Latest / Honey Badger Radio / Phillip Parrish on Duluth, Fathers, and the Family Court Machine | Fireside Chat 280

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Phillip Parrish on Duluth, Fathers, and the Family Court Machine | Fireside Chat 280 · Honey Badger Radio

0:00
Speaker 1: Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, wherever you may be,
0:02
Speaker 1: and welcome back to Honey Badger Radio. My name is Brian,
0:05
Speaker 1: and this is the Fireside Chat, where we discuss interesting
0:09
Speaker 1: topics with interesting people. And today we're going to be
0:12
Speaker 1: talking to Philip C. Parrish, who is a Minnesota Republican
0:17
Speaker 1: that ran for governor and lieutenant governor in 2026. And
0:20
Speaker 1: the reason why this is of particular interest is because, well,
0:26
Speaker 1: he was... Well, probably the only politician I've ever heard
0:31
Speaker 1: of that challenged the Duluth model and even like wrote
0:36
Speaker 1: quite a bit on it. A little bit of information
0:39
Speaker 1: about Mr. Parrish, if you don't mind. Born in 1965
0:43
Speaker 1: in Blue Earth, Minnesota, grew up in West Concord and
0:46
Speaker 1: lives in Kenyon. He earned a bachelor's in education from
0:50
Speaker 1: Monaco State University and graduate degrees from Minnesota State University.
0:55
Speaker 1: He worked as a teacher and later as an administrator
0:58
Speaker 1: at Divine Mercy Catholic School in Faribault. He served in
1:01
Speaker 1: the U.S. Navy Reserve from 1998 to 2019, retiring as
1:05
Speaker 1: a lieutenant commander. His work was in intelligence, counterterrorism, and
1:09
Speaker 1: foreign policy. He has described about 11 years overseas on
1:14
Speaker 1: active duty, including work tracking money and careers, and says
1:19
Speaker 1: that experience led him to speak publicly about Minnesota child
1:22
Speaker 1: care and related fraud. after he came off orders in 2017. Politically,
1:28
Speaker 1: he ran for governor in 2018, sought the governorship again
1:32
Speaker 1: for 2026, and then ran for lieutenant governor on a
1:35
Speaker 1: ticket with Mike Lindell. Local coverage reported that ticket received
1:40
Speaker 1: a Trump endorsement. Ballotpedia lists you as losing the Republican
1:44
Speaker 1: primary for lieutenant governor on August 11, 2026, and notes
1:49
Speaker 1: that you did not appear on the ballot in the
1:51
Speaker 1: Republican gubernatorial primary. Um, so I, I, that was a lot,
1:56
Speaker 1: but welcome to the show, Philip Parish. Hopefully I didn't like, uh,
2:00
Speaker 1: I didn't get any of that wrong.
2:02
Speaker 2: Oh, you did great. That was awesome. Yeah. Well done.
2:06
Speaker 1: Well, thank you for coming on the show. And again, uh,
2:10
Speaker 1: you have made the Duluth model, a campaign theme, not
2:14
Speaker 1: a side note. You've written at least two long pieces
2:16
Speaker 1: on it, tied it to child protection and fraud and,
2:20
Speaker 1: And yeah, you're basically doing some interviews now and you
2:23
Speaker 1: also do some stuff on YouTube as well. I looked
2:26
Speaker 1: up your channel. So I guess, first of all, thank
2:29
Speaker 1: you so much for everything that you've done and especially
2:33
Speaker 1: for talking about these things that nobody wants to talk about,
2:37
Speaker 1: especially in politics.
2:40
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're welcome. Yeah, it's interesting how many people have
2:44
Speaker 2: started to come forward and start talking about these things openly.
2:49
Speaker 2: and being out on the campaign trail. And then the
2:52
Speaker 2: last couple of interviews I did, it's added to that
2:55
Speaker 2: momentum of people coming forward. There's a couple of people
2:58
Speaker 2: that have approached me from the program that you're aware
3:02
Speaker 2: of just a few days or a week or so ago.
3:05
Speaker 2: And I won't mention his name, but desperate situation for
3:09
Speaker 2: him and very relatable because of my experience personally and professionally.
3:15
Speaker 2: So it's good to talk about this stuff and hopefully
3:18
Speaker 2: more and more people will understand they're not alone and
3:21
Speaker 2: that we might not have a magic way to fix things.
3:25
Speaker 2: I'm not going to give anybody any false hope, but
3:28
Speaker 2: just the fact that they understand that they're not imagining things,
3:32
Speaker 2: it really is stacked against them. And it gives people
3:36
Speaker 2: a little hope just to understand they're not alone. Yeah. Yeah.
3:41
Speaker 1: So could you tell us it, when you got involved
3:45
Speaker 1: with the Duluth model or at least discussing the Duluth model, um,
3:50
Speaker 1: of the wheel of, uh, I believe it's the wheel
3:53
Speaker 1: of power and control or something like that. Is that,
3:54
Speaker 1: is that the, um, is that the way you would
3:56
Speaker 1: describe it?
3:57
Speaker 3: Yeah.
3:58
Speaker 2: Yeah.
3:58
Speaker 1: It's described rather.
4:00
Speaker 2: Yes.
4:01
Speaker 1: Yeah.
4:01
Speaker 2: It's, uh, go ahead, sir.
4:04
Speaker 1: Well, no, no. I was just going to ask, um,
4:07
Speaker 1: before we talk about the Duluth model itself, um, Did
4:11
Speaker 1: you have some kind of personal experience that put you
4:14
Speaker 1: on this path? What's the background? How did you get
4:18
Speaker 1: involved with discussing this topic?
4:20
Speaker 2: Yeah, very good. Let's set the stage. Many years ago,
4:25
Speaker 2: I had a very cursory knowledge of how Minnesota was
4:31
Speaker 2: handling children's and family and courts and family custody cases.
4:37
Speaker 2: I had some cursory knowledge, but because of my personal
4:41
Speaker 2: experience in my first marriage, I then, not knowing now
4:48
Speaker 2: how to define it, but then could see very clearly
4:51
Speaker 2: that the stack is, it's stacked against the father very
4:56
Speaker 2: badly here in Minnesota. And I didn't know all of
5:01
Speaker 2: the ins and outs about the Duluth model, but experienced
5:05
Speaker 2: it real time. So this was back in 1970. Um, 90, 96, 97,
5:13
Speaker 2: 98 is when I really started it personally experiencing how
5:19
Speaker 2: bad things were for parents here in Minnesota, especially fathers.
5:24
Speaker 2: And so my first, my first marriage ended in divorce
5:29
Speaker 2: and we were in and out of counseling for four years. And, um,
5:34
Speaker 2: the reason this is applicable to the context is because
5:38
Speaker 2: in that counseling um, what I was enduring, I was
5:43
Speaker 2: a victim of domestic violence for nearly 17 years and
5:48
Speaker 2: didn't call it domestic violence. I, I just kind of
5:52
Speaker 2: took it on the chin. I was a textbook enabler and,
5:57
Speaker 2: you know, I'm six foot four, 200 and then probably 240,
5:59
Speaker 2: 250 pounds.
5:59
Speaker 1: She was five something, you know, and, um, And this
6:08
Speaker 1: was your wife, I assume a spouse. Yeah. Yeah.
6:11
Speaker 2: At the time. And, and what was she really going
6:13
Speaker 2: to do to me? Well, I didn't look at it
6:17
Speaker 2: through the right lens. I was looking at it through
6:19
Speaker 2: a lens of until the two youngest, the two children
6:23
Speaker 2: at the time started seeing what was going on. Then
6:27
Speaker 2: it clicked in my brain. Finally, um, this is not cool.
6:31
Speaker 2: This is not appropriate. You know, dishes flying across the room,
6:34
Speaker 2: knives stuck in a wall. Um, being called ridiculous names,
6:38
Speaker 2: being woken up at all hours of the night, verbal abuse,
6:43
Speaker 2: physical abuse. And I just kept enduring, enduring, enduring. And
6:48
Speaker 2: then just finally, after four years of in and out
6:52
Speaker 2: of counseling, one of the last counseling appointments, the counselor
6:57
Speaker 2: was asking me about, well, how did it feel when
7:00
Speaker 2: she did such and such and such? And after four
7:03
Speaker 2: years of this, and it felt like a groundhog day,
7:07
Speaker 2: waking up to the same tune. And I looked at
7:10
Speaker 2: him and I said, you know what? I felt like
7:12
Speaker 2: I could have reacted and done something back to her
7:16
Speaker 2: and not felt a thing.
7:18
Speaker 3: Oh my goodness. The end of the world came. Counseling
7:22
Speaker 3: session stopped.
7:24
Speaker 2: He says, I've never recommended this, but I think I'm
7:27
Speaker 2: going to recommend a separation. And I sat there and
7:30
Speaker 2: just stunned. And I'm thinking to myself, Four years of
7:34
Speaker 2: listening to how she's abused me. And not once did
7:38
Speaker 2: you stop a counseling session. Not once did you recommend separation.
