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Parents at Fatherless Day Rally Demand Equal Custody Rights
TWC.com ^ | June 13 2014 | Linnie Supall

Posted on 06/14/2014 7:04:19 PM PDT by WilliamIII

RALEIGH -- Dozens of parents stood in front of the General Assembly Friday to tell lawmakers that custody rights are unbalanced. They called on state legislators to grant equal rights to both parents after a divorce or separation.

“I am going to be another father without his child this Father's Day,” said Edward Brantley.

The group is participating in The Fatherless Day Rally. It’s just one among dozens taking place nationwide demanding fathers get equal rights in custody cases.

“[We want] to ask our legislation to mandate the family courts to grant 50/50 custody in all cases where there's two fit parents,” said Dustin Long, organizer of The NC Fatherless Day Rally.

Dustin Long has two sons, 8 and 11, but since his divorce three years ago, his time with them is limited. It’s down to every other weekend and two weeks over the summer.

(Excerpt) Read more at centralnc.twcnews.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society
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1 posted on 06/14/2014 7:04:19 PM PDT by WilliamIII
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To: WilliamIII

It’s down to every other weekend and two weeks over the summer.

That is pretty standard. I don’t think it is less than it used to be. A few coworkers were divorced and that is about what it is.


2 posted on 06/14/2014 7:24:35 PM PDT by napscoordinator (Governor Scott Walker 2016 for the future of the country!)
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To: napscoordinator

I feel sorry for kids who only get to see their dad every other weekend and two weeks in the summer. That may be “standard,” but it’s sad, and unfair to the kids.


3 posted on 06/14/2014 7:26:12 PM PDT by WilliamIII
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To: WilliamIII

My step kids father has those same visitation times with them including holidays, so it seems kind of “standard”. Though he never takes advantage of them, haven’t seen him in years.


4 posted on 06/14/2014 7:30:56 PM PDT by jughandle
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To: napscoordinator

My standard is 50/50 and equal time during summer.


5 posted on 06/14/2014 7:31:04 PM PDT by lesko
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To: jughandle

Instead of talking about “fathers rights,” the debate should be over kids rights. If my parents had been divorced, and I had been denied the right to spend time with my father except for a few days a month, I would have been beside myself as a kid. My good times with my dad are some of my best memories, and to think courts would deny kids that right. It makes my blood boil. Feminists are to blame. They’re pro-divorce and anti-fathers, and they’ve wielded incredible influence in the media, legislatures and the legal profession.


6 posted on 06/14/2014 7:36:23 PM PDT by WilliamIII
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To: WilliamIII
It’s down to every other weekend and two weeks over the summer.

The every other weekend is at her discretion or easily undone by daily alienation of your children to where they don't want to come. Forget little league, scouts, christmas concerts, recitals or any of that.

Say goodbye to 65% of your take home pay as well

7 posted on 06/14/2014 7:44:31 PM PDT by Ouderkirk (To the left, everything must evidence that this or that strand of leftist theory is true)
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To: All

It’s incredibly cruel to children to shuttle them back and forth between two homes.

There’s nothing sadder than little kids on Friday with their backpacks, waiting for a ride to wherever they’re sleeping that night. And getting screamed at because they forgot their cleats. Because they’re kids and they shouldn’t have to think about packing essential belongings every other friggin’ week.

Everybody who hates business travel, how would YOU like to live 50/50 at two different places? I guarantee, your life would suffer on every level. Work, sleep, social... everything compromised.

Two different houses is no home at all.


8 posted on 06/14/2014 8:02:47 PM PDT by Blue Ink
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To: Blue Ink

My step children live like that.

One week w/ mom, one w/ dad with alt Wednesdays. They live by 2 separate sets of rules. Very confusing for them!


