The Rights Of Man

WHITSUN COVERAGE ROUND-UP

The past two weeks have been busy in terms of anti-male issues or debunking anti-male myths. Listed below is the some of the coverage.

The Times (Sue Palmer) - Who's to blame for the lost boys?

The Sunday Times (India Knight) - Having it all is a myth, girls

Daily Telegraph (David Green) - The Gender Pay Gap Does Not Exist

Daily Mail (Petronella Wyatt) - Man Flu? It we women who are the sickly sex

BBC - Fathers Cool on Parental Leave

FALSE RAPE VICTIM TO GET DAMAGES

A man who was falsely accused of rape is to be awarded damages through the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority. This is a first.

The poor chap who lost everything and the woman who was accused (Kirsty Palmer) got 10 months won a tribunal so he get compensation. This is a small victory and nowhere near makes up for his trauma. The Fawcett Society, going by their report (see Monday), obviously don't think she should go to prison.

The story was covered by the BBC, Daily Mail and Mirror.

Another false rape stories recently was in Sunderland. It shows that a tiny minority of women are prepared to use this against unsuspecting men without any regard to the consequences. It damages honest men and poor women who have been raped.

A new angle in Canada where a cabbie is suing four women who falsely accused him. Fortunately he had a video in the car which proved his innocence else he'd probably still be in jail.

FAWCETT SOCIETY DO NOT BELIEVE IN EQUAL AND BLIND JUSTICE

Sometimes one never knows how to start a post and a good example of this is in reviewing this weeks tirade by the pro-women anti-male Fawcett Society over their report Engendering Justice where they accuse the whole British justice system of being institutionally sexist.

The basic premise is that too many women are being sent to prison and the reason for this is that the legal system is run as an old boys club because there are so few women working within it.

To be fair, they do raise worrying statistics about the level of self-harming amongst females in prison and of course, they are certain issues like this that show the prison system should improve.

However, the subtext behind all of it is that they want women to be treated more leniently than men for crimes they commit. The reason this is said is that nowhere in the report does it say that male criminals receive lighter sentences than women for the same crime.

In fact, it can be said that the opposite is true as a very early post on this site showed. Also far more community sentences are handed out to women than men in Crown courts (12,575 - men : 30,617 women) which suggests that with a prison population of 40,911 men : 3,123 women at face value judges are more likely to pass a community sentence than they would for a man. Though of course, the actual severity of the cases would need to be looked at and more men committing worse crimes (overall) than women.

The Fawcett Society have closed ears when it comes to increasing female violence (link).

The issue of childcare and child support is raised, however, this shows the inconsistency of organisations such as the Fawcett Society. On the one hand they do all they can to denigrate the family and proclaim that men are not needed (full stop) but then complain that women do not have people to look after the kids when they go to court or in prison. If they did not denigrate men so much then perhaps they might pause to think that perhaps the father could help.

Lastly, on the issue of the lack of women in senior positions in the legal system, they, like all proponents of the gender employment war, do not ask the simple questions. They don't ask whether women want a career in the senior ranks nor do they look at the progress being made. For example, there has been percentage increases in the number of police officers at every level since they did their previous research (First Report 03/04) and also a big increase in the number of High Court Judges (10% now: 5.7% in 03/04). In fact, the number of female applicants for QC positions have a success rate of 55% against a male success rate of 40%.

These things take time, but of course, the Fawcett Society does not do time (even though 63% of people signing up to the Law Society are now women) and with the disaster of the Equality Bill soon to be upon us they will be leveraging this to ensure that female candidates leapfrog male candidates for every position going. The legal system will be another target for the pro-women/anti-male witch-hunt.

In conclusion, the British justice system is supposedly blind (hence the blindfolded scales of justice) and that both men and women are treated the same whether plaintiffs or defendants. What the Fawcett Society are really saying is that they want to blind to slip whenever a women is accused of a crime and for the eyes to tip them the wink.

PS read this hysterical rant in the Guardian at your peril (you have been warned!) and she is slaughtered in the comments section.

PSPS Here is an example of the type of justice the Fawcett Society is talking about.

WIDESPREAD COVERAGE OF MALE VICTIMS OF DOMESTIC VIOLENCE

Last week marked another landmark period of coverage on male victims following the burst of coverage earlier on this year (see March/Feb here).

Ian McNicholl came forward and reported the traumatic situation he found himself in which led to his ex-girlfirend being sent to prison for a lenient seven years.

The coverage was broken on the front page of Britain's biggest selling daily newspaper The Sun (1, 2, 3) and also featured an interview on BBC Look North. The case was also covered by This is Grimsby and the Yorkshire Post.

In addition, the Sunday Express had a large feature and there were features in Scotland's Herald newspaper (1, 2).

Lastly, and apologies for missing this, but Liz Lynne MEP also had an article in the Birmingham Post.

What this shows is that the media are still starting to take this issue seriously and see it as an area where equality is not present. If it newsworthy enough to be on the front page of The Sun then there is enough evidence to show that the Government can no longer with any credibility claim that it 'the vast majority of cases are against women'.