7:42
Speaker 2: Four years of listening to how I was being beat up,
7:46
Speaker 2: called names, dishes thrown at me, knives thrown at me.
7:52
Speaker 2: Behavior that I would have been in prison for. Just
7:55
Speaker 2: one of those events I would have been in prison for.
7:57
Speaker 2: And I say, yeah, I felt pretty bad.
8:02
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah.
8:03
Speaker 2: If I, if I had done that to her and
8:06
Speaker 2: now I speak up and I say, yeah, you know what?
8:08
Speaker 2: I could have retaliated and not felt the thing. And
8:10
Speaker 2: all of a sudden the train stops. I was just dumbfounded.
8:15
Speaker 2: I was crushed. I was like, well, wait a minute.
8:18
Speaker 2: You've been listening to all this for four years. And
8:21
Speaker 2: now finally, now you're listening because I'm saying, yeah, I
8:25
Speaker 2: could have reacted.
8:26
Speaker 3: What did you expect out.
8:27
Speaker 2: Of me for four years? You know, 17, including dating.
8:31
Speaker 2: And it just, it just really disturbed me. And I
8:34
Speaker 2: drove home that luckily we were in separate cars that day.
8:38
Speaker 2: And I drove home that day and I knew in
8:40
Speaker 2: my heart that it was over. It was done because
8:43
Speaker 2: I just, it just finally, my, my false perceptions and my,
8:49
Speaker 2: the lens that I was looking through finally just opened
8:54
Speaker 2: up and the cloud disappeared. And I started to see
8:57
Speaker 2: more clearly what was going on here. And I knew that,
9:00
Speaker 2: the end result was, was at hand and I knew
9:04
Speaker 2: it would end in divorce. And then I spent the next, well,
9:07
Speaker 2: I lost everything. I, I lost retirement. I lost all savings.
9:11
Speaker 2: Everything was gone trying to get, and I was one
9:15
Speaker 2: of the lucky men in the, in this state. I
9:18
Speaker 2: was able to retain a joint legal and joint physical
9:22
Speaker 2: custody because, and it took almost two years of fighting
9:26
Speaker 2: in court, but I did nothing wrong. And when we
9:30
Speaker 2: asked for the counseling notes to be part of the
9:32
Speaker 2: court hearing, lo and behold, everything gets redacted about what
9:37
Speaker 2: her violence towards me is all redacted and blacked out.
9:42
Speaker 2: But if it had been the other way, you know,
9:46
Speaker 2: that wouldn't have happened. I would have been arrested if
9:50
Speaker 2: I had done the things that she did. I would
9:52
Speaker 2: have been arrested and never seen my children again.
9:56
Speaker 3: And do you know?
9:58
Speaker 1: I'm sorry. What were you aware? Is this how you
10:02
Speaker 1: got exposed to Duluth model? Like like was there like
10:06
Speaker 1: like I don't know, like a specific thing that made
10:08
Speaker 1: you say, well, why? Why are the laws this way
10:12
Speaker 1: or why? Why is it set up this way? Is
10:14
Speaker 1: that like how you ended up going down this road?
10:18
Speaker 2: Yeah, at the time, I didn't realize it was called
10:21
Speaker 2: the Duluth model. I was exposed to it through my
10:24
Speaker 2: divorce and through the custody. I was exposed to it
10:28
Speaker 2: because I was a teacher and then becoming a principal.
10:30
Speaker 2: I was exposed to how they were essentially in a
10:34
Speaker 2: biased way. Men were guilty of being this primary perpetrator
10:40
Speaker 2: and this power and control wheel that they use to
10:43
Speaker 2: analyze who's at fault and it's biased towards a man.
10:47
Speaker 2: I started being exposed to it, not knowing all the terms. Well,
10:51
Speaker 2: fast forward in life, I get to this point now
10:53
Speaker 2: where I've been running for office and I've been talking
10:56
Speaker 2: with people across the state. And I happened to develop
10:59
Speaker 2: a couple of really good friends that are part of
11:01
Speaker 2: my team now, or I consider them a part of
11:03
Speaker 2: my team. And they had talked more openly about the
11:07
Speaker 2: Duluth model. And as I was learning and growing in
11:11
Speaker 2: this last couple of years of doing the research that
11:14
Speaker 2: I do and helping people with investigations that I help with,
11:18
Speaker 2: it became more and more of a daily subject. So
11:22
Speaker 2: not knowing it back in 1998, I was fully immersed
11:28
Speaker 2: in the aftermath of Duluth model and didn't realize it
11:33
Speaker 2: fully until just the last several years now. But that's
11:37
Speaker 2: how it all built because of personal experience and then
11:39
Speaker 2: research and then helping others try to deal with this
11:43
Speaker 2: stack deck against men. Yeah.
11:45
Speaker 1: Unfortunately, that is how people get activated in this, uh,
11:50
Speaker 1: in this particular space. They, they have a personal experience
11:53
Speaker 1: and they say, wait a minute, this is, this is
11:55
Speaker 1: wrong in that time. Where did the police ever get involved? Like,
12:00
Speaker 1: did someone call the police? Um, At any point with
12:04
Speaker 1: all the, you know, the, I guess you could just
12:06
Speaker 1: say the violence that was going on in your house.
12:09
Speaker 2: Yeah. So, um, the only time that police got directly
12:13
Speaker 2: involved was right towards the decision to go to, um,
12:17
Speaker 2: a separation. And I agreed that I was gonna, I
12:22
Speaker 2: took a different teaching job. I moved to another city
12:25
Speaker 2: and there was a discussion. Essentially, if people are aware
12:30
Speaker 2: of how a cycle of abuse works, the abuser gets
12:35
Speaker 2: you wrapped up in this cycle. And then they, oh,
12:37
Speaker 2: they're sorry, but then they're not sorry. And it just
12:40
Speaker 2: starts all over again. And I was, like I said,
12:43
Speaker 2: a textbook enabler. Well, I decided, okay, I understand the
12:49
Speaker 2: cycle now and I'm breaking it, which for many people
12:53
Speaker 2: can attest to this, the person that's the abuser starts
12:56
Speaker 2: to escalate even farther. And so an incident arrived where
13:00
Speaker 2: luckily I didn't have to be present for where my
13:05
Speaker 2: ex-wife had actually gotten into an issue with my mother
13:09
Speaker 2: and the police were called. And it turned out, and
13:12
Speaker 2: thank goodness I wasn't there. And thank goodness, this sounds
13:16
Speaker 2: strange maybe, but thanks goodness it was my mother that
13:19
Speaker 2: was there. Because if it had been the other way
13:25
Speaker 2: around where I was present, I know from the incident
13:28
Speaker 2: that I would have been immediately taken aside as the
13:32
Speaker 2: potential victim. harm to the situation. But by the grace
13:37
Speaker 2: of God, my mother was there and she had threatened
13:41
Speaker 2: to kill my mother and she had threatened a list
13:44
Speaker 2: of just embarrassing things. And the law enforcement in that situation,
13:49
Speaker 2: and even now as I'm speaking about it, I just
13:53
Speaker 2: am totally grateful that it's kind of a Holy Spirit
13:58
Speaker 2: moment because it's lucky that I wasn't there that day. Otherwise, yeah,
14:03
Speaker 2: things could have really because again, she was escalating as
14:07
Speaker 2: I was pulling myself out of this cycle of violence.
14:10
Speaker 2: She just became more and more aggressive and she took
14:14
Speaker 2: it out on my mother that day. And if it
14:19
Speaker 2: had been that day where she had taken it out
14:21
Speaker 2: on me, it might have turned out to be a
14:23
Speaker 2: different story.
14:24
Speaker 1: Mm hmm. Mm hmm. Was she struggling real quick, uh, on,
14:30
Speaker 1: on your wife? Then we're going to move into the
14:31
Speaker 1: model itself, but was she, um, I don't know, uh,
14:34
Speaker 1: struggling with like any addictions, like, was she like an
14:38
Speaker 1: alcoholic or something or.
14:39
Speaker 3: No, um, I I'll be short tempered, I guess.
14:44
Speaker 2: I'll be very delicate in saying this because I, I
14:47
Speaker 2: am not a psychiatrist, although I have a lot of,
14:51
Speaker 2: of very, um, substance of experience, a lot of experience
14:57
Speaker 2: in this area. She was what many today would use
15:04
Speaker 2: the term borderline personality, or they would use the term,
15:09
Speaker 2: you know, some people way back when would say split personalities,
15:14
Speaker 2: but they don't use that term anymore. What I'm suggesting
15:19
Speaker 2: is that she She took on a persona in certain
15:24
Speaker 2: circumstances depending on who was present. And she used that
15:29
Speaker 2: as a way to get what she wanted her way.
15:34
Speaker 2: And it was a style of behavior or a behavioral
15:39
Speaker 2: pattern that from an early age that I just never
15:42
Speaker 2: picked up on until late in life.
15:45
Speaker 1: Yeah.
15:47
Speaker 2: But no chemical abuse that I knew of. anyway.
15:52
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, it's fine. So, um, you date the model,
15:58
Speaker 1: the Duluth model to 1977 and name Pence, Paymar and McDonald.
