Why Domestic Violence Laws are Broken

Introduction

A current case in the US has prompted us to introduce the topic of domestic violence on this site. Laws and social conventions about dealing with Domestic Violence are very much the same throughout the western world. Domestic Violence, the social norms, laws and customs is a huge topic for this site, and we will dedicate several posts to understanding what it is and why it is very broken and misguided, especially in Trinidad & Tobago. We will not present any sources of for our assertions at this point as this is just an introduction and these issues will be discussed in greater detail in upcoming posts.

The Story

Justin Lindsey of Beaver County, Pennsylvania was locked up by police for the past week and is facing charges of harassment and assault. But according to news reports the man tried to provide evidence that it was his ex-girlfriend – Rhameicka Clark, who was the perp. The woman showed up on Lindsey’s porch and started an altercation. She proceed to batter him with a metal pipe which Lindsey was capturing on his phone. All of the material on the video indicate that the woman was the perp. Clark was angry because Lindsey had visitation with their daughter and was in the company with another woman, to Clark’s annoyance. Clark subsequently went to the police and a 24-hour magistrates that handle these protection orders and had Lindsey arrested. Lindsey told the police that she was the perp and had video evidence to prove it but they refused to watch the video.

Similar to Trinidad & Tobago

While this case is based in the US – it mirrors a common occurrence in Trinidad & Tobago. A woman you are no longer involved with decides to use the Law (that’s squarely on her side) to punish you. In this case the woman shows up at his residence and starts to abuse him verbally, physically using a metal pipe and she spat on him. There were witnesses that corroborated, there was video. But the man remains locked up in jail for a week and risks loosing his job. Is the system that deals with Domestic Violence broken? In Trinidad & Tobago a person (read, a woman) can go to a Clerk of the Peace and obtain a restraining order and have it served on her partner, ex, or any man she deems a ‘threat’ to her. According to the Laws of Trinidad & Tobago Chapter 45:56 you can be deemed ‘abusive’ (which can include – mental, verbal, physical, sexual, financial, emotional or psychological) or that once she is satisfied “undermines her emotional or mental well-being”. The scope of these behaviors are extremely wide and subjective and it appears that all that is necessary is for her to feel abused, or even worse, falsely claim that she was beaten. While Chapter 45:56 doesn’t appear to have any sexist language on the surface, let’s get something clear here. This is a law written for women to use against men. This is why there needs to be reform and a gender neutral approach taken to this matter. This is why acts like Chapter 45:56 may be the reason we have a domestic violence problem in the first place.

Cause of Domestic Violence

Another axis of the problem has to do with social norms. Our culture is programmed to ignore violence by women. Many women actually support women who are violent as though it’s a good thing, sometimes with that tribal “you go gurl” mantra. Several simple social experiments illustrate our indifference toward female violence (see links in reference). Some women are completely unapologetic as though it’s their time and see it as a sort of entitled feminist right – the right to be violent. Further exacerbating the problem is the injudicious policy that women receive significant leniency in the judicial system or are not charged at all when they are abusive. And like in the case above, the man has to prove that he wasn’t abusive. It is this author’s view based on the many stories heard that many magistrates in Trinidad might latently support these wrongs.

The idea that domestic violence is a crime committed by men, causes us to completely ignore the problem even in the face of a huge body of research that contradicts this paradigm. Our Ministry of Gender, Psychologists, and Researchers in academic institutions, know that women are not innocent victims. This is ignored by stakeholders possibly due to confirmation bias. Psychological scientists say that once we have a perception, we hold fast to them, and that makes it harder to change our minds. We look for only evidence that support our beliefs. Political affiliations are great examples of this in Trinidad & Tobago. (there is a good article on this in the References).

Role of Female Violence

This is not a Trinidad & Tobago Problem, but a common issue throughout western countries. We will present unbiased (not influenced by feminist dogma) that gets to the bottom of what domestic violence is about. To do this we have to use data and research conducted outside Trinidad & Tobago. Why? Because we have no reliable information on the prevalence of domestic violence – none. It’s unreliable because much of the studies and information we have in Trinidad & Tobago are based on the assumption that domestic violence is a gendered issue where men beat up women. Other than the sensationalist stories we read about every now and again we have no reason to believe that this is the norm. We cannot rely on data based on police reports either. What all of these have in common, is a systematic ban on considering female behaviors which we know can be quite violent. We know that women are particularly violent toward children in Trinidad and Tobago, this was even admitted by Minister of Gender, Youth and Child Development, Clifton De Coteau. More needs to be understood where it relates to increasing violence toward boys growing up with increased female contact – be it single mothers, care givers, day care, pre and primary school teachers – all significant foundation years for healthy child development – and almost exclusively run by women.

