I consider myself fairly well informed on issues of child and family policy but I hadn't heard the term "moveaway" or a great deal more about the impact on courts of such sociological phenomenon as the fathers' movement, until I discovered Trish Wilson's Blog.
Trish is an unabashed, unapologetic, (and isn't that freshing) left-wing feminist with a special interest and expertise in such matters, although she blogs about much else; she's been on top of the "looting of Iraqi antiquities" story from the beginning.
Okay, maybe motherhood/family issues generally don't raise your blood pressure the way another Bush lie or Rummy "vase" comment does. Well, maybe it should.
Think for a moment about the mileage Dan Quayle's puppetmaster, Bill Kristol, got out of a fictional unmarried professional woman's decision to have a baby. All it took was an Atlantic cover story with a catchy title, "Dan Quayle Was Right About Murphy Brown," by a previously barely known academic, Barbara Whitehead, to do the trick of wiping from the minds of most mainstream media the memory of how ridiculous Quayle's comments had sounded when he first said them. From such nonsense can come more serious kinds of nonsense, like "the defense of marriage" legislation. (Yes, I know, Clinton deserves a thump upside the head for that one)
The same kind of Whitehead style of flawed social science research designed to prove a point is still going on. Someone named Sanford Beaver seems to have needed to prove that maternal moveaways lead to damaged children (sound familiar). Trish tells you about it here.
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Sanford Braver is on the horns of a dilemma.
On June 25, he (and his co-researchers Ira M. Ellman and William V. Fabricius) released a new study that contends that children are harmed by parental moveaways, especially when it is the custodial mother who wishes to relocate with the children. Braver wanted so badly to support his position that he ignored the findings of his own study.
The timing of this study and the deluge of press releases about it coincides with the upcoming California Supreme Court's decision on the LaMusga case, which fathers' rights groups hope will lead to the reversal of the California Burgess moveaway decision. The goal appears to be to influence public opinion against moveaways.
Trish makes it a lot harder for Mr. Braver et al in another post here which is an extended critique of the study by Judith Wallerstein, whose own research offered the definitive challenge to Barbara Whitehead and all those other worshippers of the sanctity of marriage, like the never married childless Laura Ingraham and the divorced mother, Peggy Noonan.
Both posts include copious links to articles, many available at Trish's more formal website. Take a look at Trish's "The Truth About Joint Custody," who warns us: 'Do not call it "shared parenting." There is nothing "shared" about it.' It's an eye-opener.
Casting a genuinely feminist eye on such matters is a thankless task these days, with built-in penalities. Ask Katha Pollitt, and then ask yourself why you almost never see her guesting on any cable news shows. Or ask Trish.
It's a shame when there's such big-time nonsense abroad as the government becoming a marriage broker who bribes couples to tie the knot. As Trish points out in this post...
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Some leftists (not nearly enough, in my opinion), have pointed out conservative hypocrisy regarding marriage promotion. Not only do they question the intrusiveness of these policies, they question what right the state has to select marriage partners if the people are poor, particularly if the woman is pregnant or bore a child out-of-wedlock. This is in effect a state-sanctioned form of the shotgun wedding
For added fun, Trish takes on David Frum, and you'll also learn about the real story behind a court decision out of Florida that got a lot of positive play for a while, in which a Judge took the children from a custodial working mom, and handed them over to the supposedly stay-at-home dad.