As regular readers here will recall, I used to write a lot on men’s rights issues at my personal blog, now gone forever. I really did try to steer away from the topic entirely, especially after a feminist operative from some unknown org showed up at my son’s house last year, claiming to be CPS and demanding entry. From what I could gather, this person was allowed to go in and look around. Well. Not knowing any different, what could they do?
The kicker was that this person claimed I had filed a complaint. Using a name, and identifying the complainant is something that the real CPS does not do. (I do know a little about these agencies, having worked among ‘em for a couple of decades.)
Anyway, once the dust settled, (and believe me, it was a sandstorm!) I promised myself never to write on those issues again. For a long time, I couldn’t look at the many photos of the grandchildren we have around the house without shedding a tear. I was deeply saddened by the trouble my work had caused them, and didn’t want to cause them any more.
Thing is, I was still online, and still watching TV, and still couldn’t stand the stark hatred expressed against men at every turn. Only a few ever objected, and even on the generally egalitarian FOX News Network I saw Marc Rudov being belittled and denigrated by an educated woman who should have known better. This kind of treatment would never be given to a woman talking about the same things.
Dear friends still phoned, lamenting their heavy-handed treatment in what should have been uncomplicated divorce proceedings.
I was writing and link-curating at the Examiner on Arizona stuff, when in April ‘09, Sandra Cantu was arrested for the murder of a child. I couldn’t let that horror go as it was being reported by the MSM – blaming Christianity, as there was no convenient man to blame. I posted a comment piece about it, and was stunned by the response. Literally tens of thousands of people read the column.
For awhile I’d seen my favorite people “of the movement” writing about other things, and it seemed men’s issues were being overshadowed by other issues. While I initially proposed a more-general Men’s Rights column to my Channel Manager at Examiner, he suggested domestic violence as a focus, reminding me that it was the core issue from which most of these other problems developed.
So that’s another thing I’m doing now. I haven’t mentioned it before here, because the assignment came at time when I was working serious full time doing a survey for NASS. All I could do then was post some reconstituted earlier works.
I am back in the game.
Since then I have had quite a number of phone calls and “nice notes” by e-mail from people whose names you’d recognize encouraging me to keep on keepin’ on. I had no idea my presence was missed, let alone noticed at all. Guess there’s still a lot left to say.
As far as protecting the family goes, I am counting on light and air driving out things like mold and infection. Should any problems result as a result of my online activity regarding domestic violence, it will be immediately, and widely reported. We are at a time in history where weasels and freaks cannot simply go back to their holes and hide. The previous feminist strategy of battery, assault, intimidation and libel simply won’t play anymore, in these connected times. This is not to mention I’m still in Arizona, which still recognizes the 2nd amendment. ;>)
I do want our beautiful grandchildren – who are all girls – to grow up with the respect for men that I came to naturally, as the youngest sibling in a family of four, and the only girl. I was fortunate to observe boys growing into men in a traditional family setting. Our parents were only married once, and their marriage lasted 61 years, until the death of our mother in 1993. As a result, I understand that men are people, every bit as much as women are.
Neither sex is any better or deserving, for any reason. Sometimes you just gotta do what you gotta do. I can’t keep silent, as the feminist jihad claims friend after friend.
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The truth is that we live in a society that is largely matriarchal, where on a practical level women often–usually?–hold far more power, prestige, and authority than men do.
What’s worse is that many men take the historical, and often noble, urge toward what we call “chivalry” to preposterous heights that don’t even apply to the modern world. Many of those “rules” were counterbalances to conditions that no longer apply today, or rarely apply. We often allow women to get away with simply awful behavior–indeed, sometimes we even enable it–simply because they’re female and are therefore seen as entitled to be abusive, selfish, and even violent.
Once you’ve seen enough of this firsthand, or worse, been the victim of it, you know it’s true. And what’s worse is that some fools will call you a baby and tell you to “stop whining.” Like a man who’s fighting for nothing but to be an integral part of his children’s lives and who wants to be with them is doing something WRONG, like there’s something WRONG WITH HIM.
It’s kind of a fun one-two punch on the kids issue too: if you don’t spend time with your kids, you’re a bum who ignores them. If you want to spend time with them, you’re kind of weird and psychotic and doing something wrong. Once you’ve experienced this, or seen a man you care about be subjected to it, you know exactly what this is like.
I’m often amazed that more mothers, sisters, aunts, and just plain friends with men in their lives seem totally unwilling to even look reality in the face on these issues.
These days I’m more passionate about the issue than ever.
WOOT! Got a link from Doc Helen
http://drhelen.blogspot.com/
Now I’m really back in it!
I could only do this b/c of support from my buds. I don’t forget you, Dean!
“I was writing and link-curating at the Examiner on Arizona stuff, when in April ‘09, Sandra Cantu was arrested for the murder of a child.”
Er. . .you mean Melissa Huckaby was arrested for the murder of the child Sandra Cantu, yes?
Trudy,
I could commisserate with you a little more fully on this issue if you were to tell what a CPS person is or does. For all I know, it could stand for “Chief Purchaser of Shit”, or something on that scale. The meaning of acronyms is best explained rather than guessed at.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
I get on Trudy about that sometimes too. Acronyms often get in the way of clear communication unless you’re CERTAIN everyone in your audience knows what you’re talking about. Which is why I use them very sparingly if at all in non-technical writing.
CPS is Child Protective Services in most states. It’s got to be one of the hardest jobs on Earth, to be honest, because the people working there generally can’t win; if they go after someone who’s innocent, they’re traumatizing both parents and children, but if they ignore obvious evidence of a problem, then a child is being harmed and they are standing idle doing nothing.
It’s complicated by the fact that since children are involved, the standards of evidence and whatnot that they work by is generally lower than the standards police have to live up to. So they can do things a regular cop might lose his job over, which is by necessity but also grants them fearsome powers.
I’m sympathetic to them especially because they CAN be used as a tool to abuse and harass people you don’t like. If you had kids in the house, Arnold, and I really hated you, it would take relatively little for me to get CPS knocking on your door, and how are you even going to react to being told, “We have information suggesting that you’re abusing your grandchild (or child), may we come in and look around and ask you some questions?” I think even a seasoned gruff take-no-prisoners guy like you would probably, as they say, be taken aback to say the least at basically being expected to prove your innocence, but that’s what they’d be looking for you to do.
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