Over the past several decades we have systematically removed men from these fields – I say removed because they have become hostile and even risky for them to participate. Compound this with the fact that men now do significantly more house and child care work in the home over the past few decades especially in the middle and upper middle class. The advent of increasingly educated and gainfully employed women have even led to so called ‘house husbands’, where dad stay home with the kids. Increasing trends in divorce and children growing up without contact with fathers and the proliferation of the policies of the Family Court, run by feminist women and increasingly serve as places for women to get revenge, have further separated children from fathers.

This trend of increasing violent young males particularly in segments of society where care givers are all female for boys under 8 must have an underlying effect. Female violence is not an insignificant component of this equation – in fact it might be the cause. There are some studies that we will present in a later post. But more research is needed and there is much resistance in illuminating this. Our feminized system of education and politics abhors any responsibilities on women for negative outcomes in our society.

We have been told over and over that men are the problem, we are the perpetrators of violence. Feminists trumpet this at any opportunity they get. What does the science say about this? We look forward to this discussion. If you have anything you’d like add, a story, an experience, especially if you are a man who was wrongfully accused of domestic violence in Trinidad & Tobago, you can send it privately via the contact form. Would you like your story published here? Any information will be held in strictest confidence and completely anonymous. Please use this form:

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References

1. She Was Caught on Camera Beating Him with a Metal Pole, but He’s the One in Jail after Cops ‘Refused to Look at the Video: http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/08/30/she-was-caught-on-camera-beating-him-with-a-metal-pole-but-hes-the-one-in-jail-after-cops-refused-to-look-at-the-video/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=story&utm_campaign=ShareButtons
2. Judiciary of Trinidad & Tobago – Domestic Violence : http://www.ttlawcourts.org/index.php/public-guidance/faqs/magistrates-court/domestic-violence
3. Laws of Trinidad & Tobago Chapter 45:56: http://rgd.legalaffairs.gov.tt/laws2/alphabetical_list/lawspdfs/45.56.pdf
4. Why Do Women Do the Lion’s Share of Housework? A Decade of Research http://irasilver.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/Reading-Second-shift-inequality.pdf
5. Jezebel – Have You Ever Beat Up A Boyfriend? Cause, Uh, We Have: http://jezebel.com/294383/have-you-ever-beat-up-a-boyfriend-cause-uh-we-have
6. ABC What Would you do? Reaction To Women Abusing Men In Public: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CRCS6GGhIRc
7. The True Activist – Attitudes toward Domestic Violence: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jy5vRGtKPY0
8. Psychology Today – The Real Reason We Believe What We Believe: http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/brainsnacks/201404/the-real-reason-we-believe-what-we-believe

 

 

The Injustice of Justice

This is the first in an ongoing multipart series on the Inequality of Western Justice. Judges openly state that they try to be lenient with women and give them lighter sentences. There are several US studies on this discrimination. As one author put it “If you’re a criminal defendant, it may help—a lot—to be a woman” – so says Professor Sonja Starr. After studying a very large set of US Federal cases she concludes:

“After controlling for the arrest offense, criminal history, and other prior characteristics, “men receive 63% longer sentences on average than women do,” and “women are…twice as likely to avoid incarceration if convicted.”

We will write an entire post about gender gap and sexism in sentencing and compare it to some Trinidad examples, when we are finished looking at the data. But it in the meantime – we will comment on current cases where this bias against men is overwhelming.

Loen Morris, the 21 yr old female pedophile of Worcester, UK, started having regular sex with an 8 year old boy until she was 18 (50 times). After which she stopped. “Yesterday a judge said he would be lenient – because she stopped when she realized it was “wrong”. Her two year sentence will most likely only net her 12 months in a low security women’s’ prison. She was laughing and smoking outside the court house after the sentencing. There was also a plea for her not to serve any time for the crime.

