research

Elephant in the Room

In the Absent movie, which will soon be touring Australia, 13-29 June 2013, John Eldredge, author of ‘Wild at Heart’ says, “If you take snapshots of western culture right now the prognosis is not good”. David Blankenhorn has stated in ‘Fatherless America’ written in 1996, “Fatherlessness is the most harmful demographic trend of this generation”. Dave Kopel, in his article called ‘Fatherlessness: The Root Cause’ says: As Pat Moynihan wrote in ...

  • suicide

The Silent Epidemic: Suicide

In June, 2000, a 44-year-old father experiencing family separation killed himself in the bush in the Victorian Gippsland region. Greg Wilton had a five-year-old son and a two-year-old daughter. This event made national news because Greg Wilton was also a federal parliamentarian. Each year in Australia, more than 2,500 people die by suicide. This is significantly more than the national road toll (about 1,700). Most people are aware of the focus ...

  • separated dad

Daytime Dads

My last article mentioned a report from the Australian Institute of Family Studies that revealed that an alarmingly high number of children spend the day with their father but never sleep over. These children, and their fathers, are being denied the opportunity for a normal parent/child relationship and all the benefits that accrue from this. They are children who only visit their father. They have no sense of being at home ...

  • single dads & family law

Single Dads & the Family Law System

It may by reassuring for separated fathers to know that many federal parliamentarians have some awareness of their plight. The efforts of many men in communicating their experiences and highlighting the injustices inherent in the Family Law System is paying dividends. During the recent meeting of the Fatherhood Foundation/Dads4Kids at Parliament House, Canberra, the following comments were made: Senator Bill Heffernan said that they hear all the time in the party ...

  • family

Family Values

‘Promoting family values’ has been the catch-cry of both well-intentional and vote-hungry politicians throughout the ages. In Australia in recent years, it has had a particularly strong and enthusiastic resurgence. Who can forget Bob Hawke's emotional electoral promise that, “by the Year 2000, no Australian child will be living in poverty”? In 1989, the Hawke Labor Government introduced the Child Support Scheme, which had the effect of engineering and accelerating the ...

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