As Congress
prepares to reauthorize VAWA, they
might do well to listen to the law’s
critics. According to syndicated columnist
Kathleen Parker, VAWA is “a special
law just for women —funded by taxpayers—that
institutionalized female victimhood
and cemented the image of man as predator.”
A full-page advertisement, endorsed
by a variety of sympathetic advocacy
groups is about to be launched in
a media campaign.
VAWA-linked “abuse
prevention” laws that provide for
the criminalization of men under the
flimsiest of legal underpinnings operate
in a quasi civil-criminal domain.
Legal protections offered real criminals
such as the presumption of innocence,
the right to legal counsel and trial
by jury, are all denied men accused
of domestic abuse.
|
...sex is by far the greatest
predictor of whether or not
a 209A restraining order is
issued and of the severity
of the restrictions imposed
on the defendant. |
|
A study of how
one court in Massachusetts applies
its abuse prevention statute (ch.209A)
as measured by the issuance of “209A
restraining orders” has just been
published in the June issue of Journal
of Family Violence, an academic journal
on domestic violence issues. “A Measure
of Court Response to Requests for
Protection,” by the Fatherhood Coalition’s
Steve Basile, examined the 209A restraining
orders issued in Gardner District
Court in 1997. When the attributes
of the litigants and their relationships
are compared to measure their impact
on court response, sex is by far the
greatest predictor of whether or not
a 209A restraining order is issued
and of the severity of the restrictions
imposed on the defendant. The
study also looked at the parenting
status of the litigants and whether
or not they lived together.
The study found
that women were 38% more likely than
men to be granted a protection order
at an ex parte hearing, where only
the victim is present and the alleged
abuser is unaware of the proceedings.
Conversely, men were 240% more likely
than women to be denied the immediate
protection of an emergency restraining
order at ex parte hearings.
Similarly, the
study found that women were 32% more
likely than men to be granted a permanent
restraining order, usually for a year,
when a temporary order was pursued
at the follow-up 10-day hearing.
Men, however,
were 383% more likely to be denied
protection when they sought an extended
or new restraining order at the 10-day
hearing.
One of the more
striking findings was that at 10-day
hearings, if no emergency order had
been granted at the ex parte hearing
(the decision was deferred), 19% of
the men requesting permanent orders
were denied, but women’s requests
for permanent orders were denied only
2% of the time. For these cases, men
were thus 850% more likely to have
their request for protection denied.
The report is
the second part of what was originally
conceived as a three-pronged analysis
of all the restraining orders issued
in 1997 in the Gardner courthouse.
The first phase of the study was published
in the Journal in February, 2004.
That report provided a qualitative
analysis of all the 382 non-impounded
209A restraining orders issued in
the courthouse, examining the type
and degree of abuses categorized by
the sex and relationship of the litigants.
Fierce opposition to research critical
of domestic violence jurisprudence
Typical of controversial
work that threatens political correctness,
the back story of Basile's research
is perhaps more enlightening than
the actual results of the study. The
planned third phase of the study would
interview as many of the litigants
(plaintiffs and defendants) as could
be found who would be willing to participate
in a survey about their reactions
to the entire process in hindsight.
But events beyond Basile’s control
forced an abrupt termination of the
survey phase, and the scant data is
insufficient to draw any valid statistical
inferences.
|
Typical of controversial work
that threatens political correctness,
the back story of Basile's
research is perhaps more enlightening
than the actual results of
the study. |
|
Because of the
sensitive nature of the survey—and
being cognizant of the opposition
from the “other side” that would surely
manifest itself—Basile took careful
precautions to make the survey as
unthreatening and defensible as possible.
He only elicited women to be the interviewers.
The process had barely begun before
the full force of the opposition from
the domestic violence industry made
its presence known.