16:06
Speaker 1: What specifically did they admit about confirmation bias? And is
16:09
Speaker 1: that their own writing or your reading of the wheels?
16:13
Speaker 2: Wow, that's really cool that you got all that. You
16:15
Speaker 2: have that pulled up.
16:15
Speaker 3: Perfect. So I'd encourage people to actually.
16:17
Speaker 2: Read the articles I've written about this because my memory
16:20
Speaker 2: of stating scripture in verse, so to speak, is not
16:25
Speaker 2: going to be really good. But the point is they started,
16:27
Speaker 2: they based their model off of research that they many
16:32
Speaker 2: years later had to admit was biased research. They had
16:37
Speaker 2: to admit, they were forced to admit that much of
16:40
Speaker 2: their model was not functioning or working the way they
16:44
Speaker 2: intended or articulated. Um, that to me was a, um,
16:50
Speaker 2: indication of, yeah, I, I don't know them personally and,
16:55
Speaker 2: and who knows where they're at emotionally or spiritually or
16:59
Speaker 2: intellectually now, but when a, when a person demonstrates a,
17:02
Speaker 2: a behavior where they then double down and triple down,
17:06
Speaker 2: even after they've been forced to admit that their research
17:10
Speaker 2: is biased or their experiences is faulty and they, they
17:14
Speaker 2: just continue on that to me as a person that
17:17
Speaker 2: has some ill intent or an ax to grind, or again,
17:22
Speaker 2: I don't know these people personally, maybe they just simply
17:25
Speaker 2: had in their life experiences like many of us have.
17:30
Speaker 2: And that was their way of coping with the situation
17:33
Speaker 2: of trying to explain what happened to them and how
17:35
Speaker 2: to deal with what happened to them.
17:38
Speaker 3: Well, That may or.
17:40
Speaker 2: May not be a rational way to approach these relationships
17:44
Speaker 2: that fall apart. But at the end of the day,
17:48
Speaker 2: when you're forced to admit that, hey, you have a
17:51
Speaker 2: bias here that's causing harm and you don't change course
17:57
Speaker 2: or you don't open yourself up to a new way
17:58
Speaker 2: of doing business, there's a bit of an ill intent
18:02
Speaker 2: there that whether they're consciously admitting to it or not,
18:05
Speaker 2: there's some ill intent there.
18:08
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah. And you would think, again, if you're going
18:10
Speaker 1: to try and do something objective, that you'd be cognizant
18:15
Speaker 1: and aware of your own biases so that you don't
18:18
Speaker 1: do something, you know, create some policy that's incredibly unjust,
18:22
Speaker 1: which is kind of what the Duluth model is. So
18:26
Speaker 1: the power and control wheel lists using male privilege as
18:30
Speaker 1: one of the tactics and labels the victim her. If
18:34
Speaker 1: you are writing the replacement protocol for Minnesota officers and prosecutors,
18:40
Speaker 1: What would you change about that?
18:42
Speaker 2: I would use language more like abuser and victim. And
18:47
Speaker 2: it's not gender based. It's not color based. It's not
18:50
Speaker 2: race based. It's not religious based. It's an abuser, a
18:54
Speaker 2: person that knowingly is causing abuse or manipulation or coercion,
19:00
Speaker 2: uses behavior patterns of abuse versus a person who is
19:05
Speaker 2: suffering from those actions and behaviors. It's not gender based.
19:10
Speaker 2: It's not race based. It's not color based. It's not
19:14
Speaker 2: origins based. It's behaviors of a person, a decent person
19:19
Speaker 2: versus a person that is, even when they're not knowingly
19:23
Speaker 2: understanding that they're being abusive, you can, if you have
19:27
Speaker 2: the proper way to frame it, you can start, for example,
19:32
Speaker 2: the counseling. I'll use the counseling sessions that we were in.
19:36
Speaker 2: If the counselor at the time had used a more
19:42
Speaker 2: pragmatic and open-minded approach, he would have identified and started
19:48
Speaker 2: using the language immediately. You are, I'm struggling a little
19:53
Speaker 2: bit because I'm trying hard to not name names because
19:56
Speaker 2: I don't want to embarrass people. So if I'm pausing,
20:00
Speaker 2: it's because I'm removing the name from my sentence. Person A,
20:05
Speaker 2: I've been listening to you for four years. You're clearly
20:08
Speaker 2: abusing your husband. You are an abuser and your husband
20:13
Speaker 2: is an enabler. And if he had started using that
20:17
Speaker 2: kind of language early on, there might have been a
20:21
Speaker 2: different outcome because maybe then he would have approached the
20:25
Speaker 2: conversation with her in a way that helped her identify
20:30
Speaker 2: what her behavior patterns were. Because it wasn't about gender.
20:34
Speaker 2: It was about the fact that she was coercive, manipulative, dishonest.
20:39
Speaker 2: And these behavior patterns are what led to the escalation
20:43
Speaker 2: of violence. And when she couldn't get her way, the
20:46
Speaker 2: more violent she would become. And so my simple way
20:53
Speaker 2: of saying it is to use the basic appropriate language.
20:57
Speaker 2: Who is being abusive here? Or discovering who's actually being abusive.
21:01
Speaker 2: Because one of the things I know, not just from
21:04
Speaker 2: my relationships, but from teaching and from being a principal,
21:07
Speaker 2: And in my time as a military, people are very
21:11
Speaker 2: clever at being dishonest. And they'll be so dishonest that
21:14
Speaker 2: they've convinced themselves that their story or their paradigm is
21:19
Speaker 2: the truth, even though they're faced with overwhelming evidence that
21:23
Speaker 2: they're clearly being dishonest. There's a human condition in there
21:31
Speaker 2: that is hard to cope with because, yes, can people
21:36
Speaker 2: get caught up in, in, in a pattern of behavior
21:39
Speaker 2: that where they somewhat don't fully understand what they've, what
21:43
Speaker 2: they're doing. I agree. And with, with, and I'm a
21:46
Speaker 2: Christian and with grace and mercy, all of us have
21:49
Speaker 2: a chance to understand that, Oh, wait a minute.
21:52
Speaker 3: Light bulb goes on.
21:53
Speaker 2: I was, I was a nasty person and I, I'm
21:58
Speaker 2: now I'm starting to get it. I'm starting to see it.
22:00
Speaker 2: You know, that would be the hope for all relationships, male, female, And,
22:07
Speaker 2: you know, long marriages or short marriages or just beginning relationships,
22:12
Speaker 2: you know, the hope would be that grace and mercy
22:15
Speaker 2: would be a strong part of the relationship where someone
22:19
Speaker 2: would realize, hey, you know what, I've been really a jerk.
22:21
Speaker 2: And now the Duluth model, back to that, these people
22:26
Speaker 2: that developed this model in my own simple language, I'm
22:29
Speaker 2: suggesting to you, they got themselves caught in this situation
22:32
Speaker 2: where you have these violent, dishonest people. that used them
22:37
Speaker 2: or exploited them or coerced them. And their reaction to
22:40
Speaker 2: this was then all men are bad. Well, it's oversimplistic,
22:47
Speaker 2: but you get the gist of what has happened. It's
22:50
Speaker 2: behavior patterns. And I would replace it with identifying the behavior.
22:54
Speaker 1: Yeah.
22:55
Speaker 3: Yeah, I agree.
22:57
Speaker 1: I think, you know, language is very important using the
23:00
Speaker 1: correct words when you are describing something. Um, this, where,
23:05
Speaker 1: when you get ambiguous is it's very easy to exploit that. Um,
23:10
Speaker 1: I might be a little bit less charitable than you.
23:12
Speaker 1: I think that when you use words like male privilege
23:15
Speaker 1: to describe something that you, you should be able to
23:19
Speaker 1: measure objectively, but you're using this kind of like very, um,
23:24
Speaker 1: vague term that's, that's very postmodern male privilege. I think
23:29
Speaker 1: that there's gotta be an agenda behind that. And, and
23:32
Speaker 1: to just drive that home, the editor, I think she
23:36
Speaker 1: was the editor in chief of Ms. Magazine. And this
23:40
Speaker 1: is like from about 10 years ago, was doing an
23:43
Speaker 1: interview and they were asking, she was being asked about
23:47
Speaker 1: what domestic violence is. And she said that they don't
23:52
Speaker 1: use domestic violence because they're That's a little bit too
23:56
Speaker 1: gender neutral and that you should just use the word
23:58
Speaker 1: wife beating, which basically just means man guilty. And of course,
24:03
Speaker 1: we know that in most domestic situations, it's bidirectional. Like
24:08
Speaker 1: usually in most cases, it's both parties that are violent.
24:12
Speaker 1: And that's sort of like and again, it's a behavior issue.
24:15
Speaker 1: It has nothing to do with your sex. But yeah,
24:19
Speaker 1: I think that the use of the term male privilege
24:22
Speaker 1: is very loaded and it has a sociological and, you know,
24:29
Speaker 1: this kind of like, I don't know, liberal arts background
24:33
Speaker 1: to it, in my opinion. So I don't know if you,
24:36
Speaker 1: you know, want to push back on that. That's fine.
