But who will have the time listen?

A fine in this case, obviously a desperate father/man.

LEAP
Posted by Quantumleap, Saturday, 14 May 2011 2:40:42 PM

I agree Leap - a fine is sufficient given the circumstances.

weareunique

It seems the above witch-hunters only see their own primitive objections to what is clearly an act of desperation. ( I can read between the lines too WAU :) So many symbolist at work here, and not to mention the profiling expert's:) We should be thinking, what would drive a seemly normal undervalued human-being to risk jail, his-life, and make a fool out of the Australian Government, not to mention making threats of harming others.

The system as obviously failed this fellow and no-one looks at the social side-effects thats caused the proverbial straw to break.

1..Why are suicides higher than ever before?

2..Why is the pressure of everyday living making us sick?

3..Why are people divorcing in record high numbers?

4..Why is it, when work sustainability is threatened for long term, people loose the plot?

5..What is the mental health state of the working population?

6..Are the numbers in Australia, effecting the way we function?

7..Why are we growing, when the care just wont go around?

8..

9..and so on to question 60.

And the lists grows faster than I can type.

15 million here for overall happiness and prosperity...IMO....But its not is it:)

The water tank is leaking, and there's not enough Ban-Aids to plug up the leaks:) For all the hoops one must jump through in order to operate, the human-beings were not meant to be pushed this far.

I tested rats once, in an over-crowded stressful situation, and the findings were less than favourable. Do you think humans are differenced? Some say...too fast and too hard, and I tend to agree.

The world has never seen this many people before, and you might want to think about shutting the gates for a while and give everyone some time-out.

Sorry for the long drawn out posts, I just add food for thought.....thats all.

Good night.

LEAP

Shadow Minister

I also respect the right of free speech, but that doesn't include a right to be a nuisance, to block roads, and it doesn't include threats of harm.

The sanction should not be a fine, which only goes to the state and would not do justice to those adversely affected. It should be to pay compensation to people affected by his actions.

suzieonline
You seem to be under the impression that when you favour a policy to enforce your opinion against people who aren't harming anyone, you aren't guilty of aggresisve violence, but you are, because that's how policy is enforced. Ultimately if you don't obey, a group of armed men will come and physically seize you. If you resist they will tazer or handcuff you, and if you defend yourself with similar force they will shoot you. This fact underlies all policy, that's why it's called policy, and it means there's an ethical question underlying all policy that you have obviously been oblivious to. When enforcing policy, everything the police do would be a serious crime for anyone else.

We don't see more of it because people already know that resistance is futile, so the government doesn't have to bother actually clubbing you into submission, they can just threaten to fine you. But that doesn't mean people, by obeying, agree; and it doesn't mean it's okay to use violence to get what you want.

So, are you in favour of policy to enforce the payment of "child support" even against people who never agreed to pay it?

If so, then you do have sympathy for people who threaten or commit violence to aggressively bully people into obeying their sexual or moral opinion, and you are guilty of it yourself, aren't you?

Why are there so many people who think that anyone who feels this behaviour is unacceptable immediately assumes said people actually object to also improving the system to prevent the offending people being drawn to this point?

I think I smell straw.

I would have thought he had standing to make a political protest, he is a non-custodial parent after all. His actions were a protest, but what sort of protest? All I saw is two signs flying on the bridge calling for reform to the political & bureaucratic status quo. As a citizen of Australia, he is entitled to make a non-violent protest of such kind. If there was such a problem, perhaps it is time that the security on the bridge should be beefed up (like we've been told it has been).

Non-litigious routes to settling Custodial disputes should be encouraged. Too often lawyers (lowercase intentionally) get involved and do whatever they can to cloud the issues, even intentionally causing dis/mistrust to further their own ends. Quite frankly, as a step-parent (partner has shared custody), it is hard to comprehend that Parents are never presumed to be capable of rehabilitation (unlike criminals), or to have grown. I don't advocate relaxing strictures against abusive parents, but other than that...

I would personally like to see the charges dropped, or for him to test the extent of the "Lange" type "Freedom of Political Expression/Speech", it would certainly seem to be a fit case for it.

I understood it wasn’t a man vs woman custody dispute that he was protesting about. Was he asking for custody because it looked like he was asking mainly for his children to be safe by any means?
Hadn’t he tried to get help because he believed his children were in danger and had been ignored many times?

If he was in a panic, or a rage, because he believed his children were at risk and kept being ignored when approaching the problem through more official and orderly channels then at the point he took to the bridge the dude was doing what we want parents to do – protect their kids by any means necessary.

I doubt you can do much good holding a silent protest in your own bathroom in case you upset anyone, I suspect it wouldn’t make much of an impact.

Peter:”...right to be a nuisance...”

Maybe we should be able to buy a RTBAN licence when we feel our children are in danger, damn these spontaneous people and their silly worries about their offspring bothering decent folk.