Australia – Prawn of the Patriarchy

No to Violence: Working together to end men’s family violence

The No to Violence agency (‘NTV’), also known as the Male Family Violence Prevention Association, appears to be populated by ardent pro-feminists. Despite that, surprisingly one third of the board members are male. Of those staff listed in the web site, seven are female and three are male.

In January 2019 I was blocked from the twitter stream of the CEO of NTV, Jacqui Watt, without explanation. I became aware of Jacqui’s stream via browsing the Twitter stream @OurWatch CEO, Patty Kinnersly.

NTV do not appear to be listed in the ACNC register, but relevant details including a copy of their 2018 annual report are available in their web site.

NTV is heavily supported by the Victorian government and their annual report acknowledges receipt of almost $3.9 million in grant funding for the year ending 30 June 2018.

In this 2014 submission NTV sought to undermine the integrity of the ‘One in Three‘ organisation.

Anyone wishing to complain about NTV or the conduct of specific staff members should familiarise themselves with the Complaints Procedure.

I will add to this page as further details are recovered.

Australian Gender Equality Council

Until recently I regularly browsed the Twitter stream of an organisation known as the Australian Gender Equality Council (@ausgenderequal). Well I did until I was blocked after posting a benign response to one of their tweets. This occurred without any warning or explanation.

Their twitter stream was of interest due to the topics covered and as new tweets were added daily, despite the fact that their members never appeared to respond. But despite their name, their pro-feminist bias was ongoing and pervasive. Calling themselves a ‘gender equality’ council is just absurd. I don’t recall a single instance of a tweet being issued that had a supportive, or even sympathetic, stance on any issue negatively affecting men and boys.

They define themselves as a national not-for-profit organisation – here is their ACNC entry. I’m not sure about what public funding they currently receive, but a report lodged in December 2017 stated that they did not receive any grants “from the federal, state or local governments” (source).

“AGEC’s vision is simple – to achieve gender equality in Australia. Through high profile national awareness campaigns, advocacy and research, it aims to drive a cultural shift in Australia so that women and men have the same rights and opportunities across all sectors of the community. We believe that gender equality will be achieved when the different behaviours, aspirations and needs of women and men are equally valued, respected and are manifest in Australian society.

AGEC’s founding members collectively represent over 500,000 women and girls.”

They have just one male board member and very few male ordinary members.

Their two current projects are listed as a National Gender Equality program for high schools, and modelling the gender pay gap and superannuation outcomes for women.

I will add to this page as and when I locate additional information.

Queensland LNP offers up failed measures to address domestic violence

In another post I described the feminist-driven non-event that is the Queensland Government’s approach to tackling domestic violence.

Now with an election just weeks away we have seen domestic violence policies released firstly by One Nation and then yesterday by the Liberal National Party.

The Liberal National Party has offered up nothing new or different, proposing:

A public register to “disclose people’s abusive pasts”
Setting up specialist domestic violence courts
Creating a specific domestic violence offence “to better protect victims”, and
A law change to prohibit perpetrators from personally cross examining their victims in civil or criminal matters

The only box they didn’t tick was a new awareness campaign.

Yes, the first dot point is based on Clare’s Law in the UK – which has been found to be costly and ineffective. The Queensland Government recently came to the same conclusion.

Special domestic violence courts were trialed in Western Australia and then discontinued as they were found to be costly and ineffective.

A new offence. Yes, that’s going to make a big difference. Like the new offence recently proposed for strangulation. We don’t already have enough suitable offences in our legal armory? Oh please! But it sounds effective, right? This particular proposal is discussed in this article.

And who needs to confront their accusers in a court of law? An obviously over-rated legal anachronism.

The LNP could have chosen to offer a real alternative to the policies of the Labor Party. Something bold that went ‘back to the drawing board’, challenging the entire feminist/Duluth model mindset. Something that would reap tangible results in terms of reducing domestic violence, in contrast to the ineffective feeding trough for feminist organisations that the taxpayers are currently supporting.

Instead the LNP have opted for the safe path and offered Queensland voter’s nothing of value or substance, and we are all the poorer for it.

See also:

Sunshine Coast Labor and LNP candidates in radio interview re: domestic violence (21 November 2017) Disappointing yet very predictable comments.

