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The Forum > Article Comments > The children's voices > Comments

The children's voices : Comments

By Barbara Biggs, published 24/2/2009

How many more children need to die before the Federal Government acts to protect kids?

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It is a shame that Barbara only concentrates on cases where the male is the alleged perpetrator.

On ABC radio a male caller talking about family law, mentioned that his ex female partner on the day that she was to loose custody of the child, she murdered the child and then killed herself. This happended only last year.

John Stapleton in the Weekend Australian 'Battered by the System' 3rd June 2000;

"Nobody believed 'Frank' when he tried to protect his son from bureaucratic bungling. John Stapleton reports that, nearly 20 years on, Frank has been proved right, even though he lost in court.

The boy was eight weeks old when his father called welfare authorities and pleaded with them to take his son into foster case. He alleged that the mother was being violent towards the child, throwing him against walls and trying to smother him. The authorities ignored him, as they did for years to come, but the father persevered."

No person, whether they are male or female should be allowed to abuse children.

Barbara cites eleven cases over a period of 13 years. However no matter how emotive this issue is, children are at much greater risk of accidental drowning or being run over by a reversing vechile, than the risks of a family law case.
Posted by JamesH, Tuesday, 24 February 2009 8:37:22 AM
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I have no sympathy at all for people who abduct children and take them overseas. It results in a huge wastage of resources that could have been expended to good effect elsewhere. The crimes cherry-picked by the author are irrelevant to the case and do not justify it one jot.

When activists demand government action for a narrow area of interest the inevitable outcome is skews in funding and problems in coordination of effort.

This is the bigger picture as reported by the ABC:

'Maree Faulkner from the National Association for the Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect says the case (of child neglect) in South Australia comes as no surprise.

"We hear a lot about sexual and physical abuse. Really neglect is the hidden bit of the iceberg. There are enormous numbers of families that are just not coping and providing and caring for their children," Ms Faulkner said.

"The Australian community demanded action from the government on climate change. The government responded and has committed over $1 billion to climate change."

"This (child abuse and neglect) is an issue that should be at least of that order."

The cost of early intervention may worry governments, but Dr David Wood from the organisation Act for Kids, says research from 2003 shows the cost of child abuse is already in the billions of dollars.

"A conservative $5 billion in 2003 would have to be an extremely conservative figure," Dr Wood says, citing the cost of hospital stays for abused or neglected children, work involved in care and counselling of children and placement of children removed from families.'

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/06/25/2285053.htm
Posted by Cornflower, Tuesday, 24 February 2009 11:03:34 AM
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'How much longer can the government ignore the voices of children living with abuse?'

One answer lies in the first line of JamesH's post above:

'It is a shame that Barbara only concentrates on cases where the male is the alleged perpetrator.'

Therein lies a major part of the problem. The debate never properly gets off the ground, because someone always brings it back to a what-about-the-menz issue.

Thank you, James - nice little piece of topic hijacking. We can always count on you.

Perhaps, one reason we keep ignoring the voices of children who are victims of abuse is because, as a society, we have little to no respect for them. They are the chattels of their parents and, for centuries, the principal responsibility for their care and emotional nurturing has been delegated to the disempowered gender - thus putting them at the bottom of the political food chain.

Things are changing, however. Ironically, one reason for this is that children have become major consumers in the last generation or two, which is starting to make our democratic institutions take more notice of them.

Another reason is that organisations such as Kids in Distress [http://www.kidsindistress.org.au/] are doing a wonderful job in giving the legal and democratic rights of children the long overdue attention they deserve.
Posted by SJF, Tuesday, 24 February 2009 11:06:11 AM
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SJF, "..the principal responsibility for their care and emotional nurturing has been delegated to the disempowered gender - thus putting them at the bottom of the political food chain."

That is absolute garbage. I suppose that is why Japanese mothers initiate sex with their sons, or why in some cultures mothers masturbate their children to pacify them?
http://www.atypon-link.com/AAP/doi/abs/10.1375/pplt.14.2.218 (click on PDF report)

Fair crack of the whip SJF, accusing JamesH of hijacking is the pot calling the kettle black. Anyhow he was only reacting to the bias he saw in the examples given in the article, which was probably a fair call if you think about it.

But who cares? What about burying the gender hatchet (other than in someone's head) and attacking the much larger problem which is child abuse and neglect?

I disagree with your opinion that "Things are changing, however. Ironically, one reason for this is that children have become major consumers in the last generation or two, which is starting to make our democratic institutions take more notice of them." Regretably, the incidence of child neglect and abuse is known to be increasing. As usual, there are no simple causes or simple solutions.

Likewise, even if there was evidence that 'democratic institutions' now notice children because they are major consumers, that is a far cry from doing anything practical to help. I confess to wondering though what possible political impact infants or even young adolescents might have. There is a wealth of evidence that the major political parties pay scant attention to what anyone below voting age might want and then it is rapidly forgotten soon after the bums hit the leather in Canberra. Talk with young people and you will see.

From all I have read, the major hurdle to doing anything about child neglect and abuse is public ignorance of the sheer magnitude of the problem. One thing I worry about though is that there appears to be a problem in coordinating effort. There are three levels of government and helping professionals - public and private - are ferocious protectors of their own patches.
Posted by Cornflower, Tuesday, 24 February 2009 12:48:40 PM
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Correction SJF, the debate never gets off the ground because of bigotted and biased people like you.

When children are abused by members of either gender, it is not a mens or womens issue, it is a human issue.

Suddenly socalled Feminists flatly refuse to allow the debate to be expand out the narrow confines of their minds. This called concrete thinking.

The real problem lies in determining who is abusing, whether they be male or female.

The refusal of socalled Feminists to allow debate about this issue, and to try and to discourage discussion of this, is in itself abuse.

It has nothing to do with fathers rights, expanding discussion into abuse committed by women, it is about the rights of the child.

Unless SJF, only supports the rights of the child until those rights conflicts with the mothers interests.

http://www.canadiancrc.com/female_sexual_predators_awareness.aspx

Interesting the above link contains the statement "86% of the victims of female sexual predators aren't believed, so the crimes go unreported and don't get prosecuted."

Feminists maintain that they support human rights and social justice, then one must ask why? These same people refuse to allow the debate about child abuse and children at risk, to include the issue of abuse by women.

Maybe such people are only interested in preventing child abuse when it is committed only be men. Thereby keeping safe their precious political dogma.
Posted by JamesH, Tuesday, 24 February 2009 12:53:30 PM
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SJF said –
Therein lies a major part of the problem. The debate never properly gets off the ground, because someone always brings it back to a what-about-the-menz issue.

It is not about bringing it back to men’s issues it is about keeping the debate free from gender issues altogether. As soon as readers smell a gender issue they should draw attention to it so that those issues can be eradicated from the debate altogether. Too often that smell crops up in articles by people who claim to be only interested in the welfare of children. It is not that difficult to write an article which is fair and balanced and focuses on the real issues. When you have some other agenda boiling away in your unconscious it will escape via your words and attitudes no matter how nice and fair you try to be.

‘for centuries, the principal responsibility for their care and emotional nurturing has been delegated to the disempowered gender’

How can you delegate that someone choose to have a child and take responsibility for its care and emotional nurturing. You cannot make anyone do this. It is physically impossible to force a woman to have a child. Women have to take responsibility for their decisions no matter how much regret they may have for them. Trying to shift responsibility does nothing in the long run to solve the problem of safety for children which is what the debate is about.
Posted by phanto, Tuesday, 24 February 2009 12:54:22 PM
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