24:38
Speaker 1: But that's what I think.
24:39
Speaker 2: No, you're right on track because the male privilege sentence,
24:43
Speaker 2: you're correct. It's it has ill intent in that structure
24:47
Speaker 2: of that sentence because you're immediately then back to the bias.
24:51
Speaker 2: All men bad. Yes.
24:53
Speaker 3: All men have privilege.
24:55
Speaker 2: And it's the same thing is being played out now
24:57
Speaker 2: in all of this gender stuff and all of this.
25:00
Speaker 1: And I think that's the intent.
25:02
Speaker 2: Yeah.
25:03
Speaker 1: Yeah. I think the intent is to divide men and
25:07
Speaker 1: women against each other. If you can get men and
25:09
Speaker 1: women to or you only you don't have to do both.
25:13
Speaker 1: You don't have to do one. If you can just
25:14
Speaker 1: get women to be afraid of, suspicious of and angry
25:19
Speaker 1: at men. then you don't even have to go down
25:24
Speaker 1: any other roads. You don't have to do anything with race.
25:26
Speaker 1: You don't have to do anything with sexual orientation. You
25:29
Speaker 1: can just focus on men and women. And I think
25:30
Speaker 1: that'll do a tremendous amount of damage. And it is
25:33
Speaker 1: doing damage because we can see that by the divorce rates,
25:37
Speaker 1: the dropping marriage rates, the birth rates, like all these
25:42
Speaker 1: things are really happening.
25:44
Speaker 2: All right.
25:49
Speaker 1: So Minnesota already tells agencies to discourage dual arrest and
25:52
Speaker 1: weigh self-defense under, I think it's Article 629.342. Duluth later
26:00
Speaker 1: added predominant aggressor rules because women were being arrested. See,
26:05
Speaker 1: this was the reason why they brought it in because
26:07
Speaker 1: too many women were being found guilty of domestic violence.
26:11
Speaker 1: So they had to change it because it shouldn't be
26:13
Speaker 1: that way because, again, their bias said no men are
26:16
Speaker 1: the abusers. Why are women getting arrested? So are you
26:21
Speaker 1: are you repealing mandatory or preferred arrest, rewriting predominant aggressor
26:25
Speaker 1: training or both?
26:28
Speaker 3: I personally writing. I would certainly advise. Oh, yeah.
26:32
Speaker 1: I mean, discussing, I guess.
26:34
Speaker 2: Yeah, I would certainly advise legislators to expose exactly what
26:38
Speaker 2: you just talked about and how that came about. And
26:40
Speaker 2: that's how you create understanding and and create a way
26:44
Speaker 2: to pull apart that legislation and rework it. is to
26:47
Speaker 2: create an understanding of how that originated. And you're right.
26:51
Speaker 2: And that's where I'm saying they doubled down and tripled
26:54
Speaker 2: down on their model, even though they were faced with
26:57
Speaker 2: overwhelming evidence that their model was broken. If you really
27:01
Speaker 2: look at the statistics of violence, women are as guilty
27:07
Speaker 2: or more guilty of domestic violence than men in true statistics.
27:12
Speaker 1: Yes.
27:13
Speaker 3: And so.
27:14
Speaker 2: this idea that it just can't, like you perfectly said,
27:18
Speaker 2: it just can't be this way. And like, well, we
27:20
Speaker 2: got to do something different because why is the women
27:22
Speaker 2: getting arrested? Well, so yeah, I couldn't say it any
27:26
Speaker 2: better than what you just articulated. It's, um, and it
27:29
Speaker 2: does need to be pulled apart. And again, it comes
27:32
Speaker 2: down to behaviors and it doesn't matter race, color, creed,
27:36
Speaker 2: or gender. It doesn't matter if you are a violent,
27:39
Speaker 2: dishonest person, you are the one that should be, um,
27:44
Speaker 2: working with law enforcement to correct your behavior if it
27:47
Speaker 2: gets to that point.
27:48
Speaker 1: Yeah, 100%. You also talked about the cost. So you
27:53
Speaker 1: put the cost, and maybe you can sort of explain
27:56
Speaker 1: this for the audience to what we mean, at $ 110
28:00
Speaker 1: billion since 1977. So walk us through the arithmetic for that.
28:06
Speaker 2: So what we have is, and this is connected to
28:09
Speaker 2: one of your earlier questions, we have an incentivized system
28:15
Speaker 2: and that incentivized system plays out in the courts. It
28:19
Speaker 2: plays out in child protection. It plays out then in
28:23
Speaker 2: custody hearings and in custody support. It plays out in
28:26
Speaker 2: how the families are dealt with at a domestic level.
28:29
Speaker 2: And then agencies are built in, in, in effort to,
28:34
Speaker 2: to help with this situation. Um, I do a lot
28:38
Speaker 2: of writing on a different subject that I'm going to
28:40
Speaker 2: use to relate to the same concept. I call the
28:44
Speaker 2: economy that we're suffering under is a Munchausen by proxy economy.
28:49
Speaker 2: In other words, the abuser or the person, the caregiver
28:53
Speaker 2: intends for the child to be sick. They keep the
28:56
Speaker 2: child sick so that they can play rescuer.
29:00
Speaker 3: Apply the same principle to this situation.
29:03
Speaker 2: They don't mind that the families are constantly in court,
29:07
Speaker 2: constantly in the system. The system grows. The children don't
29:11
Speaker 2: belong to the parents. The children belong to the state,
29:14
Speaker 2: so on and so forth. I'm oversimplifying a complex set
29:17
Speaker 2: of timeline that happens over the course of a family
29:24
Speaker 2: kind of dissolving. But that's the end state is the
29:29
Speaker 2: state then becomes this munchausen by proxy system. Savior to
29:34
Speaker 2: the situation, but they're actually incentivizing the problem to exasperate.
29:40
Speaker 2: and expand and continue. They're not really doing anything to
29:44
Speaker 2: solve the root problem.
29:46
Speaker 1: They're kind of creating the problem and then selling a placebo,
29:49
Speaker 1: but benefiting financially. Is that what you're getting at? It's
29:53
Speaker 1: like fraud, but in multiple steps. Is that it? So, yeah,
29:58
Speaker 1: not much different from what was going on with the
30:00
Speaker 1: Learing Center.
30:01
Speaker 3: Yeah, right.
30:02
Speaker 1: In Minnesota, by the way. Right, right.
30:04
Speaker 3: Yeah.
30:07
Speaker 1: And VAWA. VAWA's getting some of this money too, right?
30:11
Speaker 1: VAWA's the Violence Against Women Association, I think. Yeah. They're
30:15
Speaker 1: a big benefactor.
30:16
Speaker 3: Yeah.
30:17
Speaker 2: Multiple LLCs and NGOs in Minnesota. There are so many
30:23
Speaker 2: Save the World NGOs and Save the World LLCs that
30:26
Speaker 2: have been that have been stood up and organized in
30:30
Speaker 2: this state, you'd think we would have saved the world
30:32
Speaker 2: by now. I mean, how many, the quote that you
30:36
Speaker 2: have from the piece, you know, billions of dollars have
30:39
Speaker 2: been spent. You'd think we would have solved all the
30:41
Speaker 2: world's problems by now. We just need more agencies.
30:45
Speaker 3: We just need a bigger program of the state control program.
30:48
Speaker 3: And we'll fix it. We'll fix it. I promise we'll
30:50
Speaker 3: fix it.
30:51
Speaker 2: It's like a snake oil salesman going walking, walking into
30:55
Speaker 2: a village a hundred years ago and selling you the
30:59
Speaker 2: next greatest elixir to save your life. It's that crazy.
31:03
Speaker 3: It's really that crazy.
31:05
Speaker 1: I believe it. So like name the programs you would audit.
31:11
Speaker 1: So I was thinking like there's a fraud problem and
31:13
Speaker 1: I know this is a very big problem. It's also
31:16
Speaker 1: a much older problem than people think. Some people are
31:19
Speaker 1: discovering this very recently. I think this has been going
31:23
Speaker 1: on for a long time. So I'm not asking for
31:26
Speaker 1: miracles here, but what are some programs that you would
31:31
Speaker 1: audit in year one? Let's say you had the ability
31:34
Speaker 1: to do it. Domestic abuse intervention programs, specific batterer classes,
31:39
Speaker 1: county CCR contracts, something like that. What are some things
31:45
Speaker 1: that really need to be audited?
