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J. Steven Svoboda is founder and Executive
Director of Attorneys for the Rights of the Child.
He graduated summa cum laude from the University of
California at Los Angeles in 1983, received a
Master's Degree in physics from the University of
California at Berkeley in 1985, and then graduated
cum laude from Harvard Law School in 1991. He
practices human rights law in Berkeley, California.
His recent publications include "Prophylactic
Interventions on Children: Balancing Human Rights
with Public Health" in the February 2002 issue of
the Journal of Medical Ethics (co-authored with F.
Hodges and R. Van Howe) and "The Limits of the Law:
Comparative Analysis of Legal and Extralegal
Methods to Control Child Body Mutilation
Practices," in Understanding Circumcision, edited
by G. C. Denniston et al. and published by
Plenum/Kluwer in 2001. He was invited by the United
Nations to participate in the Human Rights
Sub-Commission’s meeting in Geneva in August
2001, where he gave an oral presentation before the
committee of experts whose written version became
the UN’s first official document entirely
devoted to the subject of male circumcision as a
human rights violation. He was married in 2001 and
has a son born in 2002. Check out www.arclaw.org
May
April
November
November
The Case Against Male and Female
Circumcision:(from "In Search of Fatherhood"
magazine, Autumn 2009 issue)
Thought Leaders. They are
intuitive...bold...passionate...innovative...not
afraid to step out on faith...and mission-driven.
While Thought Leaders live in the “here and
now”, they are constantly asking “what
if” as they envision the future and create key
“pieces of the puzzle” to transforming
“what ifs” into realities. Thought
Leaders enlighten, empower and inspire us. J.
Steven Svoboda, J.D. , the Founder and Executive
Director of Attorneys for the Rights of the Child
(www.arclaw.org), a California-based organization,
has devoted, to use his words, “substantial
amounts of life energy to the struggle to...
protect boys’ and men’s bodily integrity
by stopping circumcision”. A practicing
attorney and strong opponent of male circumcision,
Svoboda has represented plaintiffs in several state
and federal lawsuits to protect genital integrity.
Svoboda mounted such a strong case against male and
female circumcision that the United Nations invited
him to participate in the Human Rights
Sub-Commission’s meeting in Geneva,
Switzerland in August 2001. Mr. Svoboda gave an
oral presentation before a committee of experts at
that meeting. The written text of Svoboda’s
presentation became the United Nation’s first
official document entirely devoted to the subject
of male circumcision as a human rights violation
and transformed the practice of male circumcision
into an international human rights issue. In 2002,
he was the recipient of the Human Rights Award from
the International Symposium on Human Rights and
Modern Society. Mr. Svoboda’s work on genital
integrity issues has been recognized by, among
others, Harvard Law School, the New York Times, the
Wall Street Journal, and Men’s Health
Magazine. On 4 July 2009, Mr. Svoboda, who is
viewed as one of the world’s Thought Leaders
on circumcision and gender integrity issues, gave a
talk at the Genital Cutting in a Globalized Age
Conference which was held at the Royal Society of
Medicine in London, England.
A prolific writer, Mr. Svoboda’s
publications include "A Rose By Any Other Name:
Rethinking The Similarities And Differences Between
Male And Female Genital Cutting," which is featured
in a recently released book, Fearful Symmetries:
Essays And Testimonies Around Excision And
Circumcision, edited by Chantal Zabus and published
by Rodopi Press (www.rodopi.nl); "Neonatal Pain
Relief And The Helsinki Declaration," which he
co-authored with Robert S. Van Howe and is featured
in the Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics 2008:
36: 803-823
(http://www.cirp.org/library/ethics/hodges3/);
“Gender Equity and Genital Integrity,” in
Bodily Integrity and the Politics of Circumcision:
Culture, Controversy, and Change (G.C. Denniston et
al., eds., Plenum/Kluwer, 2006); “Educating
the United Nations about Male Circumcision,”
in Flesh and Blood: Perspectives on the Problem of
Circumcision in Contemporary Society (G.C.
Denniston et al., eds., Plenum/Kluwer, 2003); "The
Limits of the Law: Comparative Analysis of Legal
and Extralegal Methods to Control Child Body
Mutilation Practices,” in Understanding
Circumcision: A Multidisciplinary Approach to a
Multidimensional Problem (G.C. Denniston et al.,
eds., Plenum/Kluwer, 2001); “Prophylactic
Interventions On Children: Balancing Human Rights
with Public Health" published in 2002 in the
Journal of Medical Ethics); and "The Limits Of The
Law: Comparative Analysis Of Legal And Extralegal
Methods To Control Child Body Mutilation Practices"
which was published in 2001. In 2007, Oxford
University Press published “Does Feminism
Discriminate Against Men?” – a book Mr.
