i thought daniel's piece was about the attitudes of young men to parenting - not the family court. did i misunderstand?

i'm a divorced father myself, i have a good relationship with my former wife. we separated amicably - we talked abiut our problems,a nd tried a variety of things before deciding that while being husband and wife was not working, we were both committed to parenting our child, and to working together as friends.

as a lawyer with some experience of the family court (from many perspectives), i have seen many occasions where an applicant or respondent has had very legitimate reasons to fear their former spouse (and not just women fearing men). and many more where each was simply being nasty to one another.

taking responsiblity for your choices, and your feelings, is the message i get from daniel's piece. and as a former criminal law lawyer, i heartily agree with the general thrust of his argument: individuals need to take responsibility for their thoughts, feelings and actions; and society could be doing a lot more to help them do just that.

if you leave decision-making to others, why should you be expecting them to put your interests ahead of anyone else's? screaming and yelling 'coz you feel hard done by is childish (exactly the thing daniel is talking about). stop and ask yourself what you can do to make things better/easier before you get all het up over how unfair someone else has been.

some people do get 'screwed by the system' - but that does not absolve anyone from responsibility for themselves [unless they have a relevant disability, but that is a different matter].

TracyA - actually, I spend every day immersed in youth culture, teaching undergraduates at a university and currently living in a pastoral-care for youth situation. Alas I must share my wrinkles with 17 to 20 year olds daily. I would have to weigh in by saying, anecdotally, that youth these days seem much more mature at handling their relationships than I ever was at that far-ago time. Possibly because they commit to someone serious a little later and feel comfortable sharing more with a circle of friends and colleagues. They're also more likely to have both male and female best-friends, thereby possibly understanding eachother's gender a lot better than the generation before, and before that. Giving them a more balanced and respectful view of eachother when they get around to partnering/children.

And, sure single-ness is marketed to, but so is coupling. Eg, the excessive cross-promotion of Valentines Day each year. Being single because an advert tells you to be so, is pathetic. Young people are a bit smarter than that and want just like everyone else to belong to something, and close friendship with a small cohort allows that for them these days. What's so wrong with that?

maelorin,
most of us campaigning for change in family law recognise that there are cases like yours. Congratulations. Unfortunately for some it does not matter how much care we take to try and do it right other factors come into it.

Daniel's piece included a clear challenge to young men and a dismissal of the views of those who have experienced the pitfalls of the current system. There is a relevance for discussion suggesting that to ignore the potential costs has some associated risks.

I suspect that a factor other than being nasty which is significant but not well understood by those on above average incomes (laywers/judges/politicians) is the impact child residency can have on the income of a parent with few employment skills or a lack of desire to support themselves. CSA have an online calculator and FAO have tables available to get an estimate of just those bits. What I have not seen is a calculator for the Single Parents pension. In one case known to me the mother is getting about $450 a week tax free from the above sources (on top of investment income and wages from working one day a week). She may also be getting rent assistance but I don't know that. The parents share parenting about 53/47% (an issue costing everybody a lot of money as the mother seeks the usual 80/20 arrangements).

There appears to be a complete lack of the concept of responsibility for actions in the whole family law arena. Benefits are the same for the person who is abandoned with the kids as for the person who makes it almost impossible for the other parent to have substantial involvement in their kids lives. Creating a situation which makes shared care impossible appears to have no clear link to being the parent who see's less of the kids.

Maelorin

Your thoughts on responsibilities of the individual are interesting. However society has responsibilities also, and there are pre-marriage education programs available to help prepare couples for possible marriage (and in some countries they are mandatory). This is to try and avoid conflict or possible divorce, which is not only of great emotional and financial cost to the parents and their children, but it also has a cost to the community.

Because divorce is so common, it would be irresponsible for society not to give full information about the likely consequences of divorce to the couple before they marry.

As fathers will most likely be the non-custodial parent after a divorce, (88 % of the time), then it should be told to the intended groom how they will have to pay child support to the mother and this may occur until the child is 21 in some cases. But the father is likely to have minimal say in how that money is spent, have minimal say in how the child will be raised, and in 30% of cases, the father may not actually see the child at all.

