Note the second News reporter states "..and a lengthy battle over custody battle of Ball and his wife's three children..."

See that?


She reported that the children were the wife's children and him as a separate entity entirely... Even his own flesh and blood are classed as possessions of his wife, rather than theirs.

I do not like the way that this man has been pathologized in the news coverage of his death. They call a mere 15 page testimate a "rambling and discombobulated" letter much like his house. WHAT THE HELL! Have your life and family ripped apart and see how discombobulated you get and how much you have to say about the system that fucked you.

The presses fetish for sticking their noses into other peoples shit so their viewers can feel better about their own lives makes me want to puke.

Quote from Marx

Note the second News reporter states "..and a lengthy battle over custody battle of Ball and his wife's three children..."

See that?


She reported that the children were the wife's children and him as a separate entity entirely... Even his own flesh and blood are classed as possessions of his wife, rather than theirs.

ya...thats just f'd

The reported said, "Ball and his wife's three children".

The reporter woman seemed very unused to being filmed. She made pauses where no pauses were needed, but in that particular statement made what seemed to be a pause between 'Ball' and the 'and'. The 'and' is a joining word. This was a simple articulation error, it seems to me. I did not hear it as an indication of the children being soley the wife's.

The man's death is a tragedy.

Another man done gone.

Percy, the female news reporter clearly stated "her children", not "their children".

"Her children only"....this is the best evidence of how society sees fathers and why Mr. Ball was troubled enough to do this.

Quote from rohara

I do not like the way that this man has been pathologized in the news coverage of his death. They call a mere 15 page testimate a "rambling and discombobulated" letter much like his house. WHAT THE HELL! Have your life and family ripped apart and see how discombobulated you get and how much you have to say about the system that fucked you.

The presses fetish for sticking their noses into other peoples shit so their viewers can feel better about their own lives makes me want to puke.

I'm with you on that one. The way people react to his death and how he is portrayed is ridiculous.

Thanks to the way the media covers this and the bigotted attitude many people have, people act like this man is some monster who 'abused' his daughter, was a deadbeat (off course always in the most negative way) and now even robbed his children of a father they didn't had anymore because of the system!

They act as if he is mentally ill, because 'only mentally ill people suicide and this was just an excuse'. They won't speak such crap anymore when these folks themselves are placed in this man's shoes.

These people (read heartless, poor excuses of human beings) trivialize his death and his message because they feel compelled to twist facts, not actually take a moment to think and to look at what really happens, so they can just go on bashing another father who has been unjustly ruined. It is sickening to no end.

http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/on-fire-but-blacked-out-the-thomas-ball-story/?singlepage=true


On Fire but Blacked Out: The Thomas Ball Story

The war against men and boyscontinues.

June 29, 2011 - 12:00 am - by HelenSmith


Imagine, if you will, that a 16-year-old girl isdenied an abortion and tries to get justice through the court system. She isjerked around and told “tough luck honey” a number of times and finally becomesdistraught and sets herself on fire in front of the courthouse. Now, imaginewhat happens next in the media: The story becomes a firestorm. MSNBC and CNNhave the incident scrolling along the bottom of the news every hour while the NewYork Times interviews feminists who pontificate about this brave“political move” and its implications for women’s individual freedoms.

Now, on to what really happened. A 58-year-old NewHampshire man by the name of Thomas James Ball set himself on fire in front ofa courthouse because he was “done being bullied for being a man” by the familycourt system. And despite his horrible and public death, he got littlemedia attention. Just a few activists on the web and a few news outlets such as InternationalBusiness Times and the Keene Sentinel pickedit up. Even Wikipediatookhis page down.

Basically, Ball’s last act was treated by thetraditional news media as that of a lone nutcase with no political significancewhatsoever. The difference in these two cases comes down to what the Americanmedia finds relevant: girls and women, they’re important; men and boys, not somuch. Christina Hoff Sommers was right: the war against boys and men is still goingstrong.

And Thomas Ball knew it. He left a long letterto the Keene Sentinel explaining his grievances withthe court system and with the society that devalues men. When often is the casewhen men complain, his grievances were seen as whining rather than as realproblems.

As one of my commenters pointed out ina post I put up on the case, when a woman burns her husband todeath in his sleep, it’s seen as a major wake-up call regarding violence againstwomen, and is immortalized in an award-winning movie starring FarahFawcett titled TheBurning Bed.

But somehow, when a man like Thomas Ball burns himself up,it is not seen as a wake-up call for how men are treated unjustly by the courtsystem. Instead, some “compassionate souls” see his death as yet another wake-upcall regarding the needs of women. Do men ever matterto these “feminists,” or do they get pleasure out of men’s pain? I am thinkingthe latter.