31:48
Speaker 2: So The problem is so systemic and so massive, I'm
31:53
Speaker 2: going to oversimplify it to have a starting point. Because
31:58
Speaker 2: this same question was put to me as a candidate
32:01
Speaker 2: for governor, and it's everything from this subject to education
32:05
Speaker 2: to law enforcement. My starting point as an investigator is, first,
32:11
Speaker 2: I want to see where the money is going and
32:16
Speaker 2: to who. And the programs and or initiatives that have
32:22
Speaker 2: little or no contact, direct contact with a person, a
32:27
Speaker 2: human being, example, children in schools. If you have a
32:32
Speaker 2: bureaucracy that is so massive and they never set foot
32:38
Speaker 2: in a classroom, this is an easy illustration for everyone
32:41
Speaker 2: to get their heads wrapped around. That would be the
32:44
Speaker 2: part of the agency I would go after first. So
32:47
Speaker 2: in domestic violence, whether it's abuse or whether it's the
32:50
Speaker 2: law enforcement, if there's no direct contact with people, it's
32:55
Speaker 2: all just theory and spreadsheets and people having nice meetings
33:00
Speaker 2: about what the next agenda is. That would be the
33:03
Speaker 2: basic part of the business model that needs to be
33:07
Speaker 2: exposed and dismantled first. Because the people that are actually
33:13
Speaker 2: doing the work with children and families are or counselors,
33:16
Speaker 2: or people that are providing assistance, they're not usually the problem.
33:20
Speaker 2: Some of them are misguided because their training is poor
33:23
Speaker 2: or because they have a bad experience themselves. But the
33:26
Speaker 2: bureaucracy behind the scenes, this massive, massive amount of bureaucracy
33:30
Speaker 2: behind the scenes that never touches the life, the true
33:34
Speaker 2: life of a real person, the father or the mother
33:37
Speaker 2: or the children, that needs to be investigated first because
33:42
Speaker 2: they know that they're grifting. and I use the word
33:45
Speaker 2: grifting in a very simplistic way. You're grifting off of
33:49
Speaker 2: a program or a system to maintain a six figure
33:52
Speaker 2: salary that has providing no benefit to anyone in the public.
33:58
Speaker 1: Yeah.
33:59
Speaker 3: That's one.
34:00
Speaker 1: Most of this is, if not all of this is
34:01
Speaker 1: taxpayer money too.
34:03
Speaker 3: Right.
34:03
Speaker 2: Right.
34:04
Speaker 1: It's not like earned.
34:05
Speaker 2: And that's, That's the one category that's a little more involved,
34:09
Speaker 2: a little depth. The easy category to get after is
34:13
Speaker 2: just like when I was exposing as a whistleblower, the
34:17
Speaker 2: daycare fraud, the lists and lists and lists of fake
34:21
Speaker 2: companies that were providing services. They're not providing, they're not
34:25
Speaker 2: actually interacting. They're turning in bills for services they never
34:30
Speaker 2: provided for clients that never existed.
34:32
Speaker 3: Those are easy.
34:34
Speaker 2: You can find those. If somebody turned me loose in
34:37
Speaker 2: the state of Minnesota to show you all of the
34:40
Speaker 2: counselors and violence protection, all the children and families, the
34:47
Speaker 2: child protection stuff where they allegedly are doing this, this,
34:50
Speaker 2: and this for state contracts, and they don't really have
34:54
Speaker 2: any clients, those are easy to uncover. Embarrassing for the state,
34:59
Speaker 2: embarrassing for the agency, child protection has themselves This isn't
35:04
Speaker 2: just a money thing in like the daycare fraud and
35:07
Speaker 2: the housing fraud and all that. This is a fraud of,
35:12
Speaker 2: you know, industrial scale fraud of creating a system that
35:17
Speaker 2: doesn't really provide services. And those people in the child
35:21
Speaker 2: protection services, they have the same problem that they've had
35:24
Speaker 2: in the other agencies. And they just don't talk about
35:28
Speaker 2: it because it's too delicate.
35:29
Speaker 3: Of a, oh my goodness, you mean we have, you.
35:31
Speaker 2: Know, 50 companies providing services that never provided any real services.
35:36
Speaker 2: And they're sucking that money out of the system into
35:39
Speaker 2: things that aren't doing anybody any good.
35:41
Speaker 3: Yes, that's true.
35:43
Speaker 2: That's not hyperbole. That's a fact. And it's very embarrassing
35:46
Speaker 2: for the state. It's very embarrassing for child protective services,
35:50
Speaker 2: but that's just one example of, of this, this, um,
35:55
Speaker 2: business model that they've created that, um, And then there's
35:59
Speaker 2: another layer to it that, you know, they might be
36:01
Speaker 2: doing okay work, but is it really productive?
36:04
Speaker 3: Is it really meeting the needs?
36:06
Speaker 2: And they don't want to look at themselves because, well,
36:10
Speaker 2: if we look at ourselves and we admit that we're
36:12
Speaker 2: not being very effective, well, we're going to lose our funding.
36:14
Speaker 2: It's kind of like, I don't know what your experience
36:17
Speaker 2: is with budgeting, but when budget cycles come around and,
36:21
Speaker 2: you know, at a school district, you're often, oh, spend
36:23
Speaker 2: the money, spend the money, because if we don't spend
36:25
Speaker 2: the money, we're going to get told we don't have
36:26
Speaker 2: money next year. Yeah.
36:28
Speaker 1: Yeah.
36:28
Speaker 2: Yeah.
36:29
Speaker 3: That whole style of.
36:30
Speaker 2: Thinking, it becomes a systemic issue throughout, especially public programs.
36:36
Speaker 2: If we don't do this, we don't do that. We're
36:38
Speaker 2: not going to have the money next year. Well, wasn't
36:41
Speaker 2: the whole purpose of helping people. So you wouldn't have to,
36:44
Speaker 2: you should be working yourself out of a job. Quite frankly,
36:47
Speaker 2: you should be working yourself out of a job, but
36:50
Speaker 2: that's not the way things work. And, And some people
36:54
Speaker 2: don't have the ethics and morals to look at it
36:58
Speaker 2: the proper way. And so, yeah, I would start with
37:03
Speaker 2: the obvious things where there's fake services, there's fake clients.
37:08
Speaker 2: And then I would dig into the parts of the
37:12
Speaker 2: agencies that are pure bloat. They're pure bureaucratic bloat and
37:16
Speaker 2: they never touch a child's life or a couple's life.
37:20
Speaker 2: They never really do any direct service.
37:27
Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely. You shared a ticket with Mike Lindell. I
37:33
Speaker 1: don't know if you spent time with him or whatever.
37:36
Speaker 1: I assume that you did. Was he also on board
37:41
Speaker 1: with this, I guess you could call it, attempt to
37:44
Speaker 1: reform the Duluth model? I assume that was one of
37:47
Speaker 1: your central goals, one of the main things you were
37:50
Speaker 1: running on at the time. And I'm curious, like, was
37:53
Speaker 1: he also supportive of this? And were there other men
37:59
Speaker 1: or women in politics that were also, you know, they had,
38:03
Speaker 1: they took the same issues with either Duluth model itself
38:07
Speaker 1: or in general, the sort of state of families and,
38:12
Speaker 1: you know, all of the various sort of issues with that,
38:14
Speaker 1: because you're the only politician that I'm aware of that
38:18
Speaker 1: even talks about this. Or at least, you know, I
38:21
Speaker 1: don't know, you're still a politician. Technically, you're not right now.
38:23
Speaker 1: But you know what I mean?
38:24
Speaker 2: Yeah. I have spoken with Mike personally about some of
38:29
Speaker 2: these things. He has read some of the pieces I've done.
38:31
Speaker 2: I don't think that he he has been primarily focused
38:35
Speaker 2: on election integrity. He's been primarily focused on the money
38:40
Speaker 2: laundering and fraud. Yeah.
38:43
Speaker 3: He never made this part of.
38:46
Speaker 2: The concerns a centerpiece of his dialogue or discussion. I'm
38:51
Speaker 2: not saying he wouldn't, but it's not. So in all fairness,
38:56
Speaker 2: I would agree with you. And if it sounds boastful,
38:59
Speaker 2: I'm not being boastful. I'm just stating fact. I am
39:04
Speaker 2: one of few people that have run for office or
39:09
Speaker 2: have attempted to run for office that speak about this
39:12
Speaker 2: at all. And I think it's because people are scared
39:14
Speaker 2: of this subject.
39:15
Speaker 1: I was just going to say, is it political suicide?
39:19
Speaker 3: Because.
39:21
Speaker 1: It seems to me that if you wanna win elections,
39:26
Speaker 1: and I don't think it's a losing strategy to wanna, save,
39:30
Speaker 1: I don't know, families, because I think ultimately that's what
39:33
Speaker 1: the Duluth model does. It kind of destroys families because
39:37
Speaker 1: you put potentially innocent men, you separate them from their children,
39:43
Speaker 1: you expose them to violence because we can't see women
39:45
Speaker 1: as abusers, you know? But if you don't appeal to
39:52
Speaker 1: the female vote, then you can't win. And I wonder
39:58
Speaker 1: how many politicians, how many people there are that would
40:03
Speaker 1: like to be able to run on something like that,
40:06
Speaker 1: but they don't feel like they can because they're afraid
40:09
Speaker 1: it's going to kill their career. Supporting men is political suicide,
40:12
Speaker 1: I guess is what I'm wondering about.
40:14
Speaker 3: I would agree.
