicos... ) We'll go out on a limb and say that this is just an outright lie, just like the existence of Saddam Hussein's "weapons of mass destruction." Ms. Alexander, do prove us wrong and supply us puhlease with the list of abundant free government-funded family law attorneys for mothers.

(This fear-mongering is propaganda on the order of what the brown shirts did in pre-Nazi Germany. Terms such as "feminazi" and similar were coined to obfuscate these otherwise obvious propaganda techniques by engendering public confusion, thereby reducing the chance that they would be recognized. Womanhood has been blamed as the source of evil since the time of biblical mythology and Eve. E.g.,The Pig Page.)

Attorneys themselves tend to burn out in this area of the law, because of the emotional stress, particularly attorneys who are working pro bono or for very little money working for Legal Aid. Whether you are representing yourself or have hired an attorney, keep in mind the more work you create for your ex, the more you will wear down her resolve to fight you and keep full custody of the kids. If your ex's main reason for retaining full custody of your children is to collect free child support from you, it will vanish fast once all of the child support is going to pay her attorney to fight you in court. And the emotional stress of receiving pleadings from you and having to see you frequently in court hostilely fighting her will reduce the incentive to continue receiving free child support.

Thank you for outing the father-custody game plan. We already knew it was a fraud, but now we have yet more proof. Also the family values strategies designed (not) for children's wellbeing, as well as the delusional reasoning justifying this approach. Why would these men want to fight like hell with an expensive "aggressive attorney" (or just spend their own considerable time doing so when they otherwise could be earning all that important money) in order to wear the mother down -- at a cost of what?... to them (not to mention the higher subsequent cost, if successful, of having custody, far in excess of any child support that could be awarded)? All this in order to save the whopping "several hundred dollars a month in child support?" Obviously not. Because they are the "better parent?" Obviously not, or they already would have made being the primary caregiver a priority during their marriage and wouldn't be having such difficulties. Men who come up with legal strategies like this on their own tend to be implementing them primarily because they are abusive assholes who really don't care about their children's wellbeing. And mothers suffering at the receiving end of this are not fighting back to retain custody of the children they have nurtured for years in order to receive "several hundred dollars a month" in child support.

We note that in Rachel's opinion it's going to be the mothers more than the fathers who will feel emotionally stressed and worn down from high conflict litigation. This could be valid. Men who behave like this wouldn't be getting as emotionally stressed out because what they are doing is in large part relieving their stress. Unlike the mothers, whose stress comes in no small part from sheer worry over the wellbeing of their children, these men either don't understand the harm they are doing to their children, or just don't give a rat's rear about it. They are more interested in obtaining psychic reward by abusing and punishing the mothers. This has less to do with their wanting to care for their children than it is the seeking of retaliation to relieve their distress from the breakup of the relationship, and over not being able to continue to maintain control, and their consequent offended senses of entitlement., Its purpose is to salve their ego wounds and recharacterize their emotional issues under the guise of a legal "battle." But sympathy only goes so far, and it's in short supply here for those who refuse to consider what they are doing to their children, and who do not put them first.

The key is not to annoy the judge, if the judge suspects you are filing frivolous pleadings just to harass your ex, he may rule against you and you could end up being ordered to pay for your ex's attorney fees.

So... in other words, the intellectual conservative advice is to use subterfuge? File frivolous pleadings in some specious way so that they look otherwise? Thank you so much for making this admission on behalf of all selfish abusive pigs and the paid and unpaid swill that supports them.

If your ex does not have an attorney, consider yourself fortunate - this gives you a huge advantage. The less she knows about the legal system, the better chance you have that she will do something in the eyes of the court that will hurt her chances of getting custody. If she asks for your opinion on whether she needs an attorney, try to convince her that she does not need one and emphasize the cost to her.

And thank you too for this admission, advocating more subterfuge, lying, conniving, fraud... What was that pablum we thought we saw on the "intellectual conservative" website in support of one of the versions of the Ten Commandments? What is that "do unto others" thing? Oh yeah. Family values.

