I'm not familiar with the Act in question, and have not read the report, but I did have a cursory glance at some of the news stories post comments made by the Federal Attorney Guvna.

The issue of misunderstanding appeared to turn on the issue of:

" ... Shared responsibility does not imply shared custody. ... "

i.e. 1 abusive parent may have to $pay$, but does not necessarily get to have any custody rights.

That's quite reasonable to me in my view. Of course, if an honorable other should come along, adoption provisions should be made more reasonable and the abusive partner, if there is one, should have their "rights" extinguished in a prompt and forthright manner.

..

Posted by ChazP, Friday, 12 February 2010 1:19:05 PM
" ... All they require is a sperm donor. ... "

I have no problems with this at all. In fact, I had a mate who used to donate in England, on a monthly basis from memory. He got paid and even got to "view" his choice of "Stick Book" for free, just in case his personal powers of visualisation were lacking or otherwise during process.

(snicker, snicker)

I also think that some Gay & Lesbian people would make fab parents. If the "I" of the individual is respected then to me it follows that part of any determination visa vi custody must be on a individual case by case basis, without gender and sexual orientation bias or an overlay of what does or doesn't constitute a "family."

..

But for those to who it applies, can you point out where exactly the legislation is sexist? Or is it suggested merely that the process of making "Findings of Facts" goes wayward in that there is a perceived bias on part of those making determinations in regard to say, male parents?

'Those who point to mentally ill mothers who kill their children are bringing in a different context of child deaths. Mentally ill mothers who kill their children and/or themselves are not necessarily or usually separated and their behaviour is not shaped by family law proceedings but by their mental illness. This means that there needs to be better mental health supports. The family law centred child killings point to a need for much better assessments in the family law process and decisions which focus on child safety ahead of parental entitlement.'

Basically what I've said all along.

ie. We must look for every opportunity to help and provide more support for the poor mentally ill mothers when they hurt children, but look for every opportunity to separate all fathers from children at any suggestion of even so much as raising their voice at the mother or 'acting their gender'.

The mothers are in need of help and support, and are acting in despair or poor mental health (They obviously love their kids, they're women!), the fathers are in sound mental health and acting in vengeance at being denied some strange notion of 'entitlement' to see (woops Control) the kids they obviously don't love (They're men!). Silly Dads.

When it comes to child support, the supposed Menz groups got nowhere until the second wives added their support. See the second wife wanted her fair share of the hubbies earning power, and could see his ex wife draining the new families money (often while benefiting from a new partner's money).

I've never been in the situation to pay any child support, but I must admit I would be happy as larry to pay direct money to the needs of my children but I'd want proof that the money was going to them and them only. I'd pay above the CSA calculation for control on how the money was spent.

Pynchme,

'If they can't force women and children to do their will, then what else is in them as people fulfilling a masculine role? Menz are just not desirable anymore because women and children can survive, and are often better off, without them BUT MEN of a different type of masculinity are appreciated, loved and cherished.'

I'm not that young and I don't know any of these dinosaur types of men you constantly refer to. It's like you're living in the 1950s or something. The world has changed and moved on and the source of your antagonism just doesn't exist anymore. Which is why you come accross as so bitter and man hating.

You are the feminist lost soldier, who nobody has told that if you'd just step out of the jungle you'd see supermarkets full of caring loving dads pushing around their much doted on offspring while they give mummy a morning off to have some me time. I know a lot of fathers and all of them are in a true partnership with their wives, sharing the burden of caring for the children and earning the family money as best they can and allowing for the needs of both partners.

This gender warfare you describe is internal to yourself.

'I have described my son and his father on these pages and have been told that they're whipped; gay; probably having affairs ..'

Hmmm. It doesn't take a genius to work out that a woman who has spent her life analysing and agonising on every fault of 'men' is probably gonna radically focus her displeasure when she has one localised, all-too-flawed husband to concentrate on.

I reckon the guy must be a sadist. I can imagine it well...

H: 'Oh, honey my hands are full, can you pass me...'

Pynch: What do you think I'm some kind of slave! Using your physical power to intimidate me! Oh, you men, you've been doing this since the year dot. Throughout the ages, women have been abused by you, yes you, you're responsible, be a man and take responsibility!

H: Yes Dear.

