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Thread: BBC story on US divorces and how men are victimized

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    God/dess Deogol's Avatar
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    Default BBC story on US divorces and how men are victimized

    It's interesting how that nomarriages.com showed up under one thread and I was listening to the BBC Channel 4 just now about how in the US men are really victimized by the system when it comes to divorce.

    They had the story about one fella who is living in a garage while the ex continues to get better and better housing based on child support. He's a carpenter and has paid out over a quarter of a million dollars in child support already. The wife took care of the money before the divorce and actually made the recommendations on payments cuz he just didn't know and didn't get a lawyer to look over what she said he earned. She was all smiles and friendly then.

    There was another story about a guy who was paying a bunch of money and then lost his job. As they pointed out, a family would simply tighten their belt. But since it was a judgement - there was no choice about it - you pay it or face the consequences. He ended up facing the consequences of loosing his driver's license, contractor's license, and had his new wife's bank account cleared out by the system!

    So here is is expected to pay this money and they take all his ability to pay it away. His wife says, since they are in a rural area with no buses or the like - he is effectively under house arrest until they come and get him again for money he can no longer earn.

    The report said that it is really hard to get these payments changed because basically the courts want to be done with you once the agreement is made. Add to that, sometimes it isn't even the wife that has the choice about lowering the amounts - the court's agencies will go out and make sure the money is sent - so a deal on the side between the two parties just doesn't work.

    I dated my girlfriend for three and of those three lived with her for about two years. I am sooo glad I did not marry her when she wanted to get married. She turned out to have some substance abuse problems and that would have been quite the mess for me to deal with on top of the legalities. From now on - I don't care what anyone says - any potential wife is living with me for at least two years so ALL the secrets come out.

    My friend just went through a divorce. He earned practically all the money in the family. I personally heard him ask his wife that maybe she should go to school and maybe get herself some coin in the pocket in case something happens to him. She was like "there's a life insurance policy." She was this little cutie with blonde hair and was (barely) a hair dresser. His dick married her, not his head. This little hair dresser walked out of the marriage with over three hundred thousand dollars and he is struggling to keep the house.

    Stories like this travel like wild fire through guys social networks and it's like - you really have to protect yourself these days from the system and women who wield it.

    As a guy with personal experience explaining his life to a police officer who just questioned a drunk girl saying who -the-fuck-knows-what and having friends talk about how the system simply pounded them - I can understand how there is a little animosity between the sexes as shown in that web site.

    You just don't know WHO is going to try and screw you over.

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    Banned Katrine's Avatar
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    Default Re: BBC story on US divorces and how men are victimized

    Oh yeah, and what percentage of divorced men suffer like that? Perhaps 10%. Its far more common to see the man skip out on the wife and kids with all the money, leaving them with NOTHING! I worked with a guy who had a roomate who was hiding out, living in secret, walking on eggshells because the fuckstick left his wife and kids and didn't want to give them a dime.

    Its unfortunate that there are truly some victims, just like there are scam victims, but the tables have hardly turned.........

    "Have you ever been to American wedding? Where is the vodka, where's marinated herring?" - GB
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    God/dess Deogol's Avatar
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    Default Re: BBC story on US divorces and how men are victimized

    Quote Originally Posted by Katrine
    Oh yeah, and what percentage of divorced men suffer like that? Perhaps 10%. Its far more common to see the man skip out on the wife and kids with all the money, leaving them with NOTHING! I worked with a guy who had a roomate who was hiding out, living in secret, walking on eggshells because the fuckstick left his wife and kids and didn't want to give them a dime.

    Its unfortunate that there are truly some victims, just like there are scam victims, but the tables have hardly turned.........
    Well, that might be in your social circle - but in mine I have encountered many guys who all acknowledge we have been taken advantage of by the time we are in our thirties to mid-thirties by some woman.

    I am not condoning that guy or saying that dead-beat dads do not exist.

    I am saying that if you try to be responsible and fair - you end up realizing "I should have been a little more self-protective."

    My ex destroyed nearly $100,000 in assets in my last year with her.

