The Custody Crisis & Sisters in Solidarity
Empowering Women Post-Separation
The Women’s Coalition has expanded its platform. Our platform has been, since its inception a decade ago, the battle against the epidemic of mothers being devastated, through both the loss of custody and the inability to protect their children. This is being broadened to include a third subsection of the Custody Crisis: the financial devastation caused to women after separation via the Family Court system. This addition was made to our platform following a survey that showed 91% of PSC victims experience great financial damage or devastation due to family court injustice.
“Sisters in Solidarity” is our new activism arm for women who want to do more to end the Custody Crisis. If you’d like to join, there is more info below.
THE CUSTODY CRISIS
Women may be victimized in one, two, or all three prongs of the Custody Crisis: custody, protection of children, and/or finances. The three issues are inextricably entwined. Even in the rare cases in which mothers manage to keep custody and protect their children in the end, their finances are depleted and their quality of life has decreased dramatically.
The Coalition has received thousands of accounts of how judges have disregarded evidence of abuse, along with divvying up finances and custody to the benefit of the father. So the Coalition has been leaning towards this broader encompassment, but the recent suicide of Catherine Kassenoff was a catalyst for acting on it.
Catherine’s case has made painfully clear this victimization of women in Family Court is three-pronged. An accomplished attorney and wonderful mother, she recently ended her life after becoming despondent following the toll on career and finances, along with the loss of custody and inability to protect her children.
These three ways in which women are being routinely oppressed and denied justice form the whole basis of the system. So it has become clear the Family Court system needs to be dismantled entirely. Regular civil courts, i.e. real courts, with the more extensive due process protections and restrictions of judicial power, must be used for post-separation cases.
It is time for women to acknowledge that family courts were created by men, for men, and are rigged against them. Hence, piecemeal reforms within the system are an exercise in futility.
Reforms within the Family Court system are an exercise in futility.
Family Court must be dismantled and an entirely new system implemented.
A NEW SYSTEM
A new system must be implemented for women to receive due process and justice in post-separation cases. All cases relating to custody, protection, and finances post-separation need to be heard in regular civil courts, albeit with special statutes that provide for the true best interests of children.
Protection/abuse matters must be adjudicated—similarly to a regular tort—expeditiously before custody and financial issues. If the jury finds there was abuse by preponderance of the evidence, protective orders will be issued. The evidence from the abuse case and verdict will be presented to the jury in the subsequent custody/finance segment of litigation.
These civil court judges do not have the nearly absolute “discretionary” power Family Court judges have. They will not have the power to appoint attorneys, psychologists, or anyone; nor will they have any more discretion than in regular civil courts. Cases will be heard in open court and proceed much like tort cases, but without damages being awarded.
Of course, men can still falsely accuse women of lying, alienating, or being mentally ill, but they will be lying to a jury, not a biased judge, and there will be no judicially-appointed, supposedly neutral minions to spin the case to the father. The father will have to fool a majority of the jury even as mothers’ testimony and evidence will counteract his lies. Experts can be hired to educate the jury about domestic violence and what is best for children.
And the best part: a judge cannot order children to be taken away from mothers or allow the father to keep and alienate them.
If judges wrongly exclude evidence to steer the jury, they will be exposed by Sisters in Solidarity…who protest and publicize the fact that judge is covering up men’s abuse. Because cases are heard in an open civil court, we will have proof the judge is covering up abuse.
Real courts being used for post-separation cases is not a panacea. There will still patriarchal underpinnings; however, juries of our peers with open courtrooms will be a hundred times better than being at the mercy of a Family Court judge in an insular, rigged system polluted by a cabal of father-friendly appointees.
But legal solutions alone are not enough. Cultural attitudes about post-separation issues and the importance of the mother-child bond must be updated while fighting for a new system. The Sisters will be working towards a Modern Matriarchy, a society in which mothers are recognized as the primary attachment figure and a vital bond for healthy development. There should be no need for mothers to have to fight to keep custody after separation.
BROADER COALITION
Including women who have not been custodially challenged but have faced financial harm and other injustices in Family Court broadens and strengthens our movement.
This new objective also includes women pre-separation who are unhappy in a relationship but unable to escape due to threats of loss of custody or financial ruin. Family Court makes men’s threats viable, so getting rid of that system empowers women to be able to leave a bad relationship.
Even young, single women have cause to join the new alliance, as none can predict if a relationship will go bad and they might end up in Family Court. And, even if women are lucky enough to be in a good, lasting relationship, they likely will have friends who aren’t and who may face a crisis themselves.
So the Custody Crisis impacts virtually all women, directly or indirectly. This social justice issue is arguably the most serious facing women today.
FEMALE ALLIANCES
All throughout human history, males have formed alliances to get what they want from females, namely sexual access and control of reproduction. The success of male alliances depended on the effectiveness of female counter-alliances. Where females had strong alliances, they could fend off sexual assaults, enjoy sexual freedom, and protect their children, and maintain access to important resources.
These gender power imbalances likely favored one or the other, more or less, over the ages until about ten thousand years ago, when patriarchy took hold. Men were then able to take total, lasting control.
The key to men’s long-lasting domination is not just that men were able to form powerful alliances. It was that they were able to prevent women from forming effective counter-alliances. Now women must once again create alliances in order to take back their power and counteract male dominance and control.
Women must take back their power by creating powerful alliances.
