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by Anonymous User on Wednesday May 07, @06:54PM EST (#1)
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Great article and very true, did you see the feedback from the feminut as soon as someone mentions that men may actually do something good in society they immediatly go on the defensive and bring up the "deadbeat dad" mythology. I wonder how many Australian women are murderous moms that kill there babies before birth.
I also liked the feedback section feminut's mention of Leave It To Beaver. Oh no! Leave It To Beaver a normal two parent family going about normal family things. The absolute horror! It must be stopped!
Anyway, here is what I liked the most--the government title: Sex Discrimination Commissioner, where did they come up with that I can't think of a more apt name for a official that would hang out with the likes of Naomi. A person that's commisiened to discrimate according to sex.
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by Anonymous User on Wednesday May 07, @08:36PM EST (#2)
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http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/05/02/10513820 93363.html
Child is at risk if dad's rights always put first
By Adele Horin
May 3 2003
Fathers separated from their partners gain custody of their children at twice the rate of a decade ago. The Family Court is recognising more men are involved in their children's lives today, and more men are competent in a field once left exclusively to mothers.
Unfortunately, this progress has run ahead of the Family Court's ability to protect children from abusive parents, especially sexually abusive fathers. The court has no independent power to investigate child abuse claims made by one parent against the other. Indeed the parent, usually a mother, who accuses a partner of child abuse, is likely to be seen as manipulative and vindictive.
The Family Court's lack of powers to investigate child abuse claims is putting Australian children at risk. This is especially true now that we are in the middle of a "massive cultural shift in favour of fathers", as Australia's pre-eminent family law expert, Professor Patrick Parkinson, said this year.
At a conference this week, held by the Australian Institute of Criminology, Emeritus Professor Freda Briggs, a child welfare expert and the 2000-01 Senior Australian of the Year, told of hair-raising Family Court cases which went wrong. In one case, the court had delivered a child into the hands of a father with a criminal record for sexual assault.
"When parents contact me, they usually send me the trial documents and, frankly, I'm often shocked by what I read. Again and again, I see a disregard for children's safety and an obsession with the view that all parents have the right to maintain a relationship with their children, regardless of the trauma associated with abuse, regardless of the quality of the relationship or the children's expressed wishes."
She told of a mother who, before the birth of her child, had separated from her partner after having learnt he was HIV positive, bisexual and had 26 criminal convictions, including two for rape reduced to sexual assault. Subsequently, the mother refused to comply with a Family Court order to hand over her toddler for unsupervised access. As a result, the Federal Police took the child, placed it in temporary foster care, and then handed her to the father she didn't know. For the past four years, the mother has had supervised access for three days a month.
Dr Elspeth McInness, of the University of South Australia, who is familiar with the case, told the conference that over the Easter holidays, the child, now 7, grabbed a knife and begged her mother at the access visit to kill her rather than take her back to her father.
In Family Court cases where abuse is alleged the court is dependent on state child protection departments to investigate. This is a catch-22 situation. More often than not, these cases are low priority for overworked child protection workers. For a start, the child is usually not yet living with the abusive parent and so is not in immediate danger; and state bureaucrats tend to trust the Family Court to keep a child safe through its decisions on custody and access.
Unfortunately without independent "evidence", the Family Court is in the dark. It is bound by 1996 family law changes which give new emphasis to a child's "right to contact" with both parents.
The court's lack of an investigative child protection arm means allegations of abuse cannot be substantiated. In effect they are treated as false. Sometimes children are deemed to have been coached by vengeful mothers, and to be victims of what is called Parental Alienation Syndrome. Parents who allege abuse are considered the abusers, poisoning their child's mind against the other parent.
In another case cited by Briggs, a Family Court judge gave custody to a father who had confessed to a counsellor of having sexually interfered with his 10-year-old daughter. The confession was deemed inadmissable in the Family Court proceedings. The judge castigated the mother for her failure to dissuade her daughter from her belief that sexual abuse had occurred. If the children continued to live with the mother, the judge said, they would continue to believe their father was an abuser and be psychologically damaged. In this case, the Appeal Court concluded the trial judge was wrong but the children by then had lived with the father for two years.
Last year the Family Law Council, which advises the federal Attorney-General, Daryl Williams, called for a national child protection unit to be established to investigate child abuse allegations made in the Family Court. The Federal Government has taken no action.
With more new-age fathers about, it follows divorced men will want - and get - more time with their children. This is how it should be. Children benefit from the attention of two loving parents. But for a minority of children, the court process is another experience of abuse. Ordered to spend time with a father who molests them would be a living hell.
