Lobbying For Logic

With special guests:

• Warwick Marsh and
  

• Sue Price.
  

The never ending efforts by our lobbyist of trying to make our legislators understand the devastating effects that poorly formulated legislation has on the wider community, continues. Nowhere is this more obviously damaging to the fabric of our society, than in the jurisdiction of Family Law.

This week we speak with two of the most vocal and dedicated of our lobbyist in support of family justice, Warwick Marsh from the Fatherhood Foundation and Sue Price from the Mens Right Agency.  

While the jurisdiction of Family Law has been hijacked by agenda driven zealots and self serving bureaucrats, and been allowed to expand into a worldwide multi- billion dollar industry, there are many enlightened people around the globe trying to bring this reprehensible scandal, to the attention of our Legislators.  

Millions of children around the world have their ties of kinship severed each year, by an industry that is hell bent on destroying family bonds and re-distributing the economic wealth of separating families under the guise of “The Best Interest of Children” mantra.   

What is even more sickening is watching those who are /or have, played a major role in the removal of the nations’ children from responsible parents, position themselves as protectors of these helpless, stolen children.  

There is nothing more pathetic than to see the media roll out the retired Chief Justice of the Family Court  ‘Alistair Nicholson’ and other like minded participants, and hear how they attempt to justify their evil deeds. It is important to note how their appalling cruel behaviour, is always seen by them to have been  ‘In The Best Interest of the Children’.  

Fortunately, history will see these evildoers for what they are and judge them accordingly. Forcibly removing children from decent loving parents, always has been and always will be, seen as a Crime against Humanity.  

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The Parental Alienation Debate

With special guest

• Dr Ned Holstein.  
  

With an ever growing body of evidence supporting the existence and devastating effects of the Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS), we felt it necessary to again raise awareness to this debilitating disorder. Today we enjoy an informative discussion  with Dr Ned Holstein MD MS, who is the founder of the prominent American family support group Fathers & Families.  

The website of Fathers & Families describes the disorder in the following manner.    

“Parental Alienation is a disorder that arises primarily in the context of divorce/separation and/or child-custody disputes. Its primary manifestation is the child’s campaign of denigration against a parent, a campaign that has no justification. It results from the combination of a programming (brainwashing) of a parent’s indoctrinations and the child’s own contributions to the vilification of the targeted parent. Parental Alienation is also sometimes referred to as “Parental Alienation Disorder” or “Parental Alienation Syndrome.” 

“Few family law cases are as heartbreaking as those involving Parental Alienation. In PA cases, one parent has turned his or her children against the other parent, destroying the loving bonds the children and the target parent once enjoyed”.

“Fathers & Families wants to ensure that the DSM-5 Task Force is aware of the scope and severity of Parental Alienation. To this end, in December we asked our supporters to write the Task Force to urge them to consider including Parental Alienation Disorder in DSM-5. As usual, your response was overwhelming. It also helped lead to progress–while as expected the newly-released draft version does not specifically include Parental Alienation Disorder, the DSM-5 Task Force has now listed Parental Alienation Disorder among the “Conditions Proposed by Outside Sources…that are still under consideration by the work groups.”

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A Help Line For Men

With special guest

• Andrew King. 
  

The program this week mainly centers around some of what help is available for men, and accordingly we speak with Andrew King of MensLine Australia, who explains in detail the services provided by this excellent government funded support service for men.

MensLine Australia is the national telephone support, information and referral service for men with family and relationship concerns. The service is available from anywhere in Australia for the cost of a local call, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. The service is staffed by paid professional counsellors, experienced in men’s issues.

The benefits of telephone counselling are particularly attractive to men, who often find it tough to ask for help and can find face-to-face discussions about difficult issues confronting and even shameful. MensLine Australia offers a private and ‘safe’ environment for guys to talk about their problems. Over the phone, callers are anonymous and can retain more control over what happens as they can terminate the call at any time.

When faced with a problem, men are often more focussed on outcomes and practical solutions than their emotions and internal world. MensLine Australia counsellors recognize this preference and offer a down-to-earth, practical approach to counselling, whilst also encouraging men to deal with important issues in an effective way.

