>>You could also question the instability caused by children having to spend their lives divided between two parents.

not only could you, there is no shortage of man-hating psychosocial hacks doing just that.

>> Surely a stable predictable environment is preferable to gratifying the egos of both parents?

surely dealing realistically with childhood needs and parental desires is preferable to this kind of nasty slur.

>>Shouldn't custody go to whoever, male of female, is in the best position to care for their children?

which would just happen to be the mother ...

Eye:””TPP.But in reality they have watched their parents lose every fight with DOCS when trying to protect children.”

Yeah my own daughter watched me lose every battle with DOCS/fAMILIES SA and the family court, all that is except the final one, and even then she had to SHAME them into doing something.””

Leaves a bad taste. You find yourself unable to comprehend why they wont listen and why they make the decisions they do. And there is no one that will listen, no other department to go to. Australia shouldn’t have to wait for a child to speak up, it is shameful.

The children I have are too young to speak up or have been through so many traumas they are incapable of defending themselves and usually not invited to be court to do so.

I am guessing that if court was better then DoCS/Families SA/Child Safety Queensland and all the sister agencies in other states would be forced to change.

That word “better” – probably someone cleverer than me could define it.

TPP, "I want them both to embrace what gender they are and appreciate what innate qualities their own gender brings and acknowledge how each gender compliments the other, I don’t want either of them to be parents"

Is that a Freudian slip or do you really mean that you don't want your son or daughter to have children?

It is a bit stiff encouraging your children not to have children especially when you yourself have taken more children on board during their younger years.

Not judging, but it is a remarkable revelation and they will see your behaviour as inconsistent. Should they always carry the burden of what you have seen?

Hey Cornflower, Sorry I meant I didn’t/don’t want them to have biological children. I would be happy for them parent.

They will always carry the burden of what our whole family has seen (hardly akin to war, pestilence, death and famine) but through seeing what they have they also understand how little the biology matters.

It may go against the grain in these threads about fathers compared to boyfriends.

TPP:"how little the biology matters."

The children you see may all be damaged in some way, but they represent a very small subset of children. Biology matters a whole lot

TPP

Why don't you want them to have their own children but it is OK to parent (does that mean adopt)? That makes it sound as though biology matters but in a negative sense in their case.

Or are you thinking that our children should be childless to make up for the excesses of others abroad? Maybe their right to have children is being taken away from them by governments who through pursuing reckless record immigration numbers year after year, have made Australia's population growth higher than criticised Asian countries.

Not much of a life for many youth in a country that prefers to take in large numbers of migrants as job fodder to suit the big end of town while refusing to train or retrain its own people.

In Brisbane it is said that two suburbs supply the vast majority Queensland's criminal population. It wouldn't be a stretch to suggest that the same suburbs probably also supply many of the at-risk children for you and others to foster. Of course these suburbs also have high unemployment and family traditions of unemployment and welfare dependence that go back generations. The Australian government prefers to recruit tradies and other manual workers from overseas than train them though.