Last year (April 2008 to March 2009) ChildLine, the UK's free 24-hour helpline for children and young people, counselled an average of five girls a day (1,986) about sexual abuse by their father. Sexual abuse is still one of the main reasons children get in touch. For many, it is the first time they have told anyone about their ordeal.
Most girls who call ChildLine about sexual abuse are aged 12 to 15 years, but the youngest caller was just five years old. Two thirds (67%) of the girls who call ChildLine about sexual abuse say they have been raped.
One girl, aged just 11, called and said: "I'm scared at home, scared of my dad. I feel angry and sick…he raped me, it just happened. Mum won't believe me. She always believes what Dad says. It happened before when I was six…I want to kill myself."
Another girl aged 14 said: "My dad raped me. It happened last night. It happens whenever he's drunk and when Mum works late. I haven't told anyone. Dad says it isn't wrong to do what he did to me."
In ChildLine terminology, 'sex abuse' includes rape, sexual touching, harassment, indecency, incest, organised abuse. Some children calling ChildLine said they had been raped, others that they had been sexually abused. The ChildLine counsellors make a decision on whether it is rape depending on what has been described to them.

The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court Gender Bias Task Force was one of the first states to document the gender bias against women in family courts. This court-initiated study expressly found that “our research contradicted [the] perception” that ”there is a bias in favor of women in these decisions.” Moreover, it found that “in determining custody and visitation, many judges and family service officers do not consider violence toward women relevant.” The Court’s study further found that “the courts are demanding more of mothers than fathers in custody disputes” and that “many courts put the needs of noncustodial fathers above those of custodial mothers and children.”
- Gender Bias Study of the Court System in Massachusetts, 24 New Eng.L.Rev. 745, 747, 825, 846 (1990)
The American Psychological Association’s Presidential Task Force on Violence in the Family, the leading review of the research as of 1996, found that men who abuse their partners contest custody at least twice as often as non-abusing fathers. They are even more likely to contest custody if the children are boys.
More recently, and since the evolution and widespread adoption of “parental alienation syndrome,” a multi-year, four-phase study using qualitative and quantitative social science research methodologies by the Wellesley Centers for Women found “a consistent pattern of human rights abuses” by family courts, including failure to protect battered women and children from abuse, discriminating against and inflicting degrading treatment on battered women, and denying battered women due process. Histories of abuse of mother and children were routinely ignored or discounted.
- Wellesley Centers for Women Battered Mothers’ Testimony Project, Battered Mothers Speak Out: A Human Rights Report on Domestic Violence and Child Custody in the Massachusetts Family Courts (Nov. 2002)(hereafter “BMTP”), Executive Summary 2.

A comparable study by the Arizona Coalition Against Domestic Violence found that most of the women surveyed felt the history of abuse was not taken seriously and that they were ignored, disrespected and discriminated against by court personnel.
- Arizona Coalition Against Domestic Violence, Battered Mothers’ Testimony Project: A Human Rights Approach to Child Custody and Domestic Violence (June 2003),

ChazP:"the UK's free 24-hour helpline for children and young people, counselled an average of five girls a day (1,986) about sexual abuse by their father."

Given that there are roughly 5.3 million girls in the UK, this figure represents approximately 0.03% of the total number of girls in the UK. If the experience of the NSW Rape Crisis Centre is any guide, at least 50% of the callers will call at least twice, therefore, the number you cite represents about 0.01% of the population of girls.

Thanks for confirming my point that sexual abuse of children is a tiny problem within the community. Meanwhile, here in australia, a girl is about 6 times more likely to experience abuse or neglect at the hands of her single mother than her single father. There are no specific figures available for "women with testosterone".

I see you've been doing your rather limited best to trawl the "I hate men" sites to find obscure "research" to support your "I hate men cos they have testicles and I want them" position. It's quite amusing, in the way that watching a cockroach choking on flyspray gets a giggle...

The Massachusetts report you quote so approvingly was published in 1989 and has been comprehensively debunked as the nonsense it is. I refer those interested to http://tinyurl.com/ycfzqp4.
Suffice to say that as research, the report makes excellent toilet paper.

The APA report you also quote glowingly is a rather difficult document to find, although many versions of its "findings" are available; each rather different from the other. i'll content my7self with pointing out thatit quotes uncritically the false "statistic": "More than one in eight adult women in the United States is raped or sexually assaulted", which has been comprehensively falsified.

The last one specifically used only self-reported "victims", so unsurprisingly found that "all men are bastards". If I did a similar study among self-reported male "victims", I'd no doubt get a result that said (unsurprisingly) "all women are bitches".

Now, don't you have some ironing to do?