Articles appeared
in the Boston Globe claiming that
the Fatherhood Coalition was attempting
to “re-victimize” domestic violence
victims. Acting in uncharacteristic
speed, the Massachusetts legislature
passed legislation amending the state’s
version of the Freedom of Information
Act, explicitly prohibiting access
to restraining order information to
any agencies outside of the established
domestic violence industry. The legislation
was a combined effort of two feminist
state senators, Cheryl Jacques (of
gay rights fame) and Therese Murray
as well as Attorney General Thomas
Reilly.
The preliminary
results of the survey were tantalizing.
Thirty litigants responded before
the survey was stopped. Fourteen female
and three male victims and 13 male
defendants were interviewed (no female
defendants). Half of the women said
that they would not, in hindsight,
seek the 209A order. A third said
it escalated tensions and had a negative
impact on their family. Two-thirds
said it protected them.
In cases where
actual violence was present, 36% of
the victims said they, alone, initiated
the violence. Fifty-four percent said
they were “mostly” responsible for
the violence.
Is it any wonder that forces in the
domestic violence community reacted
so quickly to prevent these explosive
results from seeing the light of day?
Politicization
of domestic violence
After several
decades of feminist-driven social
and behavioral research, it is by
now a cliché to say that domestic
violence research has been hopelessly
politicized. Research on domestic
violence is not conducted to discover
truth, but rather to promulgate an
established doctrine on male-female
relationships, namely, that they are
driven by male power and control,
rather than love and reciprocity.
As Churchill famously
remarked, there are “lies, damn lies,
and statistics.” Feminist researches
have employed every technique to produce
the desired results, and invented
new ones to boot. The simplest
method for manipulating research to
guarantee desired results is a carefully
groomed selection of the study population
(“selective sampling”).
A recent Harvard
study (which was in turn a rehash
of a November, 2002 Wellesley study:
“Speak Out: a Human Rights Report
on Domestic Violence and Child Custody
in the Massachusetts Family Courts”)
that purported to show that mothers
are denied their human and civil rights
by family courts which are ostensibly
biased in favor of fathers, employed
“snowball sampling” to build its population
sample. This methodology produces
a population from referrals by disgruntled
women of other disgruntled women within
their circles.
The integrity
of any study can in no small part
be judged by how willing the authors
are to release the underlying data.
In her book “Who Stole Feminism?,”
Christina Hoff Sommers painstakingly
catalogued the lengths to which feminist
researchers went to deny access to
their data—even to her, a fellow female
professor in the social sciences.
Needless to say, Basile’s repeated
requests for the data underlying the
Harvard/Wellesley study were similarly
frustrated. Eventually he received
a terse letter from the chief legal
counsel of Harvard’s President Summers,
warning him to cease his efforts.
Such is the nature
of academic freedom in the brave new
post-feminist world, as President
Summers is himself now rather painfully
aware.
Basile’s research
is honest, accurate, and statistically
sound. He examined every available
restraining order docket for one entire
year, to mitigate against any seasonal
abnormalities or any accusations of
selective sampling. And Basile makes
his data openly available. Typically,
domestic violence research explicitly
excludes male victims of female domestic
violence. A domestic violence
criminologist and author once publicly
admitted that federal funding would
not be granted for any proposed study
that included male victims of female
domestic violence.
|
In
cases where actual violence
was present, 36% of the victims
said they, alone, initiated
the violence. Fifty-four percent
said they were “mostly” responsible
for the violence. Is it any
wonder that forces in the
domestic violence community
reacted so quickly to prevent
these explosive results from
seeing the light of day? |
|
It comes as no
surprise, therefore, that Basile’s
study should be criticized by the
domestic violence sisterhood.
Here are
the comments of feminist blogger Trish
Wilson, with apparent ties to the
Massachusetts Judiciary Committee,
reporting on testimony given in May
of this year at a Statehouse legislative
hearing on proposed abuse protection
reform and shared custody legislation:
“I heard from one of the members of
Massachusetts' House of Representatives
about one of my e-mails. Fathers'
rights activists were promoting a
‘study’ conducted by one of their
members about restraining orders.