When you talk to your ex, such as when you are arranging to exchange the children for your visitation, be sure to bring up issues with her raising your children that bother you. The more you point out ways she needs to change her behavior in order to be a better parent and maintain custody, the more you will bother her. You know your ex - will she eventually give in if you continue to bring up issues that bother her and continue to take her to court?

File frivolous pleadings, bother, harass, wear her down, waste money, try to pick a fight, get an aggressive lawyer... Thank you for acknowledging that this is what is actually going on. Thank you for the honesty, and for not purveying any more of that sugar-coated bile about "shared parenting," and about men's doing these things because they "just want a relationship with their children."

Build Up a Case Against Your Ex rachel alexander rachel alexander conservative truth conservative truth

If your ex already has custody of your children, spend 6 months or so collecting evidence of why your ex is not fit to be the primary custodian of your child.

And what if she is fit? What then? Take a clue from the earlier "advice" and lie about it?

Each state generally has a "best interests of the child" statute which contains the factors the court considers when it determines custody. Look up your state's best interest of the child statutes. Collect evidence based around those factors. Although these factors unfortunately tend to benefit women, if you plan carefully, you can use them to your advantage. Here are the most typical factors:

A. The wishes of the child... What you can do: You probably cannot use this factor to your advantage unless your child is at least 12, but check your individual state law to verify that it is age 12. Meanwhile, it can't hurt to coach any psychologist that interviews your children to ask them if they would rather live with you, if you are fairly certain that they would prefer to live with you.

Thank you too for pointing out the coaching of the psychologist. Many forensic psychologists prefer to think they are too smart to be manipulated, but this suggestion should assist the many father's rights-leaning ones who need a heads up that it's a good idea.

B. The interaction of the child with each parent, any siblings, or another person who may significantly affect the child. This usually ends up benefiting the mother, because frequently the mother has other children from prior relationships, and the courts do not like to split up siblings, even half-siblings. And this takes into account grandparents, aunts, and new spouses as well, so if your ex is now re-married, but you aren't, or her mother is helping her take care of the kids, this will favor her as well.

Alexander apparently thinks that it's an okay idea to split up siblings. Or just doesn't care, because after all, that's just other people, and intellectual conservatives don't even pretend to be "compassionate conservatives" which some might think is an oxymoron anyway, given that the conservative M.O. is "We have ours, and to hell with anyone else." We take note that the adult Alexander siblings still hang together as editors or some such at the "intellectual conservative."

What you can do: Get remarried first, then file for custody. If you have relatives nearby, pay them to baby sit so they become a big part of your child's life. rachel alexander rachel alexander conservative truth conservative truth

Ah, the stepmother substitute and relatives so motivated to have a relationships with the child that they have to be paid. Special. (But god forbid the child's mother should get a red cent.)

C. The child's adjustment to home, school and community. This tends to favor the mother, since in most situations, the father is forced to leave the house and find a new home, whereas the mother usually ends up with the house and keeps the kids.

What you can do: If you have not yet split up physically, try to remain in the house with the children and have your ex move out. If you have left the home, start building a case as to why the child is not doing well living at the house, attending the nearby school, etc. Do research on the school or daycare ...

D. The mental and physical health of all individuals involved. This usually favors the mother, since in a large number of cases, when a couple splits up, the mother kicks the father out of the house, and so the father tries to get back into the house. The father's actions in trying to get back into the house, or attempts to take the children, are used as evidence that he is mentally less stable than the mother.

What a way to euphemize attempts at breaking and entering, and kidnapping.

What you can do: Do not do anything that could be perceived later as mentally overreacting or physically aggressive. If your ex attempts any physical aggression towards you, call the police to create a record. Collect any records you have on the mental instability of your ex or her family, including medical records, and any police reports or convictions of their physical violence. Have a tape recorder handy to tape her if she has angry outbursts.

