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It’s Well Past Time to reform VAWA

Senator Joni Ernst; (https://www.ernst.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/email-joni)

I am writing you in regard to VAWA as I understand you are tasked with writing the 2021 senate version. First, the Violence Against WOMEN Act by name is discriminatory to men and boys, both gay and straight, who suffer domestic violence and it should be changed to reflect that is directed towards combatting domestic violence within families. Even though legal decisions stated that men and boy victims could not be excluded by name of the act and in practice they are to this day.

“Joke” Meme circulating on social media, ironically highlighting the plight of male victims of domestic violence.

I refer you to Respecting Accuracy in Domestic Abuse Reporting and their recommendations, (at http://www.mediaradar.org/docs/RADARdocument-Agenda-for-VAWA-Reform.pdf) to correct some of the problems in VAWA. Unbiased DV Research can also be found at https://domesticviolenceresearch.org. I would also suggest Phillip W. Cook’s book “Abused Men: the Hidden Side of Domestic Violence” which should be part of the library of anyone writing DV legislation.

NAGR and other gun rights groups, to which I am a life member, complain that the “Red Flag” laws, long a problem in the family rights arena, are being pushed with 135 “Republican’s” voting for these laws applied to our military personnel. False allegations of abuse, combined with the mistaken belief that all DV is male perpetrators and female victims, have long been used to gain leverage in divorce and child custody proceedings. Additionally, those who bear false witness are rarely, if ever, held accountable for their lies. My horror story of false allegations when I was a NYS Environmental Conservation Police Officer (now retired) can be found at https://nymensactionnetwork.org/2021/04/lets-red-flag-unconstitutional-red-flag-laws/. I wrote about the unconstitutional nature of red flag laws here. What was designed as a shield for victims has been turned into a sword for those that would abuse the system and turn the system into an abuser on their behalf.

As A Republican I can only wonder why those in our party continue to authorize these vast funds which are funneled primarily to left wing groups pushing the anti family socialist agenda. Worse, the programs, when audited, are generally found to be fraught with fraud and misuse of funds. Some of these cases are outlined at https://www.saveservices.org/2021/03/vawa-long-standing-and-widespread-waste-fraud-and-abuse. As a co-founder and past President of the Coalition of Fathers and Families NY Inc. (I hold a Bachelors Degree in Family and Society from SUNY ESC) in the early 2000’s when I was researching this issue one DV services organization advised me how they “counted each client 4 times” by sending them to various “services” such as counseling or legal advice, and counted them even if they said they didn’t need the service. The Washington Times in 2019 reported on the fraud that is occurring in one part of VAWA, immigration citizenship, and that is not alone. In 2011 Sen. Grassley stated, “the problem with VAWA grantees’ administration and record keeping may actually be getting worse.” What was designed as a shield for victims has been turned into a biased political boondoggle, and it continues to this day.

I attended training and was certified by NYS as a police instructor for domestic violence. I can tell you first hand that the training was biased against men and was based on the debunked Duluth Model which has it that all Domestic Violence is perpetrated by men. Primary aggressor was defined as someone who was “larger” and “intimidating” and was nothing less than double speak for “arrest the man”. I found the training to be nothing less than indoctrination which was contrary to police training and tactics conducted in concert with constitutional protections ( I was a certified police special topics instructor on multiple topics). When called on to instruct I refused to do so as the course materials and lesson plan could “not be changed” in any fashion whatsoever. “This Way to the Revolution: A Memoir” by Erin Prizzey, who opened a shelter in England in 1971 explains how the system has been usurped by radical feminists.

While it certainly provides some services for victims of DV we have to ask ourselves at what cost to civil rights and at what cost to American taxpayers. It is well past time for a name change. It is well past time to remove sexual biases against male victims. It is well past time for the program to ensure that it is not undermining the U.S. Constitution and the rights of all individuals guaranteed therein.