Although the process of separation is traumatic for all concerned, it can be particularly difficult for men whose coping strategies are often limited. MensLine Australia’s counsellors have ready access to relevant information and referral to men’s services at any time and from anywhere in the country.

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Sharing The Caring

With special guests

• Tony Smith and 
• ‘Andrew’.
    

Today’s program explores the controversial review by the Rudd Government, of the Howard governments’ Equal Shared Parenting amendments of 2006.

With most of the on-air DOTA team unavailable this week, Sue Price of the Mens Rights Agency anchored the show from Queensland, with Ian Purdie the only team member back in the Sydney studio co-ordinating and paneling the show, while Peter van de Voorde recorded and uploaded the program to the website from several hundred klm’s north of Sydney. The wonders of modern technology continue to amaze, especially since they have opened up many new options to ensure the programs goes to air each week.

Our first guest is Tony Smith a senior Barrister, who explains some of the legalities of the Shared Parenting amendments and details the reasons for moving cautiously. He questions the need for the reviews at this time, without the amendments having been given the benefit of the test of time in order to fully appreciate their merit or otherwise.

We end the show with our second guest ‘Andrew’. This young man 21 years of age, provides us with an insight into what it is like to be a young male in 2010, and how eligible males deal with the perceived dangers posed by the many anti male laws prevalent in today’s society . He details some of the reasons, why many males are reluctant to commit to a permanent relationship with a woman in our modern culture.

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Department of Child Stealing

With special guest:

• ‘Daniel’
    

This is a week where community alarm bells should have been ringing loudly. It’s a week when the Australian Government released a report showing that in the year 2009, more than 210,000 children were the subject of child protection notifications, in excess of 33,000 were the subject of one or more substantiations, over 35,000 were on care and protection orders and government agencies removed more than 34,000 children from their biological parents.

These figures are especially troubling since on the following day the NT coroner declared the death of a 12 year old girl ,who was under state protection there, as ‘appalling’ and ‘needless’.

Today we speak to one of those biological parents ‘Daniel’, a distraught father who has spent the past 13 years desperately trying to have his son returned to his care and protection, following the boys’ removal from his parents’ care by Docs of NSW,  on the bases of allegations of abuse and neglect, which were subsequently proven to be false.

The desperate emotional trauma of having their son removed on the basis of false allegations, eventually resulted in the marriage breakdown, and this father is almost at the end of his tether at not having had contact with his long lost son for many years.

More questions urgently need to be asked in order to establish the possible underlying causes for such a disturbing high level of government involvement in the child stealing racket that appears to be taking place.

Of particular interest is the fact that the governments’ own reports show that tens of thousands of the nation’s children are removed from one or more of their parents every year with the help of a number of government agencies such as the Family Courts, the Domestic Violence Industry and the departments of community services.

Again our own investigations show the frightening speed and ease by which your biological children can be removed from your care, by any of these government agencies on the basis of the flimsiest of evidence, unsupported hearsay or vindictive false allegations.

‘Daniel’ not his real name for legal reasons joins us today to tell his story in order to warn others about the dangers posed to parent/child relationships by  those government agencies that parade under the nauseating ‘Best Interest of the Children’ Mantra, as they happily remove your children. 

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The Importance of Dads

With special guests:

• Dr Bruce Robinson  and 
  
• Sue Price.
    

We commence the show with a hard look at some of the ludicrous anti male stories doing the rounds of the news desks this week. The fact that these blatant gender discriminatory activities are tolerated at all in our so- called enlightened society, should give great cause for alarm. The obvious psychological harm done to children growing up in the midst of a manufactured male versus female gender war, can be readily observed in the violent and disrespectful behaviour of many of todays youth.   

Our first guest is author Dr Bruce Robinson whose books ‘Fathering from the Fast Lane’  and ‘Daughters and their Dads’  provide a wealth of parenting information for dads. Dr Robinson joins us to discuss the importance of a dad’s involvement in his children’s lives and the need to share their everyday experiences. Dr Robinson is also a Professor of medicine and a consultant Lung Specialist at the University of Western Australia unit at Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital.  

