I've written before about a personal issue born of the pernicious national attitude towards those in poverty. I've spent one entire year fighting against being put in jail for essentially being broke, I posted about it first here;
http://www.dailykos.com/...
and then followed up here:
http://www.dailykos.com/...
This whole thing didn't even get resolved until 12/14 because only a week after the last hearing in July, my antagonist filed a petition once again seeking to put me in jail due to the processing discrepancy between my employer sending payments from my check and my having to send payments myself to make up the balance. That's right, because the order stated I had to send 'X' per week, and only 2/3 of x was sent by my employer with my mailing the balance, that meant that the payments were not processed at exactly the same time.... and I could go to jail for that. It was during such a discussion with my attorney that she told me something insane.
Just by way of summary for those who don't wish to read through the other posts: My ex, desperate to justify the mountain of lies she left our marriage on, has been waging an incessant campaign to destroy me even to the detriment of herself and our children so that she can keep her boyfriend assured that she abandoned her marriage for every other reason than for his money.
YES, sadly, I do have to include the explanation because when I don't I wind up fielding too many responses such as 'This doesn't add up.', 'it makes no sense', 'why would anyone do such a thing?', etc, etc.
On the other side of the equation I know I'll get those who will accuse me of merely railing against my ex rather than what I'm actually trying to accomplish by using my personal struggle to illuminate the seriously insane laws and policies that are doing more harm to parents and children than good.
So I'm including background because I'll save more time ignoring the accusations than posting explanations ad infinitum.
Basically, she didn't want to grow up and take responsiblity for working out the complexities of marriage, she got an offer from a 50 y/o teenager to move into his half-million dollar home, drive his Cadillac, go on Vacations, indulge in 'habits', and live free of bills and such. In order to get that life and take the children with her, she lied. She can't tell her friends, family and boyfriend she left because marriage was hard and she hated work, so instead she invented, out of nearly whole cloth, a narrative that made her a 'victim'.... one where I had to be a pariah. A deadbeat.
I wasn't. I was actually working 12 hour days at a very good job when she left, but reality is inimical to her situation. So the lies poured fourth.
She's in hell, of course, but that's not critical to the point here. So I won't detail that part.
In short; she has been trying to destroy me, not without some small successes, in order to give the appearance of legitimacy to the great lie she needs to live the life she has. To that end, she used the adversity I've endured and the insane laws of the state to try to put me in jail. Because there was a period during which I had no income despite my efforts, that could have happened. I was found in 'willful violation' for being too poor to afford child support payments even though I went without so I could send something to her. The judge sentenced me to 120 days, suspended so long as I kept making payments. That was the 10th of July this year. In order to do this, and because my employer couldn't take out the full amount from my checks, I had to supplement the payments myself by mail.
Now, if anyone would rather not take what I've said on faith, then before condemning or arraigning, please go to the above links and thoroughly peruse them before doing so. I'd rather not waste anymore time on background so I can get to the point.
Thanks.
So the moment she checked her support account in July and saw that the whole and exact amount was not processed on the same day, she filed to have me put in jail.
For those who are at all interested in how that turned out for me personally, it would seem that during the appearances the judge figured out what was actually going on. He dismissed her petition.... with prejudice, on 12/14.
The point is about what I've learned having been in and out of family court for over a decade (on other issues). Aside from the very notable bias against men in the system (Yes, I know, it's not fair all around but misandry is built right into the system in NY), I've also seen that the laws are geared not nearly as much to help the children as they are to punish people regardless of how their circumstances befell them. In fact, the laws are set up to make it more difficult for people to make enough money to pay.
But then I learned something truly insane from my attorney: In NY, if you are put in jail for failing to make support payments and have no income from which to make payments while in jail, once out of jail, you can be put RIGHT BACK IN for not making payments while in jail.
I don't know how many people are in such a situation, but to call this a failure of justice is far too modest. We actually live in a society where someone can use your misfortune to keep you poor and in jail indefinitely.
When I originally pointed out that this country has a sickness when it comes to attitudes on poverty, I really didn't see how deep it was. What my lawyer told me made me realize the depth of insanity our society creates when it comes to poverty and the poor.
I realize that our aversion to feel responsible for one-another is truly pathological when we could go about actually causing more damage to people who might otherwise have worked for an oppotunity to be financially successful... and all in the name of 'justice'.
I know I'm not the only one who sees it, buy why is so little being done to address it?
My best guess: The poor don't have the resources to get themselves treated as human beings.
Hope everyone has had a great holiday. Please keep in the back of your minds what kind of world we could have if we lifted each-other up.
Blessings.