Stew ` "If you would be so kind to point me to the statistical evidence on this assertion I would greatly appreciate it. And, please, no anecdotes”.
I’m sure you are more than aware that such information is not routinely collected and collated by statutory authorities in Australia, however I would commend to you bedside reading of some of the research into these matters. Several studies of child protection case records in the last two decades have suggested that a majority of children living with a domestically violent father experience multiple forms of abuse which includes, not only physical abuse but direct emotional abuse and psychological terrorisation from their fathers, in addition to the negative impact of witnessing violence towards their mothers and that a substantial minority also experience sexual abuse ( see for example, Abrahams, l994; Farmer and Owen, l995; Hester and Radford, l996;Hester and Pearson, l998; McGee, 2000; Brown et al; 2000). Research with mothers post-separation also indicates that such children continue to be abused in the post-separation context (Hilton, l992; Abrahams, l994; Forman, l995; Hester and Radford, l996; Hester and Pearson, l998; Radford et al: l999).
In recent times former Justices Alistair Nicholson and Richard Chisholm have both expressed serious concerns that Courts are not adequately examining allegations of domestic violence and child abuse and Chief Justice Diana Bryant is stating similar concerns.
The effects on children of being abused and exposed to intimate partner violence and intra-familial terrorism are severe and long-lasting.
The theories of `alienation’ (and its associated terminology of coaching, alignment etc) by Gardner no longer hold validity and utility in Family Courts since they were exposed as junk science and sympathetic to paedophiles.

Pelican, you are absolutely correct that the focus needs to be on protecting those that are abused rather than gender. However, this is not an absolute right to protection, as the zeal to protect an abused child may actually lead to greater harm (such as excluding innocent parents from a meaningful role in their child's upbringing or worse). As I reported, sexual abuse by a biological parent is actually a relatively rare phenomenon and abuse is far more likely to occur in other contexts.

I am also wary of letting children decide custody arrangements. There is no doubt in my mind that children can be coached and manipulated by adults (of either gender).

Check out the following website on false allegations of child abuse for some scary case histories: http://www.truthinjustice.org/child-abuse.htm

The website opens with an interesting statement:

"Our instincts are to protect and defend defenseless children. It is a measure of a civilized society. It is equally instinctive to presume guilt. That tendency is even stronger when the accused must prove a negative---that what he or she is accused of didn't happen---and the accuser is a physician with a stack of degrees or, equally potent, a child. These combinations have led to countless criminal convictions: parents, day care providers, teachers, neighbors---even when the charges cannot be supported by objective scientific evidence, or when there was no physical evidence at all to support the claims."

ChazP, I have no doubt that abusive people (of either gender) engage in all sorts of abusive practices. My request for statistics speaks to the PREVALENCE of the problem. Your emotive language implicitly (if not explicitly - would you care to clarify?) suggests that this is such a major social problem that we need to overturn a presumption of shared parenting to protect these children. My assertion backed with voluminous data suggests that such cases are relatively rare. I would be very interested to hear your estimates of child sexual abuse by fathers.

By the way, ever since the ritual abuse scandals of the 1980s, I think there is little doubt that children can be coached to create false memories - whether you label this "lying" or not is simply a semantic hedge. Child suggestibility is well established in the psychological literature.

Re: alienation - Fidler and Bala, Family Court Review (2010) - "The negative short-term and long-term effects of alienation, including intrusive parenting have been well documented (e.g., Baker, 2007; Barber, 2002; Johnston, 2005a; Johnston, Roseby, & Kuehnle, 2009; Johnston, Walters, & Olesen, 2005c)."

Stew ~ I make no apology if my comments and opinions are perceived as `emotive’ – not to have opinions without an emotive element are psychopathic.
Shared parenting is a legal principle – on separation both parents retain their full legal rights in regard to their children. They can only lose such legal rights if a child is adopted. It is a non-sequitur.
The issue is one of the presumption that there should be `shared care’, and often irrespective of prior incidents of domestic violence and child abuse, or whether a parent has previously been involved in the shared care of the child, and regardless of the fact that the child may dislike or even detest that particular parent or be extremely fearful of that parent.

The Satanic ritual abuse scandals of the 1980’s were caused mainly by religious zealots in the child protective agencies e.g. The Orkney’s Scandal, Nottingham, Rochdale, Manchester, Durham etc. In many of these events the children often appealed vigorously that they had not been abused and the whole scenarios were created by the CP workers who fabricated and embellished evidence. Subsequent research showed there was no evidence of Satanic Ritual Abuse and the children’s evidence was vindicated. They did not lie.

The research you refer to examined cases where `alienation’ had been accepted by Courts based on Gardner’s theories. Since the discrediting of such theories then such research is valueless.

There are no reliable statistics on child sexual abuse by fathers. Informed expert opinion states that child sexual abuse is grossly under-reported (as is rape of adult females) and even when reported to CP agencies is notoriously difficult to prove even as children’s testamentary evidence can easily destroyed by clever defence lawyers, there is often little forensic evidence (child sexual abusers seldom leave physical evidence of their crimes, and naturally there are rarely any witnesses to support the child’s allegations. Perhaps the most reliable evidence of child sexual abuse by fathers and others was the high percentage of adults who stated in research that they had been sexually abused as children within their families.

There are a number of problems with research methodology.

Firstly it is data collection. If data is not collect, for a specific issue, then it is easy to say that the problem does not exist, case in point is the WSS.

Secondly is researcher bias, typically pregnant women are asked about DV, but fathers are not.

Typically research into DV questions are leading questions, "When was the last time he hit you?", "When was the last time you hit her?"

Recently I was asked to partake in some research into "community attitudes to violence," very quickly it turn into attitudes about violence against women. I declined to partake in such biased research.

Typically when figures are considered, the data is inflated by including all different types of behaviour, but when it is argued, the arguement always falls back onto physical violence.

Yes, Chaz, a lack of emotion is psychopathy but an emotive outburst without a factual basis is hysteria, which is why it is important that we have a fact-based debate. The ritual abuse cases (not to mention the original Salem witch hunts in the 17th century) are useful reminders of why we need to keep a check on hysteria.

I was not aware that the term 'shared parenting' referred to what my jurisdiction calls "joint legal custody" and that 'shared care' is the term used to refer to "joint physical custody". If it makes you more comfortable I will refer to "shared care" rather than "shared parenting".

Your characterization of the issue as a "presumption...often irrespective" of negative behaviors mischaracterizes the nature of a legal presumption which allows the presumption to be over-ridden in the face of credible evidence". I agree that a presumption would be an inefficient, perhaps dangerous, mechanism if there was an epidemic of abuse by parents out there.

Re: Satanic Abuse: The McMartin case in the US revolved around childrens' testimony. I suggest you read http://www.ipt-forensics.com/journal/volume4/j4_1_6.htm or http://www.truthinjustice.org/child-abuse.htm There is absolutely NO DOUBT that children gave coached testimony that was NOT TRUE. (There is also no doubt that the children denied abuse until they came in contact with unscrupulous counselors).

I would appreciate (and expect) a retraction of your claim that it was the counselors, not the children, who lied (or confabulated, if that word works better for you).

Re: alienation. My cite was to a 2010 paper in a peer reviewed journal. Gardner's PAS has been discredited as simplistic/erroneous but most researchers in the field accept that alienating behaviors can occur (see for instance 'alienated child theory'). If this line of research had been discredited it wouldn't appear in peer-reviewed journals.

Re: reliable statistics - you still haven't provided me with your estimate of prevalence of sexual abuse by fathers.