Our second guest is Sue Price of the Mens Rights Agency, regarded by many as the doyen of the fatherhood movement in Australia. The most articulate and outspoken supporter of the rights of men to be treated equally and fairly in our society, Sue speaks about the latest campaigns to raise community awareness and how to alert your elected members to the current societal persecution of men.   

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Myth Busting Ladies

With special guests:

• Barbara Kay and 
  
• Sue Price.
    

Highly respected Canadian journalist Barbara Kay of the National Post, opens the show and speaks candidly about how the extreme international feminist movement has used and promoted the myth that the Montreal Massacre is representative of all male behavior towards females.

Barbara correctly points out that this shocking event has been hijacked by the White Ribbon campaign organizers and used to label all men as violent dangerous, psychopaths, which needs to be condemned and exposed for the malicious, hysterical hate campaign it really is.

We also speak with Sue Price from the Mens Rights Agency, who provides us with an update of Child Support and Family Law matters in Australia as they currently apply, and about the pending changes considered by the Rudd government.

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Happy New Year

With special guests: 

• Sue Price.
    

Dads on the air wish all our listeners a happy new year. We commence the year by speaking with Sue Price from the Mens Rights Agency and look at the vicious bureaucratic backlash against shared parenting by those with a vested interest in maintaining the taxpayer funded industries generated by the Australian family courts sole mother custody models.

While the rest of the world appears to be finally recognizing the massive damage done to both children and parents, by the hysterical anti-father policies of the past, Australia is heading in the exact opposite direction.

We also take a nostalgic look at some of the material we covered over the past year. 2010 is shaping up as the year the Australian government, headed by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd goes back to the future, undoing laws it once supported promoting the shared care of children post separation.

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2009 The End

With special guests: 

• Barry Williams.
    

A lot of people, including most of the Dads On The Air team, are glad to see the end of 2009. The year which saw the death of Michael Jackson, the triumph of Barack Obama and the failure of the Copenhagen climate change conference, was also the year in which the Australian government, headed by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, inexplicable moved against the nation’s fathers, holding multiple fundamentally biased inquiries into the previous government’s popular shared parenting legislation, which encouraged the courts to give fathers and their children a fair-go after separation.

The founder of the Lone Fathers Association Barry Williams, the grandfather of the fatherhood movement in Australia and way back in 1972 the first Australian male to receive the parenting allowance, here adds his voice to the chorus of concern over the Rudd governments apparent aims to roll back the legislation which encouraged cooperation between parents post-divorce

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Merry Christmas

With special guests: 

• Sue Price
  
• Warwick Marsh
• Phillip York and
• Ed Dabrowski.  

Peace on earth and good will to all men. Here a number of the leading lights in Australia’s fatherhood movement wish everybody a Happy Christmas and give some sensible advice about how to deal with things at this time of year. Of course XMAS can be the worst time of year for some separated blokes who, thanksto the bastardy of Australia’s appalling family law system, are unable to see their children. All we can say is: buck up! With a bit of luck things will get better. And ironically, many blokes who have fought heroic battles to see their children through the anti-father bias of our family law system find that once they stop fighting, things begin to improve dramatically.

But it’s the festive season, the time to be at peace and to love your fellow man. Dads On The Air wishes you all best; with words of courage and encouragement from Phil York of Dads In Distress, Sue Price from the Men’s Rights Agency, Ed Dabrowski from the Shared Parenting Council of Australia and Warwick Marsh from the Fatherhood Foundation. Unfortunately Barry Williams from Lone Fathers was unable to make the show as he was catching a plane; but also wishes everybody the best of the season and also expresses his concern for the gathering anti-father backlash in family law.

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Re-Empowering Dads

With special guests: 

• Ken Thompson
  
• Damien Diecke and
• Greg Stocks.  

First up we speak with NSW Fire Brigade Deputy Commissioner, Ken Thompson (COPAC), whose 5-year- old-son, Andrew, was abducted in 2008. He points out that, “Australia now has the highest per capita rate of IPCA in the world”, highlighting the need for new laws. “It’s far too easy for a parent to abduct a child” he said. 

The Family Law Reform Association (FLRA) has called for the introduction of new laws to protect children from being abducted from Australia. As part of the support for this campaign, Ken Thompson has recently formed a group called the Coalition of Parents of Abducted Children (COPAC).
 