There are some pundits and commenters who have saidthat Ball does not deserve any compassion or that he should hardly be theposter boy for men’s rights because he may or may not have been jerked around bythe family court. He did slap his then four-year-old daughter, giving her a cuton the lip, when she refused to obey him after three verbal warnings, etc. Thisisn’t great, but it doesn’t warrant jail time, arrest, or having one’s childrentaken away. If it does, there are so many women out there who qualify for thesame treatment, I shudder to think about it.

But whether you think Ball is a good man, a badman, or a crazy man doesn’t really matter. What matters is that Ball’s death —and the reaction to it — should serve as a wake-up call to how men and boys arebeing treated in a society that devalues their very existence. Males commitsuicide at much higher rates than women and no one cares; they are treatedunfairly by courts and no one bats an eye. They are abused by the women intheir life and people say “toughshit.” So they ratchet up the game a little and start settingthemselves on fire to get some attention to their cause and, once again, themedia and society react with: “So what?”

Can we really stand by and do nothing about thetreatment of men and boys in our society much longer? When I look at thepicture of Mr. Ball in flames on the steps of that courthouse, I think the onlyanswer is a resounding: “Hell, no!”

Helen Smith is a psychologistspecializing in forensic issues in Knoxville, Tennessee, and blogs at drhelen.blogspot.com.


http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/on-fire-but-blacked-out-the-thomas-ball-story/?singlepage=true


On Fire but Blacked Out: The Thomas Ball Story

The war against men and boyscontinues.

June 29, 2011 - 12:00 am - by HelenSmith


Imagine, if you will, that a 16-year-old girl isdenied an abortion and tries to get justice through the court system. She isjerked around and told “tough luck honey” a number of times and finally becomesdistraught and sets herself on fire in front of the courthouse. Now, imaginewhat happens next in the media: The story becomes a firestorm. MSNBC and CNNhave the incident scrolling along the bottom of the news every hour while the NewYork Times interviews feminists who pontificate about this brave“political move” and its implications for women’s individual freedoms.

Now, on to what really happened. A 58-year-old NewHampshire man by the name of Thomas James Ball set himself on fire in front ofa courthouse because he was “done being bullied for being a man” by the familycourt system. And despite his horrible and public death, he got littlemedia attention. Just a few activists on the web and a few news outlets such as InternationalBusiness Times and the Keene Sentinel pickedit up. Even Wikipediatookhis page down.

Basically, Ball’s last act was treated by thetraditional news media as that of a lone nutcase with no political significancewhatsoever. The difference in these two cases comes down to what the Americanmedia finds relevant: girls and women, they’re important; men and boys, not somuch. Christina Hoff Sommers was right: the war against boys and men is still goingstrong.

And Thomas Ball knew it. He left a long letterto the Keene Sentinel explaining his grievances withthe court system and with the society that devalues men. When often is the casewhen men complain, his grievances were seen as whining rather than as realproblems.

As one of my commenters pointed out ina post I put up on the case, when a woman burns her husband todeath in his sleep, it’s seen as a major wake-up call regarding violence againstwomen, and is immortalized in an award-winning movie starring FarahFawcett titled TheBurning Bed.

But somehow, when a man like Thomas Ball burns himself up,it is not seen as a wake-up call for how men are treated unjustly by the courtsystem. Instead, some “compassionate souls” see his death as yet another wake-upcall regarding the needs of women. Do men ever matterto these “feminists,” or do they get pleasure out of men’s pain? I am thinkingthe latter.

There are some pundits and commenters who have saidthat Ball does not deserve any compassion or that he should hardly be theposter boy for men’s rights because he may or may not have been jerked around bythe family court. He did slap his then four-year-old daughter, giving her a cuton the lip, when she refused to obey him after three verbal warnings, etc. Thisisn’t great, but it doesn’t warrant jail time, arrest, or having one’s childrentaken away. If it does, there are so many women out there who qualify for thesame treatment, I shudder to think about it.

But whether you think Ball is a good man, a badman, or a crazy man doesn’t really matter. What matters is that Ball’s death —and the reaction to it — should serve as a wake-up call to how men and boys arebeing treated in a society that devalues their very existence. Males commitsuicide at much higher rates than women and no one cares; they are treatedunfairly by courts and no one bats an eye. They are abused by the women intheir life and people say “toughshit.” So they ratchet up the game a little and start settingthemselves on fire to get some attention to their cause and, once again, themedia and society react with: “So what?”

Can we really stand by and do nothing about thetreatment of men and boys in our society much longer? When I look at thepicture of Mr. Ball in flames on the steps of that courthouse, I think the onlyanswer is a resounding: “Hell, no!”

Helen Smith is a psychologistspecializing in forensic issues in Knoxville, Tennessee, and blogs at drhelen.blogspot.com.

There's no elephant in the room.. what are you on about?