Fatherhood

A Father Arrested After Taking His Daughter’s IPhone Away

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I just read about a story where a father was arrested for taking his daughter’s IPhone as a punishment and then getting arrested in Texas for doing so. I thought I was reading The Onion, but it’s true.

A man named Ronald Jackson discovered things that he thought were inappropriate on his daughter’s cell phone. At the time, she was 12 years old.  I totally understand why a father would do something like that. I have done it from time to time with my daughter. I want to make sure that I check up on her from time to time. It is just what parents do who care about their kids.

The problem is that when he decided to take his daughter’s phone away, the child’s mother stepped in and called the police. The mother of the child, Michelle Steppe, was never married to Ronald, but they had their daughter together. Michelle later married a police officer from Grand Praire Texas.

A citation was issued after Steppe called the police and Jackson refused to give the phone to the mother. Court filings indicate the attorney’s office requested the case be dismissed but was refiled later with the Dallas County District Attorney’s office with a more stringent misdemeanor which is punishable by six months in jail. The city’s attorney’s office offered a plea deal if Jackson returned the phone. Instead, Jackson and his attorney refused the plea and requested a jury trial. Jackson never knew a warrant had been issued. Then one night at 2AM, he was arrested. Jackson  was charged with theft of property.

 He stated, “At that Point, I decided the police don’t interfere with my ability to parent my daughter.” The mother, who paid for the phone and paid the cell phone bill saw things a little differently. “As a mom, I’m upset because -number one-the property belongs to me,” she said. He was taken to jail and posted a cash bail of $1,500.

At the trial, the daughter testified and in the end, Jackson’s case was dismissed because the state failed to present evidence to continue the case. 

Jackson says the ordeal has permanently ended any chances to have a relationship with his daughter. Steppe said she was confused by the verdict because, “Even if you purchase something with your own money and have a reciept, it’s not yours.” “Someone can take it away from you.”

Jackson’s lawyer said the case is not over. He plans on filing a federal civil rights violation because of the way the police department and the city attorneys office’s treatment of his client. 

I am wondering why this even made it so deep into our court system and onto any docket. If the mother of the daughter has the “best interests of the child’ in mind, she would have listened to the father and discussed this between themselves. I’m sure that it was something they probably could both see as inappropriate. They could have dealt with the problem as two adults who are trying to guide their young child in a world full of rapidly shifting technological advances. But no. It seems as if there are two children and one adult in this case.  

Running to the police is not the best way to co-parent. In fact, I’d say the police are most likely to cause more problems that they liable to fix. I guess the mother of this child doesn’t care. Since she is married to an officer, it must not bother her that law enforcement was called. I wouldn’t doubt that her police department connections had something to do with the warrant, the 2AM arrest and the charges being filed.

Was this man a dangerous criminal? Was he a threat? Did the department harrass this man intentionally?

It seems like more of the petty nonsense that comes up after a separation or a divorce. Many parents seem to miss the bigger picture after a break-up. The parents must realize they have a child to raise. They have to get along eventually. There are challenges that pop up from time to time, especially as they get older. Having a mother and father on the same page to back each other up during the rough seas of adolescence is crucial. 

This story seems like a relatively minor incident that turned ugly rather quickly. Now, there is a broken relationship and a daughter who sees the police as the first resort when it comes to the resolution of interpersonal relationship conflicts. I feel the daughter will regret this whole ordeal in the long run. I also think the step-dad needs to stay out of any parenting issues like this in the future and let the biological parents work out things like this on their own. To even rise to the level of a court case where tax dollars are wasted is ridiculous. 

In 20 years or so when the daughter has kids of her own and her kids ask where grandpa is, she can explain that when she was 12, she had her phone taken away because of her sexting. Grandma and mommy had him thrown in jail  because he was trying to do the right thing by disciplining her. Mommy hasn’t had a relationship with him since because of that incident.

I wouldn’t doubt that the grandmother will probably be on the sidelines telling the grandkids he wasn’t good for anything anyway.

What a mess. 
Here is the link to the story: http://www.khou.com/story/news/crime/2016/01/26/dallas-dad-not-guilty-taking-tween-daughters-phone/79355512/

Fatherhood, Parenting

My Nana

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I took my kids to South Carolina to see my grandmother in 2011, 2013 and 2015. Three great road trips. We had a great time on our road trips and I’m glad we took a week out of each summer to see friends and family along the way.

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It was important that they got to know their great grandmother because even in divorce, kids still have two sides of their family…family court thinks that only one side matters for some strange reason. My Nana always got along with my ex wife while we were married and even liked her after we were divorced (a better person than me). It’s a good thing because even when there are parents who may not get along, there are still two sides of the family children are born into. I guess my Nana saw the silver lining in the dark cloud of our divorce. I’m certainly happy she saw me in my new relationship. She met my current girlfriend the last time we went to visit her in South Carolina last summer.

I feel better that I exposed my kids to both sides of their DNA and will continue to do so. Family is so important to me and I’m glad they had a chance to get to know their great grandmother.

