Dr. Helen 2009-10-05 08:45:00

With special guests:

• Samantha Page and
  

• John Flanagan.
                                                                              

Samantha faced some difficult questioning dealing with the delays in the system, the non-compliance of court orders, and the agenda driven anti shared parenting bias of some of the agencies.

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With special guests:

• Barry Guidera
  

• Laurence Anderson
  

• Rob Koch and

• Marcia Payne.                                                                               

For Australian men, who have reached the end of their emotional ability to cope with the ravages of a Family Justice system, which has removed their children, property and savings, Dads In Distress provides a safe and supportive haven for them to regain their emotional strength and sense of self-worth.

This week we salute all those who work in this wonderful organization, and who give up much of their spare time to help their fellow human beings cope, with the preventable, most traumatizing time in their lives.

Now 10 years old, Dads In Distress [DIDS] is moving from strength to strength in support of an ever increasing group of emotionally damaged dispossessed parents. First up we speak with the National Manager of DIDS, Barry Guidera, who gives us an overview of their great work. Next we speak with the Victorian project co-ordinator Laurence Anderson who details the new operational strategies being developed. We follow this by talking to Rob Koch Better Men Australia, who acts as a consultant to DIDS, and details some of the advice he offers DIDS.

We close the show speaking with Marcia Payne, DIDS Support Services, who has worked in Women’s refuges and who, having witnessed first hand the services provided to abused women, is deeply concerned at the lack of interest shown by our Governments, to acknowledge and provide support for the growing number of abused Men in our society.

The following is a snippet from the DIDS website which offers a wealth of information and support, to those finding themselves at the end of their emotional road.

“If you are finding it hard to deal with the break-up of a marriage, depression, child access, family court or just need someone to talk to, Dads in Distress is there to help”.

“Dads in Distress is a dedicated support group of men (in Australia) whose immediate concern is to stem the present trend of male suicide due to the trauma of divorce or separation. Current statistics that have been published, indicate too many men will take their own lives in preference to facing family, friends and importantly their own children with the failure of the relationship. We aim to prevent this incidence from occurring by showing the men and the community at large that someone really cares”

“While Dads in Distress Support Services (DIDSS) by its very name appears to be focused mainly on supporting men through separation from their partner and/or children, we actually have the health, safety and well-being of ALL the family uppermost in our mind. As a harm-prevention charity it saddens us that in our modern society of Australia there are men, women and children who are being harmed, and harming one another, in the very place where love and kindness should prevail”

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With special guests:

• Dr. Bruce Smyth
  

• Graeme Campbell and

• John Stapleton.                                                                              

A diversity of subject matter is covered in the topics of this week’s show. We commence the program with an interesting interview with Dr Bruce Smyth, who is Adjunct Associate Professor at the School of Public Health, La Trobe University.  

Dr Smyth has previously worked at the Australian Institute of Family Studies (AIFS) as a Senior Research Fellow. He was also a member of the Ministerial Task Force on Child Support.  

Today he speaks candidly about some of the areas of research and number crunching he has been involved with, in relation to the gathering of statistics on the impacts of Australian Family Laws, on various vulnerable sections of the community.  

Next we speak with Graeme Campbell, a spokesman for the group  SRL- R [Self Representing Litigants - Resources].  SRL-R is a support organisation for those who by choice or necessity, have decided to represent themselves in either the Family Court of Australia or the Federal Magistrates Court in Children’s matters.  

Unless you are familiar with the Family Court environment, representing yourself in this Court will be one of the most stressful experiences you will ever encounter. Especially since those finding themselves in such unfortunate position, generally are already deeply traumatized, due to a number of the nasty side effects of the breakup of their family.   

Last but certainly not least, we speak to John Stapleton, the founder of Dads on the Air, and for many years the regular on-air presenter of our weekly program. John co-founded the program more than 10 years ago, and with his journalistic experience was the driving force behind the success of the program.  

John is a respected journalist of many years standing, who has worked for several of the leading newspapers of Australia. Now residing in Thailand, he sounds like he has discovered his Utopia in the middle of Asia.  

A true gentleman himself, John loves the gentle nature of the Thai population and the way families are valued. Compared to the individualistic nature of our own, dog eat dog culture, he certainly sounds contented and very much attracted to the Thai way of life.   

We very much enjoyed speaking with John, especially listening to the beautiful way he weaves his words  and sentences together, to present a wonderful picture in the mind of the listener. We certainly miss the creative journalistic skills he contributed to the program during those many years. 

Most unlike John, he ran out of phone credit in the middle of the interview, so we hope to hear from him again as soon as he obtains a re-charge.  

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With special guests:

• Greg Andresen and 

• Sue Price.                                                                              

Our first guest is Greg Andresen, of the One in Three Campaign, who attended the recent Intimate Partner Abuse of Men Workshop, held on Wednesday 16 June 2010 in Perth, Western Australia. The workshop was aimed at service providers plus anyone who works with victims and perpetrators of family and domestic violence, and considered the implications for service providers, of the Edith Cowan University (ECU) Intimate Partner Abuse of Men research.  