    Between the BMW she crashed, her insistence that we don't move out of California even though I was between contracts and burning up savings AND TURNING DOWN OUT OF STATE WORK, to her not getting a job and when she did, loosing it two or three months later (got in the way of the drinking you know), the rehab charges (OH MY FUCKING GOD!) that didn't do any good... I added it up one night - and it came to around $100,000 in one year.

    I was trying to do the right thing, trying to take care of her, and defending myself when all my friends were saying "change the locks" - so when I say "That's Enough!" she moves on to this vice-president friend of her's of a major retailer and starts living the good life in six bedroom house and I am the villian for kicking her out.

    I think I am starting to understand why I am so fucking mad all the time this last year.

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    Default Re: BBC story on US divorces and how men are victimized

    Set up an asset trust to avoid this problem BEFORE you get married. Either that, or tie up your major holdings in a corporation.

    The pendulum of divorce and parental rights is coming back toward the middle but it'll take some time.

    In the interim, it's just wiser to not get married.
    Idealism is fine, but as it approaches reality, the costs become prohibitive.

    William F. Buckley, Jr.

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    Default Re: BBC story on US divorces and how men are victimized

    Quote Originally Posted by Deogol
    I think I am starting to understand why I am so fucking mad all the time this last year.
    That 100K may be the best money you ever spent. Your "major retailer" is about to learn how quickly assets can vanish without a trace.

    Nothing wrong with being a minor retailer.

    Kiss the ground in eternal gratitude. The anger will pass, but you've identified the cause and stopped being the guy standing all by himself "trying to do the right thing."

    Don't get me wrong -- "doing the right thing" is the most honorable thing you can possibly do. But it's a game that requires two players. If there is only one player, then that player is doing double duty as a victim.

    Let's face it, guys are usually the pigs in these scenarios. Can you blame us? We have 60 times the testosterone level. It's just amazing that we don't all just go out in some ferocious blaze of horror and death, strangling each other in an eye-bulging explosion of pure testosterone insanity.

    Women are far more likely to try to do the right thing. Often this is because children are involved. Kat is totally right about this. The role reversal is a killer, huh?

    Ten years from now, you can look back and know, definitively, that you tried to do the right thing by her. There is value in that.

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    Default Re: BBC story on US divorces and how men are victimized

    Here's an idea...don't get divorced if you have kids. Work it out for their sake.

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    Default Re: BBC story on US divorces and how men are victimized

    The Other Owner- I loves you, man!!!
    Deogol- sorry about your bad experience. I know I can't make you feel better quickly. But you're not alone. Your story proves my assertion that men might be callow a-holes, but if they "fall in love", the woman in question can do anything she wants to him. It's like a karma whip-snap.
    The whole reason that the law is hard on men is that often children become a point of contention, and the heck if the State and Federal Government wants to foot the bill to feed someone's kids. They'll hit Sperm Donor's pockets first.
    The risk factor goes the other way too- I lived with my ex for four years and did not marry him because he was in massive debt and I feared becoming liable for his debt & poor spending habits. Luckily, shacking up with him showed me he was not someone I wanted in my life. I lost four years of my life, mangled my education to accomodate him, and have a permanent distrust of men now. That stings me more than whatever dollar amount I could translate that to.......

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    Default Re: BBC story on US divorces and how men are victimized

    I agree it is a problem, but I think it is less of a problem than fatherless children. These days, everyone must know how to protect themselves, not just women.

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    God/dess Bunny's Avatar
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    Default Re: BBC story on US divorces and how men are victimized

    women can get screwed. so can men. I knew a woman in New Orleans who was getting a whopping $500 for her two teenage daughters in support from her ex. She filed for an increase because she was barely making ends meet. the asshole quit his job so she couldn't get more. But guess what? Louisiana is a community property state so they took the money from the ex's new wife. Something you really have to consider if you live in Louisiana and get married to someone with kids from a prior marriage.

    Deogol, your ex isn't an Ivy leage educated girl who decided she liked to smoke crack, is she? Because long, long ago I knew a guy who had that happen and she totalled his BMW too...or had it jacked buying crack or something like that.

    The point is, men AND women can get screwed. There are assholes on both sides so we all have to be careful.

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    Banned Katrine's Avatar
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    Default Re: BBC story on US divorces and how men are victimized

    Dammit, I have my own BMW to total now, sweeeeeeeeeeeeeet! Single is where its AT!!