It appears that she was fully aware of what she was doing and probably thought that as a young lady she could not be charged, as a minor. This is significant problem with the judiciary – they are not supposed to be biased – but being biased for a politically correct reason is still bias. Judges all over are quick to be lenient with women and treat them as victims. There are several proposals in the British Justice system (which Trinidad and Tobago mirrors) where the thinking is that women cannot naturally be criminals and that they should not be incarcerated. The Women Justice Task-force concluded in 2011 that:

“Women should not be sent to prison and should instead serve community sentences. The focus should be on health, housing and treatment for drug addiction to reduce reoffending”

“Few sensible politicians would support locking up the thousands of women who receive the shortest sentences, at the highest cost to the state and to their families, and make up a tiny proportion of overall crime in this country”.

Men need to realize the injustice of these types of measures where they can be criminalized for anything while women are considered blameless. In family court women can make the wildest accusations. Women can murder children, and society thinks that she is unworthy of prison. Men have to pay the ultimate price for the crimes women are responsible for. We must rally against this. The principles of fairness and justice are being eroded. Today a woman can decide the day after that the sex she agreed to have with you was non-consensual – because you did not get a notarized copy of her agreement for the act – so you are a rapist. More on this topic to come.

 

References

UK Mirror – Woman jailed for having sex with boy aged eight more than FIFTY times http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/loren-morris-woman-jailed-having-3258099

Michigan Law University of Michigan https://www.law.umich.edu/newsandinfo/features/Pages/starr_gender_disparities.aspx

Justice Women Task-force – Reforming Women’s Justice – http://www.prisonreformtrust.org.uk/Portals/0/Documents/Women%27s%20Justice%20Taskforce%20Report.pdf

BBC – Women’s Prisons Should Close – https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-13666066

 

Feminist Activist to Chair Equal Opportunity Commission

To place a radical feminist like Lynette Seebaran Suite in charge of Equal Opportunity Commission is like putting the Fox in charge of the henhouse. Social norms today dictate that that all emphasis be placed on women’s rights and the rights of girls. Those who repeat the falsehood that “men have all the rights already” have never seen the tragedy that occurs everyday in family court where lawyers, magistrates and family court workers collude with mothers to exclude fathers from seeing their own children. They allow women to use the family court as a House of Vengeance where the states apparatus and courts are used to serve up a cold cup of revenge on her ex. They have no consideration that fathers play a significant role in the development of children – probably more than the mother does, and that denying a child his/her father, is not only against a basic human right, it is outright child abuse. Let’s get something very clear – Feminism is not about equality – at least modern feminism.

According to Huffington Post only 20% of Americans – only 23% of women (16% of men) identify as ‘feminists’ while 8% considers themselves as anti-feminists. However when asked if they “believe that men and women should be social, political, and economic equals”, 82% agreed. In 2012 the UK Parenting website Netmums, conducted a poll and found only one in 7 women describe herself as a ‘feminist’. One third viewed radical feminism as ‘too aggressive’ towards men and 25% thought that it had a negative implication. The last few months have seen the rise of the #WomenAgainstFeminsm hashtag popularity on Twitter, with women holding up hand written notes declaring why they are against feminism. The situation is more obvious when we consider the women that are under 25 years.

These developments have irked radical feminists. Society no longer views or equates feminism with equality no matter how hard they try to assert that it is. This has also given rise to the Men’s Rights Movement – that seeks to bring a balance to equality. According equality activist and supporter of the Men’s Rights Movement Janet Bloomfield, men are discriminated against in these key areas:

1. The right to genital integrity.
2. The right to vote without agreeing to die (in wars).
3. The right to choose parenthood.
4. The right to be assumed better caregivers for children.
5. The right to call unwanted, coerced sex, rape.

This is only a partial list but in Trinidad #2 and #5 are not as relevant as in the US. But men in Trinidad & Tobago have the same issues to deal with in the other areas and more so than in the US where there is more respect for individual rights. I could add that men are always assumed to be the aggressor for ANY domestic dispute. However these topics will be discussed in another post.

In Trinidad & Tobago, where are women discriminated against unfairly? Not in family court, not in making a police report about domestic violence, Not in schools, Not in social programs, Not as a mother, Where then? If they are in places of employment there are laws and advocacy groups that help them. And don’t believe that wage gap hype. Where it is claimed that women make less for the same work? In most of the western world where this claim is made – it’s been proven false, when job experience, education, life choices and hours worked are taken into consideration. As a matter of fact throughout the western world and including Trinidad and Tobago – corporations are eager to show that they have women in management. Women are often given preference even when they are not the best qualified because it’s the politically correct thing to do.
In Trinidad and Tobago – society is only interested in men to act as ATM’s. ATM’s for the mother. Women predominantly view men’s income as a primary source of attraction – they admit that over and over. In family courts significant sums are ordered for Child Support. But that sum goes to the mother for her to do what ever she pleases. Where on earth do you get income from another source for a specific purpose and you don’t have to account for it? I have not seen it – could it be that Child support is purely income for the mother?