Unless the Federal Government acts on the recommendations of its key family law body, the Family Court will blunder in the dark, mothers will be treated as liars, and children will continue to pay a high price to satisfy a father's "right to contact".
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by Anonymous User on Wednesday May 07, @09:00PM EST (#3)
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Look at the stats dimwit, mothers abuse children at the same rate as fathers simply because a few fathers abuse there kids doesn't mean children should be taken away from all fathers this is faulty logic. In my country and I would assume in Australia we have a saying it's called innocent until proven guilty, you and your family wrecking shitheads would like fathers to be guilty until proven innocent.
Oh and by the way if you are willing to rip fathers away from there kids simply because of your gender bias are you willing to give up collecting your child support payments.
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by Anonymous User on Wednesday May 07, @11:00PM EST (#4)
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Just like reporting stories of black men raping white women when they got freed from their chains back on the plantation. Policing capacity has not been able to match the rapid increase in the non-slave population....blah blah blah
This is especially true now that we are in the middle of a "massive cultural shift in favour of fathers", as Australia's pre-eminent family law expert, Professor Patrick Parkinson, said this year.
About bloody time, but still not fast enough. We can't wait. More affirmative action, if not reparations, are definitely needed to deal with the gross history of institutional sexism against men in family court.
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Yet another AU, albeit a sympathetic one, wrote: "We can't wait. More affirmative action, if not reparations, are definitely needed to deal with the gross history of institutional sexism against men in family court.
It's hard to state how strongly I disagree with the above sentiment. "Affirmative Action" IS prejudice and discrimination. It is racism or sexism, and racism and sexism are ALWAYS wrong.
There's no 'wiggle room' here.
If it's discrimination when you do it, then it's discrimination when I do it.
Do we want equality NOW? or do we want to put it off until 'later' -- after we've had a chance to get preferential treatment and discriminate against other groups for a while? Because we 'deserve' it, of course. Because we've been 'historically oppressed.' I think I'm gonna puke.
I'll be part of none of the attitude that says "my group gets special treatment because of [fill in victim credentials here]" or whatever BS excuse is used. Skip the discrimination and go straight for equality. It's the only way it'll ever work, and it's the ONLY way to be moral about it.
Once again, ask yourself, "Do I actually want equality or not?" It's up to us to reach out our strong men's hand and STOP the pendulum.
Ya can't end discrimination by creating more of it.
Ragtime
The Uppity Wallet
The opinions expressed above are my own,
but you're welcome to adopt them.
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by Anonymous User on Wednesday May 07, @11:27PM EST (#5)
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To quote from Glenn Sacks, at hisside.com:
"Children are 88% more likely to be seriously injured from abuse or neglect by their mothers than by their fathers.
Source: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration on Children, Youth, and Families, Child Maltreatment 1997: Reports from the States to the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System (Washington DC, :GPO, 1999)."
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It is best to write a letter to the newspaper with this information, no? Otherwise this sexist woman goes unanswered.
URL is www.theaustralian.news.com.au
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by Anonymous User on Thursday May 08, @12:18AM EST (#6)
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This does have all the signs of feminist thought-the abuse boogeyman, anecdotal evidence, no hard facts, the sexual assult boogeyman, a hysterical anti-male solution, most likely unverifiable exagerated (lies) stories ect... It's no wonder people are rethinking things if this is the best feminism can come up with.
If the courts and child welfare are being flooded the solution is to hire more help not to punish fathers.
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anon spewed>The Family Court's lack of powers to investigate child abuse claims is putting Australian children at risk. This is especially true now that we are in the middle of a "massive cultural shift in favour of fathers", as Australia's pre-eminent family law expert, Professor Patrick Parkinson, said this year.
This "massive shift" BS is just a pre-emptive strike by the feminists. Its basis is a recent Australian report that the proportion of custody decisions being awarded to fathers had increased from 15% to (wait for it....) 19%!
anon> ...Dr Elspeth McInness, of the University of South Australia, who is familiar with the case, told the conference that over the Easter holidays, the child, now 7, grabbed a knife and begged her mother at the access visit to kill her rather than take her back to her father.
Dr. McInness is a radical academic feminist nutso. Having subscribed to the local rad-fem mailing lists I have a large collection of her wit and wisdom which I might tap in to some day.
cheers,
Tim
Those who like this sort of thing
will find this the sort of thing they like.
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