James H. Hays, Lt. (Ret) NYS En-Con Police

CC: National Association for Gun Rights provided the following contact emails which were accepted – pat_souders@durbin.senate.gov, john_dowd@leahy.senate.gov, lindsey_kerr@klobuchar.senate.gov, reynaldo_benitez@ossoff.senate.gov, aaron_cummings@grassley.senate.gov, richard_perry@lgraham.senate.gov, “Beth_Jafari@cornyn.senate.gov” Beth_Jafari@Cornyn.senate.gov, steve_chartan@cruz.senate.gov, kyle_plotkin@hawley.senate.gov, doug_coutts@cotton.senate.gov, ted_lehman@tillis.senate.gov, kaleb_froehlich@murkowski.senate.gov

STOP blaming men; from A beat dead, disenfranchised dad on fatherless day

Being a beat dead, disenfranchised father for 25 years one would think that I would have hardened and gotten used to the anti male posts, articles, and comments about fathers on Father’s Day. But I haven’t, the negativity and chastisements telling fathers how they are supposed to be and blaming fathers for being absent still pisses me off to no end. I suspect it is from the idiocy and propaganda that family break down is the fault of men and not government policies, laws, rules, and regulation which is the cause. Blame which flies in the face of reality.

The most recent installment of idiocy is the Administration for Children and Families “Dadication” campaign (https://fatherhood.gov/dadication) directed at fathers through its fatherhood.gov web site. Of course government needs to push the “responsible fatherhood” agenda as cover for the fact that the disenfranchisement of fathers and the destruction of families is the result of their own programs. In response to a 20% out of wedlock birth rate in the African American community in the 1960’s the Moynihan Report came out (the Johnson Administration) and received immediate backlash for blaming black men.

Johnson’s war on poverty and the developing nanny/daddy state began subsidizing single mother homes. As these federal programs increased (Nixon, Ford, and Carter Administrations) so too did the problem of single mother homes. Adding to the out of wedlock fatherless homes was an increasing divorce rate which was made easier by “no fault” divorce laws. Even though more woman initiated divorce then men the stereotype was the philandering husband abandoning his family for the younger trophy wife. Men were blamed for “abandoning” their children regardless of circumstances.

Many people are unaware that the advocacy for men’s rights and fathers rights goes back to the 1970’s. Groups like the Men’s Defense Association published “The Liberator” newspaper advocating for equality for men in divorce and with child custody. The National Coalition of Free Men, renamed the National Coalition For Men at NCFM.org, was formed in 1977 and is still in existence today. (Full disclosure, I was a member of MDA and am a life member of NCFM). Sadly, blaming men for social ills continued with liberals looking at men as oppressors, “the patriarchy”, and conservatives looking at them a “deadbeats” not living up to their responsibilities.

It was under the Reagan administration the blaming men rose to new heights. A PBS special highlighted a black man who bragged of having 9 children with 9 different mothers and this was used to argue for a Federal Office of Child Support Enforcement to set standards for financial responsibility for fathers. “Deadbeat dads” were to be held responsible to pay back into federal coffers money expended to pay for his children. Title IVd of the Social Security Act was amended to award states money to hold these deadbeats responsible and a massive federal and state bureaucracy was born.

Of course the gynocentric hypocrisy was ignored. The fact that there was 9 tawdry mothers who had children out of wedlock with the same man was overlooked as was the fact that women choose to have out of wedlock children, not men who have no say in a woman’s pregnancy or abortion. Child support payments were now separated from father access to his children, no kids no check used to be the rule. Combined with no fault divorce, a man could be divorced from his children against his will and responsible fatherhood was redefined by government and media as did you pay your child support on time and in full.

Dr. Warren Farrell wrote “the Myth of Male Power” in the 1990’s pointing to the gynocentric hypocrisies. Sanford Braver conducted federally funded research in the 1990’s which he published in “Divorced Dads: Shattering the Myth’s” where he debunked the myth of the deadbeat dad. Unfortunately truth was countered by a biased media (see Bernard Goldberg’s book “Bias”) and now a large state and federal bureaucracy funded to take money from fathers and transfer it to federal coffers or direct to mothers.

I (with others) formed the Coalition of Fathers and Families Inc. and the NY Men’s Action Network PAC in the 1990’s and like others hoped the new technologies of email, internet, and web sites would help dispel the myth’s of the deadbeat dad and other negative stereotypes of men but unfortunately well funded government agencies and well funded by government non profits use these same tools to better advantage. Misinformed chivalry meets biased gynocentrism supported by propaganda from government and organizations making a living “fixing” the problem. There is no better example then the “Dadication” Campaign, unfortunately which is but one of many.

I was lifted today when I read an op-Ed in the Epoch Times, “On Fatherhood” by Paul Adams (https://www.theepochtimes.com/on-fatherhood_3863038.html). In it he points out the difference in treatment of mothers on Mother’s Day and fathers on Father’s Day with mothers receiving praise and fathers being admonished. We are making some progress. Unfortunately right along side of it is an article about fathers manning up in a feminized world. On the former article I commented on items which needed to be fixed, on the latter I commented on the mistake of blaming men (which pulled me from other chores to write this blog).