Courier-Mail coverage of the policy release (9 November 2017)

One Nation unveils controversial domestic violence policy (24 October 2017) Strongly criticized by LNP

One possible alternative to pre-nuptial agreements

Today the Australian media reported on a High Court case involving a pre-nuptial agreement (‘pre-nup’) between a wealthy property developer and his younger bride, who he met via a “web site for potential brides”:

‘High Court tears up prenuptial agreement between property developer and online bride‘ (8 November 2017)

Pre-nuptial agreements have never been a magic bullet to prevent financial exploitation where one spouse (usually the man) takes far more assets into a marriage than the other. It has always been a case of it being better to have a pre-nup than nothing at all, in order to reduce the likelihood of subsequent divorce-rape.

In Australia, and elsewhere, even competently and ethically prepared pre-nups are subject to legal challenge. In the case cited above, the nature of the agreement was found to constitute ‘unconscionable conduct’. This was said to be on the basis of both a demand that the agreement be signed or the marriage would not go ahead, and with respect of the terms of the financial settlement set out in the agreement.

One alternative that might be considered would involve relatively minor changes to relevant Australian law. What is proposed here is by no means a complete fix, but it would represent at least a step in the right direction.

In Thailand, as in various other countries, the law differentiates between assets accumulated prior to marriage, and assets accumulated during the marriage:

Sin Somros is/are the marital assets or property of the marriage jointly owned by husband and wife, in general all properties acquired after the marriage (except those listed in section 1471 under 3) (Source)

Sin suan tua is property which is exclusively owned by only one of the spouses. The owner of the sin suan tua property is free to dispose of it without having to account to the other spouse. Under the Civil and Commercial Code (CCC), property comprising the sin suan tua of a spouse consists of: (i) property belonging to the spouse before marriage; (ii) property for personal use, dress or ornaments suitable for the spouse’s station in life, or tools necessary for carrying on the profession of the spouse; (iii) property acquired by the spouse during marriage through a will or gift if that property was intended to be sin suan tua; and (iv) the khongman (a betrothal gift). (Source)

Thai law also allows for couples to enter into a pre-nuptial agreement, the details of which are as set out here.

The reality is that the current divorce laws in western countries favour the interests of women and were written at a time when society was a very different place, for example pre-advent of no-fault divorce and at a time when most women were house-wives.

Read this other blog post to see what happens in a situation where the husband still typically brings far more assets into the marriage than the wife (indeed the wife is more likely to be in debt at the time of marriage), where most divorces are initiated by women, and where the court system is dominated by white knights and older gents guided more by chivalry than a genuine commitment to justice.

A situation where pre-marriage assets are quarantined from seizure seems to be eminently fairer to me, but which politician/s in Australia would publicly support it? Sadly, very few or none at the present time – and certainly no-one in the ranks of the major parties.

Failure to consider and introduce legal reforms such as this will only accelerate the trend of men avoiding marriage and de-facto relationships, and the deleterious social impacts arising from that.

It will be interesting to see if a positive outcome of same-sex marriage in Australia will be greater enthusiasm for law reform related to the distribution of assets in the event of divorce. When straight men are the only ones impacted then such reform is anything but urgent (think, ‘glacial’). Indeed we have already seen heightened interest in the reform of laws related to alimony and spousal support brought on by the increasing numbers of cases involving divorces involving female spouses as primary bread-winners.

The sham that is the Australian ‘Same Sex Marriage’ vote

The federal Marriage Act Sect 46(1) always required celebrants to provide a definition of marriage as part of the ceremony. The wording required is “Marriage, according to law in Australia, is the union of a man and a woman to the exclusion of all others, voluntarily entered into for life“, or “words to that effect” (Source)

The percentage of the Australian population who self-identify as gay or lesbian is uncertain, but is probably in the range of 4-6%.

This month Australians were given the opportunity to vote on the issue of same-sex marriage (‘SSM’) in Australia via a postal survey. The postal survey asked a single question that question could only be answered with a ‘Yes’ or a ‘No’. The question was “Should the law be changed to allow same-sex couples to marry?”.

I voted ‘no’, and no, it’s not because I am hateful or homophobic. Does that make me a hypocrite or a liar? No it doesn’t, and I think it’s simplistic to the point of childishness for anyone to suggest otherwise.

My primary concern is in relation to the process, including the troubling precedent it sets for future political and legal ‘reform’. As the campaign has unfolded I have also become deeply concerned about the behaviour of the media and elements of the ‘Yes’ bloc. On this latter note, see for example this article by Miranda Devine about assaults at Sydney University, the assault on Tony Abbott MP, and the young employee sacked for holding views that differed from those of her employer.

