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Using Research to Push a Narrative
October 03, 2024
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Using Research to Push a Narrative

There’s a noticeable trend in research about men and women that often tells only part of the story. A prime example is domestic violence studies that falsely claim women are the sole victims, while ignoring men’s experiences. This happens in other areas too—like reproductive coercion, teen violence, healthcare, and others. Women’s troubles are spotlighted, while men’s are overlooked. Once you see this pattern, it’s hard to unsee it.

In this post, we’ll look at a study published in July of 2024, that employs a similar strategy—not by lying, but by omission. The researchers present only the part of the story that supports the narrative they want to push. And in this case, it’s clear.

___________________________

I came across a media article about boys and threats to their masculinity. From the picture below that  accompanies the article, I anticipated some dramatic findings on violence or hostility. 

 

The research claimed to investigate adolescent boys' responses to threats to their masculinity. Here's a quick summary of the study:

The study was simple. 207 boys, ages 10-14, were given two quizzes—one on stereotypically feminine topics like flowers, makeup, and dresses, and one on masculine topics like tools, guns, and cars. Regardless of their actual scores, the control group was told they had scored high on the masculine test and were congratulated. The boys in the experimental group, however, were told they scored well on the feminine quiz but poorly on the masculine one. In other words, they were told they were more like the girls—meant as a threat to their masculinity. The boys then took a third quiz, a word completion test designed to measure their level of aggression. The parents took a series of questionnaires to assess their parenting.

The researchers aimed to see if this perceived threat would spark aggression. (One might also ask if the boy's aggression might be sparked simply because they were lied to. After all, they probably were well aware that they knew more about guns and cars than makeup and dresses.)

This type of response has been studied before and has been identified as "threat vigilance," a common reaction to status threats among men and boys, often linked to testosterone levels. Studies show that when a male's status is challenged, he is more likely than a female to respond aggressively, partly due to higher testosterone. However, prepubescent boys typically don't display this aggression, as they have not yet reached the higher testosterone stage of life. Curiously, despite examining what appears to be this same phenomenon, the study in question makes no mention of the previous research about threat vigilance. As we will later discover, the researcher was aware of this concept but chose not to include it in the study.

The media article I first read didn't mention threat vigilance or even mention testosterone, though it's a key factor in this type of research. Thinking I might have missed something, I searched for other articles on the study and found many—but still, no mention of testosterone in any of the articles.

What I did find were media portrayals showing angry, hostile boys, even though the researchers themselves didn’t claim the boys were violent.

 

Here's a quote that appeared in many of the articles: “Beyond just aggression, manhood threats are associated with a wide variety of negative, antisocial behaviors, such as sexism, homophobia, political bigotry, and even anti-environmentalism,” said the researcher, Adam Stanaland. Wait, what? How did we jump from threats to status to sexism, homophobia, political bigotry, and even anti-environmentalism? This felt like a massive leap, though it's worth noting the researchers didn’t directly say boys were violent. It seems the media exaggerated that part as seen in the photos, and I doubt the researchers did much to correct it.

Somewhat confused about this, I decided to find the actual study and read it. Testosterone was mentioned—once—in the limitations section, suggesting that future studies could explore its role. This made no sense, given that existing research clearly links testosterone to threat vigilance and status defense. This puzzled me and I was determined to find out what was going on so I wrote to the researcher with some questions.  He got right back to me and we carried on a conversation.  He was a very nice fellow and I do appreciate his initially taking the time to field my questions.  The sense I got was that he was interested in pushing the "it's all about socialization" ideas.  I looked  up his history and his graduate work was done at Duke University and he was a member of the Duke "Identity and Diversity Lab" for 5 years. The name says it all.  I think my assumptions were pretty close.  He was likely to follow the ideas that socialization is the most critical element of human development.  

 

When I asked him, "Isn't threat vigilance related to testosterone levels?" he responded: “Basal testosterone and aggression are certainly related, but here our focus was figuring out whether a social mechanism (i.e., typicality/masculinity threat) could also cause aggression among adolescent boys (as it does among men), as well as when/why.”