40:16
Speaker 2: I mean, I think that there's a level of fear
40:19
Speaker 2: out there, men and women politicians, because I think there
40:24
Speaker 2: are some good women out there that would like to
40:25
Speaker 2: confront this subject, but they don't dare. So it's not
40:28
Speaker 2: just men, but they don't dare confront the subject because
40:35
Speaker 2: what if they're wrong? And here's the sad fact. There's
40:40
Speaker 2: that one man out of 100, one man out of 1,000
40:43
Speaker 2: that proves all of the theories wrong. in the minds
40:46
Speaker 2: of the creators of the Duluth model that proves them right. That,
40:50
Speaker 2: you know, and here you did it again, you supported
40:53
Speaker 2: men and then look what happened. And this man did
40:55
Speaker 2: this and they ignore all the data about the women
40:59
Speaker 2: that they've overlooked and the harm. Just like the, just,
41:03
Speaker 2: just the trial we had with the lady that strangled
41:07
Speaker 2: three of her children. I mean, the discussions that came
41:10
Speaker 2: to my desk and the text messages and the Facebook
41:13
Speaker 2: messages and the messenger messages, all about how this woman
41:17
Speaker 2: behaved and how she murdered her children, but we're supposed
41:20
Speaker 2: to feel sorry for her and, and she didn't really
41:23
Speaker 2: do it.
41:23
Speaker 3: And, and, you know, Oh, I know. I know.
41:25
Speaker 1: And yeah, well, that's, that's just it though. That's the,
41:29
Speaker 1: the problem is that we are not, it seems we
41:34
Speaker 1: are not culturally ready for an honest conversation about this.
41:39
Speaker 1: And we're still at the stage of, I guess, trying
41:44
Speaker 1: to say what people want to hear. And so, and
41:47
Speaker 1: that's often untrue, whatever it is. And yeah, that's the
41:51
Speaker 1: unfortunate thing. And it does, it makes me wonder, and
41:54
Speaker 1: I don't know what you think about this, but I mean,
41:57
Speaker 1: I'm completely on board with all of the changes you
42:00
Speaker 1: want to see. And I want those too. I've been
42:03
Speaker 1: doing this for over 10 years. And it's just, you know,
42:07
Speaker 1: I am encouraged by the fact that there is someone
42:11
Speaker 1: in politics you know, in the potential position of influence
42:17
Speaker 1: that can actually talk about the change. Um, I've also
42:21
Speaker 1: spoke to some men in the military and veterans who
42:25
Speaker 1: have similar issues, um, in their experience. And, but I do,
42:30
Speaker 1: I do wonder, like, is there, is there a political
42:35
Speaker 1: solution to the problem? I, I'm not sure there is,
42:38
Speaker 1: and I don't want to be, um, you know, nihilistic
42:41
Speaker 1: because I'm not by nature, but I do wonder about that,
42:45
Speaker 1: you know?
42:45
Speaker 3: I think, I don't know if I'd use the word political.
42:49
Speaker 2: I would use, and I'm not criticizing that, but I'm
42:54
Speaker 2: trying to get the right word.
42:56
Speaker 3: No, that's fair. I would use.
43:00
Speaker 2: Cultural in the sense of our society has the ability
43:04
Speaker 2: to heal and has the ability to aspire to a
43:11
Speaker 2: culture of honesty and decency, regardless of these biases. And
43:18
Speaker 2: we do have the capacity as human beings, especially those
43:22
Speaker 2: that choose to believe in a higher power, in God,
43:27
Speaker 2: in our faith. And for me personally, it's my Lord
43:30
Speaker 2: and Savior, Jesus. We all have the capacity to aspire
43:35
Speaker 2: to be good and decent people. And I believe, you know,
43:41
Speaker 2: outside of, you know, a faith-based solution, a cultural-based solution
43:47
Speaker 2: in our general governance, it's built into our constitution. It
43:54
Speaker 2: really is built into our constitutional republic of how we
43:58
Speaker 2: are to behave and treat each other. I know people
44:02
Speaker 2: get lose track of that because of all of the,
44:05
Speaker 2: left versus right and red versus blue and all of
44:08
Speaker 2: the rhetoric and all the division. But in the core
44:12
Speaker 2: of our republic, the constitutional republic that we actually live in,
44:17
Speaker 2: the truth is it is there. The foundation is there
44:22
Speaker 2: for a cultural awakening to us being decent human beings
44:27
Speaker 2: to each other and not using dishonesty or coercion or
44:33
Speaker 2: manipulation to to get one up on each other. Um,
44:37
Speaker 2: our constitutional republic thought about these things. I know that
44:41
Speaker 2: sounds rather ambitious on my part and maybe sounds a
44:45
Speaker 2: little bit like I'm ignoring the human condition, but I
44:49
Speaker 2: would suggest that people are ignoring that, that other people
44:52
Speaker 2: are ignoring the human condition from the other direction. When
44:56
Speaker 2: you paint all men as bad because they have privilege,
45:01
Speaker 2: or white people have privilege or so-and-so has privilege or you,
45:05
Speaker 2: you've heard it. We've all heard it. The rhetoric changes
45:08
Speaker 2: each election cycle. They come up with a new thing
45:11
Speaker 2: to divide people over. Yeah. And the fact is, is
45:14
Speaker 2: if we, we could get to the point again, I
45:18
Speaker 2: understand it's ambitious. I'm not being euphoric, but if you
45:22
Speaker 2: treat people like a decent person should be treated and
45:27
Speaker 2: you know, If you love your neighbor like you love yourself,
45:30
Speaker 2: that type of language, there is a way to have
45:35
Speaker 2: a governance, a level of governance that is more respectful
45:38
Speaker 2: of the dignity and individual of the citizens of our
45:43
Speaker 2: communities that it is doable. There's no magic policy because
45:49
Speaker 2: the other thing that our policy ignores with a centralized
45:53
Speaker 2: governance of, hey, here's this program, we're going to fix it.
45:58
Speaker 2: It disconnects from the relationships. You and I having a
46:01
Speaker 2: podcast discussion, we have a back and forth. We have
46:05
Speaker 2: a relationship developing. And it's our choice to have an
46:10
Speaker 2: openness to listening to dialogue and to reason. And when
46:14
Speaker 2: you create some agency off in the distance that's going
46:17
Speaker 2: to fix it and the relationships aren't there, what do
46:20
Speaker 2: we really think is going to happen? It's not really
46:24
Speaker 2: a surprise. Yeah.
46:26
Speaker 1: And I don't disagree. I think that you can't fix
46:29
Speaker 1: this with an executive order or some kind of government
46:33
Speaker 1: policy or fiat or law. You have to change the
46:36
Speaker 1: hearts and minds of people. It's the only way. And unfortunately,
46:40
Speaker 1: you're going to be untangling a large rat's nest of misinformation, assumptions, lies,
46:48
Speaker 1: bad data, often intentionally bad, sabotaged to do that. So yeah, no,
46:54
Speaker 1: I don't disagree. I guess I'm bringing it up because
46:59
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people do think that that's
47:01
Speaker 1: the way. So, oh, we just need to get the
47:03
Speaker 1: right person in there. We just need to get this
47:05
Speaker 1: law changed or whatever, elect this person. And that's helpful.
47:08
Speaker 1: But if you don't change people, like what they believe
47:12
Speaker 1: and also, you know, be willing to have the courage
47:16
Speaker 1: to tell the truth about this stuff, then you're not
47:19
Speaker 1: going to change anything. So that's what I think. Your
47:25
Speaker 1: child protection plan, you have a child protection plan, says
47:29
Speaker 1: that agencies must engage fathers immediately and treat them as
47:32
Speaker 1: equal custodial options, citing Terrence Golston. How does that survive
47:38
Speaker 1: a pending OFP or a Duluth-trained GAL? Do you change
47:43
Speaker 1: the best interest factors in Chapter 518 or only DHS policy?
47:49
Speaker 1: I know that was really technical. Yeah.
47:52
Speaker 2: So there you're really getting into the systemic problem of
47:55
Speaker 2: training and paradigm.
47:58
Speaker 1: Yeah.
47:59
Speaker 2: And how to overcome that paradigm that's been ingrained in
48:02
Speaker 2: Minnesota for decades now. It's been decades upon decades of training.
48:08
Speaker 2: A lot of that is going to have to find
48:12
Speaker 2: the right people because they are out there. Some of
48:14
Speaker 2: these people that were trained in these ways of doing
48:17
Speaker 2: business know that it's wrong. but they've had to survive
48:20
Speaker 2: in a system that they're passionate about working with families
48:23
Speaker 2: and children. And so there are good people out there
48:26
Speaker 2: that know the system is wrong, and they're probably the
48:28
Speaker 2: best resources to draw on to help retrain or remove
48:36
Speaker 2: bad training is because they've already seen and identified the
48:40
Speaker 2: bad training. So there are good people out there that
48:43
Speaker 2: can help dismantle the bad paradigms and the bad training.
48:48
Speaker 2: there really are good people out there. And so we
48:50
Speaker 2: can't lose hope that this is kind of like the
48:52
Speaker 2: same bias issue going on. Not all human services people
48:57
Speaker 2: are bad. Not all law enforcement is bad. Not, you know,
49:01
Speaker 2: some of them know very well the problems and they
49:05
Speaker 2: just don't feel like they can do anything about it.
