HotWingConspiracy

Easy--the state contracts out to a collection agency which gets a cut of the take. The agent could give a crap whether it's legit or not.

The agent of the court has the force of law behind it, and none of the accountability. And the court is not accountable for what the agent does--they'll direct the agent to take certain action after you get a ruling.

Kind of like bounty hunters.

-No kids; not divorced
--Worked with a lot of guys not so lucky
---One poor bastard got divorced in Indiana.

Bcron

If I was that dude, I would stop paying. What are they going to do?

Other than just taking the money out of your paychecks, fining you thousands of dollars on top of that, suspending your driver's license, then throwing you in prison for a few months?

(Depends all on the state, but many of them are farking insane.)

HotWingConspiracy

Why is he writing a check at all? Nobody is going to report him for not sending one.

1. They will put him in jail.

2. They will sieze all his assets

3. The children will be put into a foster home by "Child Services" where they can be properly abused by a professional that they have approved.

Do I need to say who "They" are?

I'm just wondering, if he died and had custody on weekends, would the state make the kids visit the grave?

/or would she dump there there for the weekend?
//he'd get busted for neglect

*them there

Ooops.. there's preview for a reason

2006-10-31 08:44:39 AM portscanner

I get what the penalties are, but how will they know? I'm assuming that they need some kind of complaint in order to look into a missed payment. The only person that could log a report is dead.

Man, that $100 copay for the vasectomy was a really good deal!

cowinmyunderpants: Alimony seems to only be an issue for the very rich these days. At least from what I have seen and heard.

"Divorce laws in New York State provide for "maintenance" instead of "alimony". Maintenance, as defined by divorce law in New York State, is known as "payments...for a definite or indefinite period of time, to meet the reasonable needs of a party to the matrimonial action...." Maintenance served as an opportunity for the spouse to achieve independence, where alimony was awarded for the sole purpose of maintaining the wife's prior standard of living."

Alimony and "maintenence" are both crap. She gets half of your crap (or more) when you get divorced, and that should be the end of it.

I've never understood how two people are considered independent and responsible adults when going into a marriage, while only one of them is considered independent and responsible when coming out of one.

/govt involvement in marriage is why I am leaning toward being a bachelor for life

sirgrim:
And people wonder why I just pick a random chick off the street every few years and buy her a house. Saves me a crapload on wife-insurance.

*NSA puts on a wig and lingers outside sirgrim's house*

/sick of renting

Word of advice. If you are a man and are going through a divorce with kids, try and get the judge to let you pay "maintenance or alimony" instead of child support. You're out the money either way, but, at least, in Kansas, you can write alimony off on your taxes, but not child support.

aphexcoil

Reading this thread has not left me with a "warm fuzzy feeling" about marriage ... Is there any harm in remaining single your entire life?

That's why, when a Farker proposed to his lady here on Fark, I whipped this up:



I bet everyone thought I was joking. As to your question about remaining single... I don't know, but I suspect you have to have been married for a while to be able to properly appreciate the value of being single.

Lesson: Don't have kids. Don't get married.

This is why the courts are so dangerous. It's like turning on the auto-pilot of a large 747 and being told never to touch it under any circumstances until the court orders it turned off. EVER!

Nancy Johnson, director of the Licking County CSEA, said the situation is unusual but can't be resolved through an administrative order.

1. hehe. Licking County.
2. The President of the United States can order someone jailed and tortured indefinitely on a say-so (calling him an "enemy combatant), but you need a court to tell you it's safe to stop paying alimony to a dead woman.

"America, what a country!"

At the risk of turning this thread down an uglier road than this thread is already on, I'm just wondering....

If in NJ (and presumably other states, eventually), homosexual relationships are given the same rights as heterosexual marriages, does that include alimony and/or child support? I assume that now, if two dudes (or chicks) split up, the other one doesn't have to cough up sqwat in terms of alimony or child support, right? I mean, they were never married. And if you're a single parent now (which brings up another question - who gets custody? how must those fights go?) that used to be co-habitating with a member of the same sex, well, "serves ya right" (said with straw hangin' out of mouth for maximum effect), right?