Patriarchal alliances operate under the implicit agreement of non-intervention. In other words, men agree to not interfere with other men’s use of controlling, coercive or violent behavior with “their” women (and children). This is the genesis of the “it’s a private family matter” narrative which conceals the abuse from public and why there is much secrecy in family courts via closed courtrooms, gag orders and sealing of records—and why open courts are necessary to protect women and children.
Social and legal systems are designed to effectuate this look-the-other-way policy by instituting laws and measures that purportedly stop male coercion and violence in the family but are ineffective. This is why, even with modern day, gender-neutral, violence-against-women-and-children laws, nothing really changes.
The Old Boys have always recognized this power disparity in the family as a gender war. Whereas men tend to think and act in terms of war strategies, women do not, making them easy prey.
The Old Boys have always known that women creating powerful female counter-alliances is the one way male supremacy could end. So, not surprisingly, their best defense since women’s lib has been to convince women there is no gender battle, that the problem is actually just generic corruption. They disparage and discredit anyone who identifies the crisis as gendered, a common backlash strategy for other women’s issues as well.
This strategy has been wildly successful. “Protective/safe parent” and other family court reform groups wittingly or not play right into the Old Boys’ hands by peddling this misinformation. Women are being misled into thinking the crisis is being caused by profiteering, lax regulation of experts, lack of DV and child abuse laws, etc. Some of the ways women are being misled are highlighted in our “Custody Crisis Rabbit Hole” series: Abuse Rabbit Hole; Money Rabbit Hole; Parental Alienation Rabbit Hole; Rights and Laws Rabbit Hole.
As a result, women waste time fighting for ever new custody, child safety, domestic violence, etc. reforms within the rigged Family Court system, none of which will make a dent in the Custody Crisis.
Hence, men are winning a gender war that most women don’t even realize is raging.
It’s imperative that women finally recognize the Custody Crisis is the mother of all gender wars and, finally, create alliances powerful enough to end to this terrible form of oppression.
Creating a powerful female alliance is the only way to end the Crisis.
SISTERS IN SOLIDARITY
Sisters in Solidarity [SIS] is the staging grounds for creating female alliances to combat the systemic sexism causing the Custody Crisis.
SISTERS IN SOLIDARITY
Sisters in Solidarity [SIS] is the staging grounds for female alliances created to combat the systemic sexism causing the Custody Crisis.
SIS GOALS
Coordinate and fortify female alliances
Disseminate cultural narratives that accurately depict the custody crisis
Organize rallies to raise awareness with women and the public
Organize court support for Sisters
Work to implement the new system
Enjoy Sisterhood Solidarity
BECOME A SISTER
To become a Sister, you need only be on board with our position that systemic sexism is the core cause of the Custody Crisis and that we will end it by dismantling family courts and implementing a new system.
It is up to you how much activism you’d like to engage in. The possibilities range from online activism and meetings to outside get togethers and court support.
If you are not sure about joining, there will be focus groups going into more depth about our mission with Q & A sessions. Watch this page for announcements.
If you would like to become part of the Sisterhood, please fill out this form.
BECOME A SISTER AIDE
Sister Aides will help organize Sisters and events at the local level.
If you have some extra time you’d like to spend on the cause and want to become a Sister Aide, apply here.
Make sure you are subscribed to Women’s Coalition News & Views as that is where all Sister updates will be posted.
NOTE: The “Local Coalition” groups that were paused during covid will be merged into Sisters in Solidarity. You may still fill out the SIS or SIS Aide form
You may also support the Coalition’s work through a one-time or recurring contribution through PayPal.
Sisters in Solidarity is needed. Merging the Custody Crisis, the Financial Crisis and the Domestic Abuse Crisis into the Post-Separation Crisis is a wonderful idea. They are all intertwined. They are designed by abusive men to make women helpless and hopeless. Abusive men are determined to destroy women. Often, women are alone in their pain. Family members sometimes exploit rifts and become complicit with the abuser. Friends begin to drop off when they can't endure the long haul nature of this situation. The stress takes a toll. Women get emotionally drained and physically ill. Suicide too often becomes a desired escape. Understanding is found with women who have experienced this nightmare. We can share survival skills. We can gather strength by unifying further. We can use our pain and suffering to rise from the ashes. We will empower each other and strengthen ourselves. Together, we will make strides to protect women and children. Together, we will demand the rights we've been denied. We will fight the systemic sexism we face and end family court. Sisters in Solidarity will establish a new and just system.
In re " ... ... These gender power imbalances likely favored one or the other, more or less, over the ages until about ten thousand years ago, when patriarchy took hold. Men were then able to take total, lasting control.
The key to men’s long-lasting domination is not just that men were able to form powerful alliances. It was that they were able to prevent women from forming effective counter-alliances. Now women must once again create alliances to take back the power to counteract male dominance and control. " THEN You, Woman, have, .A N G E R I N G L Y. ... ... N O T been PAYING ATTENTION.
AND IF You, Woman, have been A N Y SPERM SOURCE's OBSEQUIOUS SYCOPHANT helping him to APROVECHAR - FUCK OVER / to APROVECHAR - T A K E FAR AWAY FROM the MAMA ... ... HER OWN BABES ? THEN ... ... the Entire Scorched Earth's FUCKING S H A M E BE upon You.
--- --- Dr Maas