The linked video clips show separate incidents where ‘yes’ voters aggressively harangue people holding ‘It’s OK to vote no’ signs (example 1/example 2/ example 3). Just as with Trump/Clinton supporters in USA, it’s not the conservatives (typically labelled ‘far right’) who are behaving aggressively.

And now we’re told that ‘no’ voters can’t help it because they’re too stupid.

Some readers will be asking “How is this a men’s issue?“. No doubt there are gay men who would appreciate having the option to marry in preference to the alternatives already available to them. I mean them no disrespect. I was motivated to write this post mainly due to the parallels with how the broader gender debate is playing out, recognising this to be a major obstacle to achieving recognition of men’s issues and true gender equality.

The SSM postal vote is far from being a worthy model of the way to create legislation or govern the country. Our politicians must be told this in very clear and unambiguous terms.

At an estimated cost of $122 million it is also an incredibly wasteful exercise. The propensity of our state and federal government to convene Royal Commissions or Inquiries in order to delay or avoid making difficult decisions is a long-standing embarrassment, but compared to the SSM vote they are a bargain.

Further, the SSM vote is almost certain to be ineffective, not least because either the government and/or the ‘yes’ lobby or ‘no’ lobby will not accept the result. In particular, you can bet your bottom dollar that if the ‘no’ vote gets up on the day, then we are set to witness a replay of the Hillary Clinton loss all over again.

As others have already suggested, the process might have had some shred of validity if the government had circulated draft legislation, together with a summary of arguments for and against specific proposed changes. According to Peter Dutton MP and Treasurer Scott Morrison this was a decision of Cabinet.

A draft bill was prepared some time ago, but I understand that no commitment has been made that this version will be put up for parliamentary vote should the ‘yes’ vote prevail.

The voting paper asks “Should the law be changed …?” What will an answer to a question this vague tell our politicians that they could not judge for themselves in the context of a parliamentary vote?

So exactly how will the primary enabling legislation (the Marriage Act) be changed? What other legislation and regulations will subsequently need to be amended, and in what manner? What will be the likely tangible flow-on effect of these changes for ordinary Australians, for example in terms of financial costs/benefits?

If this were about a major infrastructure project then all relevant facts (or at least, estimates) would be set out for objective consideration. Instead the scope of discussion in relation to same-sex marriage has been, for the most part, remarkably narrow. Alternately tugging on heart strings/shaming those with alternative views, or dishing out some bible quotes, does not constitute an intelligent political debate.

Why so little discussion, for example, of what has happened in those countries that have approved SSM? (see here for discussion of the UK example, with related comments by Rowan Dean here)

Along with an abundance of predictable and sometimes shrill PC frou-frou, a few thoughtful pieces have appeared in the media. One example is ‘Liberals find scant refuge in a surrender to identity politics‘ by Greg Sheridan.

“The destructiveness of identity politics is that it poisons relations between human beings by claiming that historic injustices require civic inequalities to remedy them today. This requires that some groups be classified as victims and others as villains”

Parliament of Australia briefing paper on Same Sex Marriage (undated)

Howard rejects PM’s vow on religious freedom (29 September 2017) A copy of John Howard’s full page newspaper advert is provided below

The failure of ‘Yes’ to control its militant wing (27 September 2017)

Same sex marriage in Australia – why I have to vote ‘No’ (26 September 2017) Video

The definitive guide to the gay marriage debate (21 September 2017)

“Because part of this strategy is to provoke an equally irrational response from the Yes campaign”. Joe, wake up to yourself mate! No-one is manipulating the ‘Yes’ bloc into performing their special brand of craziness. No-one needs to – it’s what people in this sociopolitical milieu do now. And not just with this issue, but many others. For a recent Australian example just look at my post regarding the ‘Red Pill’ movie.

Same-sex marriage: Yes, but spare the virtue-signalling (19 September 2017)

‘It’s not okay to be homophobic’: Canberra contractor sacked for ‘vote no’ Facebook post (19 September 2017) What is happening to our country when people feel justified in jettisoning our open and democratic way of life in their quest to virtue-signal and shame.

Gay audience member shuts down MP’s argument against same-sex marriage (19 September 2017)

On the issue of conflating the right to marry with other issues, which Mr Lau had also raised, Ms Wong said conflating issues was a tactic of the “No” campaign. “The ‘No’ campaign is finding every other issue to talk about,” she said. “It’s a deliberate scare campaign, and I think it’s a tactic Australians are seeing through. And it’s a disappointing tactic.”