So, yeah, would a government-recognized-cohabitation come with all the strings? Honest question.



/now don't make me use this!

Had alimony for 30 months, court ordered and decreed. Had the state take the money each paycheck from me on the basis of that order. My payroll had a copy of that order.

Could payroll, the state, or the judge count to 30? Nope. 45 days prior to my 30th month, i had to file paperwork with the court (cost me $65 to file), asking them to stop. It took the court 4 months to look at it and say "Yup, that was indeed 30 months", and send an order to my payroll to stop garnishment.

My recourse to recover the money I "overspent" by doing exactly what the law told/allowed me to do?

Sue my ex wife for it.

the system is BS.

I'm going through this same exact crap in the state of Misery right now. I've had the child in my home since she was 6 months old, her mom has seen her maybe 2-3 days out of every week. Now her mom has left the state, and rarely calls, and maybe comes out to see her once a year.

Stupid child support office dosen't seem to give a shiat about any of that. They still deduct every paycheck to the tune of $621 for child support. Cause, you know, that money is really helping the child out by providing her mom with nice stuff while I get to spend what little I have left on stuff like school clothes, food, ya know, stuff I don't really need anyway.

buzzcut73
I'm going through this same exact crap in the state of Misery right now. I've had the child in my home since she was 6 months old, her mom has seen her maybe 2-3 days out of every week. Now her mom has left the state, and rarely calls, and maybe comes out to see her once a year.

Stupid child support office dosen't seem to give a shiat about any of that. They still deduct every paycheck to the tune of $621 for child support. Cause, you know, that money is really helping the child out by providing her mom with nice stuff while I get to spend what little I have left on stuff like school clothes, food, ya know, stuff I don't really need anyway.

While I hate that you are going through this, it makes me glad to know that I am not the only one that seems to be getting screwed by the state. I have joint-shared custody, have my kids 15 days a month, and still have to pay the maximum amount of child support deemed by state "figures" because the mom has primary residential custody.

I work two jobs to put food on the table when I DO have my kids. New clothes for me? Forget it.....

Family court is a joke.

I noticed the farkettes are being pretty quiet in this thread.

The house feminism built is a house of straw and reality is the wolf.

Where are your false statistics now?

Make the check payable to the dead wife. If somebody cashes it, take it up with the bank.

Over the years, I've known probably a couple of dozen men who got child custody because his ex wife didn't wnat them. Not a single one of them got child support.

It's interesting to see so many people in this thread with a heartbreak story about divorce.

Child support for three children has cut my annual income by more than half, and my ex moved 500 miles away with the children so I can't afford to spend any significant time with them. Words can't express how much I love my kids, and always did. I was the primary caregiver and wage-earner before she went nuts, ran her unincorporated home-based business into bankruptcy, started having multiple affairs, then divorced me. Now she makes more than I do, thanks to my help in supporting her through graduate school.

And in court, I'm the bad guy. There was never a question of that under the law. My chromosomes are all anyone needs to determine my guilt.

There also is no automatic roll-off of these court-ordered assessments, which is why the guy in TFA is in this fix. If I don't apply for an adjustment (based on change in her income or mine, or change in status of one of our children), everything stays the same. Forever. What kind of farking justice is this?

OK, I'm on a rant now. Another thing that is so ironic about the whole custody thing. I have three boys. Society is always biatching about men not being good role models anymore, and always seem to exaggerate the dead beat dad's role in society.

What about the guy's, like me, that WANT to remain active in their boy's live's, but can't do it the way we should because we never have enough farking money to live on.

It's ironic as hell. I think the whole system needs to be re-vamped. I bet if either of the canidates in upcoming election addressed this issue, he'd pull in a few hundred thousand voters, for sure.

