The proposed change requires the fear to be reasonable. It does not suppose that a moderate amount of volence is acceptable. (Nor should it.) As such, it makes hardly any difference, since courts would normally exclude fanciful and imaginary fears in any case.

ozbib

All those who care for family and children will welcome adding "reasonable". My daugher would support making make it more concrete.

In the land of law, it is essential that we do not persecute innocent out of mere fear. The current system is does just this. Not only this, it rips off the man of his wealth, of his children, of his income and basically his life. I myself is one and can speak very clearly on this. That is why suicide rate among single fathers is so high.

Any legal process must consider the fact men can be innocent. It should be about finding what is wrong instead about witch hunting. Further, opportunitistic divorce has become the norm with the falling values in the society. So, the domestic violence has become the way to exploit innocent hardworking people of their wealth, let alone damaging families and chilren.

I believe the writer is either still in the moon or just plain out of touch with reality.

cheer - premsai

Ozib, you're quite right of course about the significance of the wording. The author must be taking a holistic approach to legal construction.

However, I think the impact in court is more than you suggest. If the word "reasonable" is absent, then the court has to decide whether or not a person really has a fear, or whether they're just making it up. The fact that the fear, if present, is not reasonable makes no difference.

With the word "reasonable" present, the court can make an objective assessment of the underlying facts. Only if the fear is reasonable does the court have to consider whether the person has it, and if the person claims they do, that's probably sufficient.

Sylvia.

Fear is fear! So on a scale of one to ten how much did you fear for your safety?
The reality is that the Family court does all it can to minimise DV in any way shape of form. The reality is that the Family Court is about making sure that an abusive violent parent has contact with that person, even if it makes orders for Supervised contact. Because this will only be ordered for a short amount of time.
My children were sexually abused by their father and he was given supervised contact. It is now going to be supervised for a few more months and then progress to unsupewrvised and by the end of the year to overnight. This is how the Family Court deal with abuse issues.
The relationship with the abusive parent is paramount! I have seen it so many times it makes me sick! Parents that have a long sheet of assult toward their X and others and have spent time in jail for these offences still get unsupervised contact Any form of contact is seen as better than none -And so the cycle will continue. Untill Australians actually do more than just pay lip service to australia say NO to Domestic Violence - any Violence for that matter and there are real consequences then all the band aids are not going to heal a festering wound.
Children are the real loosers in all of this.
Why are we being punished by being forced to see him (Father) when we did nothing wrong! He's the one that hurt us!
The Family Court send a very strong message to our kids!
They don't give a ----! My children fear this man is that reasonable NO

There is nothing reasonable about Family Law.

Those trading in fear and those arguing against the insertion of the “reasonable” qualifier, are simply in production mode.

Consider no fault divorce. Falling out of love is a perfectly valid reason to harm children. So is boredom. No “reasonable” required there.

Once you have indirectly (Scout, read deviously), threatened your children with financial and emotional harm (i.e. leaving the security of a family), the state will step in to minimise it. This will most likely involve harming the father, but as long as the mother is protected from her actions, so are her children. Beautiful.

As nature and nurture conspire to modify survival behaviour of women, time will reveal how men adapt.

The view of the author on this subject of "reasonable" fear is completely valid. Do you know the authors own personal history, no, you do not.

I agree, there have been some men who have been dealt a raw deal, but the stats also show that less than 5% of cases, that go to court, relating to violence and child abuse are false allegations.

Most cases are decided consentually either outside the courts or just before they go to trial.

Also, the notion that there is a huge amount of men that commit suicide on a daily basis due to a family breakdown. People commit suicide for varied reasons, how do you ask a corpse what drove them to commit suicide. It could be depression due to alcohol or substance abuse, depression due to family breakdown, other mental health issues, or they could be terminally ill with cancer or HIV ....you just do not know.

Violence is what it is. Being threatened verbally, like I was by my X, that he wanted to kill me, infront of our child is still violence. .... He wanted to strangle me. He didn't actually put his hands around my neck, but I was sure scared of losing my life in front of my child. 3 and a half years of emotional abuse by him, followed by marital rape 3 mths after having a C section, then 2 yrs later having my life threatened. Would you consider that fear of violence, a figment of my imagination, or would you consider that fear a result of DV.

Society in general is losing the plot, are some men in particular still can not shake their cave man insticts to control the woman.

Think about why your relationship with your X fell apart in the first place. If you are as good a father as you say you are, if you believe yourself to be decent man, if you think you have never done anything wrong by your partner (X partner) ...... then why are you in the position you are in today.