In effect, the child will be taken from the father as a part of fatherhood. They should also be told how little concern will be shown by society regards this, and even in many articles on parenting, fathers are no longer mentioned, and there are a number of recent examples of this in OLO. They should also be told how expensive Family Law systems are to get more contact with the child or more say in the child’s life.

None of this Daniel did is his article, and because of this, young men could enter into marriage being totally unaware of it, although they have a very significant chance of it happening to them. Allowing young men to enter into marriage being totally un-aware and un-prepared is not responsible of society.

With the shear number of divorces (1,000 per week, each year) it also becomes impossible to believe that all these men were no good as husbands or fathers.

Audrey,

It’s fantastic that you’re among a group of mature young adults. However, you must be aware that everyone matures at different rates, and some are more vulnerable to peer pressure and marketing than others.

Your comment, ‘being single because an advert tells you to be so, is pathetic’ is pretty insensitive, considering you’re talking about young people at a really vulnerable stage of their lives. If you have low self-esteem, if you have come from an abusive environment, and especially if you’re in a socially isolated situation, you do whatever it takes to get yourself a ‘cohort’, regardless of whether or not that ‘cohort’ is supportive. And I’d say that a large number of young men are still uneasy about ‘sharing’ their emotions with friends and colleagues.

In labelling people ‘pathetic’ whose attitudes and behaviours are affected by brand promotion and advertising, you’re referring to a large portion of the population.

Most people buy the brands they do because, however subversively, an advert has told them to do so. And many people do this, to belong to something bigger than themselves. When you consider advertising budgets (such as Nike’s $500 million advertising spend in 1997 alone), you’ve got pretty intense effort going into convincing people to do something just ‘because an advert tells them so’.

There’s nothing wrong with *not* being involved in a romantic relationship when you’re young. I’m not sure why you’re asserting that I’ve said this. My point is to *understand* why you make the life decisions you do, and that even if ‘commitment’ isn’t on your five-year-plan, it might fit with what you’ve been seeking to ‘belong’ to. And I was more referring to young adults in and beyond their mid to late-20s.

Timkins,
You’re right: we do need to inform men and women of all this. And pre-marriage counselling should be strongly encouraged. But with a word limit of 600 words when writing of your own experience, it’s impossible to address all possible outcomes of marriage. You just wouldn’t get the piece published. It would necessitate a completely different piece, which should be done.

Tracy,

You have mentioned the impact that media, advertising etc has on people, and I tend to agree that it can have a significant impact on the way people think.

Now to get some female thoughts on this, (sweet, gentle female thoughts of course), it has been thought that media that is very negative towards males can eventually turn women away from men, as it gives women negative attitudes towards men, husbands, marriage, fathers etc.

I have heard men say that no matter what they did they could not make their wives happy, as those wives seemed totally convinced that they were unhappy.

A theory regards this is that women’s media is brainwashing women into believing that their lives are unhappy and unfulfilled, and this can occur particularly in women’s magazines which sell 100,000’s copies, and appear to be addictive reading for many women.. (Male magazines sell very few copies in comparison).
http://www.magazines.org.au/driver.asp?page=circulation+%26+readership/key+circulation+facts.

The articles in these magazines are normally written to a formula to try and convince women that they are unhappy and being victimised, and the articles will often infer that “it’s all men’s fault”. See http://www.nationalreview.com/books/kob200404190926.asp

It’s a huge industry, but it is essentially an industry trying to make women feel unhappy, insecure, and often with negative feelings about males.

Of concern is that this type of media is extending down to young girls, and we now have magazines such as “TotalGirl” at http://www.totalgirl.com.au/ and also “Girl TV” http://www.totalgirl.com.au/transient/girl_tv/GIRLTV_terms.html

“TotalGirl” and “Girl TV” are children’s media with minimal male content, or males that appear are treated like a source of entertainment or as a type of fashion accessory. As can be seen on the front cover (and the web-site) of “TotalGirl” it also has a sub-title of “No Boys Allowed”, which is like a subconscious message to young girls that males are no good or unnecessary. So young girls are now getting anti-male messages from a very young age.

So what do you think about media that often portrays males negatively, and what affect would that have on women perspectives towards men, husbands, marriage, fathers etc.