Our second interview is with Damien Diecke, a motivational speaker and Master attraction coach, who asks men to join him at the “Be That Confident Guy” seminar in Sydney 19th December.  
 
Damien points out that if you are a man who finds the following familiar, than you will definitely benefit from his re empowering seminars.
 
“I see a woman somewhere at a club, across a room, or perhaps just in the queue in front of me, who makes my heart race and I want so badly to go over and talk to her - but I don’t, I can’t - for no matter how much I have struggled in the past to overcome it, again, I find myself in the grip of an overwhelming self-consciousness and fear of rejection - once more I feel paralysed”
 
We end the program with an interesting recording of the ‘HEY DAD’ workshop for facilitators presented by Greg Stocks at the recent National Mens Health Conference, which was attended by the Dads on The Air team.
 
It provides an insight into how men are working together to re-engage and re-empower themselves, following years of relentless persecution, stereotyping and isolation from our communities. They are encouraged by the many women who are supportive and who are starting to speak out against the perpetrators, under the banner of ‘We Want Our Men Back’

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Managony

With special guests: 

• David ‘Smiley’ Byrnes  and

• Ian Purdie.  

Dads on the air has witnessed the slow emergence over the last two years of the album Managony by Horizon Shine. It is a collection of songs written specifically for DOTA, dealing with issues that have featured on the program relating to fathers’ experiences during and around the subject of divorce. The songs were written, recorded and produced by David “Smiley” Byrnes and DOTA’s Ian Purdie who has been a presenter on the show for the last 4 years. Today’s program features Ian Purdie and Smiley and most of the other musicians they co-opted to help create Managony, as well as the songs and some insights into their composition and the recording process. The album is available through this website for $20. 

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What Is Family Violence?

With special guests:

• Greg Andresen
  
• Sue Price and
  
• Warwick Marsh.  

This week much media attention is given to the subject of Family Violence and Abuse. While $40 million of taxpayer dollars have been spent on the hysterical  WRD campaign, which by definition promotes the false perception that violence is only perpetrated by men against women, the Rudd Government has not spent one cent on one third of the victims, which happen to be men.  

The insidious WRD campaign which has now infiltrated our schools and is being used to indoctrinate our children, does nothing except cause our daughters to be filled with hate for our sons, and fill our sons with false guilt just for being male. 

However, armed with a dozier of more reliable factual research that indicates a large percentage of the victims are in fact males, men have finally launched the more credible 1in3 campaign.  First up we speak with the Senior Researcher and spokesperson for the One in Three Campaign, Greg Andresen, who exposes a series of falsehoods and misinformation being put forward by the Domestic Violence industry, in order to deceive an unsuspecting public into believing that only men are perpetrators and only women are victims of Domestic Violence.  

Next we speak with Sue Price from the Mens Rights Agency, who draws attention to the way the Rudd Government, which is hell bent on taking us back to the dark old days of the disgraced Nicholson era, is calling on noted anti shared parenting apologists to provide advice to the Government on how to remove the notion of shared parenting.   

We close the show with Warwick Marsh from the Fatherhood Foundation, who gives a glowing account of the success of last weeks’ International Mens Day. This event was celebrated around the world and contrary to the usual negative media portrayal of men, this positive image of men is now seen by many as one of the important building blocks of the long road back towards achieving justice and equality for men.    

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International Mens Day Special

With special guests:

• Dr. Elizabeth Celi
• Dr. Jerome Teelucksingh
• Diane A. Sears
• Jason Thompson
• Frank Crump and
• Uma Challa  

We dedicate the whole of this weeks’ program to International Men’s Day, which is finally and deservedly starting to get more recognition and traction around the world. Warwick Marsh, from Dads4Kids who is the Global Coordinator for IMD, set the scene last week on Dads on the Air when he spoke about some of the events taking place in Australia and around the world to celebrate this important International event.  

Our guests this week are from 3 different continents, representing millions of good and decent men around the globe, who currently witness themselves being publicly and relentlessly maligned on a daily basis. While there are exceptions to every rule, these should never be used to misrepresent the whole group in the way we now see men being portrayed.  