Leftists/feminists have no problem with conflating issues when it suits – the most common being the feminists=women furphy. In this case what Penny is really railing against is that other related issues might be considered, issues outside of the narrow parameters for debate approved by people such as herself.

Sure some of these factors will be over-reach or downright wrong. Most however will be legitimate and deserving of serious consideration in reaching an informed decision on this particular matter. And the many others that will follow.

The Australian Institute of Family Studies – another taxpayer-funded feminist mouthpiece

“The Australian Institute of Family Studies (AIFS) is a Melbourne-based Australian Government statutory agency established in 1980 under the Family Law Act 1975.

The Institute has a proud record of high-quality, responsive and impartial research into the wellbeing of Australian families. Our vision is to make a positive contribution to the wellbeing of Australian families by advancing understanding of the factors affecting Australian families and communicating findings to policy makers, service providers and the broader community.

The Institute operates within the portfolio of the Department of Social Services (DSS) and is responsible to the Minister for Social Services. The Institute has ongoing relationships with various other government agencies, policy makers and the community sector. Staff at the Institute are employed under the Public Service Act 1999.” (Source)

The latest annual report for the AIFS tells us that it burnt through almost eighteen million taxpayer dollars in financial year 2015/16, and that as at 30 June 2016, there were 75 staff (3/4 of whom were female).

Regrettably, the Institute appears to have a strongly feminist orientation and corresponding anti-male bias. Even more regrettably, it is but one of dozens of publicly-funded organisations of similar persuasion.

In June 2017 the AIFS issued a publication entitled ‘Fathers who use violence‘. And no, for reasons that are not acknowledged, there is no corresponding document regarding abusive mothers. Of course the document should have been entitled ‘Parents who use violence‘, but apparently that would have constituted a little too much gender equality for those in the driver’s seat.

Another indicator of the extent of feminist bias in the AIFS is the inclusion within their web site of contributions by Michael Flood (example) who holds views highly antagonistic towards the men’s rights movement. In this example it would have been far more appropriate for Dr. Flood’s view to be presented with a counter-argument provided by someone from the men’s rights movement, but clearly that concept didn’t make it past the powers-that-be (if indeed it was even considered at all). More on Dr. Flood and his tortured relationship with the men’s rights movement here, here, here and here.

Yet more gender bias on display in this report on female sex offending by Senior Research Officer Mary Stathopoulos. Reddit poster ‘DougDante‘ comments thus:

“The bias was clear in the introduction. “the debate”, which is really about providing boys and men equal access to services for victims of domestic and sexual violence, constructed as if doing so would imply that police must be forced to waste resources trying to identify equal numbers of victims and perps of each gender, “is dangerous”.

Denying boy and man victims services and silencing them – not dangerous.

The survey also highlighted shocking disparities in New Zealand where only 0.6% of convictions were against women offenders, more than 5 times lower than other nations. Are women there more moral, or is that a female rapist’s paradise?

Perhaps I missed it, but the authors did not recognize that shocking number a signal of a systematic rape culture that ignores women’s sex crimes, and used it to justify ignoring boy and man victims.

Excuses are often made for female abusers such as in the report when they stated, “most striking feature is a history of previous victimisation”, but male abusers have the same histories!

This is why it’s important that no one be allowed to abuse any child or adult.”

Why is it so very hard for MSM to allow objective airing of men’s issues? The example of Triple J Hack’s ‘debate’

This evening ABC2/Triple J Hack are to broadcast what is billed as a debate on the topic of ‘Is Male Privilege Bullshit‘. In fact it will most likely be nothing more than yet another bigoted feminist soliloquy.

They have most likely scheduled this program due to the considerable amount of recent publicity concerning the screening of the Red Pill movie, and the feminist lobby’s desperate need to try to claw back some credibility.

For background or updates readers can peruse the Twitter streams for @ABC2, @TripleJHack @TomTilley and/or the corresponding Facebook pages.

ABC2 have invited the likes of Clementine Ford and Nakkiah Lui to join the panel. Of course, if you want to have a fair and balanced discussion you invite misandrists onto the panel. If worst comes to worst then the rest of the sisterhood can claim ‘not all feminists are like that‘, then rinse and repeat.