Greg paints a disturbing picture of the way governments and the media, continue to be  misled by distorted and misleading facts and figures, presented by self interest groups, who want to ensure their collective snouts remain firmly planted deep inside the public trough.  

The fact that more questions are not being asked by our policymakers and the mainstream media, perhaps illustrates the reason for the continuation and acceptance of appallingly inadequate Family Laws and Domestic Violence legislation.  

By way of example, it is our understanding that a number of service providers attending the workshop, mentioned that Relationships Australia (WA) had directed their staff not to attend. This would be unsurprising, considering the views of their Manager, Terri Riley, expressed in the West Australian newspaper on June 1st 2010 (click here to view the article). As well as sustaining many discredited myths about domestic and family violence in this opinion piece, we are extremely concerned that the head of Relationships Australia, by telling male victims that they do not, and can not, experience systematic controlling abuse like women can, will prevent them from seeking help from services like Relationships Australia.  

Despite denying the documented reality that at least 1 in 3 of the perpetrators of Domestic Violence are women, Ms Riley proudly claims 7000 men sought help and support from Relationships Australia last year.   

In view of what Ms Riley has revealed about Relationship Australia’s bigoted philosophy, it would seem that any unsuspecting man seeking help and understanding for abuse from this organization, has about as much chance of success, as a victimized black man had, who sought help for abuse from the Ku Klax Clan, during its reign of terror.

The obvious question is, where are the anger management programs for the one in three  violent and  abusive women in our society? Or do we continue to pretend they do not exist? 

To provide an overview of the coming Australian election, and the possible implications for the nations’ fathers and their children, we conclude the show speaking with Sue Price from the Mens Rights Agency.   While recommending a continual vigil, to ensure the current government and its anti male followers are held to account, she nevertheless recommends boycotting the enduring bias and discriminating consultative process.  

Following 15 years of lobbying, Sue is frustrated by the way the system excludes and sidelines most of the credible independent voices, who represent the victims, and who continue to call for real justice and equality in the area of Family Law.  

Sue correctly points out, the way successive governments provide funding to a couple of lobby groups, in order to give the impression that they are actually seriously consulting with those claiming to represent the nations’ fathers. 

Unfortunately, these groups are seriously compromised, due to their total dependence on such government funding for their survival. It is well known, that if you want to neutralize your critics, you put them on your payroll.

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With special guests:

• Molly Murphy
• Andrea Hayward and
• Robin Inslay.

Much has already been written about an appalling family justice system, which continues to wreak catastrophic havoc to the parent/child relationships of separating families. Molly Murphy, “Winner Take All”, who hails from Canada, decided to add her voice to the growing International chorus of authors and professionals, who have decided they can no longer stand by and watch our families and communities implode.

Her new book “Winner Take All”, provides a graphic account of the way separated parents are treated by our family justice system, and how the system fails to provide social justice equally. Molly joins us, to speak of how she came to write her book, and explains the urgent need for major changes, if our family bonds are to survive.

Molly Murphy is a registered nurse with a specialized designation in psychiatry having more than twenty years’ experience in the health-care field. She resides in Ontario with her three daughters and divides her time between her two passions. Her number one priority is family and her second is to help change family law so that the rights of both the custodial and non-custodial parents are valued equally by our judicial system.

Currently it is the father who is forced into accepting the role as the non-custodial parent to their own children in the majority of cases. By advocating, Molly hopes to one day see law reforms come into effect that truly reflect the best interests of our children. She also wants to create awareness through her writing concerning the dysfunction and discrimination that exists globally today within the family law system.

Our next guest is Andrea Hayward, who is director of DNA QLD, and who was recently asked to speak at the Lone Father’s Conference in Canberra.  Andrea outlines the procedures of a DNA paternity test and the Australian position on testing .

DNA QLD is a NATA/ISO accredited specialist Paternity testing facility offering quality world-class testing and client care. DNA QLD is focused solely on parentage testing and genotyping, unlike some other parentage testing facilities which also test for genetic syndromes. DNA QLD has a proven capability to facilitate testing for clients located in any state of Australia and in international locations such as Malaysia, New Zealand, Singapore, and PNG. DNA QLD does not outsource testing to other laboratories and all our cases are processed in Brisbane. DNA QLD has a free collection centre in the Brisbane CBD.

Our final guest is Robin Inslay, who is the President of the ‘Lone Fathers Rockhampton Branch’, and he joins us to provide a roundup of the National conference held in Canberra. Their website tells the story.

The Rockhampton branch of LFAA came about from a call by concerned Central Queensland residents to do something about the damaging effects of divorce. Our branch is honoured, as do all other LFAA branches, to have a membership of many women as well as men. These women are the second wives, grandmothers, daughters, step-daughters; even the sisters of divorced fathers; and are very vocal about the many issues relating to fatherlessness in our society, today.

Our branch offers support to individuals from Yeppoon to Blackwater, Gladstone to St. Lawrence; an area which encompasses a large section of the Bowen basin mining region. We offer support and education on issues relating to family breakdown/divorce and take suggestions for submission to Government for change to relevant legislation.

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