Fathers' Rights California Gubernatorial Candidate Warren Farrell Addresses Rally in Front of LA Court

August 29, 2003

Men's and fathers' rights California gubernatorial candidate Warren Farrell addressed a spirited protest rally against anti-father family court bias Tuesday in downtown Los Angeles. The demonstration was held in front of the huge Los Angeles Superior Court building, dubbed "deadbeat dad court" for the way it handles and manhandles tens of thousands of largely low income and minority fathers. The pugnacious Farrell , like David standing in the shadows of the monstrous Goliath, decried the way the family court system allows decent fathers to be driven out of the lives of the children who love them and need them.

Farrell , a best-selling men's issues author who was once a leading member of the National Organization for Women, explained that America has gone from a "women's crisis to a men's crisis" and that now, three and a half decades after the rise of the feminist movement, many of America's worst gender inequities work against men and fathers.

One of 135 candidates on the ballot in the October 7 recall election, Farrell detailed his research on the importance of fathers and put forth his long-term solution to relieving California's highly publicized budget crisis--keeping fathers in children's lives. Farrell noted that the way family courts allow divorced dads to be driven out of their children's lives leads to high levels of violent crime and teenage pregnancy--social pathologies which "cost California billions for prisons, courts and social services." Farrell put forth a package of reforms to solve this problem, including the rebuttable presumption of joint custody and placing legal limits on post-divorce move-aways.

Farrell also called for addressing the boy crisis in education, forming a state commission on the status of men and men�s health, "female empowerment rather than victim power," legislation to combat paternity fraud , universal prenatal care, and "restraining the Government-as-Substitute-Husband." Farrell believes his program will help women as well as men, and says his candidacy represents an important step in building a men's and fathers' rights vote which politicians will seek.

The rally drew major media attention, including CNN, Fox News, the New York Times, and others. A coalition of men's and fathers rights groups sponsored the event, including the National Coalition of Free Men Los Angeles, Veterans Fighting Paternity Fraud, the Coalition for Blacks' Best Interest, Pops on Point, My Child Says Daddy, and Women Against Paternity Fraud.

Other speakers included Warren Williams of the Coalition for Blacks' Best Interest, who decried a family court system which separates fathers from their children, and Daryl Crismon , a paternity fraud victim who was trapped in a default judgment several years ago and who is being compelled to pay for a child whom DNA tests have shown is not his.

Crismon brought his 10 year-old daughter to the speaker's podium and showed the crowd her painful dental ailment, a condition which he says he needs $5,000 to fix but cannot get because of the judgment against him. He explained that the state has put a lien on his house so he is unable to refinance or borrow money, and that the state has revoked his driver's license and threatened him with jail.

"Every day when my little girl goes to school the kids tease her about her teeth so badly she's afraid to smile," he said.

Marc Angelucci, president of the National Coalition of Free Men Los Angeles and the rally's princiapl organizer, told the crowd "this rally is about unity," referring to the many men's and fathers' groups which came together to voice their concerns.

Dianna Thompson, Executive Director of the American Coalition for Fathers and Children said that women have a special responsibility to help the fathers' movement and asked "as mothers and grandmothers, how could we not help?" She also decried the ways the paternity establishment system often forces fathers to pay for children who aren't theirs.

Nationally-syndicated men's and fathers rights radio talk show host Glenn Sacks praised Thompson as being the "voice of the voiceless" and criticized the media for shutting out men's and fathers' views. He noted:

"I receive thousands of letters from men who are victims of this system. Men whose children have been moved hundreds or thousands of miles away from them, against their will. Men whose exes violate their visitation rights and poison their children against them. Men who the child support system is bankrupting to pay for children they can't even see. Men who've been falsely accused of domestic violence and who have lost all contact with their children even though they've never been convicted or even charged with any crime. If a father falls behind on his child support the system comes down on him like a ton of bricks, but when his visitation rights are violated the courts don't do a damn thing about it."

Farrell, whose books include Father and Child Reunion, Women Can't Hear What Men Don't Say, The Myth of Male Power, Why Men Are The Way They Are , and The Liberated Man , has been published in more than 50 countries and 10 languages. The International Biographic Centre of London ranks him as one of the world's top 2000 scholars in the 20th Century, and The Financial Times selects him as one of a hundred top "Thought Leaders" in the world. The Chicago Tribune described Farrell as "the Gloria Steinem of Men's Liberation" and the Boston Globe calls him "the sage of the men's movement."

Story filed by Glenn J. Sacks