In other words, he didn’t answer the question.  He acknowledged the biological link but chose to focus only on the social aspect. To me, this is like studying a car engine but only looking at the spark plug and ignoring fuel, air, and combustion. A well-rounded study would acknowledge that both testosterone (biological) and socialization play important roles. Omitting one side feels like an intentional way to push a narrative.

I asked the researcher again if he was aware of studies showing testosterone’s role in threat vigilance, and he responded: “Yes, I’m familiar with the complex role between testosterone, threat vigilance, status-seeking, and aggression. My previous explanation was all to say that there is definitely a biological component to aggression, but our results provide evidence that there is also a notable social component.”

Basically, he’s saying, "Yes, testosterone matters, but we’re focusing on the social side." And that’s how narratives are built, by telling only a part of the story. Unfortunately, this study—like many others—implies that boys could be “fixed” if only they were taught to be less aggressive when their masculinity is threatened. But this ignores the biological factor. Once boys hit puberty, higher testosterone levels biologically predispose them to defend their status. Yet, this crucial piece of information is left out of the conversation.

Puberty

The study focused on 10-14 year old males from pre-puberty through mid- and late-puberty stages. The researchers made several statements that highlighted their views on puberty, including this one:

"We contend that puberty represents a developmental shift in boys' psychological relationship with societal definitions of their gender."

The researchers acknowledged that puberty is an important factor in these behaviors, but what does puberty primarily signal? It highlights the increase in testosterone levels in young males. However, the researchers never mention testosterone. Instead, they describe puberty like this:

"We contend that puberty represents a developmental shift in boys' psychological relationship with societal definitions of their gender. Puberty causes boys to recognize themselves—their bodies, their relationships, and so forth—as being adult-like, which means they must now contend with newly discovered societal expectations of manhood: a precarious status that is earned, can be lost, and is only regained by conforming to rigid norms, such as aggression."

Their interpretation suggests that boys, upon recognizing their maturing bodies, must now face "societal prescriptions about manhood." The focus here is entirely on socialization, asserting that boys must conform to rigid societal norms. There's no mention of testosterone—it's all framed around societal pressures, leaving biological factors out of the discussion entirely.

The Word Completion Test

Another issue I had with this study was their method of measuring aggression: a word completion test. The boys were asked to fill in blanks like "GU_" (which could be "gum" or "gun") and "_UNCH" (which could be "punch" or "lunch"). The number of aggressive words chosen supposedly indicated their level of aggression.  I find it hard to believe this test accurately measures aggression, but the researcher assured me it had been validated in other studies.  It seems to me that they are taking a cognitive response and then expecting that cognition to predict an actual behavior.  Seems wonky to me.  I was fairly new to the word completion tests and poked around a bit and found that there is considerable controversy about this.  As there should be. 

I continue to think this is a very weak indicator but the study got magazines to print pics like this based on choosing gun rather than gum:

 
 

These pictures, like the other pictures in this post, imply not only aggressiveness but hostility.  Seems like a jump to me.  There is a big difference between aggressively defending your status, which is what threat vigilance does, and overt hostility or violence.  Looks like they are trying to imply the later.  But this is what the media wants.  Give them some research that shows the men and boys are aggressive and they will put violence on the front page.  Whatever happened to the word assertive which is similar to aggressive?  I think assertive might be a better word for men defending their status.  Their defense in some cases might get aggressive but the norm might be simply responding to the challenge in a strong, rational, and assertive manner.

The Sample 

The sample used in the study also raised some questions. Nearly 90% of the parents involved were mothers, and more than two-thirds were single parents. This is far above the national average for single-parent households, which hovers around 20-25%. Research shows that boys raised by single mothers are more likely to exhibit aggression, yet the study doesn’t address how this may have influenced the findings.

"Regarding the parents themselves, 87.4% identified as women (mothers) and 12.6% were men (fathers). Most parents were the sole primary caretaker of the participant (68.6%) or shared caretaking responsibilities equally with another person (30.0%)." 

