Australian Men's Rights Advocates - AustralianMRA
The Age
Law change liable to upset fathers
The Age (Melbourne), By Katherine Murphy, 24 March 2011
The Gillard government will provoke the ire of fathers' groups today with landmark changes to family law designed to protect children in cases of domestic violence.
Attorney-General Robert McClelland will press ahead with legislation winding back some of the shared parenting changes ushered in by the Howard government.
The changes will make it easier for parents to produce evidence of violence in cases where parents are in dispute over contact arrangements. The legislation will include new legal definitions of abuse and family violence.
The government believes the Howard changes made it difficult for women to make allegations of domestic violence in custody disputes because they could end up with costs awarded against them, or be branded an unfriendly parent, increasing the chances of shared care being ordered.
Family law experts, and women's groups, have urged the government to make child safety a more compelling legal principle than the concept of equal parenting rights.
The bill went out for a consultation period and the government has changed the original proposal to ensure courts will still take note of the level of parental participation in a child's life and their preparedness to provide financial support.
The architect of the changes, former family court judge Richard Chisholm, said the government had chosen not to adopt all of his recommendations, but the amendments were positive. ''It is a sensible and moderate measure,'' Professor Chisholm said.
Mr McClelland, who has been lobbied extensively by shared-care proponents, said the government remained supportive of mothers and fathers sharing care of their children after marriages failed ''but only where this is safe for the child''.
The Coalition has signalled it will block the measure, forcing the government to court the crossbench for support.
Biological Mothers Murder More of Their Own Children Than Do Biological Fathers
Australian Institute of Criminology statistics show there were 270 child homicide incidents in Australia from July 1989 to June 1999, involving 287 identified offenders and resulting in the deaths of 316 children under 15.
For example, the revised National Homicide Monitoring Program 2006-07 Annual Report states 11 homicides involved a biological mother and 5 involves a biological father.
The Western Australian figures shed light on who is likely to abuse children in families. Mothers are identified as the perpetrator of neglect and abuse in a total of 73% of verified cases.
Biological mothers account for about 35 per cent of all child murders, while biological fathers account for 29 per cent
Family Courts’
Violence Review
October 2009
The Attorney-General commissioned a review of the practices, procedures and laws that apply in the federal family law courts in the context of family violence. The Family Courts Violence Review considered whether improvements could be made to ensure that the federal family law courts provide the best possible support to families who have experienced or are at risk of violence.
Men's Rights Agency Reply to the Family Courts Violence Review
Dr Phil TV Show - Men's Rights
September 2021
Dr Phil mixes both the mainstream men's rights advocates and a nutcase guy looking for publicity to make men look bad to create a controversial and ridiculous show to attract an audience of mainly middle aged non-working women who watch TV in the afternoons.
Advertisers love such controversial shows aimed at women who control over 80% of household spending. The more ridiclous some person on the show is, the better the ratings. Dr Phil is the upscale Jerry Springer. These shows really insult the intelligence of women.
In the show, Dr. Phil, who is no longer registered as psychologist, admits that all of his show management are females as are 90+% of his staff.
The show does have the "Martin Luther King" of the Men's Rights Movement - Warren Farrell. It also has Cassie Jay of The Red Pill documentary fame. Jerry Cox who was falsely accused of rape and kidnapping by a woman is featured. He had the ridiculous charges dropped and successfuly sued the woman.
Do men get a rough deal?
National Times
January 11, 2011
Seems a bit rich these days to claim there is a ‘‘glass ceiling’’ for female jobs. Load of cobblers, isn't it? I mean, Australia has a female Prime Minister and a female Governor-General.
Has there really been discrimination over the years against mothers who work -- or against women without children?
The National Council of Women thinks so and no surprise there. I recently chatted with Victorian leader Jennie Rawther who pointed out that, among other things, women at the end of World War 1 had to give up their jobs to returning servicemen -- even though their husbands may have been killed in combat. There was no widow’s pension, nor child support.
Sounds tough but Age reader Steve Hills of Rosebud is not impressed. “There is overwhelming evidence that female health, safety and female lives were held as more valuable than men’s lives,” he says. “Men’s lives were routinely regarded as disposable. The view that women alone were discriminated against is an ignorant one.”