I recall when this man had initially
begun his ‘research.’ He had violated
victim's privacy by accessing their
records, and had contacting (sic)
them in person without their permission.
This wasn't a professor or a valid
researcher contacting victims. This
was just some stranger off the street.
Because of what he had done, restraining
orders in Massachusetts are now closed
to public scrutiny. This man has neither
the educational nor professional background
to conduct any kind of study. I'm
going to respond to that House member's
e-mail on Monday. That House member
thanked me for the heads-up about
the story behind that ‘study.’”
For the record, Steve Basile is a
software engineer with a masters in
mathematics from U. Lowell—“off the
street,” perhaps, in comparison to
the social science “professionals”
who produce the junk science that
is dutifully taught in SOC101 courses
and swallowed whole by the mainstream
media. It's a sad commentary that
it takes someone “off the street”
to conduct bona fide social science
research.
Among my favorite examples of the
bankruptcy of standards in feminist
research is this abstract from a presentation
given by Ann Goetting from Western
Kentucky University at a domestic
violence conference held in San Diego:
“As a feminist sociology professor
and a researcher with specializations
in family studies and criminology
in general and domestic abuse specifically,
expert witness work on behalf of battered
women has evolved naturally from my
research, teaching and community work
related to families, crime, and domestic
abuse. I was able to read, teach,
and research about domestic abuse
– the politically motivated terrorism
of women and children held hostage
by batterers in our patriarchal social
order – for only so long before I
was compelled to act. I consider my
expert witness work on battering and
its effects as a form of feminist
activism that follows naturally from
the expertise I have gained as a researcher,
teacher, and author of domestic violence.
It is creative applied sociology.”
(emphasis added)
|
... the newly published second
phase reveals the clear double
standard in the court response
to the victims. In each
of the benchmarks, women plaintiffs
(victims) were treated more
favorably than men, and likewise,
male defendants were treated
more harshly than their female
counterparts. |
|
The inbreeding within these academic
circles is such that “researchers”
like Goetting fail to see a necessity
to mount even a pretense of scientific
authenticity.
However, it would, be dishonest to
suggest that the results of Basile’s
study were not expected. Everyone
who has any involvement in the issue
knows that there is a double standard
in the application of domestic violence
laws. VAWA establishes this
by its name alone! However, in matters
legal, especially in the courtroom,
it is not enough, for example, to
say that it is day outside by merely
observing sunlight through the window.
One needs an expert witness to testify
to the fact. The need for unbiased,
valid domestic violence research data
to counteract the existing propaganda
is abundantly clear.
Basile knew that the data would speak
for itself. No massaging was necessary.
As studies go, the data and methodology
are unimpeachable, and the results
are clear.
Study reveals clear double standard
in law’s application
While the results of the first phase
confirmed that women disproportionately
seek legal protection from domestic
violence, the qualitative examination
of the data in the dockets, which
includes the victim’s affidavit, showed
that the nature of the abuse claimed
was roughly similar between men and
women.
However, the newly published second
phase reveals the clear double standard
in the court response to the victims.
In each of the benchmarks, women plaintiffs
(victims) were treated more favorably
than men, and likewise, male defendants
were treated more harshly than their
female counterparts.
For
the second phase, only the 358 dockets
of male-female and female-male relationships
were examined. In some of these, the
plaintiffs were requesting protection
for someone other than themselves,
such as a minor child. Of this remaining
population, 238 were from women requesting
protection orders for themselves against
men, and 44 were from men seeking
protection for themselves from women.
Eight percent of the cases involved
only female litigants and 5% involved
only male litigants.
Most
often restraining orders are initially
granted at ex parte emergency hearings,
where only the alleged victim (plaintiff)
is present; the accused is usually
completely unaware of the proceedings.
At ex parte hearings, three options
are available to the judge. The request
can be granted and a temporary restraining
(209A) order issued; the request can
be denied; or the request can be deferred
until a later hearing to be held within10
days.