We are now entering the 6th decade of government nanny and daddy state regulation of the family. Each succeeding generation we have seen an increase in fatherless households to now 40% of families in America, 75% in the African American community. We continue to blame men, now “soy boys”, “cellar dwellers” or “gang bangers” for being raised absent their father and admonish them to act different while the new “woke” generation blames everything on men (ignoring how good most of us have it in America).

Government regulation of fathers and families has made marriage a hostile environment for men and we wonder why nobody wants to get married and women lament the “lack of marriageable men”. Child support has gotten so draconian that having a child, in or out of marriage, is a hostile environment for men and we wonder why the birth rate has dropped below 2 children per woman, not large enough to sustain our population. We raise children without their biological father then we wonder why they suffer greater anti-social behaviors. As long as we continue to blame men, give women a pass for not being responsible, and ignore the problems of government regulation of the family, we are not going to see any change for the better.

Lets Red Flag Unconstitutional Red Flag Laws

With all things the devil is in the details and when we look at the details of red flag laws we find they give arbitrary power of your constitutional rights to a government official which is bound to abuse that power. As I am a, now retired, career law enforcement officer, a parental rights activist for over 25 years, and a victim of these red flag laws I can speak to the abuses I’ve both seen and experienced. Here’s my personal horror story which is not unique and my humble opinion on the matter.

I was involved in a bitter 3 year custody battle with my soon to be ex wife (late 1990s). In an effort to gain an advantage she, obviously coached, resorted to filing abuse petitions and in many of them she claimed I threatened her by “reaching back on his waist where he carries his off duty gun.” Luckily for me my neighbors witnessed many of the incidents and testified in family court on my behalf resulting in an order of protection for me against her abusive instigating behavior.

Next she resorted to withholding my parenting time with my children. Due to bias in the system police do not enforce custody orders for non custodial parents even though it is a violation of penal codes and they refer you back to family court for resolution. On one occasion I arrived at the head of her driveway as she had just pulled in with the children and standing in the road calmly demanded my parenting time. She exited the vehicle and left the children in the car with her boyfriend announcing she was going to call the police to which I responded “good, I’ll wait right here in the road.” As the State Trooper arrived she came back out I began walking towards the children expecting the usual mediation and referral back to family court.

I was three steps onto the driveway when I was grabbed by the Trooper and slammed onto the back of her car as my ex quickly spirited the children into the house. The Trooper yelled, “where do you keep your gun” to which I responded it was in an ankle holster and I lifted my leg so he could take possession of the firearm. I then had a few heated words with that Trooper regarding the excessive force in lieu of verbal discussion or commands and my treatment by him. A second Trooper arrived and advised we could go to the barracks which was 5 minutes away and “straighten things out.” I had filed multiple custodial interference complaints at this barracks over the months only to be referred back to family court and thought the same would occur.

Supervisors from my agency began to arrive and I was sitting in the Troopers office with one of them and several Troopers discussing the flawed system when the original Trooper arrived and began to yell at me that I had no right to my children and I was harassing my ex, at which point I advised I would make no statements without my attorney. The Trooper had taken possession of my wallet and he left the office but shortly returned and handed me two appearance tickets for minor violations, trespass and simple harassment, and he threw my wallet at me which I noted was missing my badge and police ID. So I went to my supervisor and asked what my status was and he said suspended without pay.

As I had my court appearance tickets and suspected my pistol was being held as “evidence” I started to leave as the walk from there to my girlfriends house was only 5 minutes. I was grabbed at the back door and told that they had decided to take me to immediate arraignment and off I went to see the Judge. I was “lucky” he said as he wasn’t going to set bail but he did issue an order of protection ,among other things, seizing my firearms. My supervisor then drove me to my house in an adjoining county and took possession of all my work and personal firearms and then to my girlfriends house to get firearms I leave there as that was where I stayed when not working.

Here’s where the ironic hypocrisy begins. My girlfriend was a licensed pistol permit holder and kept a pistol in both night stands on either side of the bed. Additionally her son was a hunter and kept long guns in the house which were readily available to me. I had managed to not be arrested at the 10 plus times she said I “reached to his waist where he keeps his off duty gun” due to insufficient evidence and in 3 years of child custody litigation hadn’t laid a hand on her, much less threatened her but now I was a threat to her and society, the prior false allegations ignored. Amazingly I didn’t take possession of these readily available firearms and go on a rampage. I’m sure the order made me not do it.