This from a woman who thinks that domestic violence legislation was concocted by women to get rid of fathers in order for (apparently) lazy women to be able to collect "several hundred dollars a month" in child support. Here's the another stultifying opine by Ms. Alexander, entitled Child Custody: Where Men Hit a Glass Ceiling http://intellectualconservative.com/article1030.html. She's really spun up about the money issue. Hey Rachel: I have an idea -- how about we just eliminate child support altogether, establish that unwed men have neither parental rights or responsibilities (after all, in a capitalist society, when one person has a talent or ability and another doesn't, in the absence of an explicit bargained-for undertaking of joint venture, we don't require the first one to have to share, do we -- that would be communism), and pay reparative alimony to those divorced married women who have made sacrifices in connection with their marriages, including for childbearing and rearing? Why does this simple pro-marriage, pro-hard work, equitable solution never get proposed by the "intellectual conservative" libertarian ultra-capitalistic pseudo-egalitarian set?

E. Which parent is more likely to allow the child frequent visitation with the other parent...

F. The nature and extent of coercion or duress used by a parent in obtaining an agreement regarding custody...

What you can do: Do not put anything in writing to your ex that might be interpreted in court as threatening. As you can see, this criterion favors mothers.

Right. Because coercion and duress are exactly the game plan (see above.) Gawd, it's so generous of you to set out these admissions...

You Need an Aggressive Attorney... rachel alexander rachel alexander conservative truth conservative truth

You Need to Proactively Research Your Case, Even if You Have Hired an Attorney...

It will be such an uphill battle to win custody, that you will need every advantage you can get. If your attorney has only practiced in this area of law for a couple of years, they may not know every tactic you can try. Two minds are better than one. Use the internet to research child custody, sites like http://freeadvice.com have a wealth of useful information. If you are doing your case on your own, join father's rights groups for assistance, and purchase the relevant statute and rule book for your state (the state where your children are located and where the court case is at). Some states, such as Arizona, have father's rights groups specifically dedicated to helping fathers obtain custody of their children. (arizonafathersrights.com). Check out your court's web site as well, it probably has free legal forms you can use instead of drafting them from scratch.

One has to wonder at a point, what the deal is with the alignment between father's rights and conservatism... One also has to wonder about the intellectual prowess of women who embrace movements that would implement policies that may well harm them (and often do -- we hear from many women in these movements who at a point in their lives involuntarily are forced into epiphany.) Are they hallucinating? Shortsighted? The brainwashed daddy's-girl product of a controlling but indulging father who embraced stereotypical "male" qualities as superior? Someone who grew up in a conservative family with successful, privileged men and brothers in which it would have hurt to be thought of as "only" a "girl" (therefore male identification, the "I'm as good as a man" confusion, and deep denial)?** Just young and incredibly naive? Ignorant (or envious) of motherhood? Have sad issues with or lack or respect for their own mothers? Just turning the equivalent of an intellectual prostitute's trick in return for promises of fame and fortune, all rationalized by a misguided individualism that believes "it can't happen to me?" Desperate for attention from men, or conversely, a patriarchal princess who wants to think that she has special rare qualities that set her apart? Fearfully in need of pleasing a husband? A second wife jealous of the woman who was there first? An AIS individual whose homophobe family psychologically screwed her up? Or just a moron? It's unfathomable.

** (A number of feminists have shared this confusion, which was rampant in the 70s, until they realized that "Hey, who made 'man' the standard?" It's not "equal" and the sexes are not the same, but that doesn't matter.)

You Need to Build up a Substantial Case Against your Ex...

Record All of Your Phone Conversations With Your Ex and Your Children... rachel alexander conservative truth

Convince Your Ex to Willingly Give You Custody of Your Children...

The main reason many mothers become adamant about having custody is because of the free child support and knowing that they are sticking it to you. You need to use this psychological factor to your advantage. Emphasize that if you obtain custody, you will not request any child support, and if necessary, offer to pay her alimony for the first year or a large sum of money to help with "bills." Although it seems unfair, in the long run you will save hundreds of thousands of dollars in child support as well as years of emotional stress. Figure out what will convince your ex to give up custody and work very hard on it.