I asked the researcher about the chances of a biased sample due to the large number of single mothers and here is what he said:

"I’m not sure that it’s fair to say that our sample comprising a majority of mothers is "strong indication that [we] had a biased sample.” Research has shown that although dads are more involved now in their child’s caregiving than they used to be, moms are still vastly overrepresented (hyperlink) as the child’s primary caretaker. It makes sense, then, that our sample would comprise more mothers than fathers—i.e., it’s representative and not biased (in fact, a sample with half mothers and half fathers would be biased against the reality of parenting in the U.S.)." 

Maybe so, but he doesn't address the over-abundance of single mothers in the sample and how that is far from the norm for parenthood in the US today. I  specifically pointed out the single mothers issue and he simply avoided it and focused on mothers doing the majority of child care.  The link he provided was not about single mothers, it seemed to be about two parent families.  If he had 87% mothers in his sample and they were all from two parent families, then that would be a different story.  But that was not the case.  It was 87% mothers and 2/3rds single parents.  This tells us that it is likely most of those mothers were single parents.  A predominance of single mothers should be a red flag, but not in his view.  Could the excess of single mothers have had an impact on the findings?  I do wonder.

Framing Parents as the Problem

One key takeaway from the study was that boys from conservative, less wealthy families with parents teaching “hegemonic masculinity” were more aggressive in response to the threat. The tool used to assess this was the Male Role Norms Inventory, which includes statements like these:

  • Men should know how to fix cars.

  • Men should be physically tough.

  • It would be awful if a man enjoyed dressing like a woman.

  • A man should be able to fix most things around the house.

  • A man should always be the boss.

  • Men should lead their household.

  • A man should always be ready for sex.

If the parents score high on this questionnaire they are assumed to be teaching their boys to be "hegemonic".  Hegemonic is seen as something bad. It's meant to say that men are controlling and dominant.   It comes from the writing of R. Connell who some time ago became a transwoman.  Many academics seem to find Conell's book as the essential word in Masculinities. The parts I have read seem highly anti-male.  Connell's book brought a great deal of change into the research on men where many of his ideas were unceremoniously and artificially planted into studies like in the Conformity to Masculine Norms Inventory (CMNI).  I did a report on the CMNI and the very suspect manner that it was developed with a focus on how Connell's ideas magically appeared.  You can see that one here.

The researchers seemed to focus on the parental pressure (hegemonic attitudes) as being a prime motivator for the boy's aggressive responses.  They titled that variable pressured motivation (PM).  When reading the media articles it seemed that this parental pressure was being portrayed as being a large part of the reasons for the aggressive responses. This would lend credence to the idea that boys could be fixed if parents would just stop teaching them to be hegemonic males.  But wait a minute.  The PM variable (parental pressure) when paired with the threat variable (the word completion test) only had a significance score of p=.835.  Usually a score of .05 or below is considered to be significant so this one was far off the mark.  But they also had a variable that indicated the Degree of Puberty for the Boys (PDS) which showed that the only boys to appear aggressive in response to the word completion were boys who were in mid to late puberty.  When that PDS variable was paired with the threat variable (the word completion test) it came up with a score of p=.095.  Still not considered significant but surely more significant than the parental pressure variable.  When both the PM and the PDS were paired with the threat variable, voila!  They get a significance of <.001. 

Simply put, the data suggest that puberty (and its associated changes) has a stronger influence on the boys' aggression than social pressure alone.  This reinforces the idea that biological factors, like testosterone, may be important drivers for these aggressive responses, even if the study didn’t say so directly.

If puberty is so closely linked to aggression, and testosterone is one of the primary hormones behind puberty, doesn’t it stand to reason that testosterone might be a key factor? The fact that the puberty variable shows a stronger effect than pressured motivation only strengthens the argument that the biological side of adolescence is critical here.

 

One does tend to wonder if defending one’s status as a male is such a bad thing as it is being portrayed in this research.  There are some good reasons for it.  Men are reinforced and rewarded for independence and for their ability to protect.  Being seen as independent and able to protect is a part of the male hierarchy. But in a highly gynocentric atmosphere these once highly valued traits are framed in a negative manner. If you think about it, maybe the boys who failed to defend their status are actually the ones who need help?  