The study found
that at ex parte hearings, the restraining
order is granted to women 91% of the
time. In comparison, orders
for protection to male victims are
granted 66% of the time. Requests
for protection are denied to men outright
11% of the time, but requests from
women are denied only 5% of the time.
Judgments are deferred to a 10-day
hearing 23% of the time to male petitioners
but only 5% of the time to women.
Thus men are 120% more likely to be
denied outright and 360% more likely
to have a decision on their case deferred
until the 10-day hearing.
At the10-day hearing,
the judge has several options. The
case (and protective order) can be
dismissed if the plaintiff fails to
appear. When both parties appear,
the emergency order issued at the
ex parte hearing can be vacated (“judge
vacated”) and the matter closed; or
if the case was deferred at the ex
parte hearing, the request can be
denied, or a new, “permanent” order
can be granted, typically for one
year’s duration. Occasionally the
victim specifically requests ending
the order.
The analysis of
the results of the 10-day hearing
show a stark difference in the treatment
of men and women seeking to extend
protection. Male plaintiffs
are denied a new order 16% of the
time, but women were denied in only
1% of the cases. Taking all possible
outcomes into consideration, the data
show that women acquired restraining
orders 94% of the time when they pursued
their requests at the 10-day hearing,
whereas men who pursued their requests
acquired protection only 71% of the
time.
It is interesting
to note that at the 10-day hearings,
fully 29% of female plaintiff requests
were dismissed either because they
failed to show up or because they
requested that the order be dropped.
The meaning of this result is certainly
open to interpretation, but it suggests
that a large number of emergency ex
parte orders may be without any foundation
(the corresponding number is 19% for
male plaintiffs).
|
Any contact he may have with
his children, direct or third-party
or even unintentional, holds
him criminally accountable
to the same punishments ...
This is why a 209A restraining
order is referred to as the
nuclear first-strike in the
commencement of a divorce
action. |
|
209A abuse protection
orders grant the “victim” enormous
power over their alleged abusers.
Provisions include removal from one’s
own home, granting of immediate custody
of minor children to the alleged victim
with a consequent assignment of child
support, and the threat of 2 ½ years
in jail and $10,000 fine for any violation
of the order, including the no-contact
provisions. It’s important to
understand that a 209A order taken
against a father, besides removing
all legal and physical custodial rights
to his children, also extends the
no-contact provisions to those children.
Any contact he may have with his children,
direct or third-party or even unintentional,
holds him criminally accountable to
the same punishments as mentioned
above. This is why a 209A restraining
order is referred to as the nuclear
first-strike in the commencement of
a divorce action.
The study also
analyzed court response with respect
to granting of custody of minor children
when the litigants are parents. Mothers
were 288% more likely than fathers
to receive custody of children as
a direct provision of the 209A order.
However, in the few cases where fathers
received custody, which was only at
ex parte hearings, none of the fathers
secured long-term custody of their
children at follow-up hearings.
The message couldn’t
be clearer. If you are a father suffering
domestic violence from your wife (or
otherwise mother of your children)
do not try to use the legal system
to gain protection for yourself and/or
your children—there is a high risk
you will lose your children regardless
of the circumstances of the abuse
in the household.
The study shows
that female defendants living with
the plaintiff with a common child
were evicted from their homes 40%
of the time. In comparison, fathers
were evicted fully 84% of the time.
Overall, with and without children
in common, male defendants were 29%
more likely to be evicted than women
and 110% more likely to be evicted
if they shared a common child.
|
The message couldn’t be clearer.
If you are a father suffering
domestic violence from your
wife (or otherwise mother
of your children) do not try
to use the legal system to
gain protection for yourself
and/or your children — there
is a high risk you will lose
your children regardless of
the circumstances of the abuse
in the household. |
|
In summary, the
statistical analysis of the data reveals
that a plaintiff’s sex is by far the
greatest predictor of whether or not
the court will grant a 209A order.
