Interesting Discussion I Posted from Another Site Regarding the Ongoing Debate on a NYS Presumptive Joint Parenting Plan


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Name: NYMOM
Subject: Re: Online Child Support Petition Sent
Tue, Mar 28 2006
Message:
Hi. I posed my message too soon in the previous post, but in essense it was saying that I sent the online child support petition Friday of last week.

I sent it to Hillary Clinton and Charles Schumer, both NY senators. It's an interesting time to send it too since NY is currently fighting over a Joint Custody bill in Albany.

Let's see what happens with this.


Name: Mxx xx xxx xxxxx
Subject: NYMOM I have a question....
Wed, Mar 29 2006
Message:
On the flip side of this bill, Do you think that everyone being awarded joint custody will eliminate constant post divorce issues and litigations? (Personally I dont think it will) IMHO unless you have joint custody with slip residential someone will be the residential parent and having a residential parent and one who is non-residential will mirror many of the same problems existing under the current system, no?

In other words the parent with residential has the child the lions share of the time and the non-residential parent, unless they are dealing with a bio parent who truely cooperates with Co-parenting, will still be subjected to the same controlling issues.

Maybe I am way off, I just dont see it as a fix for woman. With or without this law the fathers rights movement will continue to move foward and instead of fathers having Sole legal custody with residential they will prob be awarded joint legal with residential.

Will this bill, if passed reform the support system? If so how? You have to agree that co-parenting can be a nightmare when most couples do not get along, even for the remaining time they are raising their children.

A joint custody bill can not stop the residential parent from relocating away from, lets just say the non-residential mother, if the father can prove that this move is necesary and in the best interests, no?

Again, maybe I am wrong. I am skeptical, forgive me, but it comes from seeing how the courts only support 1 thing....and thats the courts themselves and not the people who turn to them.

Even if I was still a NC mother I would still have concerns because no matter what is passed I think that the non-residential parent is still going to have many of the same problems. I dont mean to be a devils advocate but I know you have done much research on this topic and I just wanted to ask a few questions and maybe with your insite you can help me understand.

I wonder who will benifit most from a joint custody bill since most of the current orders now have the mother having sole custody. That would mean an awful large percent of Sole custody mothers would have that taken from them, giving their ex husbands joint legal/non residential custody. Wouldnt that just put those men 1 step closer to being able to remove the children from the mothers residential care.

We know that there is a money play giving men power to fight woman in court because most mothers make less then their husbands and once divorced, even with support coming in, most sole custody residential mom's struggle to make ends meet and their ex's have more resourses to litigate them to no end.

Maybe I mis-understood the bill, I don't have so much time these days to really read into it, perhaps you can give me some insite.


Name: NYMOM
Subject: Response to Questions - Part I
Thu, Mar 30 2006
Message:
Hi. Thanks for the important questions.

First of all New York (and I think every state) has both Sole and some form of Joint Legal/Physical custody already. Also, I understand that Joint Legal Custody can be equivalent to Sole Custody for the parent being named primary or residential custodian.

I understand that fully.

YET this is something different from what is being proposed now in NYS.

What is being proposed in NY actually has the potential to eliminate even an appearance/ruling from a Judge, as unless abuse or neglect is involved, every family heading to litigate custody is going to be automatically signed up for a joint parenting plan. Thus the ONLY issue to settle is the details of the parenting plan: ie., who gets weekends or days/nights etc., to care for the children.

If it gets approved I eventually foresee, three, maybe four parenting plans being available to the general public and your only choice will be which one of those to pick from and use for your own family...

Of course, I understand that assholes exist. AND most of the women on here might be dealing with those few who will continue trying to undermine and subvert every plan ever made to cut down on litigation YET we must think of what works for MOST of the people. As we can't tailor every policy and law for a few assholes.


Name: NYMOM
Subject: Re: Response to Questions - Part II
Thu, Mar 30 2006
Message:
Regarding most women getting Sole custody already and how this will impact them. This was my only reservation.

Which was basically the assumption that mothers w/o custody are the exception and the mothers with sole custody are the rule. So why hurt the majority of mothers and children to help a small group?

However, that sort of thinking is wrong as non-custodial mothers are just the tip of an iceberg, which if NOT stopped here and now will grow and spread and eventually impact every other mother and child in this country and many others as we lead many other countries by example.

Actually few mothers get sole custody through the courts today. The numbers look high when they are thrown together but breaking them out shows a far different and much more menacing picture to mothers.

Remember generally when they throw that 85% of mothers have sole custody figure out, they are including 20 something years of data from a time when most mothers did get sole custody (in the 80s). Going forward and just including the last 5/10 years of data, the numbers look very different. Plus they don't include within those numbers the 5 million grandparents (many of them paternal grandparents) who have custody of children.

Thus, going forward mothers face a very real threat of losing custody of their children if something is not done to stop this.

Mothers, of course, should have their rights to their children unchallenged under natural law...YET we must deal with the reality which is those rights are only given to us legally today through the courts of men...and in those courts the mother/child bond is not respected or even acknowledged. We are viewed as just another litigant of no more importance in our childrens' lives then a teacher, a grandparent or a friendly neighbor...