Conclusion

In the end,  I never got answers to all my questions. It’s been a month and a half since the researcher stopped responding, but I’m left thinking this study was designed to push a particular narrative, one that minimizes biological factors and highlights social ones. This leaves people pushed towards the narrative that boys can be fixed (and be more like the girls) if only the parents and the culture would stop teaching them to be aggressive.

It’s true that research often focuses on a specific, narrow aspect of psychology. I’ve read many studies that follow this pattern. However, in those studies, there was always a section that reviewed previous research on the topic and acknowledged earlier work in the field. This study, unfortunately, did not do that at all.

But there’s something important that can be gleaned from this study that even the researchers missed: pre-puberty boys didn’t respond aggressively to threats to their masculinity. This strongly suggests that puberty—and by extension, testosterone—is key to understanding these behaviors. Yet testosterone was never discussed in any meaningful way.

Just as an engine needs both a spark and fuel to run, adolescent boys’ aggressive responses to threats to their masculinity likely involve both social triggers and biological factors like testosterone. By including both in the analysis, we can move beyond a one-dimensional explanation and start to understand the complex interplay of factors that drive behavior during this critical period of development.

In the end, it’s not just about what makes the engine run — it’s about understanding all the components that come together to make it work smoothly. And when it comes to adolescence, testosterone is a big part of that equation.

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Reproductive Rights End at Ejaculation: How Men Lost Control Over Parenthood


Reproductive Rights End at Ejaculation: How Men Lost Control Over Parenthood

It’s one of the most unspoken truths in modern life: once conception occurs, men have no reproductive rights. A woman can choose to keep a pregnancy or end it. She can decide to raise the child or place it for adoption. A man, on the other hand, is bound—socially, legally, and financially—to whatever decision she makes.

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And this asymmetry is defended not as a moral dilemma to be resolved, but as a settled truth.


The Silent Consent Trap

We’ve been taught to think that when a man consents to sex, he consents to everything that might follow. But when a woman consents to sex, she still retains the right to decide afterward whether to become a mother.

This moral sleight of hand is stunning once you notice it. One person’s consent is treated as final and binding; the other’s is treated as provisional and revocable.

And yet this assumption—so old it feels invisible—forms the bedrock of modern reproductive law.

If a pregnancy occurs and the man doesn’t want to be a father, the system tells him, “Too bad. You should have thought of that earlier.” If the woman doesn’t want to be a mother, society says, “She has a right to choose.”

Both positions can’t be reconciled under any serious notion of equality.


The Price of Powerlessness

For many men, the consequence isn’t only financial—it’s existential.

Imagine discovering that someone chose to bring a child into the world with your DNA, against your will, and that you’ll now spend 18 years paying for the decision you didn’t make. Imagine learning that a partner deceived you about contraception, or tampered with protection, and you’re told by the court that none of that matters.

Your body, your consent, your word—irrelevant.

The state considers you responsible for what someone else decided to do with your biology.

The irony is brutal: men are lectured about “taking responsibility,” but responsibility without consent is not morality—it’s servitude.

And while precise numbers are impossible to know, the scale of this problem is enormous. Countless men quietly accept pregnancies they would have preferred to avoid—not because they chose fatherhood, but because the law left them no voice in the matter. For every man who speaks out, many more simply submit to a fate decided by someone else. And this imbalance cuts both ways. Just as some men are forced into fatherhood they didn’t choose, others are denied fatherhood they deeply want. Many have stood by helplessly as a pregnancy they hoped to cherish was ended—not because they were careless or uncommitted, but because the law gave them no voice. For them, “her choice” becomes their grief, and that grief is treated as if it doesn’t exist.

And beneath that larger injustice lies an even starker reality: a measurable percentage of pregnancies begin with deliberate deception. Studies conservatively estimate that 1–3% of fathers are unknowingly raising children who are not biologically theirs. Men who uncover the truth and challenge paternity are often ordered to keep paying anyway, because “it’s in the best interest of the child.”