While Karen Straughan (‘GirlWritesWhat’) features in a promo video, sadly she will not be participating on the discussion panel. Cassie Jaye (‘Red Pill’) was to be interviewed (via satellite) during the show but pulled out stating:

“I already see so many warning signs of inherent bias based on the program’s marketing … I don’t see what I can gain by being a part of this when it’s clear that the show is going to give selective and limited airtime to certain guests over others.” (Source)

Additionally, yesterday ABC2 published this biased and misleading article about domestic violence (‘DV’). The focus of the article is an assertion that the Australian finding that one in three victims of domestic violence are male, is false. This is not the first time that Australian feminists have attacked this statistic.

The article quotes well-known anti-men’s rights advocates Michael Flood and Michael Salter, and includes various factual errors as well as misrepresentations of the MRA perspective on the issue of DV.

Here is a rebuttal of that article prepared by Greg Andresen of the One in Three organisation:

“I would greatly appreciate it if you could look into correcting the following factual errors from your article “What about men?: Challenging the MRA claim of a domestic violence conspiracy”:

The article claims, “In the 2012 PSS, about 33 per cent of men said they had experienced an act of violence from a current partner in the last 12 months. The ABS warns the estimate has a standard error of 25-50 per cent (meaning the real figure could be 50 per cent higher or lower) and “should be used with caution”. If we look at experiences of domestic violence over a longer period, we find the proportion of male victims sharply falls.” The 2012 PSS also found that about 33 per cent of men said they had experienced an act of violence from a current partner since the age of 15. There was no standard error. This is the same proportion, not a “sharp fall”.
It claims, “When we look at other stats, the proportion of male victims also falls below one in three… Emergency departments: Two-thirds of patients presenting for family violence reasons were female.” This is exactly one in three, not a fall.
It claims, “When we look at other stats, the proportion of male victims also falls below one in three. Victoria’s 2016 Royal Commission into Family Violence compared several sources…”. The Royal Commission into Family Violence found (I quote), “Over the five years from July 2009, the proportion of male victims has increased and in 2013-14 male victims made up 31% (n=5,052) of total victims of family violence”. That’s pretty close to one in three.
Dr Salter claims, “For men experiencing violence from a female partner, it’s primarily self defensive or it’s expressive in terms of a push or a slap” without citing any research to support his claim.
It claims, “Some MRAs argue the one in three figure actually underestimates the number of male victims of domestic violence, because men are either too ashamed, too stoic, or too chivalrous to report being hit by their female partner… But apart from these anecdotal reports, there’s no other evidence to back up this claim, and no easy way of measuring this potential statistical bias.” The 2012 PSS found that men who have experienced partner violence are 2 to 3 times more likely than women to have never told anybody about experiencing current and/or previous partner violence; twice as likely as women to have never sought advice or support about experiencing current and/or previous partner violence; up to 40% more likely than women to have not contacted police about experiencing current and/or previous partner violence; and half as likely as women to have had a restraining order issued against the perpetrator of previous partner violence. See http://www.oneinthree.com.au/infographicrefs.
Michael Brandenburg said, “Certainly there’s a cohort of men who experience family violence… In our experience a significant number of those experience violence not by intimate partners, but from other family members.” The 2012 PSS found the vast majority of partner and dating violence committed against men is perpetrated by females (94%). Only 6% occurs in relationships with a male perpetrator. See http://www.oneinthree.com.au/infographicrefs.”

The Australian mainstream media have apparently learnt nothing from the marked backlash against the rude and biased treatment of film director Cassie Jaye on The Project and Sunrise TV programs.

It is so incredibly frustrating that they are unable to address men’s issues in a fair and objective manner, and simply provide the public with the facts and different opinions and let them form their own views.

The debate tonight is designed to try to inflict maximum damage on the men’s rights movement. It will only dig the media an even deeper hole in terms of their credibility in the eyes of the community. Instead of bringing people together and fostering understanding and consensus, media stunts like this simply set the scene for more lobbing of grenades from trench to trench.

Media coverage after the event:

Hack critique Pt. 2, by Gary Orsum (22 June 2017) Video

Hack Live: What happened when we debated male privilege (21 June 2017) with related Reddit discussion thread

Bettina Arndt tells why Cassie Jaye ditched Hack Live (20 June 2017) Video

Elsewhere in this blog you might be interested in reading:

Privilege, respect and entitlement

Female Privilege Check-list

Persistent pro-feminist and anti-male bias in the mainstream media

Cassie Jaye and Karen Straughan in Sydney, Australia

This post was provided by Bettina Arndt

Exciting times are coming. Fabulous women are coming to town.