So, it's NOT just a small group of non-custodial mothers at issue here, but an ongoing attempt to delegitimatize EVERY mother, those with custody as well as those without. Moreover, it's an attempt to roll back all of the rights women have won, by holding our children hostage if we don't go along with the program.

I mean you yourself can see how much of your life and resources were expended in this years long custody fight for your daughters. How much different would your life have been if this has NOT been permitted to happen to you????


Name: NYMOM
Subject: Re: Re: Response to Questions - Part III
Thu, Mar 30 2006
Message:
Actually it winded up quite accidentally being the perfect time to submit the online child support petition when this joint parenting bill is being debated. As one big fear in NY was how would child support be paid to offset the cost of welfare for parent who are awarded this joint parenting?

So the Colonna vs. Colonna ruling can solve this problem. As it awards child support taking disparities in income into account not who has more parenting time.

Many men claim this is not about money but about spending time with their children. So fine...they can both spend time with their children YET still pay child support if there are disparities in income between them and the child's mother.

Interestingly enough the Colonna vs. Colonna ruling came about due to a man who was virtually a millionaire trying to avoid paying child support. YET he will impact many low income men, whose childrens' mothers are on welfare, causing them to have joint custody YET these men must still pay child support.

Ironic.

NOw, I do not imagine that this solution will settle EVERY problem regarding custody of children...but it will solve many of them...

Actually I have a feeling many mens' rights representatives see the same thing as many complained in CA when similar measures were taken. Saying that men would be discouraged from picking up their children; if there were no financial incentive for them in having Joint Custody...


Name: Mxx xx xxx xxx
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Response to Questions - Part III
Fri, Mar 31 2006

Message:
Thankyou for such a great resonce!

I have to tell you, from where I sit it is all very scary. I am not afraid to admit being a little paranoid because even after I have won custody back I look back on the yrs it took for me to get where I finally sit today and to think of how much CPS let slide and even when CPS finally indicated the wost case of abuse (overlooking othertimes) the courts KNEW and all they did to my ex was restrain him from moving outside the county.

The court knew what was going on but needed to drag the whole "investigation" out over the course of 2 yrs while those kids were sitting ducks in the same house with their abusive step mother. All the step mother did, once under the watchful eye of the law guardian, was revert from the physical abuse back to what she was originally doing to the kids, emotionally abusing them.

All I can work with is what I know from what I personally have been through, and I am sure there are kids out there living in conditions even worse then mine were in and the thought of that rips my heart out, but I have seen how far CPS and the courts let abuse go before they actually remove kids.

There is whre my fear comes from, what will be considered abuse, I mean I know a grown woman whos mother use to burn her skin with a cigarett when she was little, what will the courts see as abuse?? How abused do kids have to be?

What about all the emotionally abused kids who are being subjected to PAS, look at all the children out there who have been or are being brain washed by one parent. Where will the line be drawn. Is the 1 indicated abuse against my kids step mother, with a recomendation that the children nmot be left alone in her care be enough to keep my ex from regaining joint legal as long as the kids reside with me?

Do you know the nightmare for someone in my shoes if someone like my ex is given equal decision making? The man has gone out of his way from day 1, and continues to do back flips, to make my life and simple things as difficult as he can. This whole divorce thing, I would not wish it one even an enemy, it has been nothing but a heartacke, not just from my standpoint but for my children, it has forever changed their lifes and the way they see the world. I have so little faith in a system that makes court orders but never enforces them.

I cant even get my ex to pay his child support and they are letting him drag me into court dozens of times because as he sees it he has a ton of rights and he wants to punish me for taking away his children.

I hope that they reform more then just parenting plans, that they make the system stricter with enforments for those who refuse to comply. If they dont overhaul more then the custody stuff things will always be difficult because like you said, so many men are big erning asses... Thanks again for all your help,


Name: NYMOM
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Response to Questions - Part III
Fri, Mar 31 2006
Message:
Your ex won't be eligible for this Joint Parenting as it's only for families w/o a history abuse or neglect. So the one founded report will eliminate him...

At least that's my interpretation...

Anyway by the time the kinks get worked out of this law, at least your oldest will probably be 18...


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Just to let other mothers know who might have similar questions that no plan, law or public policy is going to solve 100% of your problems, especially if you had kids with a world class, 24th carat, abusive asshole...that one-step plan doesn't exist and never will. Well actually it does exist, but we live in a civilized society where the 'one-step guaranted plan to get rid of an abusive asshole' is illegal.

Sorry.

BUT as ex President Clinton once said (and actually this is the ONLY useful idea I feel he contributed for the whole eight years he was in office) "Just because we can't do EVERYTHING doesn't mean we can't do ANYTHING"...

So no, this presumptive Joint Parenting idea is not going to solve EVERY problem, but it can solve many of the common (man/woman's) everyday family issues...

Thus, it will work for many of us but not all.

Again sorry, but as I said previously we can't tailor every law, plan, family policy. etc., to cater to the small group of abusive assholes who exist. It's just not fair to the 99% of the rest of us parents out there.