In other words, the legal system tells men that even being lied to about fatherhood doesn’t matter—your wallet still belongs to the child, and by extension, to the mother who deceived you. It’s her body, her choice—and your wallet, her choice too.


Moral Courage and the Empathy Gap

Why is there so little outrage about this? Because when men suffer, empathy tends to vanish.

We can see this in how society responds to female pain—mobilizing instantly, funding shelters, rewriting laws—and how it responds to male pain—with indifference, mockery, or moral lectures.

A man who feels trapped by fatherhood he didn’t choose is told he’s irresponsible or immature. A woman who feels trapped by motherhood she didn’t choose is seen as courageous for seeking control. And when a man feels trapped by abortion—when he longs to protect the life of his own child but is powerless to stop its ending—his pain is dismissed as interference in someone else’s right.

This empathy gap runs so deep that even discussing male reproductive rights feels taboo. People worry it undermines women’s freedom, as if equality for one sex must come at the other’s expense.

But fairness isn’t a zero-sum game. Equality doesn’t mean less compassion for women—it means more honesty for everyone.


The “Financial Abortion” Idea

One idea, sometimes called “paper abortion” or “financial abortion,” proposes that men should be able to relinquish legal parenthood within a set time early in pregnancy—mirroring a woman’s right to choose abortion or adoption.

Critics say it lets men “walk away from their responsibilities.” But this criticism misses the point: responsibility must follow consent. You can’t demand moral or financial duty from someone who had no voice in the decision that created it.

If women can legally choose parenthood, men should at least be able to choose not to be one.

Otherwise, what we call equality is really a kind of gendered servitude—freedom for one sex, obligation for the other.


Consent and Control

At its heart, the issue of reproductive rights for men isn’t about sex. It’s about consent, autonomy, and the meaning of equality.

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Yet when it comes to reproduction, we abandon that principle completely.

Men’s consent ends at ejaculation. From that moment on, everything that follows—the pregnancy, the birth, the lifelong obligation—is out of their hands.

And society calls this justice.


The Deeper Consequence

When men feel they have no control over one of life’s most defining events—whether or not they become a father—it fuels a quiet kind of despair. It teaches them that their choices don’t matter, that their voices are disposable, that their role in reproduction is purely mechanical.

It also weakens trust between men and women. True partnership depends on mutual agency and mutual accountability. When one side holds all the power, resentment grows.

This isn’t just a legal problem; it’s a relational one. Many young men today fear relationships precisely because they sense this imbalance—because they know that in the eyes of the law and culture, they have no reproductive rights, only responsibilities.


A Culture That Values Both Sexes

Reproductive fairness shouldn’t be controversial. If we truly believe in equality, then both sexes deserve the same moral and legal respect for their choices.

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  • Should paternity testing be standard, to protect both fathers and children from deception?

  • Should reproductive coercion—like lying about birth control—be treated as seriously as forcing a woman into pregnancy?

Equality isn’t about punishing women or freeing men from moral duty. It’s about aligning rights with responsibilities, and recognizing that both sexes have an equal stake in the creation of life.

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October 16, 2025
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The Engineered Isolation of Men
 


The Engineered Isolation of Men

For decades, society has been dismantling the three foundations that once anchored men: work, identity, and family. What we call a “men’s crisis” isn’t just about depression or suicide—it’s about systematic disconnection. When a man loses his place to contribute, his right to belong, and the respect that once gave him pride, he doesn’t merely suffer; he disappears.


1. The First Cut: Economic Displacement

For most men, work is more than a paycheck—it’s proof of worth. Through skill, labor, and persistence, men find identity and belonging. But modern economies have quietly stripped that away. Factories closed, trades devalued, and risk-taking jobs replaced by automation or overseas labor.

Men were told to “adapt,” but few noticed what they were adapting to: a world that no longer needs them in the ways that once gave them purpose. Unemployment doesn’t just steal income—it steals function. And when function vanishes, meaning follows close behind.

History bears this out. During the Great Depression, when millions of men were cut off from productive work, suicide rates climbed to record highs. A man’s worth had been tied to his usefulness, and when society no longer needed that usefulness, despair filled the vacuum. Yet during the world wars, when men were again called upon to serve, build, and defend, suicide rates fell sharply—even in the face of danger and loss. The difference wasn’t comfort, but purpose.

