This was sent to me from an e-mail list that I
belong to. I think it has some very interesting points.
Psychological evaluations are a violation of our privacy in federal and state
law both. Your (although in your case may benefit you) situation with who the
child likes to be with is an example of how they manufacture arguments that we
can't win generally and base their decisions on things that have nothing to do
with law or our rights as parents.
The truth is whether or not our kids like us has nothing to do with our
rights. There is no law that says if your kids like you, you get them and if
they don't, you don't. They use this all time against us as generally younger
children like moms better as they are more likely to discipline them with less
consistency and firmness.
This becomes an issue because we permit it. Being a parent is not a
popularity contest with our kids or anyone else. We make decision all the time
our kids don't like, it is just part of what we must all do. If I did what my
kids wanted to make them happy I would have been dead long ago when they wanted
to build a campfire in the living room.
The truth is courts are a matter of law and the law clearly states we are
entitled to joint custody irrespective of how our kids feel about us. The
Constitution is not a popularity contest either. If we have to compete with moms
for popularity we will almost always lose. As a matter of law not one second
should be spent on the issue of which parent is more popular as it does not
change our rights one iota.
We are allowing them to judge us on who the better parent is from their
perspective instead of asserting our rights. I will say as I say all the time,
show me the law that says the "best" parent is the only one that has
rights.
People on death row are entitled to see and participate with their children,
as a matter of law. As long as we permit them to use the best interest of the
child silliness instead of our rights, we will lose. This is nothing more than a
touchy freely saying like it takes a village to raise a child. Have you ever
seen a picture of the village this saying came from?? If the village is raising
their children they sure aren't teaching them to build houses, roads and
schools. If this village came to offer my help raising my children I think would
say if you want to help give my kid a sandwich and I think I will pass with
anymore of your help as I want to get my kids out of this third world dump. Has
the "village" helped you lately? I have my child and my rights because
I asserted the law not my popularity.
These are a loser for us. The courts pay these people to come up with an
evaluation they want. What is interesting about this is the case of TR stopped
these from being done years ago as a violation of privacy. One of the tactics
the system uses is when things are done and laws are over come they don't remove
the laws from the books and if you don't know your rights you don't have
any.
Now we have groups of people trying to get joint custody legislation in Pa.
and we have had it since 1977. Shared custody has always been a federal legal
premise as "equal treatment under the law" and a clear Constitutional
issue. There is much federal case law that shows this. There is a clear
correlation between what happens to men and the Civil Rights movement of the
60's. The state courts denied Afro Americans their rights for many years but as
soon as they got wise and petitioned the federal courts for their civil rights
schools were integrated and equal treatment under the law became the
focus.
We are now and have been copying the loosing strategy of the civil rights
struggle so we shouldn't be surprised this is happening to us. We need to copy
the winning strategy of the civil rights movement as visitation and shared
custody is a civil rights issue. Changing state laws that don't need changed is
a waste of our time as the state courts don't follow the laws no matter what
they are. All we will accomplish is going from one law they don't follow is
going to another law they don't follow. Psychological evaluations are a great
example
