Via email from The Alliance For Freedom From Alimony, Inc.:

Alimony Statutes’ Background

There is no common law right to alimony. It is merely a statute that must conform to state and federal constitutional provisions.

Alimony originated because of coverture, i.e. a wife was viewed as property of the husband and herself was not entitled to own property., thus the idea that if the couple separated the husband was responsible for the cost of living of the wife.

Coverture was abolished by most states in their constitutions and statutes to guarantee wives the right to buy, own and sell property. It created opportunities of economic equality for wives.

The doctrine of necessaries, the idea that a husband was responsible to third parties for the debts of their wives, was abolished in many states based on equal protection grounds. The law in many states is that neither party in a marriage is responsible for the debts of the spouse to third parties. This effectively makes the parties in marriage economic independents. Some states have made both parties in a marriage responsible for the debts of the spouse to third parties thereby solving the equal protection issue by keeping the doctrine but making it gender neutral.

Story here. Excerpt:

'BEIJING (AFP) - – A woman armed with a knife went on the rampage on an overnight passenger train in northeastern China, stabbing and wounding nine people as they slept, state media reported on Wednesday.

The attack, which occurred in the early morning Tuesday on a train in Heilongjiang province, is the latest in a wave of violent attacks by lone assailants that has shocked the country.

The woman, who was not identified, went from berth to berth stabbing sleeping passengers until she was wrestled to the ground and restrained by other travellers, said Dongbei, a news website covering China's northeast.

The woman was estimated by witnesses to be about 40 years old, but no other details about her were provided.

The train had been travelling from the provincial capital of Harbin to the city of Hebei. The victims received treatment when the train stopped in the city of Jiamusi, but the report did not say how serious their injuries were.'

Story here. Excerpt:

'A TV advert shows "abusive" behaviour towards a woman, including being leered at and enduring sexist comments.

Social Justice Minister Carl Sargeant said while that could seem harmless to men, women can feel threatened.

Welsh Women's Aid said tackling "widespread social attitudes" was crucial.
...
"Any behaviour that intimidates a woman should not be tolerated. If the campaign makes people stop and think then it will have served its purpose."
...

Adele Baumgardt, Wales commissioner for the Women's National Commission, said: "Gender discrimination affects women in Wales daily and can leave them feeling intimidated and even frightened.

"We need to change how men perceive women, challenge inappropriate attitudes and show men how damaging these can be. I hope that this campaign will give victims the confidence to come forward and ask for help."'

Article here. Excerpt:

'To inaugurate a Domestic Violence Awareness Day conference in London, Ont., this coming Sunday, a vigil and commemorative ceremony will be held for Dave Lucio.

Dave Lucio’s life was cut tragically short three years ago this Sunday by a .40-calibre Glock pistol bullet to his head. The lethal shot was fired by Kelly Johnson, a woman he had broken up with the previous day after a three-year intimate relationship. When she pulled the trigger, Lucio was driving a van with Johnson sitting beside him. Johnson then turned the gun on herself. The circumstances therefore left no room for doubt about who perpetrated the crime.

Although by no means the first time a Canadian man had been killed by a present or former intimate partner — one-third of Canada’s approximately 70 annual intimate partner homicides are men killed by women — the case made waves because both the killer and the victim were police officers (Lucio a retired superintendent).

Article here. Excerpt:

'A B.C. panel has issued 19 recommendations for preventing domestic violence deaths, including fast-tracking cases through the courts and flagging those at high risk of resulting in serious harm or death.
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The panel also called for more consistency and better sharing of information between government agencies when dealing with domestic violence.
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The recommendations come from a study of 11 deaths resulting from domestic violence in B.C. between 1995 and 2009.
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Many of the recommendations are similar to those made at a 2009 coroner's inquest into a Victoria-area murder-suicide that resulted in the deaths of five people.

The inquest was examining the case of Peter Lee, who in September 2007 killed his estranged wife, Sunny Park, their six-year-old son and Park's parents, before committing suicide at the family home in Oak Bay east of Victoria.

Article here. Excerpt:

'With the surfacing of yet another falsified rape allegation, this time by UC nursing student Kristen Lamb of Lebanon, Ohio, many are left questioning just how many rape claims are fabricated. Statistics show that such fake claims happen at an unfathomable rate.

The false allegations of Lamb's are not unusual, unfortunately. A 1994 study conducted by Purdue University professor Eugene Kanin, Ph.D. found that 41% of forcible rape allegations made during a multi-year period were false. While the Kanin Study has its critics, the findings of falsehood in the report were all based upon confessions by the alleged victims that their claims were fabricated.

Article here. Excerpt:

'Four years later, the moment that ripped his world apart has given him direction to help others.

Four years later, the scared kid from Essex Fells who was falsely charged in the notorious Duke lacrosse rape case is gone, replaced with a confident young man already working to change the legal system.

Remember Reade Seligmann?

His mug shot was plastered on the cover of Newsweek four springs ago with the headline: “Sex, Lies and Duke.” He was facing 30 years in prison for a crime he did not commit — a crime, it was later proven, that never took place.

He will graduate from Brown University today. Seligmann, now 24, will leave the Ivy League school with a joint degree in history and public policy and attend law school in the fall, where he will pursue a career focused on reducing the number of innocent people behind bars.'