In psychology, this is called projection. Mother's motivations in seeking custody and what occasionally works for women to get men to drop their custody cases (because more often than not, they are instigated primarily for financial bargaining leverage against the mothers) isn't likely to work in reverse. But what the hey. Pander to deluded men who think this and want to believe it.

Maybe your ex wants to attend school, but with taking care of the kids on top of work has no time. Emphasize how difficult it will be for her to raise the children alone while trying to pursue other interests, pointing out how she will be stuck with the kids on her own almost every day and night of the week. Of course, even if she does give you custody, she can always change her mind later. However, it will be much more difficult for her to get custody after you have had the children by yourself, particularly if you have had them for at least two years.

In other words, commit fraud. Flat-out lying is a persuasive technique commonly used in certain conservative pundit circles all the while they dribble and belch on and on about morality and "The Ten Commandments" (all those WMD, e.g.), but we digress... One has to ask again why it is that these men, who busily pursued their other interests prior to the custody case, now somehow have the time, energy, interest, and inclination to care for their children?

The Courts are Interested in Pushing Cases Through Quickly, and Discouraging Parties from Going to Court

...The only thing you can do is use this to your advantage - every time your ex has to go to court or respond to one of your pleadings, it is causing her emotional stress as well as money if she has an attorney. If she realizes that all of the child support you are paying her ends up going to pay her attorney, coupled with the additional factor of emotional stress, she may give up after awhile and hand over custody to you.

Custody Evaluations rachel alexander rachel alexander conservative truth conservative truth

When you file for a change of custody, the court will probably order a custody evaluation. These are assessments by a social worker that usually end up favoring the mother. The type of person that is attracted to this type of job are low income women with a chip on their shoulders; they are not going to be predisposed to making a determination that children should be with their fathers. They will latch on to small details to justify their preferences to give the children to the mothers. For example, if the children cry when they leave their mothers to go for visits with their fathers, the social workers will emphasize this in their reports and claim that it is evidence that the children are unhappy with their fathers. One way to combat these custody evaluations is to preempt them with a psychological evaluation of your own. Find a child psychologist who has a reputation for being favorable to fathers, and preferably also one on the court's approved list of psychologists, if the court has one, and have him do a preliminary evaluation of your child. You may want to give the psychologist leading questions to ask your child, such as whether your child would rather live with you, if mother abuses drugs, alcohol, or smoking in front of the child, if people close to the mother abuse or sexually touch the child, etc. - whatever bad things your child has indicated to you about living with your ex.

This is acknowledges and lends credence to the widespread perceptions by both mothers and fathers that the forensic psychological industry is permeated with father's rights types sympaticos. Now... why might that be true?

Eh. Alexander is no conservative and no intellectual. I can't maintain a sense of humor around such manure. I see the actual results of it too often. Go read some other opinions, better writers:

World o'Crap
http://blogs.salon.com/0002874/2005/08/16.html

The Countess: The Angry Dad's Manual On Keelhauling Your Wife
http://trishwilson.typepad.com/blog/2005/08/how_fathers_can.html

Amanda Marcotte at Pandagon
http://www.pandagon.net/archives/2005/08/how_to_wield_yo.html

Bloodless Coup
http://www.bloodlesscoup.com/blog/001348.html

-- 08/15/05

"Equality" under the law means that WHEN men and women are the same in all ways, the law will treat them that way, and that when they are not, the law will not default to what is characteristic of "man" as the standard. Thus, "equality under the law" means more than merely consideration of each person as an individual. It also means that that "consideration" will not be cast in terms of standards and rights that can attain only to non-gestating human beings. The law will not determine what is "reasonable" with reference solely to what would be "reasonable for a man;" the law will not determine what is "just" by reference solely to what could be "achievable by someone who cannot gestate;" and the law will not ignore reproductive differences between mothers and fathers where they do indeed exist and have effect. conservative truth conservative truth