/ok...i'm done

learn2fly
I feel your pain brother...
And I yours... I'm "lucky" though, only 9 more months of child support.

You're out the money either way, but, at least, in Kansas, you can write alimony off on your taxes, but not child support.
Good point. That's federal tax law too, btw. (And she has to file it as income.)

The reason the system is how it is now is because feminists seized control of the courts.

It also shows how contradictory feminism is. Feminism is built on two ideas:

1. That men and womyn are equal.

2. That womyn are superior to men.

I needed this thread this morning. Makes me feel "less alone"....lol.

Good luck to all of you dad's out there that really care. You all should be honored and recognized.

Feminism is crap.

Lets start a movement called Whiteism about getting equality for all races.

Lets talk about how much better whites are than other races but how we are also equal.

Some false statistics should get us some 1500 "White Studies" groups on campus' nationwide and maybe we could get 300 or some White commissions to study white "issues" for equality.

OH NOES, TEH FEMINISTS!!!1101!!eleven01!!

It's like another fark cliche.

Herder: Some false statistics should get us some 1500 "White Studies" groups on campus' nationwide

European History?

Ladies and gentlemen this is the same government that people have accused of orchestrating 9/11. Now I ask you could the government really have pulled something like that off?

just more proof that men start out behind in the count with two outs when entering any relationship with a woman.

/equal. yeah, right.

Yes, all women are feminists who want nothing more than to have you men by the balls :P

I actually have several male friends here in MN who were granted custody of their children. I think it's great - they WERE the better suited parent. Just because the women pop the babies out doesn't automatically make them good mothers. My BIL has custody of his kid because mama was a junkie who left pills all over the floor and spent most of her time passed out in a drug haze while her infant crawled around unsupervised. I'm not saying daddy is a peach (he leaves the kid with the grandparents a LOT), but he's definately the more stable of the two, and can provide a better support network.

As for the state of the courts in the rest of the country - you guys are being raped hardcore. Reading this thread REALLY upset me - I think it's MORE sexist that the courts favor women because we're women than actually taking into consideration what is best for the CHILDREN.

Alimony is a joke. The institution of marriage shouldn't be about money. If you're able bodied, go get a job at the gas station and get back on your feet. Serves you right for not being a well-rounded individual before you got married.

Some of those hos out there give the rest of us women a bad name!

\college-educated married woman with my own income
\\love my husband dearly

I seem to be getting ignored. I know, it happens. Whatever. But I thought my question was a really good one.

Right now, without the title of marriage, when a same-sex relationship ends, I imagine the process is pretty simple. Partners probably have to sort out custody and whatnot on their own, right? The court would never demand child support if you were never married, right? I'm asking. I don't know.

But, if you're given "all the same rights as married couples, just not the title", does that include things like this? In the event of a "divorce" (and, side question, is it still called that?) who gets custody? who pays child support? can wages be garnished? etc, etc.

These are honest questions. I'm really wondering. Do same-sex couples in NJ really know what they're getting themselves into?

Two men live together. They love each other. They adopt children. Years later, they seperate. Who gets the kids? Does the other have to help pay? A man receiving child support checks?! Who's ever heard of such a thing?

Two women live together. They love each other. They adopt children. Years later, they seperate. Who gets the kids? Does the other have to help pay? A woman writing child support checks?! Who's ever heard of such a thing?

Or, two women... one gets impregnated "artificially". Both help raise the child. They seperate. I assume custody would go to the birth mother. Does the mother which didn't give birth have any say whatsoever in court, or is she pretty much treated how men are treated now?

Yes. I'm really wondering about these kinds of things. I'm curious.

jspitalieri: Nobody saying the actual government hydra pulled off 9/11. They are saying that certain factions within the government (neocons and the intelligence corps) pulled it off.

There is def a distinction between the government at state local level than the dreaded beast at the federal level.