Article here. Excerpt:

'The AAP makes a valid point on the comparison of FGM/C to male circumcision: "Health educators must also be prepared to explain to parents from outside North America why male genital alteration is routinely practiced here but female genital alteration is routinely condemned." Male circumcision is more invasive than the "ritual nick" proposed by the AAP, yet most Americans don't bat an eye at the procedure. In fact, after my son was born (and not circumcised), a nurse expressed surprise that he wasn't cut. Meanwhile, Jewish families celebrate the ritual with a gathering at home eight days after the birth.

Male circumcisions have been performed under similarly brutal circumstances as FGM/C, and like FGM/C, historical reasons cited for circumcision have included cleanliness and control over sexuality. Religious observance plays a part in both procedures as well. Those defending the AAP's revised stance have cited these points as reasons to legalize FGM/C. What's good for the gander ought to be good for the goose too.

Article here. Excerpt:

'When the kindergartners at the Brooklyn School of Inquiry, one of New York City’s schools for gifted students, form neat boy-girl rows for the start of recess, the lines of girls reach well beyond the lines of boys.
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Educators and experts have long known that boys lag behind girls in measures like high school graduation rates and college enrollment, but they are concerned that the disparity is also turning up at the very beginning of the school experience.

Article here. Excerpt:

'Feministing’s Jessica Valenti has a new op-ed in the Washington Post, and she has decreed that to qualify as a feminist one must believe that American women are oppressed. She writes:

Feminism is a social justice movement with values and goals that benefit women. It’s a structural analysis of a world that oppresses women, an ideology based on the notion that patriarchy exists and that it needs to end.

The article, titled “The fake feminism of Sarah Palin,” targets the Alaska governor for daring to call herself a feminist; Valenti also throws in shots at the Independent Women’s Forum, Kathryn Lopez, and Christina Hoff Sommers for failing to get just how much American women still suffer.

Article here. Excerpt:

'A Northern Territory researcher says studies show women can be just as violent as men and social changes are behind a reported rise in violence among young women.

A senior lecturer in psychology at Charles Darwin University, Dr Peter Forster, says there is no truth to the argument that testosterone levels make men more aggressive.

He says social factors such as the rise of feminism in the last few decades could be behind the rise in violence amongst women.

"We've now taken away the expectation that women will behave differently to men," he said.

"It used to be that one of the biggest differences was that women were more peaceful, they were peacemakers.

"[But] that kind of inhibition to be violent has gradually diminished to the point where it no longer inhibits women at all."

Article here. Excerpt:

'Late for appointments? Rude to your wife? Maybe the security guards should ask you to check your bags on the way into a store.

Some personalities are more prone to shoplifting than others, finds a study published in the June issue of the British academic journal Personality and Individual Differences. Its authors conclude that men who are "unpleasant and antisocial" or "disorganized and unreliable" are more likely to shoplift than anyone else.

"There's this sterotype of elderly women stealing tins of salmon, but that's not what we found," says Vincent Egan, a psychology professor at the University of Leicester who co-authored the study. "My results suggest dishonest consumer behavior is narrowly associated with how unpleasant and disorganized you are."'

All the subjects identified in the study as shoplifters were men. Outgoing youths were also more prone to steal, maybe because they don't fully understand the consequences of their actions and may get "carried away by the moment," says Egan.'

Blog entry here. CPS extremism sometimes whacks decent moms as well as dads. Excerpt:

'The case that's dropped jaws all across the U.S. and Canada is finally coming to an end. Judge Kip Leonard is finally allowing Noah Kirkman to return to his native Calgary after two years in foster care in Oregon. Read about it here (Yahoo, 5/29/10).

I and countless others have written outraged pieces about the case. Noah Kirkman is now 12 years old. When he was taken into foster care by Oregon authorities two years ago, he had not been abused; he had not been neglected. No one has ever claimed that his mother Lisa Kirkman (pictured) or his stepfather John Kirkman has ever been anything but a good parent to him. That's reflected in his grades which are straight A's despite Noah's severe ADHD.

Article here. Excerpt:

'Question: What do lawmakers Arlen Specter, Alan Mollohan, Barbara Boxer, and Orrin Hatch have in common?

Answer: They are all high-profile supporters of the federal Violence Against Women Act whose political fortunes have plummeted in recent months.
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Most lawmakers who support the Violence Against Women Act sincerely believe the law is doing good. But according to a recent report, "Assaulting our Rights: How Domestic Violence Laws Curtail our Fundamental Freedoms" (http://www.saveservices.org/downloads/SAVE-Assault-Civil-Rights), VAWA is dealing a devastating blow to our constitutional protections, with two million Americans having their civil liberties trampled upon every year.

Over time, that builds up into a tsumani of disenfranchised voters who are tired of business as usual in Washington DC. And that's why many lawmakers are thinking long and hard about reflexively supporting the Violence Against Women Act this time around.'

Article here. Excerpt:

'IOWA CITY — Tom Dunn jokes that it will take the rest of his tenure as Iowa’s men’s gymnastics coach just to clean out his desk.

For 31 years Dunn, 60, led the Hawkeyes, once taking them to a second-place finish at the NCAA championships. He will retire next month, witnessing his sport change dramatically over his tenure. And that’s no joking matter.

Since 1988, 49 colleges have dropped men’s gymnastics, and just 17 teams compete annually for a combined NCAA title, including one Division III school. It’s a sport where expenses soar past revenues, and the combination of gender-equity and economic issues have made it vulnerable on the chopping block.

“We did obviously lose a ton of teams over the 20 years, but recently it hasn’t been an epidemic by any means,” Dunn said.'