Robert -
When you say "Too often…etc" where exactly do you mean? In the media? Well that may be so, but the media portrays single mothers equally negatively. Its agenda seems to be to marginalize anyone who is underprivileged.

But if you mean on the Forum, see that’s where I have a problem.

Many posters maintain that ALL gender debates are a variation of "woman good – men bad". But in all fairness perusal of these threads does not support this view.

I have stated categorically that I am not of that opinion and so have all the most vociferous female posters on here. Even those who don’t post often have made an effort to record that they love the men in their lives and certainly don’t harbour feelings of hostility towards an entire gender. Many who have been treated badly also make the difference between the feelings they harbour towards a single male and the entire male sex.

"While people still promote the nasty idea…..." again, who here is doing so? The important modifier "some" has played a pivotal part in every discussion – including those of Flood – about men’s groups I have read.

We agree there are radical female groups out there and distance ourselves from them. But I don't hear the corrollory that there are radical "Nazi" men’s groups admitted.

My personal experiences also showed me the family law system doesn’t care about truth. I have always pointed out how unfair the system is. Neither it nor the two women’s groups I went to could give me any practical help at all. It was Community groups comprising all genders and all denominations – and who also agree about the uselessness of the government systems - which offered the only practical help I ever got.

So we are going to have to agree to differ. As long as you continue to point out how biased the system is towards Dads, I will continue to underline its unfairness to ALL and recommend across-the-board community involvement rather than gendered reform.

Romany:"We agree there are radical female groups out there and distance ourselves from them"

Which ones?

Romany:"I don't hear the corrollory that there are radical "Nazi" men’s groups admitted."

Which ones?

Romany:"The important modifier "some" has played a pivotal part in every discussion – including those of Flood – about men’s groups I have read. "

Please point out anything by Flood that has anything good to say about men's groups, especially those organised around the rights of fathers. If he uses the modifier "some" it is purely to put a pseudo-impartial gloss on what is essentially gender hate-literature.

As an aside, it's interesting that Flood has had little to say since the birth of his son...

Romany:"As long as you continue to point out how biased the system is towards Dads, I will continue to underline its unfairness to ALL"

All well and good, but responding generally to specific complaints is not helpful. Think of it this way: someone says "women are underpaid because men doing the same work get paid more" (a specific complaint) and someone else responds: "we all need to be paid more" (a general response). Does the second have anything to offer the first, or is the response essentially a non-sequitur? I say the latter and that at worst, this type of response is specifically designesd to obfuscate the issues at hand.

Perhaps one of the problems with having many single-parent families in a society, is that we become accepting of this as the norm, without acknowledging the tremendous hardship this places on the parent and the effort that goes into trying to be both "mother" and "father" (having to do at least some things that would traditionally be done by the opposite sex). I and my sisters grew up without a mother, in a single-parent household. I did go through a phase of hating Mother's Day, and was tempted several years to nominate dad as Mother of the Year. However, to see such a celebration phased out to appease my hurt is only to impose on everyone else. And down the track I see it as part of learning to fit into society, where not everyone is bending over backwards to appease you as a person. I do think however, I gained a better appreciation of my father from the constant remarks about how well he did with his "girls", and acknowledgment of the effort that he put in. Perhaps those from single-mother families would also benefit from the recognition of the extra burden placed on their parent. Further, whilst there have been times since I became a parent myself that I would REALLY have loved to have mum's input and advice, ultimately its made me appreciate just how much effort my dad put in, and it hasnt impacted on my ability to be an effectiv parent (so no cop-outs for boys raised solely by their mothers - they can still be effective fathers themselves).

Romany, my "To often" was in relation to SJF's earlier comment ending in the bit about a female paradise. I've also seen plenty of comments over time in a similar vein and others regarding nobody making a fortune from child benefits. Some on this site, others in the media.

I agree single mums do sometimes cop a caning in the media (and sometimes on this site).

My earlier posts were prompted by the reference to Liz's attacks on Farrell and Flood's attacks on the mens movement. Please read them in context with that, I'm not trying to add to the gender wars but neither do I wish to meekly accept SJF's suggestion that "Perhaps the supposed scarcity of divorce information available to men is more a reflection of their advantage, not their disadvantage."

R0bert

Robert,

Yeah, o.k., you are the last person I want to get into a dispute with. But I have a valid question. Why does Flood get up your nose so much? I have read a lot of his stuff and it seems pretty balanced.

You mention his "attacks" on mens clubs - but he doesn't indiscriminately attack: he reserves that for for the ones that, as I mentioned before, are the equivalent of those radical feminist groups: the gender bashers.

I have logged on to a couple of those in the past as some of the male posters here have provided links to them...and they are abominable. I can't see why such a reasonable person as you are objects to warnings about them? Recently divorced men are every bit as vulnerable as recently divorced women and a real danger exists that anyone who falls into one of the radical groups that exist for both men and women will never heal and will scar their children, surely?

And the Farrell person. I find it incomprehensible that you, of all people - and especially as the father of two boys - would defend someone like that?

You still haven't said how you could possibly overlook his views on incest which you say are balanced by his other views? You didn't comment on either of the quotes I gave earlier but I can't see how one could turn a blind eye to them. The guy is not a psychologist, nor has he any qualifications in childcare/parenting either formal or informal, being childless himself. There are a plethora of wonderful books around written by qualified men - it was Modern Paradox I think who cited a recent one. What insights could someone who condones paedophilia possibly give that are more valuable?

Not stirring here, just curious, is all.

Romany, I've read a fair bit of Floods stuff and he has most definately not given me the impression that he takes a balanced approach to gender issues. He seems to go out of his way to find fault with issues raised by the mens movement but I've not seen any similar critique of the mums groups. He has published material attacking CTS but I've not found similar critique from him addressing the genderised approach to the DV stats he seems to support.

The mens/fathers rights groups play an important role but Flood seeks to portray them in a much more negative light than I believe is fair.
He mentions the possibility of some good but consistantly counters with a negative.

My view is they save a lot of lives. They provide some support when often all other support is gone or at risk of being overused. They provide access to resources which are not (or were not) widely available to fathers otherwise. They provide some hope when in many other ways hope is gone, some help in taking the long view rather than just being overwhelmed by whats happened already.

Flood has said some worthwhile stuff, there are risks associated with long term involvement in advocacy groups - I'm not currently a member of a fathers group because I don't think it would be good for me long term but in the short term it was invaluable.

As for Farrell my own readings of what he has said and what others say about him leave me with the impression that there is a large disparity between the two. Comments appear to have been taken out of context to portray him as a child abuse supporter but my impression is that he has tried to provide a moderate voice in what is generally a discussion of extremes, never an easy task.

I could be wrong about that, the whole issue is emotive and hard to find anything which looks like independant commentary on it.

R0bert