A wise man once told me: The biggest difference between men and women is that women have a choice in whether they work or not. So true.

Don't blame feminists, blame feminazis.

There was a definite need in the 20th century to establish equality, not just socially but even under the law.

The work feminists did toward that was a good thing.

Now the crappy result is some things are biased towards women, which is just as bad, but some things ARE still biased towards men. Feminazis ignore one and rant about the other. Feminists actually want equality wherever it's applicable.

/don't hate on the SANE women.

Herder

Actually, women have always worked. Now we have the opportunity to work jobs for which we are paid. You just love being a victim, don't you?

I've heard that most people filing are the wife. Gee, I wonder why that is? Maybe because they have pretty much everything to gain?

That said, I wouldn't NOT have had kids. I love my kids and I'll always be in their lives divorce or not. If she left and moved far away, I'd follow every time damn the financial consequence. Don't biatch about the kids being 500 miles away. You lost the battle, move yer ass to where they are and win the war by being close to them no matter what she wants.

Family courts should be tried with the responsible legislators under the RICO laws. Farking organized crime bosses of the worst order, IMO.

I've been close to divorce a few times. The threat of being farked by the courts for no other reason than my gender has been a big reason for me staying.

Hopefully she'll have figured out I'm not that hard to keep happy if she wants to stay on the gravy train after my youngest is an adult.

Mendakem

The feminazi's are fairly few and far between. Doesn't stop people from trying to paint all feminism with the same brush.

"Just because the women pop the babies out doesn't automatically make them good mothers. My BIL has custody of his kid because mama was a junkie..."

In NJ, it certainly seems to. My step-father (deceased now) had to fight hard for custody of his three boys (my step-brothers) after his divorce. His ex-wife was also a drug addict. Convicted, no less! Repeatedly! And still, he had to go to court and demonstrate that he was able to provide a comfortable home. He had to prove his assets. His address. He had to prove that my mother (his new wife) was a fit parent. She had to go court! She had to show herself (nevermind that she already raised two children) to the court a fit parent. All of this to receive custody from a convicted drug addict!!

Ya know what happened? He won. He got custody. And the boys lived with us. We were a family of seven (two parents, five kids - one girl, four boys) until she got out of rehab. Now that she's clean, she asked for custody back. My mother, mind you, was never even IN rehab. She was never on drugs. She was never arrested. The house the boys lived in was clean and comfortable. Their father was gainfully employed, and helped keep the house that way. While living with us, his children even attended private school. (My sister and I did not. We were both in high school, and private high school would've been to expensive, I guess, thankfully!).

So, yeah, a nice life, right? Nope. All she did was tell the judge she had completed rehab and wanted her kids back. That's it.

Guess if she got them or not.

A week later, we got them back. She had flipped out and started throwing plates at the children. I don't know why. The neighbors heard the sounds of screaming and shattering glass, so they called the police. The police came and saw the chaos. They picked up the children and brought them to us. I think that might've been because the children asked. I don't really recall.

She faught again and again for custody. Again and again, my step-father and my mother had to go to court. Again and again, they had to remind one judge after another what happened the last time she was awarded custody. They won, every time. The children never left again. But our parents spent a lot of time in court making sure of that. It was ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous.

And don't get me started on how eerily quiet my step-brothers were the week after they returned - especially when near the dinner table.

So, yeah, in the end, we won. But it'd be nice to think that once you've been in and out of rehab (oh yeah, she went back after the plate-throwing thing) you just shouldn't be allowed to ask anymore. Or, if you do, the court should look at the paperwork and say, "You're a criminal. Their father is not, and he's now re-married to someone who isn't either. No. You can't have them. Go home." There should never have been a need to call us and make us prove our home was acceptable.

But, she's the birth mother, so she pulls the strings and the court dances.

"Checks in the mail."

Me: "...and private high school would've been to expensive, I guess..."

