Dear Robert... apologies if I overstepped the mark by simply re-stating what you have indelibly stated yourself here on a number of occasions.
I could have re-worded it as "Robert has reported dv from his ex".. is that better ? I didn't label her..you did.

Steel.. you come close to the mark there, referring to the ways in which some feminists seek to have their views become law. It seems we are often in danger of projecting in either of 2 ways.

Vanilla 'projects' from her moderate and balanced feminism to suggest that her kind is ok. (quite possibly correct)
Others like me, tend to project the worst images and reports across the board.

The more important point is that we should all be looking out for those who try to use the democratic process in unscrupulous ways to further an extremist agenda.

"Unscrupulous" would mean the deliberate manipulation and shaming of anyone in a 'Womens Studies' class who speaks out about such things as 'Its always his fault'. That's one issue and experience that has been reported on OLO a few times.

So.. YES.. the issue runs deep..and is quite emotive. I feel threatened and oppressed when I see brochures like that one at the police station, because I know that no matter what happened to me, (wife attacked with a knife, and I belted her) I am wrong by default.

So, in terms of specifics.. 'There is work to do' and the eradication of that brochure would be high on the list.

It is contrary to the crimes act anyway, and is discriminatory. It could even be siad to be 'perverting the course of justice' Reasonable restraint is very much a part of our legal system, and 'knocking out' a "person" attacking you with a deadly weapon is very 'reasonable'.

ACTION STATIONS. One act of protest may be to compose a letter, illustrating the last paragraphs above, and delivering it to the local police station, and also the police public liason unit.

Boazy, perhaps I read to much into your comment. If so sorry. My intention has never been to label my ex but rather to draw attention to the failures of a system that refuses to address female violence.
My ex has been violent but I don't think violence is one of her identifying characteristics.

If you find those posters threatening in a police station you should try dealing with a mediation situation where the shelves and walls are plastered with them. Where councellors tell you that "she is smaller than you and unlikely to hurt you".

One of the points often raised against the studies that show similar rates of DV initiation by men and women is that those on the front line don't report it. My experience is that those on the front line have been trained to ignore female violence. When confronted with it they excuse it and minimise it. "She felt threatened, she is smaller than you, she was upset", etc.

They have been so indoctrinated with the udea that DV is a male problem that they refuse to see it when females do it.

Apart from the pain (emotional and physical) suffered by male victims some of the research shows a high correlation between reciprical violence and the severity of injury to women. Women who hit men either as initiators or in retaliation are more likely to be seriously injured than those who don't. That alone should be reason to be telling women not to hit even for those who don't care about the male victims of DV.

Whilst feminism has had a significant role to play in this approach to DV so to has paternalism and a determination to judge people by perceived gender characteristics. Your kind of thinking about gender roles is part of the problem. Those who insist that women are almost all gentle nurturers who should be protected and excused for their weaknesses whereas men a barely controlled violent types get their thinking from a love of gender roles not from a passion for equality.

R0ber

Steel, Boazy and RObert

I read Steel's link and yes there are many cases where children have been put at risk due to decisions made by Courts. Recently a man in Australia drove his children into a lake and drowned them and he did have access to his children and by all appearances was a good dad.

There is no doubt that in the past men were generally the losers in custodial arrangements and as RObert mentioned the issues surrounding men experiencing DV perpetrated by women. We can't ignore the fact that women who are victims of DV also need assistance and in my experience they are in the majority. I accept that the statistics about men experiencing DV are not perfect because of the failure to report but it is not a competition to see who wins.

It is only in the past 40 years or so that women had access to shelters if they were being beaten by their husbands. In the past women often had to 'cop it sweet' because there was nowhere else to go and women were nearly always completely dependent on their partner for financial security. Now of course, these issues have been addressed and our working culture has shifted somewhat.

In regards to custody, I don't know much about the new Family Relationship Centres that were set up to assist families in making better and fairer decisions about children but I am told they allow a forum for men to be able to air their grievances about access to children, issues of child support etc.

The only thing we do know is that it is not an exact science, sometimes the authorities will make mistakes because lets face it the only two people who really know what went on in a marriage are the couple involved and sometimes people lie.

We all agree that there are problems, but how do we address them to ensure better outcomes for children? It is about the children first and foremost. No-one disputes that children should experience equally loving relationships with fathers as well as mothers.

pelican you are being rather biased. you are very quick to say two things which indicate this: a quick example" of a man doing something similar as if the two cases are equal (they most assuredly are not mainly because of the decisions and warnings provided in the example i provided). the website contains a lot more than one example of this.

http://glennsacks.com/blog/?cat=61

And your second paragraph begins with:
"There is no doubt that ...............*IN THE PAST*........... men were generally the losers in custodial arrangements"

> "The only thing we do know is that it is not an exact science, sometimes the authorities will make mistakes because lets face it the only two people who really know what went on in a marriage are the couple involved and sometimes people lie."

And there lies the point. Women are favoured in LAW and men are generally assumed to be the liars by authorities too.

When the opposite is quite possibly true:
http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/s/139/139613_women_lie_cheat_and_steal.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KgxwPU0W-Wg

And i've been told i have a strawman in a prior comment:

"
* “Politically, I call it rape whenever a woman has sex and feels violated.” — Catherine MacKinnon

* “Men who are unjustly accused of rape can sometimes gain from the experience.” - Catherine Comins

* “All men are rapists and that’s all they are.” (Marilyn French, Author; and advisor to Al Gore’s Presidential Campaign)

* “We are, as a sex, infinitely superior to men…” Elizabeth Cady Stanton, “One Woman, One Vote”
"

http://endofmen.wordpress.com/2007/11/05/86/

Um, I think it was me who brought up the straw woman, Steel. However I left the thread when CJ invoked Godwin's law. (I know! What am I doing here? It's a paradox!)

My resolve to leave was further strengthened by your comment: "they are working behind the scenes to socially engineer society." It was then I remembered I was due back in the secret underground bunker from which my feminist "brethren" and I rule the world. Abyssinia.

Also I have my own version of Godwin's law, it's called Vanilla's law, and it occurs when an argument about feminism ends in either a Catherine McKinnon or an Andrea Dworkin quote. CJ, R0bert, Pelican - can you help me popularise it?

Good.. seems like no hard feelings lingering.. certainly no ill intent intended Rob.

If we look at most of the posts.. the central issue is conflict. Its 'men are disadvantaged' or.. 'Women are vulnerable'.. and we have some example of tragedies that illustrate these things.

Robert.. I take that point about partly the fault of men due to their ideas about gender.. in that they don't take female DV seriously enough to report it. I guess because they/we know that if we decided to, we could end it quickly, but there might be a few bruises. (unless knives and/or guns are involved or the element of surpise)

One of the themes running through my heart all through this dialogue is how tragic (to me, as a Christian) that we have allowed society to deterioate to the point where such things are commonplace.

I think I would be brough to utter despair if I was in a mediation room surrounded by all manner of literature condemning me because I'm a bloke.

So.. coming full circle to the beginning again.. I hope and pray that we will give more consideration to the role of faith based on beautiful values, and a wonderful example in Christ, with whom we can indeed have a relationship with.

Having lived in such a society, where those values permeated all our relationships, its rather wonderful. The differing roles of male and female were not a problem, as people who's hearts seek the good, will not feel comfortable with one side of the gender equation carrying an unfair share of the domestic/family load