Svoboda co-authored with Warren Farrell, Ph.D. and
James Sterba.
Mr. Svoboda has published over 175 reviews of
books that explore topics relating to men, boys,
and gender issues. He has been a Contributor to
Men’s News Daily and for an eight-year period
he authored a column for Everyman Magazine
entitled, “Gender, Law And Society.”
After the birth of his first child, Mr. Svoboda
renamed the column, “Gender, Law And
Fatherhood.” He appeared in an interview on
Penn and Teller’s television program Bullshit!
which was aired on Showtime and shared his views of
some of the legal aspects concerning male
circumcision in the United States. A member of the
Advisory Council for The Mens Center
(http://themenscenter.com) and a senior board
member of and Public Relations Director for the
National Coalition of Free Men, a non-profit
organization which works to educate individuals,
policymakers, and institutions about the negative
effects of gender discrimination upon men and boys,
Svoboda is a performance artist, a tournament chess
player who is rated as an expert by the United
States Chess Federation, and the founder of the Bus
Stop Co-op, a vegetarian organic cooperative in
Berkeley, California
So where did the man who has moved circumcision
from what has been characterized as an
“obscure practice” to an international
human rights issue grow up? Where was he
educated?
“I grew up in suburban Southern California.
I went to public school for almost all my
education, including my Bachelor’s Degrees in
Physics and English from the University of
California at Los Angeles and a Master’s
Degree in Physics from the University of California
at Berkeley. Then I broke with tradition and went
to Harvard Law School for my law degree,” Mr.
Svoboda replied.
When we asked to talk about the role models he
had as he made the journey from childhood to
adulthood, Mr. Svoboda immediately pointed to his
maternal grandfather:
“My grandfather, my mother’s father,
was a huge role model. He showed me how to
gracefully be a man. Yet he could be tough when
times called for that. In the eulogy I wrote and
read at his memorial service, I said, “My
grandfather trusted in others and loved without
fear, walking like a man, and teacher that he was,
taught me how to do the same. For this simple,
wondrous gift, I will carry him in my heart
forever.” My father was physically present and
mostly emotionally absent though even from him I
learned a few lessons, such as control over
one’s own emotions and safeguarding
boundaries. But I was especially lucky to have my
grandfather.”
Who or what inspires him?
“People who take risks to struggle for what
is right, who stand up for something even if
it’s not fashionable or convenient to do so.
The struggle for fathers has unfortunately become
one of many such battlegrounds.”
Svoboda is married to a pediatrician, Paula
Brinkley, M.D., and the father of two children
– a girl and a boy. When asked to talk about
the most rewarding and challenging aspects of being
a Dad, he thoughtfully remarked:
“The most rewarding aspect of being a Dad
is that the straightjacket that constrained what
Dads could do in the last generation have been
significantly loosened. I tell my kids I love them
every day, and my purest moments of joy come from
time I am blessed to spend with them. They have
motivated and inspired me to be the best man I can
be and to be things I otherwise never would have
been. The most challenging aspects of being a Dad
are too little time, too many pressures, too many
fronts on which we are called on to achieve
simultaneously – and not to mention all the
challenges the country faces and the earth
faces.”
What valuable life lessons are Mr.
Svoboda’s children learning from him?
“I hope they are learning to have fun, to
laugh at themselves, to think for themselves --
this they are already doing, I know from hard
experience --, to work hard for what they believe
in, whatever that might be, and coming to believe
that for all its problems, the world is basically a
good place. I hope so. I father with all my
imperfections and all my own learning curves
painfully clear, so I can only hope,” Mr.
Svoboda answered thoughtfully.
In 1997, six years after graduating magna cum
laude from Harvard Law School, Mr. Svoboda founded
Attorneys for the Rights of the Child What was
going on in the world at that time to cause him to
feel that the rights of children needed protecting?
What compelled him to create Attorneys for the
Rights of the Child?
“Amidst all the competing identity groups,
which are often defined in an adult-centric way,
children are often forgotten. As a culture and a
country, we seem to feel empowered to treat
children in a way we would never dream of treating
adults. One example of many is unneeded and harmful
childhood surgeries, which some call ‘female
circumcision’ or ‘male
circumcision’.” There are many other
examples. It is great that human rights documents
are starting to protect children. It is scandalous
that the United States is the only country in the
entire world with a functioning government that has
not signed the Convention on the Rights of the
Child, the main international legal document
safeguarding our most vulnerable population,
children.”