Research confirms what common sense already knows: long-term unemployment raises men’s suicide risk several-fold. Not because men are fragile, but because usefulness was the thread holding their lives together. When that thread breaks, they fall—not from weakness, but from the weight of purposelessness.

A culture that robs men of purpose is a culture engineering their isolation.


2. The Second Cut: Moral Displacement Through Shame

Even men who keep their jobs often lose something deeper—the right to feel proud of being men.

The term toxic masculinity didn’t just critique bad behavior; it redefined maleness itself as suspect. Strength, stoicism, leadership, and competitiveness—traits once considered virtues—became moral liabilities. Men were told that their instincts were dangerous, their achievements oppressive, their nature defective.

This isn’t self-improvement; it’s cultural shaming.
When a man is told his strength makes him unsafe, he hides it. When he’s told his logic makes him cold, he doubts it. Over time, he disconnects—not only from others but from his own nature.

And shame is the most isolating emotion of all. It tells a person, you don’t belong anymore.
A shamed man withdraws, not because he doesn’t care, but because every gesture of care risks being misinterpreted. His silence isn’t indifference—it’s self-protection in a culture that punishes his voice.


3. The Third Cut: The Forced Separation of Divorce

Then there is the wound that goes straight to the heart: divorce.

In countless cases, it’s not just a separation of spouses—it’s the erasure of fatherhood. Courts presume maternal virtue and paternal suspicion. Even loving, stable fathers are reduced to “visitors,” permitted only fragments of the lives they helped create.

For a man whose identity revolves around providing, protecting, and mentoring, losing daily contact with his children is devastating. It is grief without a funeral—a living bereavement he’s expected to endure without complaint.

The statistics are grim: divorced men have some of the highest suicide rates of any demographic. Not because they’ve failed as fathers, but because the system has forbidden them to succeed. When the law itself enforces separation, the message is unmistakable: you’re no longer needed.


4. The Result: A Culture of Quiet Exile

Take these three together—economic displacement, moral shaming, and family loss—and you get the blueprint for male disconnection.
Each cut severs a man from one of the three bonds that make life meaningful:

  • Work (purpose)

  • Identity (dignity)

  • Family (love)

A man without purpose feels restless.
A man without dignity feels ashamed.
A man without love feels invisible.
And when all three disappear at once, the result isn’t just sadness—it’s annihilation.


5. What the Culture Gets Wrong

Modern culture mistakes this for fragility: “Men just need to talk more.”
But talking doesn’t rebuild meaning.
What men need isn’t therapy in isolation—it’s reconnection to the structures that once made their lives coherent.

A man can’t talk his way out of being unnecessary.
He can only live his way back into usefulness, belonging, and respect.

That requires social systems that recognize men as contributors, not relics; as protectors, not problems.


6. The Way Back

The solution isn’t to “save” men—it’s to restore their place in the human story:

  • Rebuild economic paths that value masculine work.

  • Reclaim cultural respect for masculine virtues.

  • Reform family law so fatherhood is a right, not a privilege.

  • Speak openly about the moral injury of being labeled toxic for existing.

Men don’t need saving — they need a place to stand again.
Give them that, and they’ll rebuild everything else.

Men Are Good.

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October 13, 2025
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Why Dads in Family Court Need tp Learn From Father X

I’d like to introduce FatherX, a man who has turned hard-earned experience in the family court system into practical guidance for fathers. He teaches the fundamentals that most men are never told — how custody works, how to navigate the courtroom, how to read case law, and how to keep your emotional balance through it all. His work equips dads not only with knowledge but with strategy and calm confidence in one of the most painful arenas a man can face. Tom Golden

 

Good Morning! I’m Father X, the creator of the Youtube series “Father X - How Fathers Can Win Child Custody” at YouTube.com/@FatherX2022.

