False
Domestic Violence
Accusations Can Lead To
Parental Alienation Syndrome
By David Heleniak
30 April, 2007
Countercurrents.org
Parental
Alienation Syndrome (PAS) is a pattern of thoughts and behavior that
can develop in a child of separated parents where the custodial parent
causes the child, through manipulation and access blocking, to unjustifiably
fear and/or hate the other parent. PAS is more than brainwashing, in
that the child comes to actively participate in the degradation of the
target parent, coming up with original (often ludicrous) reasons to
fear/hate him or her.
Domestic violence (DV) restraining
orders are a perfect weapon for an alienating parent. Typically, in
addition to removing an accused abuser from the marital home, a DV restraining
order also “temporarily” bars the accused abuser from seeing
his or her children, and “temporarily” gives the accusing
parent exclusive physical custody. And temporary, in the Family Court,
has a funny way of becoming permanent.
Obtaining a restraining order
based on a false allegation of domestic violence gets the target parent
out of the house and out of the picture. A father who can’t see
his kids, for example, is unable to rebut the lie “Daddy doesn’t
love you anymore. That’s why he left you.” Nor can he rebut
the alternate lie, “Daddy is dangerous. The wise judge said so.
That’s why he can’t see you.”
Often, if an accused abuser
is allowed to see his or her children, it is in a supervised visitation
center. As Stan Rains observed in “Supervised Visitation Center
Dracula,” “The demeaning of the ‘visiting’ parent
is readily visible from the minute that a person enters the ‘secured
facility’ with armed guards, officious case workers with their
clipboards and arrogant, domineering managers.... The child's impression
is that all of these authority figures see Daddy as a serious and dangerous
threat. The only time a child sees this type of security is on TV showing
prisons filled with bad people.” Not only does visitation in a
visitation center send the clear message to the child that the “visiting”
parent is a bad person, if children decline to see their parents under
such a setting, they are generally not forced to do so. More perversely,
if a child is encouraged by the custodial parent to refuse to see the
target parent, there will be no significant repercussion to the targeting
parent, and, generally, the child will not be forced to see the target
parent.
The more time a child spends
away from the alienated parent, the worse the alienation will become.
As psychologist Glenn F. Cartwright remarked in his article “Expanding
the Parameters of Parental Alienation Syndrome,” “the old
adage that time heals all wounds, such is not the case with PAS, where
the passage of time worsens rather than heals the affliction. This is
not to say that time is unimportant: on the contrary, time remains a
vital variable for all the players. To heal the relationship, the child
requires quality time with the lost parent to continue and repair the
meaningful association that may have existed since birth. This continued
communication also serves as a reality check for the child to counter
the effects of ongoing alienation at home. Likewise, the lost parent
needs time with the child to ensure that contact is not completely lost
and to prevent the alienation from completely destroying what may be
left of a normal, loving relationship.... The alienating parent, on
the other hand, requires time to complete the brainwashing of the child
without interference. The manipulation of time becomes the prime weapon
in the hands of the alienator who uses it to structure, occupy, and
usurp the child's time to prevent ‘contaminating’ contact
with the lost parent, depriving both of their right to spend time together
and furthering the goal of total alienation. Unlike cases of child abuse
where time away from the abuser sometimes helps in repairing a damaged
relationship, in PAS time away from the lost parent furthers the goal
of alienation. The usual healing properties of time are lost when it
is used as the primary weapon to inflict injury on the lost parent by
alienating the child.” Along these lines, Dr. Richard A. Gardner,
who coined the term “Parental Alienation Syndrome” in 1985,
maintained: “If there is to be any hope of their reestablishing
a relationship with the targeted parent, PAS children must spend significant
time with him (her). They must have living experiences that will demonstrate
that the PAS parent is not noxious and/or dangerous.”
A parent willing to falsely
accuse the other parent of domestic violence would probably be willing
to poison a child against him or her. Add to this the problem that a
judge willing to “err on the side of caution” by entering
a DV restraining order based on a dubious false allegation would probably
not be willing to do what was necessary to prevent the development of
PAS.
PAS is heart-wrenching and,
tragically, common. If the DV restraining order system could be reformed
so that only real victims obtained restraining orders and only real
abusers were thrown out their houses, I predict that the number of PAS
cases would be greatly reduced. Let’s try
to get there.
David Heleniak is a civil litigation attorney in New Jersey and Senior
Legal Analyst for the True Equality Network. He can be reached at [email protected].
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