The American Journal of Bioethics, in its Spring
2003 issue (Volume 3, Number 2, pages 52-54)
published an article Mr. Svoboda authored entitled,
Circumcision—A Victorian Relic Lacking
Ethical, Medical, Or Legal Justification. What is
the message that Svoboda is conveying through his
article on circumcision? Isn’t male
circumcision practiced for health and disease
prevention reasons? What are the arguments for male
circumcision? Are there any documented adverse
effects of male circumcision?
“Here’s the message: In the absence of
an emergency, children deserve the right to decide
what happens to their own bodies. Since doctors
worldwide agree that male circumcision is not
medically justified, why are we still performing
this ostensibly medical procedure? Yes, it is true
that those who promote the practice allege health
and disease prevention reasons, but these have been
disproved, as even American medical organizations
such as the American Medical Association agree.
It’s actually cultural inertia that sustains
the practice more than anything else. Discomfort in
contemplating children’s future sexuality is a
secondary force. Documented adverse effects of the
procedure include loss of a functional body part
that has important erogenous, protective, and
immunological functions. The negative impact on
sexuality is huge. Even more fundamentally, the
individual himself should get to make the
decision.”
Is there a connection between a man’s
circumcision status and HIV infection and AIDS? In
other words, does documented evidence exist which
reflects the fact that circumcised males have a
lesser risk of contracting AIDS or becoming
infected with HIV?
“There are a handful of flawed studies that
suggest this. The controls and the subjects were
treated differently in that the subjects were told
not to have sex for a period of time after the
procedure. The studies were terminated early to
maximize circumcision’s apparent effect. Over
three times as many study participants suffered a
complication as those who were supposedly
“protected” from HIV. Even if the African
studies were valid, their results would not
transfer from Africa to America or any other
first-world country because the virus is a
different strain, the vectors are different, and we
have better access to education, hygiene, and
healthcare.
“Research is now emerging suggesting that
intact bodies can better protect themselves against
HIV. After all, Europeans don’t circumcise and
have fewer sexually transmitted diseases and lower
HIV rates than we do. Moreover, a recent study
suggests that women’s risk may be 50% higher
as a result of the procedure. Many scientists are
starting to “cross party lines” and
question the evidence that circumcision advocates
claim supports the procedure. In any event, those
who would reduce this issue to an asserted
“battle of medical research” are
promoting a red herring, because a heavy burden of
proof must lie with the advocate of the amputation.
It makes no sense to violate a child’s body at
infancy (and even with anesthesia, the pain is
severe) to protect a disease that we are
speculating may arise many years later. This is all
the more true given recent strides that are being
made with an AIDS vaccine. By the time these kids
are grownups, this will be an obsolete procedure,
but they will have to live with the damage. And by
the way, studies also show that female circumcision
may help prevent HIV. So should we also be
considering circumcising more girls for that
reason? Why is it so much easier for us to see the
issue for what it is when it involves our beloved
female children?”
Let’s talk about female circumcision. Why
is female circumcision practiced? What are the
arguments for female circumcision? Is it practiced
for health reasons? What are the documented adverse
effects of female circumcision?
“It may interest our readers to know that
the reasons why female circumcision, also known as
female genital mutilation or FGM and female genital
cutting or FGC is practiced are the same as the
reasons why male circumcision is practiced. These
include aesthetics, incorrect medical reasons,
mistaken theories that it improves sex, or is
universal, its use as a rite of initiation into
adulthood, and other asserted cultural reasons. So
yes, female circumcision is practiced for what are
claimed to be health reasons. While the exact harms
vary widely according to the particular form of
female circumcision, it can also contribute to
infertility, problems during childbirth, sexual
problems, and can even result in a victim’s
death.”
What is the National Organization of
Circumcision Information Resource Centers (NOCIRC)?
Why did NOCIRC request the United Nations
Commission on Human Rights to conduct hearings to
ascertain if “involuntary and
non-therapeutic” circumcision of male minor
children should be considered a human rights
violation?
“NOCIRC is a long-standing non-profit
organization with whom we work very closely. They
run biannual symposia and have to date published
seven books collecting presentations from the
symposia, to each of which I have contributed.
NOCIRC had obtained consultative status with the
United Nations and we proceeded in our work in
Geneva under their kindly offered auspices. It was
ARC, using NOCIRC’s United Nations status,
which asked for the United Nations hearings
addressing male circumcision as a human rights
violation. We made this request based on our
concern that children’s rights should be
safeguarded.”
In 2001, Mr. Svoboda helped transform the
practice of male circumcision into an international
human rights issue when his oral and written
submissions concerning circumcision became a part
of the official United Nations record and the first
document to have ever been accepted on male
circumcision by the United Nations. This came about
as a result of his travel to Geneva during the
months of July 2001 and August 2001 for the
purposes of consulting on behalf of ARC with the
United Nations’ Sub-Commission for the
Promotion and Protection of Human Rights. In
Svoboda’s view, why is male circumcision a
human rights issue? We asked him to take us back to
2001 and to talk to about the compelling case that
he presented against circumcision to the United
Nations’ Sub-Commission for the Promotion and
Protection of Human Rights, thereby helping move
circumcision from an “obscure practice”
to an international human rights issue.