9 posted on 06/14/2014 9:13:33 PM PDT by Tx Angel
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To: Ouderkirk

My brother is going through this exact thing. Custody is at her discretion and to hell with court orders. Primary custodians can do what they want and it takes going back to court to do something about it. In my brothers case, his ex has skipped his custody arrangement 7 times in two years and she has the gall to drag him back into court to have his custody reduced to supervised only, based on non existent neglect. When his Childs therapist won’t go along and doesn’t support the allegation, she shops for someone that will. His ex has brainwashed my niece to the point she believes it, yet can’t come up with a single instance when confronted. She is even on record saying she was afraid my brother was going to kidnap her. His ex actively plans events around my brothers time so she can pit her against him. When he agrees and they swap dates, she does it again and again, always finding an excuse that pits his child at odds against him. It is text book parental alienation and the family court system ignores it. It is child abuse.

My brother is a great man. He tried to save his marriage even after she slept with numerous men in their bed when he was out of town on business. He made every appointment, every event, pays his support and then some, he doesn’t do drugs, he makes well over 100k a year, no criminal record, not even a speeding ticket. He has seen with his own eyes the things she has said to their daughter about him. “ Your father doesn’t respect your feelings. He doesn’t care about you.” I could go on and on. She won’t even take his calls anymore. She is 11 now and last year she was supposed to spend Christmas with him. Instead, his ex planned a trip to Mexico with her family and literally put my niece on the phone to tell him she didn’t want to go and he should respect her feelings. A ten hear old saying these things.

He is now in the process of taking her to court and pressing for contempt charges for her numerous and well documented violations. She has no respect for him, the law, or any man and is forcing their child to be just like her. She has made my brother out to be her emotionally unavailable father, despite the effort my brother continues to put forth. Now he gets to spend thousands of dollars, again, fighting for his rights as her father and fighting for her to respect her custody agreement. If she gets put on probation, which we are hoping for, and she screws him over again, he calls the police and she goes to jail. It has really come down to this and it has to for this sociopath to learn you cannot just do what you want. This is the second time she has done this and enough is enough. He missed the most crucial early years while his ex took their child and moved her out of her district all while using her parents address as cover. For weeks ny brother showed up to exercise his rights only to be ignored. The judge did nothing then and likely may do nothing again. Hope is preparing yourself to be crushed. There is no reasoning or working with someone who is unreasonable but most family judges expect and demand it. Its not about justice or the kids or parental rights, its about turning families through as fast as possible so the state can collect child support and you better get it in writing or the state will call your payments gifts and not count them. Then comes interest charges which are used, along with all child support, to balance the state budget.

If you met his ex, she would fool you. She’s all sweet Christian country girl until she doesn’t have her way. Then she turns into a demon and no blow or attack is too low. She even fooled my mother for a bit, smiling to her face while she moves forward with the allegations and court, never once addressing any of it to his family. Its like we don’t exist and my brother is nothing but a piggy bank to maintain her lavish lifestyle of high end goodies. Only the best for her. The skank even lied to her own child about where her favorite toy, her iPad, came from. She didn’t tell her how we all pitched in to buy it and how my mother saved and sacrificed what money she has. Instead, she said it was a gift from her new husband. My niece refused to believe we got it and called my brother a liar in therapy in front of the therapist. He showed her the receipt and she still refused to believe it.

My brother will be back in court at some point later this summer to fight for his custody and hopefully get some accountability for his ex wife’s blatant disregard for parental rights. He really needs prayers right now and he is having a very difficult weekend with fathers day. He misses his kid and just wants to be a dad to his daughter.

shared parenting may be tough at times, but it reduces alienation and fosters equality for both parents and child. It forces parents to work together and limits any one parent from having all the power. Courts always favor primary custodians often at great emotional and financial expense to the other parent. It also eliminates child support, debt imprisonment, and the influence of pandering white knight politicians ( Greg Abbott) who prop themselves up on the backs of those abused in family court. Divorce is not easy and kids suffer from it but the kids I know that went through it with equal time with both parents did the best.


