The Massachusetts Appeals Court decision, as reported in “Court Rules in favor of father who abused ex-wife in custody case“ by John Ellement and reported in The Boston Globe on October 31, 2014, bostonglobe/ gives reason to examine another recently published article on current thinking in custody decisions. The current Massachusetts case provides the perfect window for examining J. Herbie DiFonzo’s recommendations in “Child Custody-Parental Rights vs the Child’s Best Interest. theconversation/child-custody-parental-rights-vs… The Massachusetts father, a police officer, has a history of domestic violence against his wife, the mother of his two children. The Appeals Court decided to dismiss the violent behavior of this husband, to overlook the pattern of brainwashing that has caused the children to fear and hate their own mother, and to ignore the damage created by years of delay and arbitrary court litigation, intimidation, and control. Instead, it ruled in favor of the parent who has exerted coercive and psychological abuse, and gave indivisible custody to him, all at the behest of a single “expert” called the guardian ad litem. The court cited that the current scenario is the only one that matters, and that now one daughter wants to kill her mother and the other child is threatening suicide if he is given to mother’s custody. What happened here? How is any of this in the children’s best interest? In his article, Di Fonzo recognizes “the brutal dynamics of adversarial child custody litigation.” He further identifies that the terminology used today, including “decision making” and “parenting time,” indicates a shift “toward mutual child rearing responsibilities rather than declaring a winner and a loser.” However, in the cited case, the court must certainly have decided that the two parents will never be able to share parenting effectively. In fact, DiFonzo suggests that it is only these brutally contested cases that should ever go into family court. And this is exactly the stance, that the two parents are incapable of co-parenting, that results in ludicrous, one-sided, distorted outcomes such as “awarding”full power and control to the parent who has perpetrated physical violence as well as has continued to badger the absent parent to the children and in the courtroom. That the Appeals Court of the State of Massachusetts would overlook such blatant psychological control of the children is especially disturbing when so many parents and professionals around the country are citing the almost irreparable damage that removing a parent from children can wreak on relationships between them and this parent’s extended family and community. A parent who is willing to go to the lengths of conditioning children to exclude the other parent from their physical and psychological lives is most certainly incapable of providing for the long-term, whole-scale emotional health of the children. Alarmingly, this dynamic, named “hostile parenting,” or “parental alienation”, consists of “bad mouthing” the targeted parent and punishing or ostracizing children for allegiance to the disfavored parent. Any parent or attorney who coaches a parent to manipulate the children’s emotions using guilt, bribery, and distortion, is clearly NOT providing a healthy environment. Yet the prevalence of such under-handed behavior is not even cited by DiFonzo as a concern about the unreasonable, dangerous results of custody battles. The results of such banishment can easily be researched. Just look at the history of fathers who have been incarcerated and chased away from their children for the last fifty years because of child support arrears. Contempt of court charges, instigated by the custodial parent, have been handed out for decades, and such legal sanctions are currently handed out to both mothers and fathers at the request of the custodial parent, culminating in jail time. This imbalance of power is equivalent to a death sentence to the absent parent, and even lasts into generations, as the excluded parent’s reputation becomes the stuff of family legend, especially once they have gone to jail. Again, DiFonzo never mentions the consequence of child support used as a weapon. It is vital that the Massachusetts case is not viewed as a victory for fathers. It is vital that this case not be seen as a win for the guys; this outcome, that of rewarding behavior that belittles and undermines the one parent by giving custody of the children to the antagonist is played out over and over again, and is not based on gender superiority. It is based on willingness to use every trick in the book—political influence, bribery, racketeering for financial gain—to generate increased hostility and protracted litigation—until one parent is beaten into submission. And those who profit from such legal posturing must be stopped. DiFonzo suggests that any deviance from the “best interest of the child” standard that gives the default right of both parents to equal care, custody, access, and support for the child is automatically a “best interest of the parents” standard. Has he flown in an airplane? Put the oxygen mask on yourself first so that you can supply the child with a chance at survival. Why doesn’t he suggest a “best interest of all parties” norm? The answer is that DiFonzo is not writing about any significant reform of family court. Yes, it would be wise to “craft parenting plans” together. However, this does nothing to address the unlawfulness of family courts as they stand today.
Posted on: Mon, 01 Dec 2014 05:43:22 +0000
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