We commence our International lineup of guests with Australia’s Dr Elizabeth Celi from Quality Living who is the keynote speaker at the  IMD function to be held at Australia’s Parliament House in the Nation’s Capital, Canberra, on the 19th November. Dr. Celi is a strong supporter of the rights of men to be treated as an equal in a modern society, instead of having to face the daily injustices that confront them in many sectors of our community.   

Next we speak with Dr. Jerome Teelucksingh from Trinidad in the West Indies, who is the founder of IMD and described the event in the following manner, “International Men’s Day is about addressing the challenges and problems that men face; improving gender relations between men and women; promoting gender equality; highlighting positive male role models – not just movie stars and athletes – but “everyday working class men who are living decent, honest lives”; and creating a safer and better world”.  

We then speak with Diane A. Sears, IMD Coordinator in the USA, who puts it this way, “We must work together as a team. International Mens Day provides us with a great opportunity. Strong fathers create and sustain efficiently functioning family units which positively shape the minds and souls of our children – our future – our bridge to the future. After all, isn’ t it really about our children?”  

The person responsible for Global Promotions, who is also the Historian and Coordinator for IMD is Australia’s Jason Thompson and our next guest, who would like to take this opportunity to ask individuals and organizations who are planning an event to contact him with the details at: soulgany@bigpond.com

The following guest is Frank Crump from the USA and UPI Education, who with  IN SEARCH OF FATHERHOOD® have entered into a partnership in observance of International Men’s Day 2009 on Thursday, 19 November 2009. UPI Education is asking students, faculty, and administrators to observe International Men’s Day 2009 through one moment of silence beginning at 11:19 A.M. (EST) and ending at 11:20 A.M. (EST) to commemorate and contemplate the sacrifices and contributions that Men have made throughout the world. UPI Education is also soliciting essays, articles, and poems from students and adults which identify the positive male role models that have influenced their lives. These essays, articles, and poems will be published on IN SEARCH OF FATHERHOOD®’s blog.  

We conclude our program interviewing  one of the hardest working and passionate promoters of equality and justice for all, Uma Challa from India. Uma Challa is the IMD Coordinator for India. She made the point that, “International women’s Day is celebrated the world over every year but we also need to have a celebration every year to recognize and honor men: our fathers, brothers, partners, sons, male friends and colleagues; for the numerous services they render and the innumerable sacrifices they make to ensure the health and well-being of the family and the society.”

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Family Law, Marriage and Men

With special guests:

• Sue Price
• Ian Purdie and
• Warwick Marsh. 

This week we present an extensive discussion with Sue Price of the Men’s Rights Agency, on the topic of the proposed roll back of Australian Shared Parenting laws. These laws which are only three years old and which presented a tiny glimmer of hope for the nations’ children to continue to maintain regular contact with both parents, following their parents’ separation, are now again under threat by a Labor Government.

Next our own Ian Purdie from Ian Purdie dot com, speaks about his recent trip to Las Vegas, where he was best man at his mates’ wedding. While some would regard this type of wedding as somewhat bizarre and plastic, Ian enjoyed every minute of it and speaks about being driven to the wedding in a stretch limousine, seeing the names of the bride and groom in neon lights and watching the wedding ceremony being performed by Elvis.

The final guest this week is Warwick Marsh from the Fatherhood Foundation. Warwick speaks about the upcoming International Men’s Day celebrations planned for the 19th November, and of his work to bring this event to the attention of our Parliamentarians and the community. This International event will also be the main feature of our program next week, when we will speak with International organizers of this event from India, Australia, Trinidad and the USA.

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Indigenous Men's Health

With special guests:

• Ashley Gordon and

• Craig Hammond.   
  

This week we’re broadcasting to you from the opening of the week long National Men’s Health Gathering in Newcastle, which is about 2 hours north of Sydney. This national event occurs every alternate year and the whole week is dedicated to the health issues facing men today and how we can best deal with those issues.

The state of health of Australian men has been ignored and neglected for many decades by successive governments, while at the same time, the cultural landscape for men, has in recent times come under severe attack from many sources, causing a further deterioration in the well being of the nations’ men and boys.  

We are dedicating the whole of this weeks’ program to the opening day at this year’s National Men’s Health Gathering, which starts the week with the 5th National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Male Health Convention.