For a start there’s the young filmmaker, Cassie Jaye whose movie, The Red Pill has been causing such a stir. Cassie is speaking at the International Conference on Men’s Issues (ICMI) being held at the Gold Coast, June 9-11 and then she will be in Sydney for a few days. Cassie will be all over our media during her visit. She’s appearing on Channel 10’s The Project on Thursday June 8 and on Weekend Sunrise on June 11, and will be with Andrew Bolt on Sky News, probably on June 12.

But we’ll also be seeing the amazing Karen Straughan. Karen, also known as GirlWritesWhat, is one of the most popular women working for the men’s movement. I first came across her blog back in 2011 when she was a newly divorced waitress and mother of three writing about her astonishment at how easy it would have been for her to destroy her ex-husband. How our biased legal system conspires with vengeful women to punish men they wish to discard. It was powerful stuff.

Karen went on to become a hugely popular advocate for men’s rights. She now has more than 160,000 subscribers on her YouTube channel and her 2011 Vlog on “Feminism and the Disposable Male” video has almost 1.5 million views.

Karen is extraordinary – totally brilliant, well-informed and an incisive, ferocious debater. None of the well-known feminists will debate Karen after seeing what she did to other members of the sisterhood. See Karen demolishing Naomi Wolf on a televised panel discussion.

Or have a look at this wonderful blog where Karen dissects a pathetic attack by a women’s studies professor on The Red Pill.

Now for the exciting events involving Karen – please tell all your friends so they can see her Australian performances.

Karen will be in Sydney for the week prior to the conference. She’ll be doing an hour long interview with my friends Rowan Dean and Ross Cameron, on Sky News’ The Outsiders at 10 am on Sunday June 4. I’m sure that will be well worth watching.

Then on Tuesday June 6 Tuesday night Karen is doing a Q&A with viewers of Mark Latham’s Facebook. Live streaming from 8.00 pm. We want you to all start thinking of questions or comments. You can send in short video questions or written questions/comments (email to bettina@bettinaarndt.com.au) or wait until that evening and post them on the facebook page for Karen to answer. It should be great fun.

Then for our Sydney people – Karen is speaking on Wednesday June 7 at The Sydney Institute on Why Marriage is Too Risky for Men. The event starts at 5.30 pm, level 40, Governor Phillip Tower, 1 Farrer Place, Sydney. Currently this event is reserved for Institute members who can bring one guest but if they don’t get enough people they will allow others in for $10. A few days prior to the event I will alert everyone to the situation through my web site at www.bettinaarndt.com.au, and let you know if non-members are allowed in. You can become a member for $90.00.

Since word got out that Bettina is organising Karen’s visit to Sydney she has been swamped with emails from men offering good money to see Straughan take on Clementine Ford. And now that’s about to happen – Straughan is one of the stars of what promises to be a very lively event on the ABC’s HackLive on June 20, a debate on “Is Male Privilege Bullshit?” Straughan and Cassie Jaye will participate via Skype, joining a panel of locals including Daisy Cousens and… wait for it…Clementine Ford.

Here’s a taste of Karen where she sums up the risks of marriage for men:

“From a woman’s perspective, marriage still provides significant benefits over single life –in fact, marriage as an enterprise has only improved for women since the 1950s. A woman now has the right to say no to sex with her husband. If he’s abusive, she has an entire public-sector industry itching to help her. If a woman decides she doesn’t want to be married to that jerk who doesn’t help with the dishes, has mommy issues and leaves his dirty socks lying all over the place, well, she doesn’t have to be. She won’t be stigmatized, she won’t be financially destroyed and she won’t lose her children. For women, marriage is all benefit and zero risk, and that’s why women are whining about men’s reluctance to tie the knot. But for men, it’s the other way around–no guaranteed benefit, and the kind of risk an adrenaline junkie would eschew.”

And to give you a further taste of Karen Straughan’s brilliant, refreshing take on gender politics, read these extracts:

About women’s privilege

Women are so rarely held accountable for their actions and decisions and burdens to the degree they should be as human beings:

If a woman can’t be successful, it is because the business world is sexist.
If a woman wakes up after getting black-out drunk at a party full of horny young men to discover she was violated, any hint that perhaps getting black-out drunk at a party full of horny young men is maybe not the smartest decision anyone ever made, means you’re blaming the victim and you’re an awful human being.
If a woman takes five years off from the workforce so she can be a stay-at-home mom, and her re-entry into her career is less than spectacular, it’s never because sometimes life comes down to making a choice between something you want and another thing you want more–it’s because government/society doesn’t do enough to help her.

