Darkness at Noon: Soviet-Style Re-education in
State Mandated 'Batterers' Classes
It doesn't matter that you're innocent. Or that she attacked you
first. Or that you both went over the line and that both of you
want to put it behind you and work it out. The system will
prosecute you and persecute you until you've confessed your
sins--even if you've none to confess. And you're not cured until
they say you're cured--even if you were never sick to begin
with.
In
Darkness at Noon Arthur Koestler wrote of the nightmarish
world of the Stalinist Soviet secret police, wherein all accused
were guilty and protestations of innocence were acts of
subversion. Koestler describes how police power was used to
extract confessions and the way perfectly innocent men were
manipulated into publicly declaring their crimes and their
guilt.
While thankfully America is not a police state, the modern
domestic violence industry operates on principles which Gletkin,
Koestler's fictional interrogator, might appreciate. As Seattle
family law attorney
Lisa Scott
explains, from top to bottom the current domestic violence
system won't let women be anything but victims and can't see men
as anything but batterers. And from the moment a 911 call is
made there is practically no such thing as an innocent man.
Scott and
Seattle area marriage & family therapist
Michael
Thomas discussed the anti-male domestic violence system and
state-mandated 'batterers' treatment programs.
Scott is the
founder of Taking Action Against
Bias in the System, a Seattle-based civil liberties
organization.
Thomas,
because he objects to the way batterers' classes are conducted,
has pointedly refused to become a state certified domestic
violence treatment provider.
To find out more about police and judicial anti-male bias in
domestic violence-related matters, see Glenn's columns "Baseball
Player's Domestic Violence Arrest Demonstrates How Men are
Presumed Guilty in Domestic Disputes" (Los Angeles Daily
Journal, San Francisco Daily Journal, 8/8/02) and
NCFM-LA's Lawsuit Against Shelters is Valid Response to County's
Refusal to Help Abused Men
(Daily Breeze, Los Angeles) (6/22/03) (co-authored by
Marc Angelucci of the National
Coalition of Free Men Los Angeles).
The use and misuse of "emotional abuse" is discussed in "Colorado
Arsonist Terry Barton's Smart Strategy:
When
in Trouble, Blame a Man" (Cybercast News Service, 7/3/02).
