iii. PAS Pathologizes Women’s Exercise of Legal Rights

http://209.198.129.131/images/EvidentiaryAmissibilityofPAW_Hoult_CLRJ_2006.pdf
Children’s Legal Rights Journal
Evidentiary Admissibility of Parental Alienation Syndrome  7
Jennifer Hoult
Vol. 26 ♦ No. 1 ♦ Spring 2006


iii. PAS Pathologizes Women’s Exercise
of Legal Rights
PAS’s diagnostic criteria for determining a child’s
treatment focus on maternal legal actions,
evaluating the mother for:
1. presence of severe psychopathology
prior to [marital] separation,
2. frequency of programming thoughts,  Evidentiary Admissibility of Parental Alienation Syndrome  7
Vol. 26 ♦ No. 1 ♦ Spring 2006
3. frequency of programming verbalizations,
4. frequency of exclusionary maneuvers,
5. frequency of complaints to police and
child protection services,
6. litigiousness,
7. episodes of hysteria,
8. frequency of violation of court orders,
9. success in manipulating the legal system
to enhance the programming, and
10. risk of intensification of programming if
granted primary custody.
132
 
 With the exception of the first criterion, there
is no evidence that any of these criteria indicate
pathology.
133
 Women are entitled to exercise their
legal rights, and as mothers they are expected to
protect their children from paternal abuse. Many
divorced women hold and express negative
opinions about their ex-husbands. Such expressions are protected under the First Amendment.
134
Many people, including successful litigators,
satisfy Gardner’s definition of “hysteria,” which
includes “intensification of symptoms in the context of lawsuits,” “emotional outbursts, dramatization, attention-getting behavior, release of anger
with scapegoatism.”
135
 In effect, the DDC
diagnose women with PAS primarily when they
exercise their legal rights. Because the DDC do
not examine the father’s conduct, his psychiatric
history, violent conduct, and exercise of legal
rights are not construed as symptoms of pathology.