49:08
Speaker 2: And it does, it does take leadership and it does
49:10
Speaker 2: take a culture to say, you're going to step in
49:14
Speaker 2: and you're going to say, I get it. I understand
49:17
Speaker 2: those of you, that have been misguided and you know
49:20
Speaker 2: that you've been misguided and you have a better way
49:22
Speaker 2: of doing business, we're going to lean into you. And
49:25
Speaker 2: those of you that really truly believe in this almost
49:29
Speaker 2: a cult-like approach to dealing with men and families, they're
49:36
Speaker 2: going to have to find the door and find themselves
49:38
Speaker 2: a new profession. And yes, would that be difficult? Would
49:42
Speaker 2: that be hard to convince people? Absolutely. And I'm not delusional.
49:47
Speaker 2: I understand that. And again, whether it's a man or
49:50
Speaker 2: a woman, it doesn't matter how good your training is.
49:54
Speaker 2: It doesn't matter how good your paradigm is. There are
49:56
Speaker 2: certain people that are just not going to be amenable
50:00
Speaker 2: to being a good, decent person. They believe they're right.
50:05
Speaker 2: They think they're right. They know in their head they're right.
50:08
Speaker 2: And they're never going to change. And unfortunately, that is
50:12
Speaker 2: a part of life.
50:14
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it is going to be a challenge. What
50:18
Speaker 1: have you been working on lately with regards to this?
50:24
Speaker 2: So, again, I won't name names, but since the previous program,
50:29
Speaker 2: and I'm anticipating probably now that the word's getting out,
50:32
Speaker 2: I've had two men contact me about their cases recently.
50:37
Speaker 2: My team and I'll do the best I can. I
50:39
Speaker 2: tell them up front, I'm disclosed to you. I'm not
50:45
Speaker 2: a magic worker. I can't fix anything miracle, but I
50:49
Speaker 2: can definitely help try to steer you in the right
50:53
Speaker 2: direction with advice and with whether it's a man or
50:55
Speaker 2: a woman and how to deal with the courts and
50:58
Speaker 2: law enforcement. The one gentleman that approached me, he has
51:02
Speaker 2: a very sad case that he He does have some hope,
51:08
Speaker 2: I think, in the sense that if he had the
51:10
Speaker 2: right people, unfortunately, it takes money as well, which is
51:13
Speaker 2: another downside to all of this process. He has a
51:18
Speaker 2: good case that he shouldn't be being treated the way
51:21
Speaker 2: he's being treated. Now, his case is kind of sad
51:25
Speaker 2: because now that this has gone on for so long
51:29
Speaker 2: and the child has grown to an age where It's,
51:34
Speaker 2: there's kind of a whole new dynamic involved with, you know,
51:37
Speaker 2: with the child's age and then the child's own decisions.
51:42
Speaker 2: So I guess what I'm saying is, is I'm here to,
51:46
Speaker 2: my team and I are here to do our best
51:48
Speaker 2: to help people, A, feel like they're not alone because
51:51
Speaker 2: they're not, and B, we'll do our best to steer
51:55
Speaker 2: them in the right direction with support and help and
52:00
Speaker 2: And that's the best we can do. I can't I
52:01
Speaker 2: can't make any false promises.
52:03
Speaker 1: Are there any like I guess like legal tips that
52:07
Speaker 1: you can help? Like if there's a man and he
52:10
Speaker 1: finds himself in the situation that you were in and
52:13
Speaker 1: he doesn't he doesn't know what to do, like he
52:16
Speaker 1: can't go to the police because they might arrest him.
52:19
Speaker 1: He can't obviously fight back because that would be like disastrous. So, yeah.
52:24
Speaker 1: What what are some services you guys offer, like some
52:27
Speaker 1: help that you can give to somebody that's in that situation?
52:30
Speaker 2: The number one thing to do, and it might be
52:33
Speaker 2: an emotional thing for the person to do, but is
52:36
Speaker 2: to start documenting everything and try to be, you know,
52:42
Speaker 2: maybe write it down while you're angry, but then rewrite
52:46
Speaker 2: it or while you're sad, sad or angry, write it
52:49
Speaker 2: down while you're emotional, but then go back and rewrite
52:53
Speaker 2: it without the emotion. And I'm going to re-say that
52:57
Speaker 2: because it might not, seem understandable to the person listening
53:01
Speaker 2: right now at this moment. But after they've gone through
53:05
Speaker 2: it a couple of times in a week or two,
53:07
Speaker 2: they'll say, oh, that's why Phil said that. Because, you know,
53:11
Speaker 2: write it down even while you're emotional. But then after
53:14
Speaker 2: you calm down, rewrite it and make sure you get
53:18
Speaker 2: the basic facts documented. Keep text messages, save them. Keep
53:24
Speaker 2: screenshots of emails and text messages. Keep evidence, video or
53:32
Speaker 2: or photographs, still footage of of times and places and
53:37
Speaker 2: keep it calmly to yourself. Protect it and keep it
53:39
Speaker 2: to yourself. Don't don't try to be some superhero saving
53:43
Speaker 2: the world with some squirrely, you know, like Intel gathering thing.
53:48
Speaker 2: And don't put up cameras. I don't recommend putting up,
53:53
Speaker 2: you know, hidden cameras. I don't recommend that. But you're not.
53:57
Speaker 1: Going to be used against you.
54:00
Speaker 2: Document things in a logical and decent way. That's number one.
54:08
Speaker 2: Number two, you've already said it. Don't get baited. No
54:13
Speaker 2: matter how bad an abusive person can become, don't retaliate.
54:20
Speaker 2: In some cases, some men might think they're less of
54:23
Speaker 2: a man if they just let it go on. I've
54:27
Speaker 2: never thought of myself that way before. basically because of
54:30
Speaker 2: the way my mother raised me. I think, um, I
54:34
Speaker 2: never looked at myself as less of a man because
54:36
Speaker 2: I cried or because I, I didn't strike back. I
54:40
Speaker 2: actually thought of myself as more of a man that
54:43
Speaker 2: I had the courage and the endurance to not retaliate. Um,
54:48
Speaker 2: to me, in my definition, I'm more of a decent
54:51
Speaker 2: man by not retaliating. Um, yeah, I understand. So, um,
54:57
Speaker 2: Those two are the biggest tips. And then the other
55:00
Speaker 2: legal thing is don't let people... So my third tip,
55:06
Speaker 2: and then that's it for tonight, is don't let alleged
55:10
Speaker 2: legal people talk you into stuff that's blatantly not true.
55:13
Speaker 2: Stay true. Stay honest. Don't let people talk you into
55:18
Speaker 2: stuff that you just know in your head and heart
55:20
Speaker 2: that is just not true. If you haven't been the abuser,
55:24
Speaker 2: you are not the abuser, right? You are not responsible
55:28
Speaker 2: for the other person's violence. If you're an enabler and
55:33
Speaker 2: you're allowing it to go on and on and on, yeah,
55:36
Speaker 2: you have your part in it. You're being an enabler.
55:39
Speaker 2: Admit that to yourself. You've been enabling the violence. But
55:44
Speaker 2: don't get talked into things that clearly aren't true.
55:48
Speaker 3: All right.
55:49
Speaker 1: I guess we're kind of getting close to the end here.
55:53
Speaker 1: I did have some other questions, but they're not quite
55:56
Speaker 1: as high on end. But I will ask with regards
56:00
Speaker 1: to your ex-wife, are there or were there any children
56:06
Speaker 1: in the home, like some of your kids or her
56:07
Speaker 1: kids involved in this? Yes.
56:10
Speaker 2: So the first relationship, there were two, the twins. And
56:15
Speaker 2: and that was part of how things fell apart. You know,
56:18
Speaker 2: the violence that was occurring, the abuse that was occurring.
56:21
Speaker 2: I don't want to minimize it, but I didn't my
56:25
Speaker 2: own brain, my own paradigm didn't really take it on
56:28
Speaker 2: as how inappropriate it was until after the children were the,
56:33
Speaker 2: the two were like in kindergarten, it started to become
56:37
Speaker 2: very evident to me that this clearly can't go on
56:40
Speaker 2: like this. This is, yeah. And I'm, I'm assuming some
56:44
Speaker 2: people in the audience might be able to appreciate why
56:46
Speaker 2: that finally clicked in my brain. But, but yeah, there,
56:50
Speaker 2: there were children involved and, and then later on in life,
56:53
Speaker 2: you know, it, with divorce and then remarriage and blended
56:57
Speaker 2: family that I'm in now. Blended family primarily because of
57:01
Speaker 2: tragedy and because of the death of my current spouse,
57:05
Speaker 2: the death of her husband on duty. We're quite a
57:11
Speaker 2: tragic romantic story.
57:14
Speaker 1: And- Do you still, I assume you're, because there must be,
57:18
Speaker 1: they're probably grown up now or the twins that is,
57:21
Speaker 1: do you still talk to them? Yeah. Did you lose
57:24
Speaker 1: custody or anything when the divorce happened?