I had a copy of my ex’s statement which was included in the charging documents. She claimed I was screaming and swearing and “reached around to my waist where I keep my off duty gun” and she feared I was going to grab it so she ran to call the police. Unknown to her or the Troopers was the fact I recorded every interaction I had with her and this incident was no different and I had an audio recording rebutting her allegations of verbal abuse and the fact my off duty pistol was in an ankle holster and was where I normally carried it undermined the argument I reached for a gun on my waist. I demanded a hearing on the seizure of my firearms and a speedy trial in 30 days which I was entitled to by law but was given neither and in fact had it postponed for month’s.

I scraped together my last $2500 and hired a criminal attorney. We arrived at the court date, an afternoon trial with me the only case docketed. As I was charged with only simple violations I was NOT entitled to a jury trial, the one case docketing certain to keep the process in the dark. I was left in the hall as my attorney went into a room with the Judge, the Assistant District Attorney for that Town, the Assistant District Attorney for Domestic Violence, and my ex. He came back out, visibly shaken, and advised when he told the Judge about the recording he ruled it inadmissible as “there was no chain of custody,” that if I demanded a trial and “if” found guilty he would sentence me to jail time and issue a lifetime order of protection. I had heard through my law enforcement contacts that the Judge was going to sentence me to consecutive 15 day sentences (30 days the maximum) and that I was to not be segregated from the regular population as was customary so I believed he would follow through on his threat.

My attorney advised I could win on appeal but it would cost between $5000 and $10,000 and take about 4 years. I advised him the lifetime order of protection meant I would be out of work and additionally incarceration, and this incident, would be considered a “voluntary” reduction in income and I would be jailed after 6 months for failure to pay child support waiting for the criminal appeal. I told him to cut any deal which would put me back to work. He told me my ex was incessant that I not be given a deal and when she was told that would mean no more child support payments from me she stated she didn’t care and wanted to see me destroyed. He apologized for not being able to stop the worst injustice he had seen in his long legal career, I’ve never seen anyone get as effed as you”, he said and went back in to see if he could cut a deal.

Back out he advised that the Judge had called my agencies Colonel in charge of uniform personnel to OK the deal and I was to be given a one year order of protection and I would be allowed to carry my duty firearm while working but no long guns or shotguns while on duty. I was to plead guilty to trespass and pay a $50 fine. My personal firearms would remain seized. As a condition of employment I had to maintain a home office and I was to leave my issued sidearm at my home office and not to carry a firearm when off duty. Given my girlfriends possession of firearms this in effect meant I was only unarmed from the time I left my home and travelled to hers. Amazingly the order “prevented” me from driving in my police car with my duty weapon and murdering my ex, I expect as I had my uniform on I was an upstanding member of society but when I took it off I turned into a dangerous threat to society. That’s it, I’m sure.

In divorce court I asked that exchanges of the children occur at a public location which could be monitored by neutral parties and was denied. If you violate an order of protection it is a felony and so I couldn’t risk picking up the children and having the false allegation repeated so in effect, the total exclusion of me from my children she had been fighting for three years to achieve was achieved by making these multiple false allegations when one finally stuck. Bankrupt, reputation destroyed, career almost ruined, and faced with a bad choice of returning to work and losing my children or the worse choice of going to jail and losing my children I chose bad over worse.

My suspension without pay from work was for 60 days, conduct unbecoming an officer for arguing with the Trooper. I was out of work for 4 month’s on the order of protection so when they offered to “take 5 days” I said the 60 days should be concurrent with the 4 month’s. When it went to an arbitration hearing the union attorney felt I had a very good argument but I warned him that they would play the domestic abuser card and they did. The hearing examiner split the difference and ordered a 30 days suspension without pay. Once the red flag is thrown it’ll be thrown time and time again when needed.

Those of us who have suffered in family and matrimonial courts have been sounding the alarm about these abuses of due process and violations of civil rights to no avail. Petitions for orders of protection are filed Ex Parte, meaning by one party without the defendant present. Judges think abundance of caution as no Judge wants to be the one who didn’t issue an order and then have something bad happen so fearing blame and having no rebuttal to the charges they almost never deny the order. Once the order is served any anger or indignation at the violation of your rights will be used as evidence to show you are angry and a danger. You suffer the costs of attorneys to retain your God given rights and the system will drag on painstakingly slow as you suffer financially, emotionally, and reputation-ally.