My video series should be required viewing for every dad going through family court. I often get comments like this from dads:

I can’t possibly express enough gratitude to you, Father X! Thank God I found your video series. I followed all of your steps and took all of your advice and it SAVED ME AND MY CHILD!

During my 3 years in family court, I learned the system isn’t designed to determine the actual best interests of the child. Instead, their process is designed to produce a standard factory output: the mother must get custody, and the dad must pay child support. I managed to get primary custody of our son, but it took superhuman effort to break the family court machine.

How did all this come to pass? It started in real life, before family court got involved, when I lived with my ex-girlfriend for over a year. We moved in together when she became pregnant and I immediately became a male victim of her domestic violence. The second time she assaulted me, I called the police, who told me it didn’t matter what I said because they only believe the woman. They told me they could just have me arrested based on her word alone, and I should just leave our home for the night...even though I was the one who called 911! Obviously, that’s not a competent process.

When I tried to file a police report a couple of weeks later, a police lady told me I wasn’t allowed to file a report because the mother had already filed one. Days later, I learned this police officer lied to me. I had a lawyer call the police station to tell them I was coming to file a police report against my ex-girlfriend, and only then was I able to do so. You can see the barriers created for men.

I also called the domestic violence hotline, who confirmed the police would always just arrest the man, maybe unless he was bleeding from the skull. I learned the police and domestic violence hotline only exist to help women, whether the woman is guilty or innocent.

In addition, I considered leaving my son’s mother. When I researched family court, I learned that mothers get primary custody about 85% of the time. But I wanted to raise our son, and I had no interest in leaving him in the hands of a violent and abusive mother. Thus, I had to stay in that abusive relationship if I wanted to continue raising our son. The legal system, end to end, provided no relief for a male victim of domestic violence and his child.

The day I finally moved out of our home, because it was too dangerous for me to live with my son’s mom, she went to court and got a restraining order based on false allegations against me. And a couple of hours later, she went to the police to file a false report, and the police started the process of having me arrested. For her, it was as easy as ordering a Big Mac at McDonald’s. And then the Dominoe’s fell into place...starting the standard process where the government agencies all avoid learning the facts, so they can rubber stamp everything the mother wants and enable and reward her false allegations.

To see the incompetence of the government agencies starting on Day 1, you have to know that after 3 years in family court, after a full trial, after I testified 14 times for a total of 28 hours, after I “politely forced reality down my judge’s throat”, the court decided it was in the best interests of our son for me to have primary custody. And I proved the allegations of domestic violence that I made in my petitions on Day 1. The mother’s restraining order against me was cancelled. And my restraining order against her was extended for 2 years because she was found guilty of assaulting me.

So, knowing that end result, the questions are, starting on Day 1, how does family court handle this scenario, where the father is a better parent, and the mother is an abusive, unfit parent? And does the court have a competent process for figuring out the correct answer when it comes to domestic violence allegations and child custody disputes?

With every new government agency involved, the starting point is “supposed” to be neutral. But there was an obvious pattern that each new government actor started by giving the mother whatever she asked for. And these government actors never started by conducting intelligent analysis to figure out the truth. I had to force the truth upon them, one at a time.

When the mother filed her false police report and restraining order, this started the feeding frenzy where these government actors took their shots at me one at a time and I was fighting a war on multiple fronts.

Police and District Attorney: The police arrested me based on the mother’s allegation alone. They never asked for my side of the story to see if I had evidence to contradict her. The district attorney told the police to arrest me even though the DA didn’t investigate either - because any investigation would have involved me. That’s not a competent process.

Bail Judge: After I was arrested, I appeared in front of a bail judge. He was complaining to me about how terrible it was for an infant child to see his father assaulting his mother. It never occurred to the bail judge that the mother was lying in order to get custody. Or that she was the one punching me in front of our child. That judge was just using stereotypes, disconnected from reality. Another incompetent actor in this game.

Custody Judge: Next, we appeared in front of a custody judge. I already submitted my own petitions for custody and an order of protection, where I stated the mother assaulted me multiple times, I showed police reports against her, and I shared that she had anger management problems and was suicidal. But this judge never bothered to read my petition. So, she started off by giving the mother temporary primary custody, only because the mother was unemployed and available to parent, but I had a job. The judge ignored all the other best interest factors that the appellate courts required to be addressed. That’s not a legitimate process.