Let’s clear another misconception – agreement to have sex is not agreement to become a parent. Men do not have the right to choose to become a parent. All the rights are bestowed on women from conception, to abortion, to giving up the baby after its born for adoption. ALL without the fathers having a say. The only rights fathers have is to “pay up”. Most fathers don’t know that children are viewed as property of the mother. You only get to pretend it’s yours (legally) if and when she says so. It’s well accepted that many women deliberately get pregnant without letting their partners know – either because they want the man to stick around or they do it for money. The latter is the case if the man happens to be a celebrity or a sporting personality. Multiple surveys done on women’s’ attitudes toward conception and toward their partners about who is the biological father of their child – about half of the women say they will lie about the true father if she desires the relationship. One in 4 women will get pregnant when they know their partners don’t want to become a father. Popular Talk show host Wendy Williams in the US told a woman to sabotage her birth control in order the get pregnant when her husband did not want another child. As it stands most western women don’t think you have the right to know who the biological father of ‘your’ child is, and you must pay child support. Most laws support this injustice.

Rape and sexual abuse Laws in Trinidad and Tobago exclude crimes committed against men and boys. They assume that if someone has sex with a man he must consent (the erection theory). The laws clearly center on forcible sexual relation where the man is the aggressor, so legally forcible sex on a man is not considered rape. Additionally, statistics and records on sexual abuse against men and boys are ignored. In most of Western countries if a woman have nonconsensual sex with a child and she later gets pregnant – that child will be responsible for paying child support. If the gender roles were reversed she could easily have an abortion.

There are many issues like these which affect men. Unfortunately, feminism have become a problem. Feminists and feminists men tell men who raise these matters – that they need to “man up” or “take it like a man”. When the victim is a woman we must drop everything and “see what we can do for this poor woman”. Women get to be treated like a child, often irresponsible for her actions and for herself. Men get to “man up”. This is sexism and inequality at its finest, and it is supported by feminism. Don’t believe that nonsensical pseudo ideology that “it’s the patriarchy”. Feminism is not about equality, it is about getting the best advantage for women even at the oppression of anyone else who gets in the way. The worst part about this is that men face this discrimination from other men who declare that they are for feminism. They are the enablers of these injustices. They are in many strategic areas in society and work with feminists to oppress disadvantaged men. On the other side there are many women like those #WomenAgainstFeminism that support equal rights for everyone. That’s fair. They will tell you they are egalitarians not feminists. Men need to stand up for their rights.

Do you think Lynette Seebaran Suite and her radical feminism – trumpeting the rights of Women and Girls – do you think she is suited for a role in Equal Opportunity Commission? Or will she be sexist like most feminists are? Please take part in the poll.

References

1. http://www.newsday.co.tt/news/0,199679.html
2. http://www.trinidadexpress.com/news/Seebaran-Suite-sworn-in-as-EOC-chairman-273117511.html
3. https://www.facebook.com/WomenAgainstFeminism?fref=nf
4. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/16/feminism-poll_n_3094917.html
5. http://thoughtcatalog.com/janet-bloomfield/2014/08/5-legal-rights-women-have-that-men-dont/
6. http://jezebel.com/wendy-williams-says-its-okay-to-trick-a-man-into-gettin-1567980067

 

Suicide in Trinidad & Tobago – A Gendered Issue.

We have a big problem about how we discuss suicide. It’s not just a Trinidadian problem it’s a gender issue and its prevalent worldwide. I have just read Caroline C Ravello’s column in the Trinidad Guardian – “Depression is dreadful; suicide’s never an option” and it reeks of that problem, which we will come back to, at the end. But first let’s discuss some of the perspectives over the last few years on suicide in Trinidad & Tobago.