“In our United Nations presentation, we
noted that we are pleased to see panoply of
protections being extended to women and girls to
assist them in overcoming all the various systemic
and individual burdens which tend to fall on
females around the world. These are needed and are
good. We observed that everywhere that Female
Genital Mutilation occurs, male circumcision also
occurs. Elimination of one practice may therefore
go hand-in-hand with elimination of the other. We
noted that if one had just arrived in Geneva from
another planet and spent time reviewing all the
work done there, one might be forgiven for
wondering: Are males not also human beings? Do they
not also enjoy the right against removal of healthy
tissue from their bodies without their consent? We
repeated that, as one of many people answering
‘Yes’, Jacqueline Smith of the
Netherlands Institute of Human Rights wrote,
‘By condemning one practice and not the other,
another basic human right, namely the right to
freedom from discrimination, is at stake.’
My research in the bowels of the United
Nation’s Geneva headquarters turned up some
surprising information. The mandate of the officer
charged with investigating circumcision and related
practices originally encompassed traditional
practices affecting the health of women and
children but her mandate was then redefined to
focus exclusively on traditional practices
affecting the health of women and the girl child,
thus excluding boys from protection. This change
was made without ever going through proper channels
or even being announced, thereby directly violating
required UN procedures.
It may be tempting, we noted, to dismiss the
issue as trivial. But nothing could be further from
trivial for David Reimer, whose penis was entirely
burned off. He was raised and surgically
‘reassigned’ as a girl but his life and
the lives of everyone in his family were
catastrophically altered. Later both he and his
twin brother, who was not circumcised, committed
suicide as direct results of these events. Nothing
could be further from trivial for Demetrius Manker
of Carol City, Florida, one of the many boys who
have died in hospital after a circumcision.
The pain has been proven conclusively, and
cannot be prevented even with anesthetic, which
carries its own risks. Male circumcision harms
infant neurological development and memory, has
permanent impacts on sexuality, and deaths occur
regularly. Do medical benefits exist which justify
routine circumcision? No, according to the American
Medical Association and every other national
medical association throughout the world that has
examined the issue.
What about religion? For boys and girls alike,
under basic human rights principles, another’s
right to practice a religion must end where that
individual’s body begins. Otherwise,
individual protections carry little meaning. Many
Jews and Muslims are involved with organizations
working to stop male circumcision, and many are
questioning whether removal of healthy tissue from
the bodies of their children is required by or even
consistent with their faith. When the child is of
the age of consent, he or she can make up his or
her own mind about his or her own body. Some day,
we will come to understand the misguided nature of
our attempts to explain why any violation of female
genitals is criminal while a serious, extremely
painful, and disfiguring alteration of male
genitals is permissible. In the meantime, we noted
in conclusion, the screaming babies can't tell the
difference. All we need do is open our ears and
start to hear their cries. As an action item, we
asked that the mandate of the Special Rapporteur on
Traditional Practices Affecting the Health of Women
and the Girl Child be revised to again encompass
traditional practices affecting the health of women
and children.”
If our readers want to support the work of
Attorneys for the Rights of the Child, how can they
contact the organization?
“They can call 510-595-5550 or email us at
arc@post.harvard.edu. They can write to us at ARC,
2961 Ashby Avenue, Berkeley, CA 94705. Or they can
visit us on the Internet at
www.arclaw.org.”
What’s next for J. Steven Svoboda,
J.D.?
“Editor Albert Fields and I are pleased to
announce the publication of the 21st issue of our
newsletter, which is distributed by the three
leading content providers (EBSCO, ProQuest, and
Gale) to libraries throughout North America and the
world. While ARC is not directly involved in
litigation, we frequently advise potential
plaintiffs on their options. Years of experience
with countless aggrieved individuals have motivated
us to work on releasing to the public accessible
information on legal rights relating to
circumcision. In coming months, two legal brochures
will be posted to our website, a short brochure to
provide basic information and a longer brochure
providing more detailed information for those
wishing to delve deeper. A longer-range plan is to
prepare a video downloadable from our website that
will give people down-to-earth advice on rights
relating to circumcision. The newsletter is
available free of charge to anyone who is
interested by emailing us at arc@post.harvard.edu.
We are also preparing to return to the United
Nations to continue addressing these issues in
front of the Sub-Commission’s successor
organization, the Human Rights Council.”
