Are Family Courts in the U.S. Destroying the American Family?

Having gone through a custody contest in family court, it is my opinion that in fact family courts are destroying the U.S. family. What became apparent is that the family court system is a business that survives by breaking up families. Not happy with your life, come to us and we can make your spouse, who of course is the cause of all of your problems, go away, and we will give you a large portion of all of his or hers money, future earnings, and make you the supreme boss over your children. Why compromise with your spouse when we can force your spouse to do everything we demand him or her to do.

Then, these courts drag on and on, you are lucky if you ever get to a trial, and all the laws are essentially ignored. You must pay a lawyer to get any access into the system, and there is no limit on how much they can charge. Want to keep seeing your kids? Start paying us lots of money, or your children can grow up without one parent, who might be the abusive one. I know the local family court gave not one concern about who was telling the truth or who might be the abusive parent. The parent who files first, gets the ball rolling, gets first dibs as reward for bringing in the new business.

This might sound harsh, but this is how these family courts operate.

I was talking to my fabulous husband about this the other night, and while I understand the reasons for family court being a closed court, I don't think it should be entirely closed. If you want a divorce, child support, alimony, etc, you should be judged by a jury of your peers just like anyone else. This would prevent women from taking men for all their worth; it would prevent men from being railroaded by the system; and it would protect the children from parents who want to do nothing more than make them pawns in their personal war with each other. It might not be the best idea, but it's better than judges assuming that children are better off with their mothers, even when their mothers are crack whores.

reply to post by scarlett1125

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The sad fact is that this is exactly what many of these judges have done. Mom is a crazy drug addict, and dad is the responsible one working a job, paying the bills, cleaning the house, and taking care of the kids, but the judges give mom everything, full control of the kids, and a large chunk of dads paycheck. Then the kids are forced to live with a string of losers who keep her supplied with drugs. Talk about an environment for abuse. I think judges who make these types of orders ought to be going to jail themselves for child abuse.

It seems that if the guy makes large amounts of money, the judges tend to go the opposite way. The women get screwed, and the men get all the control. The system mainly seems to work for those who come to the system first. This way, the system rewards those who bring it the business.

Lately they have added in these evaluators. I wound up working with two different evaluators, and these people were power mongers with serious personal issues in my opinion. In fact, I got re-assigned because my first evaluator took a personal leave. That guy was clinical in my opinion. When I finally got my second evaluator, being forced to pay for my lawyer to meet with another evaluator, that one ignored every law on the books.

Trying to take any action against this system is practically impossible. Heck, taking any action to stand up for your rights against our current court system has gotten to be practically impossible.