TPP: "I saw a man a couple of months ago smacking his partner around in front of their young kids on my street, police called... several people came forward and told the police that they all saw it. You know what the police did?

Nothing!"

Frankly, I don't believe you. If there was an unprovoked assault reported and there were witnesses, then the complaint did not have to come from the victim and they would have acted immediately.

On the other hand, if there was a mutual argument that got out of hand, the police might well have decided that there was no real assualt committed and that the best course was not to escalate the issue.

It's very easy to jump to conclusions, which is precisely the problem with the proposed changes to the FLA.

TPP:"For an alleged feminist court system there is a hell of a lot of women claiming to be unhappy with it"

They're most often complaining that the Court gave some care of the children to their father. They're upset because the Court doesn't take their unsubstantiated word that their ex is a bastard.

It's pure sour grapes and vindictiveness. Read some of the stuff on some of the single mother's blogs if you don't believe me.

Read some of the stuff that has been posted here in the past.

Howard's misogynistic deference to Fatherhood is legendary.

His obedience to The Fatherhood Foundation, AFA, CDP, etc, enshrined homophobia and consequent childhood abuse, to alleviate this "detachment disorder/disease".

One hopes an astute humanistic and rights oriented approach will exploit this bill and the "emotional manipulation, financial abuse and physical violence" that defines strict Christian upbringing, to include psychological abuse, indoctrination, denial of cognitive development and in severe cases enforced social withdrawal. Children have no contact with the outside world, nor access to information.

Whilst cults like The Exclusive Brethren are extreme in number and power, practices such as "special" home schooling [bible vs education], teaching of supernaturalism not science, removal from socialisation and community engagement, are common in politically oriented Christian Groups.

Forcing ones gay child to be "cured", based on ones own delusional illness, is violence and abuse of towering immorality on many levels. Placing ones drug using child with faith healing groups using prayer, Jesus "music", exorcism, baptism and anti-psychotic drug cocktails - eg; anti-rights/anti-science Drug Free Australia who boast Australia's highest fatality rate - is criminal. Such practices combined with conscientious objection to vaccination, preaching of 'Zionist Conspiracies' and distrust of "hedonistic modernity" compete - on a parenting level - with paranoid psychosis, and childhood "neglect" of significant proportion.

Pied Piper I've held the view that the problems with the family law system are not particular feminist. Much of the grief revolves around the father as provider, mother as nurturer thinking. The feminist part has been solidarity with the sisters and providing skewed research to keep the perceptions of male as aggressor, female as victim going.

I think some women do have good cause to have grief with family law as well. The court as far as I can tell has moved a long way from the old maternal bias standards hence the frantic efforts of some to make changes which will make it easier to play on gender perceptions. I'm not sure that Howard got the balance right but from those who are backing the proposed changes and the issues they won't talk about I'm quite confident that they are not about actually making children safer.

The system though is still set up as adversarial and shows little interest in digging for the truth. Once the role of maternal bias is out of the way then it's the biggest scoundrel win's which will leave both men and women unhappy if they have tried to do the right thing and an ex has been successful playing nasty tactics.

There will also be people of both genders who are unhappy because the system works despite itself sometimes.

R0bert

Pied Piper,
The Family Law Counrt is a highly feminist system that also scavangers money from anyone who attends (both men and women).

It has very lttle to do with families, as most people who walk out of a Family Law Court have no family afterwards. Unless you call the feminist model a family, which is that the mother has the children while the father pays money to the mother.

We also have a highly feminist culture of divorce and separation. The so called Family Relationship Centers are just centers for separation or divorce. I count the word "separation" 10 times on the Home page of the so called Family Relationship Centers.

http://math.hws.edu/javamath/basic_applets/SeriesGrapherApplet.html

The proposed changes will do nothing to strengthen families in this country.

It has been the same cycle repeating itself whenever Labor gets into power. They plunge the country into debt, install social policies that wreck the fabric of society and are too expensive to manitain, and then after they are voted out, it takes about a decade to repair the damage done.

Dear Pied Piper
I and at many couples I know have a 50/50 arrangement. It works a charm. I wish I had done it earlier, as for the first 8 years of our separation I had only fortnightly access.

You are right, there are a number of prerequisites, proximity of living arrangements, flexibility with work and a resolutnees towards the inevitable whining from a new partner/s.

But the positives far outwiegh the inconveniences, for all parties. We as a culture entirely undervalue the critical role parenting plays in becoming a mature and rounded individual. Most people who, for whatever reason, never take on the responsibility for another remain trapped in their own shallowness; forever looking to distract and entertain themselves.

To start to correct some of the current tragic family law consequences, it is essential that we spend promotional and advertising money counteracting the shallow pop culture and promote parenting as cool, as the path to wisdom; and the single life as shallow, lonely, meaningless and depressing. What is essential is that both fathers and mothers desperately want to be parents.

And then, the rest will work itself out without the need for heavy handed litiguous intrusion.

Hey Anti, yeah I do read it and believe it and read other stories and believe them. I just see tragedy being used. When you have suffered you look for an enemy and once one is focused on people become very resistant to other information that might prove them not always right.

Was a true story Anti, I stood there saying “but we saw it”, “what about the kids”. Fully bleated really I was so upset, one of the kids was still screaming in the background. Stupid me that is when the officer said he would contact DoCS. This domestic went for ages, at one point one of them had burnt rubber down the road then the dummy came back with the kids. I was on to the police 3 separate times going “COME NOW!” No she never did anything back.

Four witnesses. Four of us saw it over like half an hour but the police officer said it would not go anywhere unless she said something and she’s standing there saying nothing happened while one little girl is literally jumping up and down and still screaming she didn’t want to be hurt. It was a Friday night or Saturday, waste of time ringing them in my area on those nights.

I don’t know what to tell you blokes, I don’t like feminists, some were mean to me because I wanted to be a housewife and not join the workforce. I held a grudge ever since but I don’t like what mens groups are saying or the way they are saying it, the children will pay.

I'm 100% behind you YEBIGA. Parenting being described as the hardest job on earth is complete rubbish, it is fun and pretty easy really. I had an awesome ex and bestest friend that turned into an idiot when a new woman was in his life for a short time, then he died… not suicide I should add.

Women can’t use the word separation vanna?

R0bert: "There will also be people of both genders who are unhappy because the system works despite itself sometimes."

Yep.