In another Trinidad Guardian Article, “Suicide a growing concern in T&T”. Quoting the Central Statistics Office for 2007, “data on suicide is from 2007 and showed that 111 men and 20 women died from self poisoning and hanging”. A more recent Trinidad Guardian Article “Psychiatrist: T&T emotionally volatile” (April 28, 2013) deals with the issue more from the perspective of Prof Gerard Hutchinson (head of Clinical Medical Sciences, UWI). Prof Hutchinson’s expertise leaves out some very critical information about suicide that appears to be deliberate throughout academia, the media, political will and hence any solution these stakeholders are likely to develop. The table at Wikipedia’s “List of countries by suicide rate”, paints an accurate picture of what suicide is largely a MALE affliction. Men commit suicide at a rate typically 3 to 5 times that of women. The figure of Trinidad and Tobago – although outdated shows a male suicide rate that is almost 5X that of the female rate. Professor Hutchinson’s article in the Guardian only had this to say –

Females attempt more, men complete more.In suicide demography, females are more “attempters” than males. Females would not drink gramoxone but will drink bleach or kerosene, Hutchinson said. “So you find males do more serious things,” he said. Currently, there are close to 15 patients on the ward who are being managed; nine of them have tried to kill themselves. He said in the last three weeks there had been three deaths from gramoxone/paraquat poisoning and they were males.

It should be pointed out that Professor Hutchinson appears to have a predilection for Paraquat cases. In 2010 he published a paper with Hubert Daisley on the “High Rates of Paraquat-Induced Suicide”, in the American Association of Suicidology. The Authors were criticized by several, when their article was peer reviewed for blaming Trinidad’s social problems on the Agrochemical. From the Paraquat paper’s abstract Professor Hutchinson appears to have cleverly masked the male issue of suicide. They claim that in 1996 Paraquat Suicide accounted for 81% of all suicides – 39 out of 48. But in their own submission they declare that the rate per 100,000 was 8.0 – which quite obviously with a population of over 1M people does not add up. According to data from WHO the overall rate for suicide (males and females, all method’s) 1995 (closest year) was 14.5/100k. These figures does not corroborate.

In a much earlier paper “Suicide in Trinidad and Tobago: associations with measures of social distress” (Journal of Social Psychiatry Winter 1997) using data from 1978 to 1992, Professor Hutchinson wrote about a 319% increase in male suicide while female rates remained stable. He draws significant conclusions from several ‘associations’, including the increasing crime rate and rise in employment. That older article appears quite telling of the real issue – that several changes in the social environment was probably responsible for crime, and male suicide was at the center of these issues. Why did Professor Hutchinson change his perspective from this to “Females attempt more, men complete more”? Several authors around in the world over make suicide into a kind of male bashing issue – there is the notion that’s it indicative of the Macho man that won’t seek help and that females are better at caring for themselves. These statements contribute to our ignorance of the problem – there are issues with men that have changed in the past several decades that tie in to the larger social picture and we are pretending they don’t exist with these unhelpful statements. We will come back to a better analysis of what the implications of these issues in a wider sense in another post – but it should be clear, that we are failing boys and men when it comes to suicide, and by extension we are failing society as you cannot disconnect male suicide from the impact on wider society. Here’s the problem – all the data we have, not just Trinidad & Tobago – but throughout the western world – suicide is largely a MALE ISSUE. Sure some women do it – but when Professor Hutchinson asserts that “women attempt” – let’s be clear – that’s not suicide. It’s unreasonable for me to say, claim the Nobel Particle Physics award, because I made more attempts than anyone else to discover the Higgs Bosson particle, anymore that women attempting suicide is as important as the men whose acts actually end in their deaths. Many researchers don’t consider failed attempts at suicide to be ‘suicidal’ at all – you can do your own research on this. It is widely accepted that Depression type afflictions affect women at twice the rate compared to men. Men commit suicide when they have nowhere ‘to go’ in life – the cost/benefit analysis is in favor of dying. Usually it’s when they are out of a job, with significant debt, OR they are in serious trouble with the law, OR they feel they cannot live because a woman has turned down their advances, OR been diagnosed with a terminal or painful condition. These are serious issues – it has NOTHING to do with depression. Of course they can become ‘depressed’ over these issues – but blaming depression is like blaming the bullet they used to blow their brains out. Robin Williams, it was found out that he had been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, and that’s probably the reason he killed himself. In his cost/benefit analysis he calculated that his life was not worth living.

