For decades conservatives and conservative Christians have claimed that they are fighting to "defend the family," when in reality they have wasted an enormous amount of time focusing on trivial issues like gay marriage. At the same time they have ignored the forces which are hurting children, destroying fatherhood, and tearing families apart. These are the family law system, the federal financial incentives which help shape and drive that system, and the shortsighted mothers who place their emotions or convenience above their children's needs for their fathers.   more >>

Topics Glenn discussed included:

• Glenn spoke in defense of working fathers and elaborated on his quotes in the Washington Times article Custody's high stakes (7/10/05).

• Glenn discussed His Side listener Jim Evans' commentary on the negative portrayal of divorced dads in the movie War of the Worlds. To learn more, click here

• Glenn discussed the article Rev. Billy Graham's Daughter Facing Domestic Violence Charges

• Glenn discussed Salman Rushdie's India and Pakistan's Code of Dishonor (New York Times, 7/9/05)

• Glenn discussed the Boy Crisis in Education. To learn more, see Glenn's column New Study of Youth Shows It’s Boys Who Are in Crisis (Los Angeles Times, 3/20/05)

• Glenn discussed soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan facing child support problems. To learn more, see Glenn's co-authored column  Laws Must Protect the Rights of Military Dads (Army Times, Marine Corps Times, 3/28/05)

The Violence Against Women Act (VAWA), which was first passed in 1994, expires on September 30, and legislation was recently introduced to renew it. While on the surface VAWA sounds good--after all, everyone opposes violence against women--there are many serious problems with it.

VAWA-funded shelters and domestic violence organizations ignore and often refuse to provide services to male victims of domestic violence. Domestic violence organizations funded by VAWA refuse to acknowledge the mountains of research which show that men compromise a significant percentage of domestic violence victims.   more >>

Topics Glenn discussed included: 

• How fathers are portrayed on TV and in children's books

• Glenn defends traditional dads and the fathers of yesteryear

• Fathers' Day "Deadbeat Dad" raids

• Glenn's new co-authored column "Not the Era of the Deadbeat Dad but the Era of the Hero Father" (Ft. Worth Star-Telegram, 6/19/05)

• Glenn's new column, "This Year Daddy Began a Comeback" (Riverside Press-Enterprise, 6/19/05)

• Media's lighthearted coverage of a woman's domestic violence-- see the Associated Press' Woman Gets Fiancé's Attention

It has been said that a man never knows what love is until he has a daughter. Of all the bonds between family members, those between fathers and daughters are often the closest. At the same time, they can also be the most tenuous.

In her book Whatever Happened to Daddy's Little Girl? Jonetta Rose Barras asserts that many women suffer from what she calls "Fatherless Woman Syndrome," and that it often stays with women their whole lives. She believes that while the effect of fatherlessness on boys receives more attention, fatherlessness has a devastating impact on girls, too.   more >>

Feminist writer Amanda Marcotte disagrees. She believes that both the Conference and the fathers' movement as a whole seek to "reverse feminist gains in divorce and custody laws," and help men "use children as a tool" in order to "regain control of their ex-wives' lives."  Marcotte labels Parental Alienation Syndrome a "fake syndrome" and says "the underlying issue for a lot of fathers' rights activists is paying child support."   more >>

The average American woman earns only 76 cents for every dollar a man earns. Feminists have long argued that this is the result of sexism. Men's activists and dissident feminists counter that the gap is caused by the different career and lifestyle choices men and women make, and that it is often the responsibilities of motherhood, not discrimination, which hold women's wages back.  more >>

• Glenn, NOW VP, Others Square off on Post-Divorce Move-Aways on Univision's Aqui y Ahora

• After a Decade, Gulf War Veteran/Paternity Fraud Victim Still Under Jackboot of Los Angeles Child Support Enforcement

• Glenn, Debbie Kline, Melanie Jacobs, Murray Davis Quoted in Michigan Paternity Fraud Article

• Feminist Activist Tries to Get Air America Host Fired for Having Glenn on Show

• Should California Shared Parenting Advocates Sponsor a Shared Parenting Ballot Initiative?

It would be hard to overestimate the amount of pain and misery that result from modern divorce, particularly for children. My e-mail is usually jammed with letters from aggrieved and often desperate people who have been chewed up by divorce and family court. Shared parenting advocates, divorce reformers and fatherhood activists are 100% correct in fighting for a divorce regime that is more child-centered, equitable, and respectful of the loving bonds children share with both parents.

However, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. When I set aside time to answer my listener and reader mail I often tell my wife "I'm going to go climb down into the sewer now." While dredging through the seemingly endless stream of broken families and broken hearts I often think "what can we do to prevent some of these damn divorces from happening to begin with?"  more >>

1) Oprah Includes His Side with Glenn Sacks Audio in Whitewash of Clara Harris' 'Murder by Mercedes' Clara Harris. To learn more, see:

• Oprah Exclusive: Clara Harris, The Woman Who Ran Over Her Cheating Husband

• Glenn's column "In Defense of David Harris" (LewRockwell.com, 3/4/03)

• Glenn's column "Convicted Murderess Can Get Custody but Decent Fathers Can't" (Houston Chronicle, 9/19/03)

• CBS' 'Suburban Madness': It's OK to Kill Your Husband (October 10, 2004)

• Domestic Violence Series Substitutes Emotion for Facts (San Francisco Chronicle, 4/8/05)

• Hear Bobbi Bacha, the leading investigator in the Clara Harris case, on His Side--Texas P.I. Reveals Secrets Behind Clara Harris' 'Murder by Mercedes'  (9/28/03).

2) Update on His Side campaign supporting the California Shared Parenting Alliance's AB 1307, the California Shared Parenting bill.  more >>

His Side has launched a campaign supporting the California Shared Parenting Alliance's AB 1307, the California Shared Parenting bill.

AB 1307 will clarify California law and create a clear presumption that parents equally share in the responsibility of joint custody of their children unless there is clear evidence that it would not be in the children's best interest.  more >>

Some of the issues discussed included:

• The Elian Gonzalez saga--see Five years later, Elian, now 11, is living a ‘normal’ life (Sun-Sentinel, 4/16/05)
   

• Glenn spars with feminist domestic violence leader Esta Soler, founder and President of the Family Violence Prevention Fund, one of the world's leading domestic violence organizations, in the San Francisco Chronicle. Soler labeled Glenn's column Domestic violence a two-way street (San Francisco Chronicle, 4/8/05) a "shameful example of cherry-picking and distorting data to confuse readers." Read her letter here.   more >>

Shot in the line of duty. Twice awarded the Medal of Honor. Named New Jersey Police Officer of the Year.  A highly decorated officer with an impeccable record. For 22 years police officer Eric Washington battled criminals on the streets of East Orange, New Jersey.  On January 21, 2001 Washington was ambushed and brought down--not by an ex-convict bent on revenge or a shadowy gunman but instead by a false domestic violence accusation brought by a mentally ill woman.

Under the Violence Against Women Act of 1994 and the 1996 Domestic Violence Offender Gun Ban, individuals, including police officers and armed forces personnel, are prohibited from possessing a firearm if they are subject to a restraining order regarding an intimate partner.  Yet restraining orders are notoriously easy to obtain. Unless the accused can get the order undone at a hearing--no easy feat in today's climate--any police officer's or serviceman's career is one flimsy accusation away from destruction. In New Jersey, state policy dictates that men lose their weapons simply when a woman makes a police report of domestic violence.   more >>

Marks won custody in part due to the widespread media sympathy she created through constant theatrics, playing victim, and her determination to place her little girls in the public spotlight. After losing custody of the girls to John Aylsworth, her ex-boyfriend, she successfully took her side of the story to the public via appearances on Larry King Live, PrimeTime Live, The O'Reilly Factor, and Dr. Phil, and through quotes in one-sided "news" articles in the New York Daily News and the New York Post.

In contrast to Marks, Aylsworth and his attorney, Patricia Grant, have, in the interests of protecting the girls from the media circus Marks has created, declined to speak publicly about the case--until now.  more >>

A divorced father gets laid off. Or injured. Or sick. His income drops. The court won't give him a downward modification, or he's not able to apply for one, or he didn't know he had to get one. His child support arrearages pile up. Interest and penalties are tacked on. Soon the father has a debt he couldn't possibly pay, and which he never should have been expected to pay.

Nationally syndicated advice columnist Amy Alkon believes that men, like women, should have reproductive rights. Condemning women who get pregnant intentionally and "turn casual sex into cash flow sex."

The "Choice for Men" movement seeks to give unmarried fathers the right to relinquish their parental rights and responsibilities within a month of learning of a pregnancy, just as mothers do when they choose to give their children up for adoption.

When Gary, a US Navy SEAL, deployed to Afghanistan in the wake of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, he never dreamed that his service to his country would cost him his little son. Gary's son was not taken from him by a terrorist or a kidnapper. This 18-year Navy veteran with an unblemished military and civilian record was effectively stripped of his right to be a father by a California court.  more >>

Should men go to jail for having sex without a condom? Law professors Ian Ayres and Katherine Baker say yes. Under their highly-publicized "Reckless Sex" proposal, a "defendant would be guilty of reckless sexual conduct if, in a first sexual encounter with another particular person, the defendant had sexual intercourse without using a condom."

The penalty for the "guilty" man would be up to six months in jail. The authors say their proposal  would help increase condom use and the "quality of communication in first sexual encounters" and thus "reduce the spread of sexually transmitted disease and decrease the incidence of acquaintance rape."   more >>

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February 27, 2005

Restraining Orders: Saviors of Abused Women
or Child Custody Tactic?

