Customer Reviews

Mothers on Trial: The Battle for Children and Custody

5 star:		(4)
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3 star:		(1)
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1 star:		(2)

 

 

Every mother should read this eyeopening book about the patriarchal legal system. Mothers do not get custody if fathers (even poor fathers) want to ask for it. Good mothers lose custody, bad fathers get custody (and child support) and the court system is biased toward men and their money. Mothers are slammed if they work for not being a full time mom, and equally so if they ARE full time moms for being lazy. I read this book ten years ago and rarely a week goes by that I don't think about it or tell someone about it.

However warm, enlightened and positive you feel about villifying men while placing mother, as always, on a pedestal, the fact is these cases should not be based on anything at all to do with the sex of the accused or the accuser. It should be decided on the merits. And to say that the female/mother is a tragic victim and the male a brutal abuser is all the evidence I need you can't get a fair trial in America today.
Evidence would be nice, save the emotionalism, those would be my thoughts should I be the accused.

Every mother going through a custody battle should read this - puts a whole lot of issues into perspective - you're not an unfit mother - it's not your fault - reading this tells you all about what custody battles are about

... this is THE book AND THE ONLY ONE (and I have read them all) on the subject of who gets custody of your children and why. Dr. Chesler, unlike sooooo many other authors who claim expertise on THE SINGLE MOST IMPORTANT ISSUE THERE IS, OUR KIDS' WELFARE, IN THE ENTIRE WORLD, knows, I mean reeeeally knows why women lose custody of the flesh of their own flesh. So. She tells it. And, O, what a mess she causes. And, ya' know, ordinary, general folks, why, they do NOOOOOT like messes. Especially where their MOST IMPORTANT ISSUE, their families and kids, is concerned. Dr. Chesler pulls out all the stops and lets it rip. And, ya' know, ordinary, general folks, why, they do NOOOOOT like being messed with -- especially when it is their families' uuuugly TRUTHS they want kept quiet and in hiding. Dr. Chesler doesn't. She doesn't keep quiet and she doesn't keep those secrets in hiding. Women in the civil (custody) courts around the entire US of A? Why, these "good 'nough" mothers might as well be in Jordan or Afghanistan or Congo for all the likelihood there is of their getting custody of their own natural flesh -- IF HE PRESSES FOR CUSTODY AND HAS THE LEAST BIT OF PILLAREDNESS ABOUT HIM. That is, if he, the father, is himself a doctor, a judge, a lawyer, a prominent, community businessman, teacher, cop, administrator, manager, MONEY, yada, yada, yada AND seeks custody or a modification of an original decree (custody or child support $), good ole' ma is dead. SHE WILL LOSE. PERIOD. Ask Dr. Laura? Hah! I say: KNOW Dr. Chesler. If you are a mother and in, or not even yet in and think you could not possibly ever be in, a custody struggle, you had better THINK AGAIN AND MEMORIZE this book cover to cover. NOW. The only good news from this book and Dr. Chesler's research: There are now entire chapters of support groups nationwide called exactly that, Mothers on Trial, who can help you. Try one out; moms meet SECRETLY because of fear of revenge and reprisal against them. After all, their flesh are still, most often, years and years away from legal adulthood; the mothers are soooo afraid -- and need to be -- of losing whatever contact they may still have with their kids -- IF those kids' fathers find out about their "association".

It's hard to know where to begin with 'Mothers on Trial'.

To say firstly that it is short on evidence would be an understatment - there's barely any figures or evidence provided at all.

To say that from opening sentence to index it's several hundred pages of venom, misandry, anti-male rhetoric and spite would be accurate, but would hardly begin to describe what an unpleasant book it acually is.

To her credit, the author must have a great deal of stamina to sustain a radical feminist world-view of such indefatigable zealotry that joint custody can be airily described as 'post-divorce patriarchy'.

It's simply incredibly depressing. For example, Chesler states that joint custody - now called 'shared parenting' (quote: "although parenting has little to do with it") as being a conspiracy by 'fathers supremacist's groups'. Instead of simply fathers loving and wanting to be with their children and respecting their obligation and duty to support them, they are simply: "wanting to get out of paying child support and continuing to control their exes through the children, with permission and encouragement from the courts". With a joint custody award comes "a lower or completely eliminated child support order. Money, not doing right by their children, is a primary motivation in the eyes of father supremacists."

I can accept that if a mother had sole 24/7 custody of children she'd certainly be getting a higher child support order from the father than if she had 50/50 custody with him, but to say that the father's sole motivation is money would seem to impune the basest of motives without a shred of evidence.

I would have said that most fathers simply want to be with their children because they love them. Simple as that. And children benefit from having fathers in their lives. In fact, in all of the book I don't think there's a single point where Chesler focuses on what's best for children.

What a sad, tawdry book. Horrible.

The book was eye opening to the fact that mothers in custody battles get screwed all the time. This seemed to be the entire book, stories of mom's who got wronged. I was surprised to see there was no advice in it about the situation. It also did not give you any hope in ever retaining your children back if you lost them to your ex. I can tell you that another book I ordered here on Amazon was GREAT,
Winning Custody
By: Deedra B. Hunter

This book will tell you step by step what you need to do, know and so on.
I learned alot of the history of child custody and courts favoring fathers for whacko reasons, but it just wasn't what I thought it would be!

I wish I read this book before I even married. It is a must-read for anyone woman, especially a custodially-challenged mother. It should be mandatory for all Family Court lawyers, judges, and personnel as well.

I particularly like the academic nature of it; there are plenty of citations, etc., so hopefully people will start listening - particularly judges.

The most fundamental idea to grasp - is that a challenging a mother's custody of her children is a form of abuse. Everything falls into place, once you can view the litigation process in terms of abuse.