Although, I also might've learned when to use two o's and when to use one, so I guess you get what you pay for, huh? ;)

Mel,
"The feminazi's are fairly few and far between. Doesn't stop people from trying to paint all feminism with the same brush."

While that might be true, there are PLENTY of women who take advantage of the system set up by feminazis to abuse fathers. They may not be radicals in every area of their life, but they are happy to play along for reasons of spite and profit. That makes them just as bad as the women who want to replace a patriarch for a matriarch.

mount.diablo,

I have no idea what you're talking about. Spite? Profit? Heavens, no. Alimony is about the children! Not those horrible things you said.



/oh.

JE,

LOL. I've seen a similar plate around here.

About your story. I knew a lady who was the step-mom and her family went through the exact same thing you described. OMG what a farked two years for her entire family. The ex eventually lost, but the dad was insolvent by the end of it. they were still glad they fought, but nobody on the court could explain how this was beneficial to the kids.

Again, if you're in a custody situation, go for maintenance or alimony instead of child support. You can write it of on your taxes, and she has to claim it as income on hers.

/learned this long after the fact

mount.diablo

While that might be true, there are PLENTY of women who take advantage of the system set up by feminazis to abuse fathers. They may not be radicals in every area of their life, but they are happy to play along for reasons of spite and profit. That makes them just as bad as the women who want to replace a patriarch for a matriarch.

You can blame a system that automatically regulates childrearing to "women's work". This is not a system feminists set up, not by a long shot. And people who biatch about it conveniently ignore the myriads of cases of deadbeat dads, dad's who NEVER EVEN FIGHT FOR CUSTODY, dad's who think their financial contribution is all that's required of them, divorces that happen due to abuse or addiction or infidelity on the part of the husband, the fact that single mothers have the highest poverty rates, etc etc. I'm not saying men don't sometimes get shat on - some of the stories in this thread were heartbreaking. I know if my parents had ever got divorced, i would have fought tooth and nail to make sure it was my father who got me, and I would have run away from home if he hadn't. But a little perspective goes a long way. I am all for reform of the family court, but people who run around like chickens squacking about "the feminists!!11010!1" are farking retards.

learn2fly,

Not an option here. If you have 2 kids the CP is automatically given 23% to 28% of the pre-tax income. The only adjustments are high debt load, other support obligations, and high salary (which I think is interpreted to mean an axtra hard a$$-rape for the NCP).

Mount.Diablo -

hmm...I did not know that. I know that when I was faced with it, my lawyer told me that they wanted to do a deal 50/50, 50% child support, 50% alimony, with the stipulation that alimony cannot be modified by either party, but child support could.

IN hindsight, I would have taken that deal, because I could have at least written the alimony off.

/I should probably familiarize myself with the actual law before giving advice, this was just my situation.

"This is not a system feminists set up, not by a long shot."

Bullshiat. As previously stated by someone else, when women had less rights, that included the choice over who got the kids, even when the US was completely male-run.

"conveniently ignore the myriads of cases of deadbeat dads"
Truism. I've known very few dads who didn't make payments when the payments were actually something they could afford.

"the fact that single mothers have the highest poverty rates, "

...and this is in support of women getting custody? Maybe the man should have been given a chance to carry the load, as it were.

Yes I can blame a system that is designed from the ground up to diminish the very important role men play in rearing the kids. A system that is designed around the theme of a protection racket (pay up or else).

"i would have fought tooth and nail to make sure it was my father who got me"

Good for you. Too bad the judge would have said fark off and go live with mom.

Are there bad fathers? Absolutely. I'd say the numbers of bad parents are pretty much equal, relative to the size of the population. If this was taken into account by the courts, child support and custody would favor women by a percent or two, not an overwhelming majority.

Add to this the fact that I do NOT raise my kids with my pre-tax dollars and no WAY do they add 30% to my cost of living and you have a recipe for bitterness and dysfunction. Women may "win" but society loses along with the fathers.