May
Having arrived back in Berkeley after four years on
a small Pacific island, I almost instantly found
myself observing a drama that has also proven a
volatile cultural war—the battle over gay
marriage. As nearly everyone knows by now, the
mayor of near-by San Francisco elected to authorize
same-sex matrimony despite the California ballot
proposition which the people of my very politically
mixed state passed a few years ago specifically
banning such unions. As other scattered towns in
the US such as the village of New Paltz, New York
followed suit, traditionalists armed themselves to
the teeth for what promises to be an extended,
pitched battle between forces of the future and the
past, conservatives and liberals, lovers and
opponents of same-sex unions. With Canada having
instituted immigration benefits for partners in
same-sex marriage back in 2002, the US is behind
the times, but at least the Massachusetts Supreme
Court ruling (on my son Eli’s second birthday,
February 4, 2004!) clears the way for gay weddings
there through at minimum November 2006, the
earliest date by which a constitutional amendment
can possibly be instituted to stop the
ceremonies.
To my mind, what we are seeing is a lot of
people acting in their own interests while
purporting to be acting from principles. San
Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom, exceeded in his
profound affinity with downtown interests only by
his immediate predecessor--the notoriously
developer-addicted Willie Brown, can be relied on
always to test the wind before tossing his kite up
in the air. I can only applaud the San Jose City
Council’s somewhat surprising decision to
offer identical benefits to all married city
employees, whether gay or straight, though again,
so close to San Francisco, one can assume they also
realize that they have a large gay and lesbian
taxpayer base. Meanwhile, religious leaders and
conservative do what they consider correspondingly
necessary to pander to their own constituents, and
Republican politicians adopt “San
Francisco” as a euphemism for non-conformists
of all stripes. To paraphrase, P.T. Barnum, no one
ever went broke underestimating Americans’
tolerance for fellow citizens who dare to step
outside the norm. Maybe I’m just an overly
cynical middle-aged ex-hippie.
One of the issues I had with becoming a father
is it turns out to be so demanding simply to do the
musts that I find myself running out of time to
meditate on where my life is going and certainly to
keep up with issues in others’ lives. There is
always the next thing that must be done—buy
groceries, keep gas in the car, hold onto a job or
in my case search for one, keep your children
entertained and healthy, occasionally toss a word
or two to your partner as you frantically rush by
each other on your way to the next tasks. Of
course, especially living as I do in one of the
most hectic of areas, it’s not all that
different before you have a child, but the addition
to one’s family does tend to further crimp
your time and further sap your energy. So in
principle I feel outraged about the resistance to
gay marriage. And in practice I just have a hard
time sustaining the same level of focused,
vociferous adrenalin I used to run with ease when I
was younger.
Not that I’m complaining, mind you. I love
being a father and there is nothing on earth that
could induce me to trade it for my previous life.
Right now we are in particular crunch time as we
are buying a house in Berkeley (the prices are
unbelievable), I am frustrated and feeling a bit
vulnerable about my problem landing employment, we
are trying to produce a companion for Eli, and many
other things too mundane to bore all of you
with.
I have served as a warrior in a variety of ways
in my life, devoting substantial amounts of life
energy to the struggles to advance men’s
rights and to protect boys’ and men’s
bodily integrity by stopping circumcision. I spent
half a year doing human rights work in rural
Guatemala with the peasants, visiting morgues,
confronting Army officers in their bases over
murders they had helped orchestrate, and the like.
Could have easily lost my life somewhere in there,
but I lucked out. Also worked as an immigration
lawyer for several years, struggling to earn
political asylum for immigrants, which amounts to
roughly the supply end of the work I was doing in
Central America. Slept on the steps of the
administration building at UC Berkeley for a month
to help stop apartheid. And so on.
One of my biggest struggles was the one I found
myself embroiled in to avoid a literal
battle—draft registration. I was born in 1960
and so was required to register for the draft and
yet was unwilling to do so. I was also receiving
financial aid on which I depended since my parents
were unable or unwilling to fund my college
education. So what did I do? I pulled off a tricky
little end-around with the certifications you were
required to file stating that you had registered or
were exempt from registering. I hand-wrote an
explanation regarding my failure to register into
the card I received ever year, and never once did
the university notice my unusual notation on the
card and ask for further information. My financial
aid continued to faithfully arrive until I left
Harvard Law School in 1991.