    "Have you ever been to American wedding? Where is the vodka, where's marinated herring?" - GB
    "And do the cats give a shit? No, they do not. Why? Because they're cats."-from The Onion

    Quote Originally Posted by Mia M
    If a cupcake was tossed at me... well, I'd only be upset if it missed my mouth

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    Default Re: BBC story on US divorces and how men are victimized

    lol,not exactly the forum to post this one on,but i gotta say,one more log on the fire to better equal out the roles in this new "family values"era.
    One day the fathers will be equal to the mothers in the role they play.

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    God/dess Deogol's Avatar
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    Default Re: BBC story on US divorces and how men are victimized

    Quote Originally Posted by Bunny
    Deogol, your ex isn't an Ivy leage educated girl who decided she liked to smoke crack, is she? Because long, long ago I knew a guy who had that happen and she totalled his BMW too...or had it jacked buying crack or something like that.
    Nope. She was a drinker. Alcohol was her "drug of choice."

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    God/dess Deogol's Avatar
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    Default Re: BBC story on US divorces and how men are victimized

    Quote Originally Posted by madmaxine
    ... have a permanent distrust of men now......
    Put a "wo" in front of it and I think we share mindsets. Fucked-up-ness is an equal oppurtunity hunter it is, yep.

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    Default Re: BBC story on US divorces and how men are victimized

    I know women who have cheated their husbands out of hundreds of thousands of dollars right before divorcing them. Since they "liquidated" it and hid it...nothing could really be done about it. I also know a few women who are stuggling to make ends meet because their husbands ran off on them (one man never filed for divorce) and left the payments (car, house, etc) but cleaned out every single account. I worked with one woman who worked 2 jobs in order to scrape by while her "husband" frolicked with a much, much younger woman (22 at the time) in Europe. She finally divorced him...and it will be a big mess, IF he decides to come back...which I am sure he's well-aware of the situation here...and will probably never return.

    The most important factor in any relationship is respect of the self. If you have a high level of self-respect, self-love, etc. You will not feel the need to try and find someone to fill any voids. I hate to say this, but the people who find themselves in these horrible situations, really need to take a close look at themselves and do some personal inventory. If they were really "whole" people, they would not have found themselves in these situations.

    And, no one should ever stay together "for the kids". What needs to happen is adults need to "grow up" enough to be able to recognize when they should no longer be together and split when the time comes (if it does). Children do not need both parents in the home. What they need is a calm/peaceful living environment and the knowledge that both of their parents love them very much, but the parents just could not stay together. It's the love that kids thrive on...not the fact that their parents stayed together.

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    God/dess VenusGoddess's Avatar
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    Default Re: BBC story on US divorces and how men are victimized

    Quote Originally Posted by BigGreenMnM
    lol,not exactly the forum to post this one on,but i gotta say,one more log on the fire to better equal out the roles in this new "family values"era.
    One day the fathers will be equal to the mothers in the role they play.
    Well, now that there are a lot of fathers who stay home with the kids while the mothers go to work, I believe that there will be a lot more consideration that fathers can be just a good as mothers in the nuturing department. That's always a good thing.

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    Default Re: BBC story on US divorces and how men are victimized

    Well, dude, of course guys FEEL taken advantage of in relationships. So do girls. How many people do you know think that really, they are on the up end of it? That their SO is just putting up with all their shit? Not a whole lot (although maybe a few). Your bad relationship (although it sounds dreadful) has nothing to do with court mandated child support.

    Now, not that I think it is great (if the stories are in fact true) that these men are being "screwed" but I'm sure you, as well as the BBC knows perfectly well that this is not the standard, statistically likely outcome of divorce. Statistics show (and these statistics are under serious contention yes - but it should be noted that the contention is in the degree, not the truth of them) that men, after divorce, have a higher standard of living, while women (and their children) have a lower one. Very few men are bankrupted by divorce, and a significant portion of those who are are "staged bankruptcies". These are examples of glitches in the system - child support is not intended to bankrupt one. It is meant to be about what you would pay if the child were living with you.
    I have taught that the sky in all its zones is mortal and its substance was formed by a process of birth

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