57:27
Speaker 2: Nope.
57:28
Speaker 3: I'm one of the lucky ones. I call myself lucky.
57:31
Speaker 2: People might call it something else. But I lost everything
57:34
Speaker 2: two times over. But I maintained... I was able... I
57:38
Speaker 2: fought hard enough that I maintained joint physical and joint
57:42
Speaker 2: legal custody. So I had them 50-50 through high school.
57:46
Speaker 2: And it was... I would never... I wouldn't wish it
57:52
Speaker 2: on anybody, but I'm glad that I fought. I'm glad
57:55
Speaker 2: that I don't regret fighting that hard. And I don't
57:59
Speaker 2: mean fighting as a real bad thing domestically.
58:01
Speaker 1: I know, like the legal battle for your children.
58:04
Speaker 3: Yeah, legal battle. Isn't it crazy that.
58:07
Speaker 1: After all that, you still just got 50-50 with all that?
58:12
Speaker 1: unless that was, you know, the, the agreement, like you
58:15
Speaker 1: guys agreed to that or something.
58:16
Speaker 2: No, that, that's part of how this conversation started and it,
58:19
Speaker 2: and it grows back to the Duluth model. Yeah. Again,
58:23
Speaker 2: then in 1998, I wasn't, I wasn't as well versed
58:27
Speaker 2: in what was happening to me as I am now.
58:30
Speaker 3: If I had known then what I know.
58:32
Speaker 2: Now, I could have been even more successful because I
58:35
Speaker 2: would have been able to, to, to dismantle some of
58:38
Speaker 2: the lies that I was being told. And, um, And
58:41
Speaker 2: I was told some whoppers, I mean, some real whoppers.
58:44
Speaker 2: Cause again, the real upsetting thing to me is if
58:48
Speaker 2: I had behaved towards her, the way she behaved towards.
58:52
Speaker 3: Me, I.
58:55
Speaker 2: Would have been in prison overnight is gone and never
59:00
Speaker 2: seen my children again. And after all of that, in
59:03
Speaker 2: all of that counseling, listening to what went on for
59:05
Speaker 2: years and he not being able to, to just come
59:09
Speaker 2: out and say, you know, this man has been beat
59:12
Speaker 2: up and abused for 17 years. Why am I even
59:14
Speaker 2: listening to this anymore? The children belong with him. She
59:18
Speaker 2: belongs with maybe some kind of visitation, but he clearly
59:23
Speaker 2: is the stable parent, but that didn't happen. Even in
59:28
Speaker 2: my situation, I had to fight with every inch of
59:31
Speaker 2: my life to, to, to just get joint legal and
59:34
Speaker 2: joint physical custody.
59:36
Speaker 3: And it was crazy.
59:39
Speaker 2: I mean, again, if I had behaved like she was behaving,
59:42
Speaker 2: I never would have seen my children again.
59:44
Speaker 1: Yeah. Are your, your kids are growing up now then? Yeah.
59:48
Speaker 2: All of the kids, all the kids are actually, there's all,
59:51
Speaker 2: there's six of them between the two of us now.
59:54
Speaker 3: So they're all out of the house. Mostly out of
59:56
Speaker 3: the house.
59:56
Speaker 1: Yeah.
59:57
Speaker 3: Pretty much out of the house there. All of them
59:58
Speaker 3: are out of the house and they range from... And.
1:00:02
Speaker 1: They're well-adjusted despite being in that environment, like everything's fine.
1:00:07
Speaker 1: Because that's like another aspect that doesn't get talked about
1:00:12
Speaker 1: enough with regards to domestic violence and the Duluth models.
1:00:16
Speaker 1: It's impact on the children that might be present, right?
1:00:19
Speaker 1: To see their parents fighting... especially when it's sort of
1:00:25
Speaker 1: one-sided in, in some cases, you know, and there's no consequences. So.
1:00:30
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, four of them deal with all of this
1:00:34
Speaker 2: on a daily basis. The youngest one was, was abducted
1:00:37
Speaker 2: internationally and got him back.
1:00:40
Speaker 1: Wow.
1:00:40
Speaker 2: The, the second to youngest is adopted and she's had
1:00:46
Speaker 2: an amazing opportunities that were presented to her, but she's
1:00:51
Speaker 2: struggled quite a bit because of, a background that I
1:00:53
Speaker 2: won't go into because it should be embarrassing to her,
1:00:56
Speaker 2: but she struggles with what happened to her for many years.
1:01:02
Speaker 2: The ones in the middle, the twins, they have their
1:01:05
Speaker 2: own issues that they're trying to cope with. They're not
1:01:07
Speaker 2: as connected to us as the two oldest and the
1:01:11
Speaker 2: two youngest, but no, the impact on all of them
1:01:16
Speaker 2: is felt forever. I'd like to think that recently, Um, there,
1:01:24
Speaker 2: there's been some progress where they've had to grow through
1:01:27
Speaker 2: some of their own challenges that they're self, you know,
1:01:30
Speaker 2: self-induced challenges where they're, they're kind of waking up and they're,
1:01:36
Speaker 2: they're too proud to say, oh, gee whiz, mom and
1:01:38
Speaker 2: dad were right. You know, or my dad, you know,
1:01:41
Speaker 2: I call my wife now is mom to all of them. And, and, uh, and,
1:01:46
Speaker 2: you know, they've, they've had the opportunity to listen to,
1:01:49
Speaker 2: to Victoria and I, and, and, I know that several
1:01:54
Speaker 2: of them, several of the six are probably waking up
1:01:57
Speaker 2: at times going, gee whiz, dad was right all along
1:02:00
Speaker 2: or mom was right. And but that's true for any
1:02:04
Speaker 2: of us. I do that myself.
1:02:08
Speaker 1: Well, I'm glad that, you know, you are you pull
1:02:11
Speaker 1: through that. And this was a great conversation. I hope
1:02:16
Speaker 1: that you enjoyed it as well. Um, and maybe we'll
1:02:19
Speaker 1: have you back on sometime. I think that, uh, you know, I,
1:02:22
Speaker 1: I hope that you will get more. I wanted to
1:02:24
Speaker 1: see you on other people's podcasts, you know, uh, bigger platforms.
1:02:30
Speaker 1: And we have this thing, this thing here at honey
1:02:33
Speaker 1: badger radio, for whatever reason, after someone comes on our show,
1:02:38
Speaker 1: they end up going on to do like to get
1:02:42
Speaker 1: on much bigger shows. So I hope that for you,
1:02:45
Speaker 1: cause I do want this conversation to, to go out
1:02:48
Speaker 1: and reach everyone everywhere, especially in the United States, not
1:02:51
Speaker 1: just Minnesota. Every state in the country needs to know
1:02:54
Speaker 1: about this because that Duluth model, it's applied not only
1:02:58
Speaker 1: in the United States, but it's applied in other countries.
1:03:02
Speaker 1: And so this is like a virus that we need
1:03:07
Speaker 1: to nip in the bud. So thank you so much
1:03:11
Speaker 1: for coming on our show, Philip Parrish. Really appreciate it.
1:03:14
Speaker 1: links are in the description. What are some places where
1:03:17
Speaker 1: people can follow you at?
1:03:19
Speaker 2: The best place to follow me is right on my website, parish4mn. com, P-A-R-R-I-S-H,
1:03:26
Speaker 2: the number four, M-N.com. And I'm very active on X.
1:03:32
Speaker 2: I use almost all the platforms. But if you really
1:03:36
Speaker 2: want to get to me and interact with me, you
1:03:39
Speaker 2: get to my X profile. And if you're if you're
1:03:44
Speaker 2: up for it, um, I'm telling it like it is
1:03:47
Speaker 2: and I'm not holding back and I'm a decent, respectful person,
1:03:50
Speaker 2: but I'm, I'm not, I'm not.
1:03:52
Speaker 3: Going to let a lot.
1:03:53
Speaker 1: I can see that. No need to explain, explain. I
1:03:56
Speaker 1: did put all the links in the description so people
1:03:58
Speaker 1: can follow you and stuff. Um, and yeah, like I
1:04:01
Speaker 1: honestly do hope that you will, you know, get invited
1:04:05
Speaker 1: onto some giant show and do a really great conversation
1:04:08
Speaker 1: with those folks. But But with all that said, again,
1:04:12
Speaker 1: I want to thank you, Mr. Parrish, for coming on
1:04:15
Speaker 1: today's show. And I want to thank you guys watching
1:04:18
Speaker 1: at home on this live stream. If you guys like
1:04:20
Speaker 1: this video, please hit like, subscribe if you're not already subscribed.
1:04:24
Speaker 1: Hit the bell for notifications. Leave us a comment. Let
1:04:26
Speaker 1: us know what you guys think about what we talked
1:04:27
Speaker 1: about on the show today. And share this video because
1:04:31
Speaker 1: sharing is caring. Thanks so much for coming on this
1:04:33
Speaker 1: episode of the Fireside Chat. And we'll talk to you
1:04:35
Speaker 1: guys in the next one.