This is not surprising to Fathers
Rights advocates, but it is repeatedly
denied by all in “the system,” including
Chief Justice of the Gardner
Court, Patrick Fox, who indignantly
asserted in a Sept. 2002 Telegram
& Gazette article on the study:
“The suggestion we favor one gender
over another is something I'd categorically
deny.”
Naturally, Jane
Doe and Battered Women's, Inc. also
objected to the study: “[The results]
fly in the face of national studies,”
said an unidentified spokesman in
the same article.
An old adage says
“The law is an ass,” meaning the law
is a blunt instrument that can and
often does produce absurd results
when blindly applied. Law cannot be
perfectly crafted to account for every
possible situation that may arise.
However, the injustices that result
from Massachusetts 209A are not the
exception—they are the rule. It is
an obscene understatement to claim
that 209A is merely “poorly crafted,”
and just requires a little tweaking
here and there.
If we wish the
state to intervene in family relationships
where violence may occur, we need
to be very clear to distinguish between
real violence and family conflict.
The present law treats a phone call
to one’s children outside of a specified
time carved out of the ‘no-contact’
provisions of a 209A restraining order
no different than a defendant bashing
his or her way into their home and
beating their estranged partner to
within an inch of their life.
For the Statehouse
to refuse to recognize such an absurdity
cannot be explained by mere ignorance
alone. No one can be that stupid.
And this is but one of the many glaring
absurdities and flagrantly unconstitutional
provisions of 209A.
Perhaps the most
fundamental flaw in 209A is the flimsy
threshold under which an order can
be granted. Under the present wording
a “victim” need only claim to be “in
fear of” abuse to justify their request
for a protection order. Massachusetts
courts have Victim Witness Advocates
on hand to counsel women seeking 209A
orders before they go in front of
the judge. Furthermore, judges in
Massachusetts are trained to ask leading
questions if the “victims” do not
on their own articulate the correct
code words. It is a staple of 209A
hearings to hear a judge continue
to question a woman until she utters
the magic “fear” word.
209A Reform Bill
There is a bill
sitting in the Judiciary Committee
that addresses eleven of the law’s
most serious flaws, including the
“fear of” clause in the definition
of “abuse.” The so-called “209A Reform
Bill” is not really the answer to
the problem, but merely a band-aid.
Abuse protection law needs to be scrapped,
rethought and re-drafted from the
ground up. The starting point will
be to distinguish between actual violence
and family conflict.
The Basile study
exposes the mechanism by which the
law is abused. There is no real argument
to be made that Gardner District Court
is an especially anti-male environment
any different from any other jurisdiction.
Anti-male bias is not just a feature
of domestic violence jurisprudence
in Gardner, it is by and large part
of the present national cultural climate
of male hatred and demonization. Writing
in Human Events in June this year,
Phyllis Schlafly, another woman who
is not afraid to attack the sisterhood,
writes a scathing criticism of VAWA:
“… the feminists
parlayed their hysteria that domestic
violence is a national epidemic into
the passage of the Violence Against
Women Act. This created a gigantic
gravy train of taxpayers’ money, known
as feminist pork, that empowers pro-divorce,
anti-male activism… Billions of dollars
have flowed from VAWA to the states
to finance private victim-advocacy
organizations, private domestic-violence
coalitions, and the training of judges,
prosecutors and police. This tax-funded
network is, of course, staffed by
radical feminists who teach the presumption
of father guilt.”
Enough is enough.
In Washington, it’s time for Congress
to end this boondoggle that wreaks
so much harm to fatherhood across
the nation. In Massachusetts, it’s
way past time the Statehouse addressed
the repugnant Ch.209A “abuse prevention”
statute.
# # #
Mark Charalambous
of Leominster is Spokesman for
CPF/The Fatherhood Coalition.
Mark Charalambous
32 Pearl St., Leominster, MA 01453
(978) 840-0268
brontis@thecia.net
Copyright 2005
Mark Charalambous |