Junk Justice Joseph on intentional acts

The Sally Mitchell CPS report against me said:

XXXXX XXXXX XXXXX XXXXX XXXXX
Text omitted by Oct. 24, 2008 order of Commissioner Irwin H. Joseph, Santa Cruz Family Court.

When she testified on the witness stand, I asked her just what I was intentionally doing. She answered that I was doing things like asking the kids to do their homework, help with the dishes, and wake up in time to goto school.

Afterwards, Commissioner Irwin Joseph gave this speech:

Frequently during this hearing, the word "intentionally" came up. And the interpretation of intentionally to the Court, I suspect, is different than Father's interpretation and maybe Mother's as well. If one intends to do the act, whatever the act is, then usually it's the case that they're responsible for the consequence, even if they didn't intend the consequence. When one intends to strike a match, there is a resulting fire. Obviously, the person didn't intend to set the room on fire, but they did intend to strike the match. So a whole series of questions was -- were posed -- series was posed to Sally Mitchell and Mr. AngryDad about intentional. And they sort of miss the mark in large measure because they focus on the consequence of intend as opposed to did you do this intentionally or negligently or accidentally, which is really the alternative, the poles to be discussed.

So whether he likes to acknowledge it or not, Father did most of what he did intentionally. He intended that these things occur. That is the issue that the Court finds to be truthful and accurate and persuasive.

I readily acknowledged on the witness stand that I asked my kids to help with household chores, and do homework and other such tasks. I absolutely denied that my purpose was to irritate, frustrate, separate, or demean them, or that they ever suffered any adverse consequence from my actions.

Comm. Joseph then tries to address the fact that no one could find any evidence of harm:

If my deputy goes to someone and puts her gun at their temple and just stands there for a moment and then puts the gun back in the holster -- not that she would ever do that. But if she were to do that, one could say no harm occurred. She put the gun back in the holster. But how was the person made to feel? When the alarm clock is set, no harm is done. They're at school on time. But how are the kids made to feel? ... When they want to buy food besides Costco food, but Dad shops at Costco every Monday for the week, how are they made to feel? When they're enrolled in a contest that they know is for people that are older than they even though they might win the contest -- and no one is arguing about the virtue of children being ahead of their grade level in mathematics. But how are they made to feel?

So Comm. Joseph was speculating that the kids might have been irritated by me setting the alarm to wake them up for school, or by buying groceries, and therefore I was intentionally irritating the kids.

For idiotic rants like this, Comm. Joseph is known as Junk Justice Joseph.