FAMILY COURTS - WHEN OPEN DOES NOT NECESSARILY MEAN OPEN

There has been much debate (link, link) about whether the landmark change in allowing accredited journalists into the UK's family law courts will make much difference.

The reason for the concern has been about the fact that judges can still stop journalists from reporting what they see and hear and also from attending in the first place.

Some of the outrageous judgements made by judges on custody issues and the enforcement of custody orders means that they themselves can still hide behind many of their absurd views. This also helps to protect the inept and bias against fathers by Cafcass and Social Services.

Another concern is that because of the savage cutbacks in the local media, apart from any very serious cases, there are not enough reporters to cover the courts. Many a journalist cut their teeth as a court reporter for a local paper but these newspapers can no longer keep such posts going and nearly all such positions have gone. It means that apart from this week and perhaps in an outrageous/serious case, the interest in this issue by local papers will wane.

At least there is some transparency but it is doubtful there will be a change in attitude on custodial/parenting issues when the judges who make the rules up as they go along still have the power to hide and be unaccountable. There will still be no justice.

Coverage from the the Times, who won awards for opening up the secret family courts is here (1, 2, 3. Other coverage includes (Press Gazette, Families Need Fathers, Daily Mail, Daily Mail 2, BBC, Guardian, Independent)

OPENING UP FAMILY COURTS A 'CON TRICK'

The last post welcomed the outline proposal to open up the family courts to the media. It would seem according to the analysis by John Hemming MP (link) and Marcel Berlins (link) that all is not what it seems.

In many respects, what these two commentators have revealed is worse, because at least before there was no pretence of openness, now the judiciary and Government can say there is, when there is not.

Very Orwellian but is anyone surprised?

Hat-tip: Mensaid

BREAKTHROUGH ON OPENING FAMILY COURTS UP TO THE MEDIA

One of the biggest complaints made about the UK's Family Courts System is the fact that because the media are not allowed access, they are unaccountable and not transparent. Basically, it all goes on behind closed doors and there is no scrutiny, and therefore justice is not being seen to be done. There is no public confidence.

The Government has been well aware of this and has been lobbied by the media (link) and groups such as Families Need Fathers for this transparency.

At last, the Government (link) looks like it will deliver and they are measures now before Parliament to allow accredited media into the family court system. Fingers crossed it goes through.

GOVERNMENT CONTINUES ITS CAMPAIGN OF IGNORING MALE VICTIMS OF DOMESTIC ABUSE

The UK Government announced (link) last week that it was introducing a further 18 specialist domestic violence courts into the UK.

However, as the court system is supposedly meant to be gender neutral, one would think that the Government's announcement would also be gender-neutral especially as two in every five victims, according to the Government's own figures (link), are male. Such naivety.

Firstly, spot the picture of a woman, no picture of a male victim.

Also note the comments by Home Office Minister Alan Campbell and Baroness Scotland, they are clearly only aimed at female victims.

Baroness Scotland says "'Improving the safety of women experiencing domestic violence and the support that they are given is a key priority for the government." It should say "improving the safety of women and men experiencing domestic violence."

Just another example of the ongoing bias of the present Government who continue to ignore male victims of domestic violence.

WHEN WILL THE GOVERNMENT CHANGE LAW TO STOP MEN BEING NAMED AND SHAMED UNTIL FOUND GUILTY

The case last week where Peter Bacon was acquitted of rape (link, link, link) continues to highlight the problem faced by men who are falsely accused. It means that whilst he was innocent, the stigma of his name being made public means he will never escape from it, it is on the Internet forever.

As he said himself, his name has been dragged through the mud and he questioned why his alleged ‘victim’ received automatic lifelong anonymity, while he was named as an accused rapist.

In a statement read by his solicitor, he said: ‘This case seriously calls into question the lack of anonymity for people like Peter who have been wrongfully accused of rape, and who are ultimately acquitted.

Whilst there is the issue about the false accusation itself, at least a dozen years after the issue was raised nothing still has been done on securing the anonymity of the accused. Rightly, the accuser should not be named before the jury's decision but the accused should not be either. If he is found guilty then rightly he should then be named but he is not guilty as the systme stands an innocent man's reputation is ruined.

The Government simply do not seem interested in bringing in this change which suggests they are happy for innocent men to be named and shamed forever. This blatantly unfair and wrong law should not continue.

Some previous posts on this subject are here (link, link, link, link, link, link)

UPDATE - Another story of a false accusation where the man was named (link)

An article in The Times (link)

FALSELY ACCUSED OF RAPE IN WANDSWORTH - NO APOLOGY FROM POLICE

One of the most pernicious crimes that a woman can commit against a man is to accuse him of raping her. Obviously rape is an awful crime and those who are guilty must be punished severely but when false accusations are made (often with the man being named) the man they are stigmatised for life.

There seems to be an increase in cases coming to the fore which is of great concern (link, link, link) to those men accused but also the genuine cases which probably make it harder for female who have been raped to come forward.

This particular case (link) is one of the most pernicious as it mean two teenagers spent months behind bars. As the article suggests the police do not seem to be remotely interested in the damage done to the boys, they have received no apology and are stigmatised.

Glenn Sacks in his commentary (link) says these boys are just 'collateral damage'. Very true.