This brings us back to how we ignore the problems men face in society – experts like Gerard Hutchinson, Caroline Ravello – make the problem more difficult to address – they mask these male issues with some kind of pseudo-scientific bunk that will never solve anything other than make a few bucks for their respective industries. Ms Ravello unequivocally states about depression “It’s a biological disease with social and psychological implications…”. Unfortunately this, like most ‘theories’ touted by the Mental Health Industrial Complex are not scientifically proven. If one looks at the synopses of biological etiology for depressive disorders, from the gene environment interaction to the monoamine hypothesis, one would see a pattern of non-acceptance in the wider scientific community. The Guardian should look over Ms Ravellos credentials as an expert in mental health issues as most of the articles she has written are about mental health.

Everyone trumpets this “get help”, “go see a therapist”. Unfortunately these forms of help cannot change the circumstances in these men’s lives. However, talking about it with a friend can provide the same ‘therapeutic’ effect. Or better, finding someone who might know of a way to change your circumstances. Be it financial or about some romantic endeavor – men need to find real solutions to their problems. Many suicides are related to relationship issues. We are told as males very early in life that we must find the right woman and “settle down”. We have a host of ‘scientific’ literature hyping the virtues of marriage – from health benefits, happiness and longer life. However as Psychology Today author and advocate of living single, Bella DePaulo realized from analyzing the data more closely in most of these pro marriage studies – they committed one serious sin – they count divorced persons with the single. Most of these studies actually show that happily married people have about the same life outcomes as people who remain single all their life. However, failed marriages (and by extension, relationships especially where there are children increase the risk of suicide in men by 5 to 10 times. In short Marriage KILLS men! I don’t have the space in this post to expand on why this is so. Here’s the problem. Everyone tells men, that in order for him to be worth anything, he must marry and have kids. The Mental Health industrial complex turns everything single people like, sex, the internet, porn, gambling, eating, etc into a pathological disorder so that they can treat you. As well their focus is on what women want – they want commitment, kids, intimacy and your money. They have turned your needs into pathologies and her needs into ‘social norms’. My advice to men. If you wish to live long – NEVER marry and ensure that you can account for every one of your sperm. Focus on your career, earning a good income and take care of your physical health. Single life has never been better and it will get better.

 

References:

1. Trinidad Guardian – Depression is dreadful; suicide’s never an option – http://www.guardian.co.tt/lifestyle/2014-08-27/depression-dreadful-suicide%E2%80%99s-never-option
2. Trinidad Guardian – Psychiatrist: T&T emotionally volatile: http://www.guardian.co.tt/news/2013-04-28/psychiatrist-tt-emotionally-volatile
3. Trinidad Guardian – Suicide a growing concern in T&T http://www.guardian.co.tt/lifestyle/2012-09-12/suicide-growing-concern-tt
4. Hutchinson GA1, Simeon DT. Suicide in Trinidad and Tobago: associations with measures of social distress – https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9483454
5. WHO – Suicide Rates by Gender Trinidad & Tobago 1955-2006: http://www.who.int/mental_health/media/trin.pdf
6. Wikipedia – Suicide Rates by Country: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_suicide_rate
7. Letters to The Lancet – Hubert Daisley, Gerard Hutchinson, Paraquat Poisoning: http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2805%2960796-9/fulltext
8. Letters to The Lancet, Martin Wilks – Paraquat Poisoning: http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2805%2974910-2/fulltext
9. The American Association for Suicidology, Gerard Hutchinson, Hubert Daisley – High Rates of Paraquat-Induced Suicide in Southern Trinidad: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1943-278X.1999.tb01055.x/abstract
10. Psychology Today – No, Getting Married Does Not Make You Live Longer, Bella DePaulo: http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/living-single/200902/no-getting-married-does-not-make-you-live-longer

Boys Underperform Again in SEA. Why Boys Matter.

The 2014 SEA results are out and again the girls have outperformed boys across the board. Today in the Express newspapers a letter by David Subran titled, “How to Help Boys do better at school” complimented Kevin Baldeosingh’s recent article – “Why are our boys under-performing in school?” Mr Subran appears to have not gotten the point as Mr Baldeosingh was not very complimentary about the two UWI lecturers he interviewed for his article – Raymond Hackett (Education) and Gabrielle Hosein (Gender Studies) . Mr Baldeosingh quoted ‘nontraditional’ feminist Christina Hoff Summers works on the failing of boys to discredit the suggestions of the two UWI ‘experts’. This opinions of the two UWI lecturers are a mish mash of “unproven feminist theory” and about not really knowing “what boys want”, to Ms Hosein focusing on “girls”. Baldeosingh touched on 2009 Education Ministry report, although titled “Gender Issues in Education and Intervention Strategies to Increase Participation Of Boys” found that boys were performing badly but concluded that policy-makers “should ensure that programmes to raise achievement seek to do so for all students, rather than simply focusing on boys.”