If you think it can’t happen to you look up “Cowboy’s for Trump” and the plight of their leader Couy Griffin, a New Mexico elected official, who “entered a restricted area” at the Capitol protest on Jan. 6 and held a prayer session outside of the Capitol Building. Regardless how you feel about his political views and alleged simple trespass on restricted capitol grounds his physical arrest and incarceration for 3 weeks with no bail seems extreme on its face. And when he was finally released, RED FLAG, his right to possess firearms was revoked in spite of the fact he has not been violent. When he received multiple death threats the Judge allowed him to possess firearms in his home but not his car or in public. If he’s not a danger to violate that order then the order itself is unnecessary and additionally threats against him are valid away from or in the home.

The view that an order of protection prevents violence flies idiotic in the face of reality as the violent acts are felonies and anyone who is willing to commit violence and face years in prison isn’t worried about violating an order which has less than a one year term. Orders “preventing” the possession of firearms similarly only work on people who legally own firearms and weren’t going to commit acts of violence in the first place. “Red Flag” is a government misnomer for “violate due process” under the guise of government “protecting” society by violating the civil rights of an individual who has not committed any crime and has not been allowed to rebut the allegations against him. Any angry exaggerated excited utterance or public post not meant to be taken literally, such as “Communists should be taken out and shot,” opens the door to anyone with a grudge, or government themselves, to RED FLAG the persons civil rights.

The fathers rights and parental rights movement dates back to the 1960s where advocates have since then and to today been complaining about the lack of due process, ex parte allegations taken as fact (Red Flag), unnecessary orders of protection issued, and individual civil rights violated on a daily basis. Legislators create misnamed bills “to protect the public” which in effect undermine civil rights and due process. Executive branches overcharge, incarcerate with excessive or no bail, issue ex parte orders of protection, and use overbearing and unnecessary police tactics to intimidate citizens. Judicial accountability is an area ignored by most of the public, courts are now where civil rights go to die. Our lack of due diligence to protecting civil rights under the guise of protecting the public and “preventing” crime is now undermining liberty for all of us. Us parental rights activists would like to welcome the rest of America to the unconstitutional nightmare.

James Hays,

Lt. (Ret) NY En-Con Police, past President of the Coalition of Fathers and Families NY, Inc. (FaFNY) and past Director of the NY Men’s Action Network (NYMAN)

The Daddy State is Replacing Fathers and Undermining Marriage

Not a day goes by where we don’t see a person on TV talking about the problems of father absence and out of wedlock births. Do a search for “Responsible Father” and up pops web sites and government programs directed at men and talking about their responsibility to their children. As a 25 year father rights activist I am well aware of these programs having attended state and national seminars put on by government promoting responsible fathers all aimed at fixing fathers. Unfortunately they are all the same and doomed to failure for they fail to properly identify the problem and keep blaming men and ignoring the federal government and states as the culpable parties.

The 1935 Social Security Act (SSA) included federal dollars for Aid to Dependent Children. At that time most black mothers worked so the program was aimed primarily at white mothers with a deceased, absent, or unable to work husband. In the early 1960s civil rights activists and welfare reform activists worked to eliminate biases within the system and black mother participation increased. Fearing the program would reduce marriages the name was changed to Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) in 1962. In 1964 President Johnson began his war on poverty campaign which added food stamps and medicaid for poor people. Thus the role of father as financial provider was usurped.

In 1967 the federal government required states to establish paternity and also to extend benefits of unemployed male parents. In 1968 the Supreme Court ruled that the AFDC benefits could not be reduced for a man in the house if they were not deemed to be an “actual or substitute parent.” In 1981 the Supreme Court ruled that a step-fathers income be considered. Thus providing a financial incentive to mothers to not live with their children’s father and to not marry any future significant others.

In 1965 Daniel Patrick Moynihan saw that there was a crisis in African American families as 23.6% of births were to unmarried mothers. He also noted that historically the rate of increase or decline in African American male unemployment paralleled the rate of AFCD cases but in 1962 the lines crossed with AFDC cases going up as unemployment claims went down. He warned against Defining Deviancy Down as single mother houses were becoming socially acceptable. When he published his findings in “The Negro Family: the Case for National Action” he received criticism from civil rights leaders for labelling blacks. The report was not put into policy by Johnson due to this.