10 posted on 06/15/2014 12:05:10 AM PDT by drunknsage
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To: Blue Ink

You want to see sad? How about paying for a kid you don’t get to raise, who you have zero say about their upbringing. How is that being a parent. How is a few days a month being a parent? That’s no parent at all, just a piggy bank. Is that all fathers are good for? Money, sperm, and something to beat on when you have a bad day? That is the modern state of fatherhood in this country. Women almost always get the kids and a fathers place in the home has been compromised and devalued to the point they are considered only for their ability to provide financial support.

If that isn’t sad enough to motivate you, how about having no say, no tracking, no accountability for the money the State confiscates from you to ensure it is spent on the child. Imagine not being able to move on, to try again, to have a family of your own because you are stuck paying for one you aren’t a part of. Primary custodians get to have it all. They get to move on, remarry, and keep the spoils of the previous relationship. Imagine losing your job, falling behind on support payments, and having a politician call you a deadbeat while judges refuse to lower your support payment. This is reality for countless fathers and you never hear their stories because its not fashionable to portray men as anything other than irresponsible losers who dont care about their kids.

Did you stop to think about the child and actually ask one how they feel or are you too busy injecting your own emotions and fantasies into the issue. Yelling about forgotten cleats... That is creepily personal and I’m very sorry if you experienced that growing up. No kid should have to live that but we have to deal with the world the way it is, not the way we want it to be. Divorce happens, the system is broken, and it is destroying our society.

Non custodial parents have no more rights than they do money to enforce them in court. It fosters tyranny and creates an environment for it to flourish. Shared parenting eliminates this and has been extremely successful everywhere it is allowed. As I said before, ex’s MUST work together in these situations. Both parents are on equal footing and children get to develop real relationships with both parents, not one parent calling the shots while the other pays for it with no input. Do you know how devastating it is to a parent to take away their power over over their own flesh and blood. It crushes entire families, not just the losing parent. That parents family is also stripped of their connection and their rights to see and interact with their own flesh and blood. With shared custody, ive seen parents ordered into therapy to build a bridge so they can actually work together and avoid the damage done to children by parental alienation. Are you familiar with the term? Its worth looking at and it needs to be addressed in our courts and culture. It does serious and often permanent damage to children and family members.

Divorce doesn’t have to destroy kids but removing a parent nearly guarantees it. It takes more than a few days a month to be a called a father or a mother. It takes equal custody, equal time, and equal responsibility.


11 posted on 06/15/2014 1:22:18 AM PDT by drunknsage
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To: WilliamIII

The children of divorce have grown up, and now many won’t breed because they don’t want their fathers’ lot in life. Men risk much more in childbearing than women do; it is no mystery why young women fume about young men not growing up while many of the men are quite content with the status quo.

In a few decades Anglo-Americans will be practically extinct due to these legal issues.


12 posted on 06/15/2014 5:01:51 AM PDT by kearnyirish2 (Affirmative action is economic warfare against white males (and therefore white families).)
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To: WilliamIII

Headline says “Equal Rights”, but the protestors are demanding the law mandate Equal Outcomes. Very different animal, and always a bad idea.


13 posted on 06/15/2014 5:12:53 AM PDT by Teacher317 (We have now sunk to a depth at which restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men)
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To: WilliamIII

Yeah, that would be nice for both circumstances, that which you describe and those who are not the most up-standing parents in the world.
Unfortunately under 18, the kids usually don’t have a say..


14 posted on 06/15/2014 6:13:27 AM PDT by jughandle
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To: drunknsage

Not to be a downer...but speaking from experience he will get only a token response from the courts.

The best he can do, is maintain some sort relationship with his children, do not speak ill of the ex-wife, avoid her family, document everything, and wait until the children come of age to show them the facts.

I have regaled others of my experiences and your brother’s experiences are nearly identical to mine, and they are right out of the playbook.


15 posted on 06/15/2014 6:18:29 AM PDT by Ouderkirk (To the left, everything must evidence that this or that strand of leftist theory is true)
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To: Teacher317

Really?Why are equal outcomes always a bad idea?


16 posted on 06/15/2014 7:57:08 AM PDT by Craftmore
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