We would like to commend Mr Baldeosingh as he points out a very significant problem that is probably at the root of a lot of the social problems in Trinidad and Tobago – Boys are ignored, and no one cares! In most of the western world – this is a norm. Focus on Girls and Women – regardless of the cost. It’s politically correct and even worse to criticize it. Take the recent Boko Haram kidnapping of 200 female students. Boko Haram was kidnapping killing boys during the preceding months – Hilary Clinton as SS in the US even refused to support the idea that they were Terrorists. It was estimated that in the preceding months before the girls were kidnapped – they had murdered almost 2000 civilians (mostly boys and men) up until August for 2014 alone. But when this is pointed out the messengers are labeled as misogynists. This is relevant because it shows the prevailing ideology in our culture – that boys are not worth thinking about.

Let’s get into understanding of what goes on as boys grow up in today’s female dominated environment. By female dominated we are talking about the about of face time boys get with their mothers, care givers, pre and primary school teachers – most of which are predominantly female. Over the past several decades for whatever reasons children have less and less contact with male authority figures. The reasons are multifaceted – the least of which is not the increase in “single mothers” households – especially in these problem areas of Trinidad & Tobago. There is a body of research in psycho-biology that suggest that boys actually need more attention and nurturing than girls. The trend by most care givers across the spectrum has been to treat boys more roughly and even with violence. Girls react differently compared to boys to abuse, often withdrawing and internalizing the experience – while boys externalize with impulsive and hyperactive actions. While a discussion on this subject is outside of this article – we can see the hypothesis of why we have problem behaviors in boys that are neglected. Indeed, some scientists have proposed these differences are due to the smaller size of the corpus callosum in the brains of boys. This neglect can lead to poor development in the prefrontal cortices which is responsible for self-control and empathy.

It is against this framework that we begin to see emerging the causes of our aggressive male problem in many parts of Trinidad and Tobago. The changes in the roles of women over the past several decades as well as the change in our schools and learning environments to suit the needs of girls may have brought out about a very significant problem over the decades. Women rights have lead to the recognition that women are free to work and function as they please. More and more feminists have been advocating for the complete abolishment of “Gender Roles”. Far from it some of them believe that Gender is a social construct and that biology needs to be rewritten to suit this hypothesis – if you can all it one. There is no doubt that women who work and have children see their lives as more stressful and unmanageable. In fact this have given rise to all the social programs supporting single mothers and women as a whole. We have failed is to ensure that boys needs are adequately taken care of. Many of the experts take pride in identifying boys as problematic. Psychiatry have invented new disorders to ‘treat’ their problematic behaviors with dangerous drugs whose effects and efficacy are not properly understood. Why haven’t we seen studies showing how these changes in politics and social norms have impacted the outcome in boys? Let’s get one thing very clear – Boys are very important. Without them we would not have Mozart, Da Vinci,Newton, Einstein, Abraham Lincoln or even Bill Gates. Unfortunately we also have Hitler and Jack the Ripper, for which there are no female equivalents. So make your pick – Trinidad & Tobago, Where are we heading?

Ex wife downloads Child Porn Images to Frame Husband

August 21, 2014 –  INDIANA, Pa. (AP) – A western Pennsylvania woman faces up to nine years in prison for downloading child pornography in an attempt to frame her estranged husband. An Indiana County jury on Wednesday convicted 43-year-old Meri Jane Woods, of Clymer. District Attorney Patrick Dougherty says Woods downloaded 40 images to the family computer and took it to the state police last August, then blamed Matthew Woods for the material.

according to US media reports the case is from November 2013. The wife made the report to the police AFTER she obtained a protection order for ABUSE. Police soon realized that upon examination, the images had time stamps AFTER the husband had left the house. She was charged. During the court proceedings her lawyer argued that “time stamps were not reliable” . She will be sentenced in December 2014.

J4DK would like to know if you have ever experienced something even remotely like this – for example planting evidence on your computer. If this case was in Trinidad how do you think the justice system would perform – so I’m adding a poll  here. How many times do you even think this type of thing happens and the perp either doesn’t get caught or some body decides to cut the “poor woman some slack”?

Please participate.

Links – CBS,  Daily Mail