Kudos again go out to what is currently perhaps
our strongest and greatest fighting team, Fathers 4
Justice (F4J) of the United Kingdom. In December
2003, five F4J activists dressed up as Santa Claus
and held a three-hour protest on a walkway above
The Strand in Liverpool. Some 300 protesters
participated in a similar event in central London,
marching to the High Courts and the Houses of
Parliament while 21-year-old drama student Darryl
Westell—also dressed as Santa--spent his third
day on a crane 140 feet above the offices of
Children’s Minister Margaret Hodge. Ms. Hodge
was later presented with a giant turkey and branded
“Turkey of the Year” for refusing to
change old child access laws which favor
mothers.
In late January, registered childcare worker
Jolly Stanesby braved cold weather for a full week
sitting 20 feet above the ground on the Tamar
Bridge that connects Devon to Cornwall. Mr.
Stanesby carried with him only seven army surplus
ration packs (how appropriate for this issue’s
theme!), a flask of soup, some brandy and a
sleeping bag. He then successfully clambered down
and escaped without drawing police attention to
himself. Then in the early hours of February 2,
2004, four F4J members took over the Clifton
Suspension Bridge in Bristol, England. Dressed up
as Batman, Robin, Superman, and Spiderman, these
fine folks held up a banner that read,
“Superhero Fathers 4 Justice—Fighting for
Your Right to See Your Kids.” This act of
civil disobedience eventually led to denial of
public access to the bridge for part of the day
and, combined with simultaneous actions by five
members in London and four on Newcastle’s Tyne
Bridge, drew national attention to F4J’s
important and impressively successful campaign for
fathers’ rights to access to their children
and children’s rights to access to their
fathers. Then early the next day, F4J members waged
a successful graffiti attack on a Yorkshire law
firm notorious for its father-hostile legal
services to mothers, scrawling such messages as
“F4J here to stay,” “child
thieves,” and “parasites” in large
purple letters on the building. Police have
responded to some of these events with raids at
addresses in London and other parts of England.
Sounds like war to me!
Possibly inspired by F4J’s stunning string
of successes, protests have been breaking out all
over the place. A group of 15 to 20 angry Dutch
fathers involved in custody battles for their
children peacefully occupied an office of the Dutch
child protection agency on November 20, 2003, the
International Day of the Child. Refusing to allow
anyone into or out of the building, they hung
banners from the office windows demanding fair
treatment and justice and also a meeting with the
Justice Minister and the child protection agency
director. On December 22, 2003, a group of fathers
calling for changes in Nebraska’s custody laws
set up a picket line to call attention to their
grievances, protesting outside the Douglas County
Hall of Justice. On Christmas Day, a group of
fourteen Vancouver dads erected a Christmas tree
and pickets outside the Supreme Court of British
Columbia to remind people that Christmas is a
lonely time when you can’t see your children.
The group faulted outdated family laws and biased
judges for their problems with custody and access
to their children.
Perhaps F4J’s impact is extending even
further than we realize, as one safe house for
battered men has reportedly already opened at a
secret location in southwest England, with a second
slated to open soon in northwest England. At the
same time, I am very sorry to have to report that
in early December, the British Home Secretary
announced an extensive set of changes in domestic
violence laws, further extending the potential for
bad faith use of restraining orders by allowing
them to be imposed even on men who have been
acquitted of domestic violence accusations due to a
lack of evidence! The reason I say “men”
rather than “domestic violence
defendants” is because the British
government’s official announcement similarly
discriminates against men despite the wealth of
evidence of women’s at least equal involvement
in spouse-bashing. (Elsewhere in this issue, you
can read my review of lawyer Thomas James’ new
book on this subject.) Furthermore, the government
came right out and said, “Just because there
isn’t enough criminal evidence to secure a
conviction doesn’t mean the victim
doesn’t need protecting.” Come again?
What happened to the rule of law? Melanie Phillips
notes in the Daily Mail, “This measure will
destroy the very concept of innocence
itself.”
As if that weren’t enough, on January 28,
virtually on the eve of these major F4J events, the
UK Court of Appeal handed down a judgment in the
case of “Re: S” confirming that British
courts will allow a mother to maliciously destroy
the relationship between child and father and even
though the child would be better off having contact
with Dad, will bar the child from reuniting with
Dad. The reasoning? Where Mom is so opposed, it
will be even worse for the child if the court
forces her to let the Dad back into the kid’s
life.
Compliments to Pittsburgh police for arresting
and charging a 38-year-old woman with falsely
claiming rape by members of the St. John’s
University basketball team. Turns out the gal
willingly had sex with the athletes and then
threatened them with rape accusations when they
weren’t in the mood to meet her subsequent
demands for money! Similar recognition is due a
British Columbia Court of Appeal that upheld an
award of custody to a father after the mother
falsely accused the father of sexually abusing his
young sons.
