(no subject)

[dreamer_easy]

Gods, what a disappointing article from Paolo Totaro on the presumption of joint custody, to be tried for the first time in the world here in Oz.

...to start from the premise that mum is always the best parent is simply insulting to the men who perform the role with passion - and all the women partnered with men who take being a father seriously. It is also intellectually primitive, sexist and profoundly unfair.

It's also non-existent. Sexist attitudes may persist in the judiciary, but the law itself makes no such assumption - and when the Family Court must hand down a decision, fathers are twice as likely to win. Totaro, whose own shared parenting arrangements have worked just dandy, naively thinks the change has something to do with what's best for the children, rather than pandering to "men's rights" activists. The overwhelming majority of divorcing men work out their parenting arrangements themselves with their former wives, without the need for the intervention of the court. The new law is a bone thrown to a small minority of bitter men.

Comments

[kitzen-kat.livejournal.com]

The splooge is already hitting the wall. I'm surprised at how many people are commenting on how useless women are as custodial parents - often women tearing into other women.

[infinitarian.livejournal.com]

I think your last two "majority"s there perhaps ought to be "minority"s.

[infinitarian.livejournal.com]

(Oh, hang on, perhaps not the first one now I reread the sentence. It sounds ambiguous, though.)

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

My bad - fixed it. Thanks!

[hiraethin.livejournal.com]

I've no idea what the breakdown of numbers is by gender for parents who get what they want through the Family Court system. Anecdotal evidence (I come into contact with a lot of unhappy Family Court applicants and respondents, sadly most often at this time of year) suggests that many men and many women are unhappy with the handling of matters by the court. Of course the courts are handling the matters in the first place because one, or both, of the parents was unable to come to a reasonable arrangement for separated parenting without recourse to some other authority.

Evidently your opinion is that men have a better than even chance of getting their way through the court system - can you point me to some evidence?

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

I broke my own rule, and posted before double-checking my figures. In the small minority of custody cases which end up going to trial, men are twice as likely to succeed than in cases which don't. I'll fix the posting.