Everyone has heard the story--a father is hit with a restraining order, booted out of his house, and pushed to the edge of his children's lives. Boston criminal defense attorney Jeffrey Denner believes that restraining orders and spurious domestic abuse allegations are frequently used as weapons in custody battles against decent fathers.

Feminist family law attorney Lynne Gold-Bikin, former chair of the American Bar Association's Family Law Section, believes that domestic violence is at epidemic levels, that the vast majority of restraining orders are legitimate, and that we must "protect the abused--even if a few innocent guys get nailed."   more >>

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February 20, 2005

Is Child Protective Services Out of Control?

Few agencies receive more criticism than Child Protective Services. Some critics say they use their practically limitless, police-state style powers to seize decent parents' children and destroy families. Others claim that CPS does not do enough, and that it is tragically ineffective in protecting children from abuse.

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"I've never paid for a date and I never will," says relationship expert Athena Navarro, the LA Love Coach. Navarro believes that both men and women have suffered from the decline of traditional courtship. She notes, "it's hard to respect a man who's a wimp," and believes that men need to fulfill their traditional masculine obligations in dating and that American women need to recapture their lady-like qualities.

Marc Rudov, author of The Man's No-Nonsense Guide to Women, believes that modern men are still unfairly saddled with the burdens of traditional dating.  more >>

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February 6, 2005

Feminist Law Professor Leads Backlash
Against Paternity Fraud Laws

The stories of victims of paternity fraud often provoke disbelief. Many men are falsely assigned paternity in default judgments and are compelled by the state to pay 18 years of child support for children whom DNA tests have proven are not theirs. Many of these men are not properly served notice of the paternity proceedings, never get their day in court and have no idea they are "fathers" until their wages are garnished.

Often by the time these men realize what has been done to them, the statute of limitations for challenging paternity has already passed, and sometimes lose half or more of their take-home pay to child support, arrearages, interest, and penalties -- often to support children they have never even met.  more >>

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January 30, 2005

Misogynistic Rap Culture and the Decline of the Black Family

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According to Gender Studies professor Dr. Hugo Schwyzer, Ph.D., a member of the National Organization for Men Against Sexism, the emerging men's rights movement is a reactionary expression of deep-seated societal misogyny and homophobia.

According to Dr. Schwyzer, talk show host/columnist Glenn Sacks is part of the problem--a "purveyor of a victim mentality for men" who "masks men's own responsibility" for their problems and who "lashes out at those, such as feminists, who call men to accountability for their actions." Schwyzer also labels Sacks a "denier of male privilege," adding "just because a group doesn't feel privileged doesn't mean that they aren't." more >>>

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January 16, 2005

Keeping Your Marriage Together

It would be hard to overestimate the amount of pain and misery that result from modern divorce, particularly for children. My e-mail is usually jammed with letters from aggrieved and often desperate people who have been chewed up by divorce and family court. Shared parenting advocates, divorce reformers and fatherhood activists are 100% correct in fighting for a divorce regime that is more child-centered, equitable, and respectful of the loving bonds children share with both parents.

However, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. When I set aside time to answer my listener and reader mail I often tell my wife "I'm going to go climb down into the sewer now." While dredging through the seemingly endless stream of broken families and broken hearts I often think "what can we do to prevent some of these damn divorces from happening to begin with?"  more >>

Listen to the show (MP3 format)

 

January 9, 2005

NBA Vet Pays $90,000 in Child Support But is Imprisoned Anyway

Billy Sims. Andre Rison. Ron LeFlore. Kal Daniels. James Brooks. Darryl Strawberry. Bennie Blades. Ralph Sampson. Roscoe Tanner. Chris Warren. Vernon Maxwell. James "Lights Out" Toney. Monte Reagor. 

Newspapers often carry accounts of retired professional athletes who are arrested for being behind on their child support obligations. In some cases these are men who have behaved selfishly towards their children. In others, drug or alcohol problems have played a major role. Yet in many others the problem is that the retired athlete is being required to pay child support based on a high professional salary he no longer earns. According to family law attorney Lisa Scott, getting a downward modification on child support is "one of the most difficult tasks" faced by lawyers who represent fathers.   more >>

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January 2, 2005

The 'Wimp Factor': Leftist Psychologist Says Conservative
Men Are 'Femiphobic'

Do conservative men come to their political beliefs because they are afraid of women? Stephen Ducat, author of The Wimp Factor: Gender Gaps, Holy Wars, and the Politics of Anxious Masculinity, believes that male "femiphobia" is the cause of the right's ascendance among American men. In his view, such phenomena as the Bush administration (which he calls "the most sociopathic American administration in my lifetime"), Christian fundamentalism and right-wing U.S. policy all spring from an American "hyper-masculinity."   more >>

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