Further raves are due the American Civil
Liberties Union, of which I was a member until
resigning several years ago due to their neglect of
men’s rights. I may have to reactivate my
membership given their recent involvement in
facilitating the release of 100 men in Montgomery
County, Pennsylvania whom, according to the
ACLU’s notice to the court, had been jailed
for alleged nonpayment of alimony/support without
being told they had a right to an attorney, thereby
violating due process. The court has since agreed
to provide adequate notice of impending proceedings
and also to ensure the presence of legal counsel to
assist all similarly situated people in the future.
This success comes a year after the ACLU sued state
court officials in Lawrence County, Pennsylvania
for improperly jailing non-custodial parents.
Sometimes the news reads like satire. A Gender
Recognition Bill has been proposed in the UK which
will allow transsexuals to register for a new birth
certificate in their adopted sex, and to marry in
that sex. An eight-year-old boy was forced to
enroll in a sex offender program after he pinned at
least one female classmate and touched her breasts
and genital areas while they were both at school.
Equally absurdly, Staten Island has joined the
growing ranks of jurisdictions opening
“integrated domestic violence courts.”
These tribunals permit “ex parte”
testimony without being required to hear the
defendant’s side of the story. Such courts
will circumvent the protections of criminal law by
reducing or removing the burden of proof and
tossing out the previously sacrosanct presumption
of innocence until proven guilty beyond a
reasonable doubt.
As I settle into middle age, I definitely still
have some fight in me. These sorts of battles still
attract me and in fact I am preparing to wage war
on a new frontier—working to form a Men’s
Law Center with Marc Angelucci of the Los Angeles
chapter of the National Coalition of Free Men
(N
April
It’s four in the morning, and I have been up
for more than an hour. As a father, and as someone
currently plumb in the midst of preparing a move
nearly halfway around the planet (from Guam to
California), I have been fully exploiting the
24-hour clock lately, from both directions.
Although I have changed my residence more than
20 times in my life, this is likely to prove my
most significant move yet. Having come
(metaphorically speaking) to the
“wilderness” and “gotten the
girl” (not to mention the boy, my son Eli), we
are all coming back to “civilization.” I
will be transitioning toward paid work while my
wife Paula will be focusing more on caring for Eli
while still keeping her physician skills sharp by
seeing patients part-time.
Of course, this change is at least equally
significant for Paula. Having grown up on this
small, friendly, primarily Catholic,
family-oriented island, she is preparing to say
goodbye to many dear friends, not to mention her
mother. Paula was working as the Medical Director
of Guam’s Public Health Department so had a
highly visible role here in her career, frequently
appearing in the media to discuss medical
developments such as SARS or immunization programs.
This will be a big step for both of us.
Getting to a place where we were ready to make
the change took a lot of patience, careful thinking
and feeling, and hard work from both of us. One
critical key to this process has been our weekly
couples’ meetings, which have nominally now
become family meetings (and once he starts talking
his participation won’t be so nominal).
Suggested by a number of insightful folks including
Warren Farrell, such meetings give space and time
to vent, get caught up on what is going on with
each other, make practical plans, as well as say
the things that somehow there is never the
opportunity to mention in the hubbub of daily
life.
Here are the issues I am struggling with (and by
the way this month’s theme of pornography
feels very far from the surfacing issues in my life
at the moment so I’m going to for once give
the theme a total pass in this column): How do I
find employment as a lawyer that will satisfy all
three of my minimum requirements: decent pay,
decent hours, and work in which I believe? And how
sad it is that work as a lawyer that satisfies
these three seemingly simple requirements is so
rare.
I honestly am a bit unsure exactly where my work
is going. Although I have been a lawyer for
thirteen years now, I have spent the last seven
years as the Executive Director of the
anti-circumcision non-profit Attorneys for the
Rights of the Child. I have been extremely
gratified at the financial support individuals have
given us, which have covered our expenses but
haven’t allowed for me to receive any pay at
all for this work. I am certainly not complaining
as following this path was entirely voluntary and
made it possible for me to come to this island and
join with Paula to create a family. While ARC will
certainly continue, it also feels like time for me
to expand that effort into other areas.
A good friend of mine in Los Angeles—Marc
Angelucci--and I have been seriously discussing
starting a “Men’s Law Center” to
provide legal services to males. One idea is to
take some relatively well-heeled clients and apply
part of the fees from their representation to
enable us to accept cases from low-income men who
are otherwise incapable of affording a lawyer.
Whether we can make this fly I don’t know;
certainly it’s never been done before to my
knowledge. A number of barriers
exist--institutional, political, public perception,
practical. And yet Marc and I are both very
committed to transforming the concept of a law
center for men (in some form) into a reality.
The work has already started to some extent, as
Marc has been involved in initating a number of
men’s rights lawsuits, some of which I have
previously discussed in these pages. Back in June,
Marc was instrumental in filing a sex
discrimination case against ten taxpayer-funded
domestic violence shelters in Los Angeles County.