This judge also denied me an order of protection, even though I talked about how the mother assaulted me. My lawyer started yelling at this judge because my allegations against the mother were greater than her allegations against me...and the mother was getting an order of protection! Only then did the judge read my petitions and gave me a temporary order of protection against the mother. Then I told the judge that since she hadn’t read my petitions, she needed to reassess her custody order because she was giving primary custody to a violent, suicidal mother. This judge denied my request, ignored the issues, and kept the mother as the primary custodial parent...without stating why that was an intelligent decision.

I saw how courts make temporary custody and restraining orders based on whatever reason they need to rubber stamp the mother. And remember that I ultimately got primary custody and a final restraining order. They could have made a correct custody decision on Day 1, but they chose to ignore everything the man said.

It’s possible the judge was thinking I was arrested, therefore I must be guilty, so it must be safer to give the mother custody. But we know the police arrested me without any actual intelligent thought – that’s their standard “process”. But the judge wasn’t questioning the validity of the police work. So now you have one incompetent agency feeding another agency...and incompetent decisions are building on incompetent actions. That’s a central pillar of the family court culture.

Child Protective Services: Next, we had Child Protective Services investigate us. The CPS worker wrote a report where she stated she had no idea which of us committed domestic violence. However, we had couple’s therapists, while we lived together, who all knew the mother had anger management problems and the mother was the violent one. The CPS worker spoke to them, and this information was at her fingertips. But because she was incompetent and/or biased, she didn’t provide the judge with a view of reality. So, we had another layer of incompetence building on incompetence.

Child Support: Next, the child support agency ordered me to pay about $16,000 per year of support to the mother, even though the actual cost of raising our infant son was $4,000 a year. The mother was making a profit from child support. This made my net income negative, and I was bleeding cash every month. I had to pay my criminal defense lawyer, my custody lawyer, and the forensic evaluator. I ended up with over $100,000 of debt and no assets. So even though the priority question is figuring out who committed domestic violence and who should have custody of the child, the child support agency makes it extremely difficult for any man to proceed with a trial to figure out the truth to these questions. And if you quit because you can’t afford a trial, then the mother wins automatically…because she was given temporary custody to start, without any fact finding, without any intelligent analysis.

With all these agencies taking their turn siding with the mother, without any intelligent thought, you can see how demoralizing it is for any man to face all of this. And, too often, dads have to settle for whatever the mother or the courts offer them. It’s emotionally and financially draining. Many men quit and many others kill themselves.

And this is all standard operating procedure in family court. This is how you get the end result where about 85% of moms get primary custody.

Ultimately, I was able to overcome the gender bias and incompetence of family court. It took superhuman effort for me to overcome family court and get primary custody of our son. I quickly recognized that most fathers can’t do this and are destined to be railroaded by the system. I promised myself that I would do something to expose this system. As a result, I now create educational videos on YouTube, teaching dads the flaws of family court and how to overcome those flaws. I teach dads everything that I learned the hard way, over 3 years.

I teach the basics of primary custody, sole custody, restraining orders, and legal custody. We discuss whether you need a lawyer and how to interview lawyers by asking the hard questions. I teach strategic behaviors in the courtroom. I teach how to handle your first day in family court, as well as the overall family court process. I teach how judges make bad decisions…so you can anticipate where they’ll go wrong and how you can counter maneuver. I teach dads how to read case law to learn the real laws. I teach dads how to correctly analyze the best interests of the child so you can present the best possible case for your kid. We discuss how to handle the enormous emotional burden on fathers. And for those parents that can mediate, I teach you exactly what a fair parenting plan looks like.

It’s important to recognize that nobody is coming to save you or your kids. You must be your own advocate. I teach you how. Find me on YouTube or get my family court guides at FatherX.LemonSqueezy.com…before it’s too late.

https://www.youtube.com/@FatherX2022

https://x.com/FatherX2022

https://fatherx.lemonsqueezy.com/

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