This is MY life. I am the architect of it. If I fuck it up, it isn’t something that merely “happened” to me–I was an active participant in the sequence of decisions that led to the fucking-up. Make no mistake, modern feminism isn’t about women’s rights. It’s about women’s privilege. It may not look like privilege to everyone, but that’s what it is.

On male disposability.

Male disposability has been around since the dawn of time, and it’s based on one very, very straightforward dynamic: when it comes to the well-being of others, women come first, men come last. This is just the way it has always been. Seats in lifeboats, being rescued from burning buildings, who gets to eat. Society places men dead last every time, and, society expects men to place themselves dead last every time.

Domestic violence

Violence against women in any form has been a HUGE cash cow for feminism. The more they inflate their claims regarding its pervasiveness in society, the more money pours in, and the more power they have to tinker with legislation and policy.

Women lying about rape

Pretending women never lie about rape is not only dishonest, it sends a despicable message to victims. “Women never lie about rape,” tells victims they should always be believed, on the spot, and therefore the normal investigative process is a revictimization rather than a necessary evil….A justice system that refuses to punish women who lie about rape is demeaning and belittling the experiences of rape victims, and allowing false accusers to damage the credibility of every legitimate victim without any accountability for the harm they do. And it demeans and belittles a justice system that is supposed to protect ALL victims, including victims of false accusations.

Female self-interest

Feminism has done nothing but exploit this dynamic of the expectation on men to put everybody else before themselves. Especially women. Women’s safety and support, women’s well-being, and women’s emotional needs, always come first. This is the most stunning piece of society-wide manipulative psychology I think I have ever come across. Feminism has been down with old-school chivalry right from the start. They might seem like strange bedfellows, but they’re not. Because both concepts are built on a firm foundation of female self-interest.

Please spread the word about the fresh of fresh air that is about to hit Australian airwaves. I will list their full media schedule on my website just before they arrive. And if you know anyone in the media who might like to interview these wonderful women please contact Bettina Arndt (bettina@bettinaarndt.com)

Are dads still being Mackintoshed?

The following post was was contributed by Bettina Arndt:

Here’s some rare good news about our Family Court system. Fewer dads with very young children are being denied overnight care of their infants and toddlers.

That’s a very big deal because up to three years ago most fathers lost out when they went to court seeking any overnight care. Lawyers used to joke they’d been “McIntoshed” – a reference to Jennifer McIntosh, the woman whose one study led to fathers all over the world missing out on those precious early years of fathering their children.

Jennifer McIntosh is a Victorian psychologist who was the lead author in a hugely influential study which concluded that any regular overnight care by fathers was damaging to infants and toddlers. McIntosh promoted this position across the world – men’s groups in Israel threatened to sue her after she campaigned in their country against shared parenting.

Then came the game-changer. In 2014 Richard Warshak, a psychiatry professor who’s also an international authority on parental alienation, brought together 110 leading international experts who signed a consensus report which concluded the McIntosh position was deeply flawed, with the researchers shown to have cherry-picked and exaggerated their results to draw “unwarranted conclusions from the data.”

The consensus report provided solid research evidence that in normal circumstances children are likely to do better if they have regular overnight contact with both parents and that depriving young children of overnights with their fathers could compromise the quality of developing father-child relationships.

Another important paper was published at much the same time by Wake Forest professor of adolescent and educational psychology Linda Nielsen who used the McIntosh study as an example of what she called “woozling” –the process of misrepresenting and disseminating data in ways that mislead the public and policy makers. Her 17 page critique exposed the many flaws in the McIntosh study and concluded it should never have been used to influence courts nor drive social policy.

I wrote about all this at the time – my article in The Age finally appeared after numerous legal threats from McIntosh. After publication I heard from fathers all over Australia who’d been McIntoshed and often struggled to establish meaningful relationships with their children after years of virtually being excluded from their lives.

I talked to one man, a Sydney academic who’d been the principal carer for their infant for much of the first year after marital separation due to his wife’s work commitments. Then his ex-mother-in-law arrived in Australia and suddenly he found himself in court fighting for any overnight care. He was McIntoshed and denied any overnights for years of his young child’s life.

The stories were just extraordinary and the whole situation quite farcical because everyone knew many of these mothers were allowing all sorts of people to care for their children overnight – from babysitters, to relatives or even highly unsuitable boyfriends. The only person being denied this role was the father.