In 1960 the birth control pill was approved for use in the United States giving women reproductive choice. In 1970 abortion was legalized. Men have no similar effective temporary birth control method nor means to “abort” an unwanted pregnancy. If a woman has an unwanted pregnancy she can terminate the pregnancy regardless of the wishes of the man. If a woman decides to carry the pregnancy to term, even if she lied to the man about her reproductive status, and even if he doesn’t want to be a father, she can establish him as the father and he will be held financially responsible for the child.

The Feminist movement began in the 1960s and originally touted itself as an equal rights movement but the radical feminist movement split off from that blaming “patriarchal white men” for “oppression” of women. It portrayed the view that men were abusers of women and children. The theme of the feminist was women don’t need men. Labor participation increased for women throughout the 60’s with 1963s Equal Pay Act and 1965s establishment of the Equal Employment Opportunity Act and prohibitions on sex discrimination in employment. While originally about choice, the movement looks down and denigrates women who choose a traditional nuclear family over a career, encouraging young girls to forego the former and choose the latter as the social norm.

Historically the person wanting out of a marriage or who committed adultery lost custody of the children. In the late 1800s the courts increasingly relied on the Tender Years Doctrine holding that young children be placed with the mother and older children with the father. In 1970 California passed the first “no fault” divorce law and this trended across the land. In reality all one needed to do to escape a marriage was to file for legal separation in family court, live apart for a year, then file for divorce under the abandonment statutes. New York was the last state to enact no fault divorce in 2010. Child custody changed in the 1970s abandoning the Tender Years Doctrine in favor of The Best Interests of the Child standard. Thus decision making on custody was placed at the courts discretion. Even with this standard the mother custody rate after divorce was well over 85% due to judicial bias against men. Divorce rates jumped to about 50% of all marriages.

The combination of subsidized single mother homes and easy divorces saw divorces and father absent homes rise as did AFDC claims. In 1988 President Reagan signed the Family Support Act establishing a federal Office of Child Support Enforcement thus removing states rights in this area. He ordered the states to have support guidelines in effect but left the states only one year to establish them. Each State was to also establish an Office of Child Support Enforcement. While labelled as “child support” the massive bureaucratic program was designed to establish paternity of children receiving AFDC and hold the father financially responsible and return the money to federal coffers. And thus the “Deadbeat Dad” was created.

Lacking time to establish reasonable child support guidelines the states just enacted the example guidelines provided by the federal government, an income shares model which taxed the “non custodial parent” (most often the father) 17% of his income for one child and 25% for two (with some variation in states). The assessment is pre tax dollars so the payer is responsible for the income tax in addition to the income transfer and one child is 35% and two 48% of gross income. In later years draconian collection methods were implemented, including incarceration. Fathers making close to 3 figure salaries can usually make the payments and still get by but a father making under $60,000 is reduced to living below poverty levels. Studies have shown that the vast majority of “deadbeats” are really dead broke, inability to pay the number one reason for default. Incarceration disproportionately affects poor fathers who tend towards young fathers and fathers of color.

In the 1990s Sanford Braver conducted the only federal research on child support and the family and he published his findings in “Divorced Dads: Shattering the Myth’s.” This, and subsequent private studies, have shown that about 80% of divorces are filed by women with the number one reason being “we grew apart”. The divorce rate peaked at about 50% of all marriages and has been declining as the marriage rate is rapidly declining. After divorce mothers obtain about 50% of the marital assets, usually more, and gain custody of children in about 85% cases. Worse, there are virtually no access enforcement avenues for a non custodial parent denied access by the custodial parent, and 50% of women admitted to having interfered with a fathers access to his children.

In out-of-wedlock births the support guidelines provide a perverse incentive for women to have multiple children with multiple fathers as two 17% payers (34%) is higher than one father paying for two (25%). Poor young men have no disincentive to having out-of-wedlock children as they have no income to be taxed. And those with out-of-wedlock children are incentivized to work off the books, crime and drug distribution two good off the books income earners. Access to their children can be had by providing direct financial support to the mother in exchange for access. And we are now in the third and forth generations of children raised in single mother homes, thus establishing it as the societal norm for 1/2 the population.

As government “helped” the family these past 6 decades we saw marriage decline, divorce and out -of-wedlock births increase and now 40% of children live absent their father, close to 75% of African American fathers. I think it’s plain to see, it isn’t fathers that need to be taught responsibility.

James Hays, Lt. (Ret) NY En-Con Police, past President of the Coalition of Fathers and Families NY, Inc. (FaFNY) and past Director of the NY Men’s Action Network (NYMAN).