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Unfortunately, this is their introduction to what it feels like to lose a family member. My Nana was born in 1918…the year Workd War I ended. Unfortunately, she died this morning at age 97. It’s a sad day for my kids, but she had a enormous impact. Cousins, uncles, grandkids, great grandkids, friends, colleagues and extended family all across the country were touched by her generous spirit.

I certainly know that life is short. Do your best to live it to the fullest and spend time with those who you care about. Social media is cool and all but find a way to make a road trip of your own to actually see your family in person. Whether they be in the next town over or in a state halfway across the country.

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Fatherhood

Mentoring

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Mentoring- I should have done this a long time ago. I’m really enjoying the conversations I’m having with the kids who I spend time with every other week.

I was turned on to the idea of being a mentor through an old college friend. He has been doing it for years and he is totally dedicated to the people he has been working with. I have other friends over the years who have been doing similar things and they have told me about the joy that comes with helping to shape the minds of our youth.

Those who think that nothing is being done to address the issues in certain communities where there are serious problems are ignorant to the hundreds of organizations who have been spending years putting in work on a grassroots level. These groups may not make the news and may not behave in a disruptive manner like the people who interrupt political rallies and block traffic.

I prefer a different approach and will make change in a way I feel is much more effective in the long term.

It’s so interesting to hear what is going on in the minds of these kids and how they think. The young men who I am mentoring are in middle school in Central Harlem. They really have a lot to say and ask a lot of questions. It’s great.

Even though I’m already a mentor to my own kids I often find it even more rewarding when I can affect young minds who are not related to me.

A story that is to be continued….

 

Society

Are elite college students victims of “white supremacy”?

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An excerpt from HERE: http://spectator.org/articles/65001/cult-social-justice

THE CULT OF SOCIAL JUSTICE

By Robert Stacy McCain

There are too many white musicians in the Oberlin College jazz band. This was among the numerous complaints — “concrete and unmalleable demands” — in a 14-page manifesto issued last week by the Black Students Union (BSU) at the elite private liberal arts college in Ohio. The second item on their list of demands was “a concerted effort to increase the percentage of Black students and specifically Black female identifying instrumentalists in the Jazz department. We would like to reiterate the demand for a 4% annual increase in the enrollment of Black students in the Jazz Department starting in 2016 to accumulate to 40% increase by the year 2022.”

Underrepresentation of “Black female identifying instrumentalists in the Jazz department” might seem a rather odd choice of student grievances to those of us old enough to remember when campus radicals focused their attention on serious issues like the Vietnam War. The seemingly trivial nature of the Oberlin BSU complaints contrasts starkly with the group’s dramatic denunciation of the college as an institution that “functions on the premises of imperialism, white supremacy, capitalism, ableism, and a cissexist heteropatriarchy.”

That last bit of academic jargon is derived from Third Wave feminist theory — the social construction of the gender binary within the heterosexual matrix, to summarize the thesis of Judith Butler’s 1990 book Gender Trouble, now commonly assigned as required reading in programs like Oberlin’s department of Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies. To decode a jargon phrase like “cissexist heteropatriarchy,” one must know that the prefix “cis-” is the opposite of “trans-” and thus “cissexist” means not only discrimination against women, but also against “transgender” persons. Likewise, the familiar feminist denunciation of “patriarchy” (i.e., the social system of male supremacy) has been updated with the prefix “hetero-” to imply that homosexuals in particular are oppressed by such a system. These linguistic modifications have the effect of allowing men to abjure their identification with “male privilege” either by declaring their homosexuality or “transgender” status, and thereby including themselves among the oppressed members of the LGBT coalition.

Determining one’s position in the scale of privilege and oppression is necessary to the progressive project of “social justice” of which the Oberlin BSU’s list of demands is an example. This is how and why a seemingly trivial matter — too many white people in the jazz band — gets transmogrified into a major grievance at Oberlin College (annual tuition of $50,586) where students bemoan their plight as victims of “imperialism, white supremacy, capitalism, ableism, and a cissexist heteropatriarchy.” Social justice is a sort of cult religion, and elite college campuses function as temples of this postmodern faith, where the saintly Victims of Oppression are taught to hate the demonized Forces of Privilege.
Of course, the demon figure in the white student’s social justice drama is Daddy, who is paying $50,586 a year to send his kid to Oberlin. Anyone familiar with Freudian theory could understand the psychological appeal of social justice rhetoric to affluent white teenagers whose resentment of their humiliating dependency on paternal support manifests itself as an Oedipal impulse to denounce Daddy. Whereas black students at a posh school like Oberlin have a rather obvious outlet for their juvenile rage — making “white supremacy” the scapegoat for their dissatisfaction — white radicals require elaborate theories to justify their own protest tantrums. This explains why campus “activism” is so common at elite schools, but is seldom found at less prestigious institutions. Certainly there must be students at my own alma mater, Jacksonville (Ala.) State University, who care about social justice, but they are much more interested in practical matters like getting their diplomas and finding a job after they graduate. Campus radicalism is a luxury most students at JSU (annual tuition $8,790) probably can’t afford.

Read the entire pice HERE