The Warshak Report was translated into 18 languages and changed the way courts across the world now deal with such custody matters – in countries including the UK, Canada, Israel, Finland, Romania, Croatia, and Sweden. It’s shocking how influential McIntosh’s mischief had been up to that time.

Finally even McIntosh changed her position, after being influenced by persuasive colleagues to agree to a slightly more nuanced approach. Of course she now claims she never promoted a ban on all overnights for pre-schoolers – yet there’s plenty of written documentation contradicting that statement.

In a discussion paper for the Australian Association for Infant Mental Health (AAIMH) in 2011, McIntosh wrote that: “Regardless of socio-economic background, parenting warmth or cooperation between parents, the shared overnight care of children less than four years of age had a significantly negative impact on the emotional and behavioural well-being of the child. Babies under two years who lived one or more overnights a week with both parents were significantly stressed.”

The same year she also wrote a guest editorial for The Family Court Review which included the following summary: “Repeated overnight stays away from the primary caregiver in the first year or two may strain the infant and disrupt formation of secure attachment with both parents. Overnight stays away from the primary caregiver in early infancy are generally best avoided unless of benefit to the primary caregiver.”

Hopefully such dangerous nonsense is no longer party line in our Family Court system.

Judges and lawyers now tell me that reasonable dads usually are being given some overnight care even with infants, and there are signs that the number of nights now tends to increase more rapidly. It would be great to hear from dads, family lawyers and others with recent experience in the family law system as to whether that’s actually the case.

Of course there are still the Mummy judges sticking firmly to the McIntosh line, allowing dads only daytime contact with pre-schoolers – which is particularly shocking given that research continues to be published showing the importance of both parents being actively involved in children’s lives from a very young age.

So please send me your comments and stories (bettina@bettinaarndt.com.au). Richard Warshak is soon to publish a follow-up to his consensus report and it would be nice to have news from the coalface in Australia to add to the reporting when that comes out.

Another federal government domestic violence inquiry – This one focuses on family law

“On 16 March 2017, a Committee of the Australian Parliament adopted an inquiry into how Australia’s federal family law system can better support and protect people affected by family violence. The inquiry was referred by the Attorney-General, Senator the Hon. George Brandis Q.C. The Committee aims to make recommendations that will improve the system for all participants.” (Source)

Members of the public were able to provide feedback in the following ways:

An anonymous online questionnaire, open until 30 June 2017.

Community statements for individuals who wish to discuss their experiences of the treatment of family violence within the family law system with the committee.

Public hearings to gather evidence from stakeholders, including government agencies, non-government organisations, and experts in the policy area.

Written submissions addressing one or more of the terms of reference to be received by Wednesday, 3 May 2017.

The Chair of the Inquiry is Sarah Henderson MP, who is interviewed here on Sky News Australia. In this interview Ms Henderson unreservedly commends the work of Rosie Batty (strike 1), as well as mentioning some of the specific issues to be addressed in the Inquiry.

One such issue was the possibility of creating some sort of nexus between the nature of court orders made in relation to spousal support and property settlement, and the presence or alleged presence of family violence in the relationship. This is described in the Terms of Reference at point 4:

“How the family law system can better support people who have been subjected to family violence recover financially, including the extent to which family violence should be taken into account in the making of property division orders”

Men are already being blackmailed with allegations of domestic violence or sexual abuse in relation to child custody matters, and now it seems they will also have to worry about the impact of such allegations on their financial affairs (strike 2). How many more male suicides will this generate?

As of 21 June 2017, 114 public submissions have been uploaded onto the Committee’s web site. I tendered a brief submission which can be accessed here (see submission 113).

The Committee subsequently tabled its report in Parliament on 7 December 2017. The report, which makes 33 recommendations, is available to read on the Committee’s web page at this link. The media release for the tabling of the report can also be found at this link.

Under a 2010 resolution of the House of Representatives, the Government is required to respond to the report within six months. When the Government has provided a response it will be made available on the Committee’s web page.

Related media articles:

One in Three Campaign supplementary submission to Federal Parliamentary Inquiry published (24 October 2017)

Lone Fathers President To Address Parliament Inquiry On DV (28 July 2017)

‘Good men doing nothing‘ by Bettina Arndt (9 May 2017) with related Reddit discussion thread (see comment by ‘SantaOrange’)

Domestic Violence Inquiry To Take On The Family Law System (23 March 2017)