Col,
So we aren’t talking at cross purposes, the principles underpinning the changes to the Family Law Act give a broad direction to where we’re headed, these are:

· children have a right to know both parents and to be protected from harm;
· parenting is a responsibility that should be shared, providing this does not put children at risk of harm; and
· parents and children benefit when parenting arrangements after separation are resolved outside the court system.
The system hopefully, is heading toward something less adversarial where outside interference is kept minimal – despite the sham of the current child support payment scheme.

Maximus sums up well what I thought of the McInnes article.

I guess we’d all save ourselves a lot of angst if we got our relationships right before inflicting our baggage onto the next generation. The best governments can do is to provide an appropriate legislative framework – as individuals, however, we'll always be charged with getting ‘our own houses in order’, albeit, a fragmenting society or community doesn’t help.

The concept of shared parenting after separation is a good step towards strengthening the family – the onus is placed back onto the parents. Those who absolutely need to separate will – many, however, will be forced to consider any superfluous reasons for splitting. Childcare, healthcare, schooling etc. are the practical government help measures given in shoring up ‘family’.

The reality is, people continue to want and value family life, the 'breadwinner' model is now disappearing with new structures emerging - 80 per cent of all children, however, live with both their natural parents. Family is the 'soil' on which kids thrive. The extended family network is important and appears alive and well, if it were not so, the number of unsupported people on our streets would be far greater than it is.

To a large extent, it will continue to be a matter of integrity and veracity as to how successful and cohesive a society we’ll be.

"He has nothing to prove, and the idea of hitting someone is utterly foreign to him."

It is almost in the subconscious female vernaclar(sic) that there has to be a reference somewhere about blokes hitting someone. It is perhaps more like that 'negging' technique that pick up artist use.

In a discussion paper "Who kills whom and why by Jenny Morgan, Law School, University of Melbourne, she examines the murders of 90 children in Victoria over a ten year period from 1985-95. 58 children were killed either by parents or step-parents. She found that men and women were almost equally responsible for the murder of children, mothers killed 22 and men killed 24. Unfortunately her paper does not account for the murders of 12 children.

All the mothers who committed murder, murdered their own biological children. No children were recorded as being murdered by their step-mothers.

Of the 24 children who were murdered by men 62.5% were murdered by their step-father.

37 or 80% of children who were murdered, were either murdered by their mother or stepfather.

Fathers who murdered their biological children accounted for just 9 murders or 20%.

Fatal assault is defined as being usually an assault committed with the intention of punishing the child rather than killing them.

In 13 of the 15 cases of fatal assault it was the mother's defacto that killed the child. In 5 cases it was the mother that killed the child as a result of fatal assualt.

JamesH,
I do not dispute that many men never hit someone or that many women often feel like doing so - and may do so, that wasn't my point, and it'd be good if you didn't read my post so selectively.
I'm not terribly impressed by the "your gender's just as nasty as my gender so how dare you point the finger" argument. Children should be protected, from whoever wants to hurt them. "nough said.

The family court has moved on; its grip by feminist led propaganda has been pried with the Shared Parenting Responsibility Act that now instructs that the court must order 'parent child meaningful relationships' in separation...so it seems the new tact in 2006 to continue the unbalanced woman dominated family control of our children is promote a 'fearful child dogma' particularly under 7 years of age, while the family court struggles to effectively address false allegations getting unlawful legal power...

Unfortunately, the emerging fact is the woman's control of a young child is through the power of fear to strict obedience to her power and authority and the long term harm it has caused, which the feminists appears to be countering by the role reversal strategy of 'child fears father' and still try to keep the now discredited 'father is violent' dogma based on corrupted statistics which now being set straight by valid studies.

I wonder what the feminist strategy will be to the increasing power and force of men to strengthen the surrogacy laws to allow a man who has set his life to have a child, but does not want to be in a relationship with a woman to do so, to allow this. More feminst lies and deceit to damage the name of such fatherchild families to allow this happening... let the conflict begin...

Sam

My ex-wife used to abuse my children, causing bruising and even bleeding on occasion. She never denied it. The court acknowledged it but she was still given custody despite the facts that: both children said they wanted to live with me, the children's counsellors had identified that the children did not feel safe with my ex-wife and they did feel safe with me, my ex-wife was a full-time professional working away from home and I was working part-time from home and I had been the primary carer of the children for 2 years prior to the separation.

My son developed paranoid schizophrenia and is now homeless, god only knows where, - my daughter became an ice-queen and cut herself off completely moving to Europe.

Dr McInnes's bias in portraying family violence as something 'men do to women and children' is thoroughly offensive. I could expect this from some ratbag crackpot. The fact that it comes so confidently from someone with her position without any sort of censure by her employers or the culture in general shows just how deeply entrenched this bias is in the culture and how readily accepted.

I notice even in programs like SBS's Insight when women use the terms 'perpetrator & men' and, 'women & victim' interchangeably the moderator doesnt pick anyone up on it (apparently it reflects her own ignorance).

Women get real - look at the stats, look at the studies from all around the world that prove that women engage in an enormous amount of violence. Even discounting emotional/psychological aggression (which anyone who has ever had anything to do with women knows they use far more than physical violence) women perpetrate huge volumes of violence both toward men and toward children. Women are responsible for the great bulk of child abuse and while that has to be taken in the context of women doing the bulk of the childcare that does not make it ok.

If you lack academic references on the extent of female violence try this to start:
http://www.csulb.edu/~mfiebert/assault.htm

Quite right Rob513264.

Just off the wire and into the mainstream -

Sydney Morning Herald
Defacto couple guilty of child abuse
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/he-hurted-me-in-the-shower-toddler/2006/10/20/1160851115980.html

"The toddler had been whipped with a kettle cord by her mother and burnt in the shower by her mother's de facto husband because she was not toilet trained, Wollongong District Court heard yesterday."

Well, where was her real dad?

We don't know, but statistically she would have been a lot safer with him that in the most dangerous place in the world for a toddler - with a single mother and her defacto.

Enough said, except to point out the typical man-slander headline of the article - He hurted me in the shower: toddler - leaving saintly mum completely out of the picture despite the fact that from the text it would seem that mum was the instigator of the violence. This focus on men as perpetrators is a repeating behaviour of Fairfax and other lefty publications and sub-editors.