In October, the district court judge granted a
“demurrer” (motion to dismiss based
strictly on the law) by the shelters and repeatedly
refused to explain on the record his response to
the constitutional challenge to California
Government Code section 11139, which carves out an
exception to discrimination laws for “women
and minorities.” He could not answer, and
refused to do so. The case is currently under
appeal.
Across the pond, Fathers 4 Justice continues to
show us the UK style of activism. In September,
three protesters in Suffolk (including one woman)
layered purple paint on the door of the Children
and Family Courts Advisory Support Service
(CAFCASS) office in Ipswich. Then work on one of
Exeter’s biggest building sites abruptly
halted when a father tied himself to the top of a
massive crane. Later the same month, a group of
twenty F4J protesters visited the offices of a
leading family law firm in reading, dressed in
chemical decontamination suits. After announcing
their intention to “clean up family law,”
the visitors occupied the firm’s offices and
put hazard tape across the door while supporters
outside gave out “warning notices” to
passersby.
In October, David Chick, a 36-year-old father,
spent six days perched on top of a 120-foot crane
beside London’s Tower Bridge, leading to the
bridge’s closure and drawing tremendous
attention to the issue of gender equity in family
law in the UK. Later that month, two men from F4J
dressed as Batman and Robin climbed onto the roof
of the Royal Courts of Justice in London to protest
fathers’ treatment in family court. Wonderful
photographs of the masked crusader and his fearless
sidekick showed up in leading newspapers, both of
them raising their arms in front of a banner with
their organization’s name. Newspaper reporting
of F4J’s latest plans exemplifies the forces
that are being confronted. The Sun wrote that the
group is “planning to raid family law
courts,” raising the specter of masked
masculists stealing law books and perhaps grabbing
the judge’s wig and robe. Later in the article
the paper is forced to admit that this
“raid” is actually planned to consist of
“members dressed up as Santas singing carols
into courts across the North East to disrupt family
court proceedings.”
In November, a march of supporters drew
attention as it snaked its way through London from
Trafalgar Square to the Royal Courts of Justice, to
burn underpants in symbolic rejection of the biased
family court system. The march itself also drew
attention for its real armored tank at the front,
followed by eight men and a woman in white
protective clothing, using brooms to sweep away the
“family law gravy train.” Sir Bob Geldof,
of “I Don’t Like Mondays” fame with
the Boomtown Rats, has taken up fathers’
rights and written several excellent articles on
the topic lately, in the wake of his own horrendous
custody battle with his late ex-wife. Concrete
results are ensuing, as British ministers are
considering plans to grant fathers expanded access
to their children through “parenting
plans” which would be required of divorcing
couples.
Meanwhile, back on the home front, we have
Craig, a Seattle father of two who was sentenced to
three months in jail for returning his
ex-wife’s phone call. Jaw-droppingly, a judge
has granted Clara Harris, who is serving a 20-year
sentence in prison after murdering her husband with
her Mercedes-Benz, joint custody of their
5-year-old twin sons along with her former
neighbors, Pat and Ana Jones. The boys’
paternal grandparents, Gerald and Mildred Harris,
who would seem to be the only viable candidates for
custody, instead will have visitation rights. Kudos
to the Ohio judge who jailed a rape victim with a
criminal record to force her to testify, leading to
the discovery that her claim was fabricated and to
the exoneration of the accused man. Plaudits also
to the Washington state Supreme Court for upholding
a contempt citation against a divorced mother who
claimed she couldn’t force her 13-year-old
daughter to visit her father. In the unanimous (!)
opinion, the court noted that a custodial parent
“may be held in contempt… for failing to
make reasonable efforts to require a child to visit
the other parent as required by a parenting plan
and court order establishing visitation.”
To my astonishment, this is my thirtieth column
for Everyman. I am planning to continue this
quarterly adventure once we are back in California
though probably my book reviews will become less
frequent due to my continually shrinking time. So
many gender paradoxes and men’s issues are
cropping up in concrete ways right now in my own
life. I am going to be giving up some of my time
with the thing I absolutely love the
most—taking care of my son—in order to
plunge more deeply into the more typically
masculine pursuit of career. And yet my wife and I
both feel that this move is the right one. I feel
uncertainty about whether I can find a career that
will encompass my basic requirements, modest though
I think they are, and fear about whether I can cut
the mustard back in the workaday life. And when my
mood is right, I can flip that emotion into the
excitement that it genuinely represents as I ride
my own personal-roller coaster on toward the next
unforeseeable curve and loop-the-loop that life and
God have in store for me.
©2010, Steven Svoboda
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