We also speak with former rugby league star Ashley Gordon, “Aboriginal people and gambling” a dedicated Aboriginal leader and one of the organisers of the convention. Ashley is joined by fellow convention organiser and Aboriginal leader Craig Hammond, “The Brothers Inside Project” who is also committed to improving the physical and mental health of the nations’ Indigenous men.

If we want to see what is in store for our men and our culture, we need look no further then the enormous task faced by our Indigenous community to restore the health, dignity and well being of their men and boys. To their great credit and our national shame these communities are working hard to re-engage their once proud Men and have their cultural landscape restored.

The deplorable state of mens’ health in Australia,  is in no small part due to the fact that it has by and large been ignored by Australian governments and the media. Despite the fact that we are proud to be able to claim that Dads On The Air were the only media organisation to cover this important national week long event, it is an absolute disgrace that the nations’ media completely ignored reporting on this event and the dire state of our mens’ health.

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Men's Business

With special guest:

• Ian Watson.    
  

A leader in the field of mentoring his fellow man, Ian Watson is a shining light of hope and encouragement to those suffering at the hands of agenda driven zealots, who are hell bent on destroying the resilience and natural inner strength of men and boys. 

He runs popular monthly men’s gatherings where men talk men’s business. Ian’s well attended “Transit Lounge” gatherings, provide a welcome sanctuary from the many real life experiences men suffer at the hands of government sponsored agencies and the media, whilst many of their kids are forced to live in fatherless households.

While the gender war against men and boys rages unabated around the globe, we see an apathetic and ignorant community laughing at all the demeaning anti male advertising propaganda, that sees them easily drawn into joining the “all men are perpetrators ” domestic violence hysteria. 

However, there are encouraging signs that men have just about had enough, and are collectively starting to show their enthusiasm for more pro-active engagement with one another. Mentoring is fast becoming the accepted new communication tool to support those that have fallen victim to some of the worse excesses of male bashing persecution, the world has ever witnessed.
 
We also broadcast a recording made at the National Men’s Health Convention recently, of the presentation made by psychologist Drew Cowen who works in the Family Court in Newcastle, and who’s theme was “Giving Kids the Best Dad they can have: Helping Fathers and Kids to have strong healthy relationships when they don’t live in the same home”.
 
Now on the face of it, such a caring sounding title would indicate an understanding of what fathers and their kids are forced to endure , as they desperately try to keep their parent/child relationships intact following separation. But to many dads in the audience it appeared that the one preaching to them, was part of the problem and not the solution.

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Behind The Black Robes

With special guests:

• Barbara C. Johnson and    

• Paul Stolz.

We commence this weeks’ program speaking with American lawyer and author Barbara C. Johnson who’s latest book “Behind the Black Robes: Failed Justice” which has just become available. This book addresses a serious problem, the need for court reform and the abolishment of judicial and quasi-judicial immunity. Marinated with the makings of sizzle, the book is filled with the courts’ tricks and traps for the unwary. It sets out to alert the readers both why their law cases failed and what must be done to effect court reform.

Barbara C. Johnson is an unconventional 74 year-old, who has long been a fierce advocate for fathers’ rights in family courts. She is an outspoken critic of the Massachusetts court system, which she says is rife with corruption.

Secondly we speak with Paul Stolz, who is the CEO of Victorian support group “Evolve” which provides a supportive environment for disadvantaged young people to evolve into strong, caring and purposeful individuals.

Young men in today’s society face many challenges – they are struggling educationally, emotionally and socially. Without early intervention and on-going support, many are at risk of tragic futures involving broken relationships, crime, substance abuse and even suicide.

Evolve’s Young Men’s Program is an early-intervention option for young blokes who want to work through their challenges and build a more positive future for themselves.

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Threats To The Family

With special guests:

• Barry Maley   
  

• Dr Elizabeth Celi and

• Sue Price.  

We start the program interviewing Barry Maley, who is a Senior Fellow at the Centre for Independent Studies in Sydney. Barry has released a report Family on the Edge – Stability and Fertility in Prosperity and Recession in which there are surprising findings leading to some major recommendations. Birth rates have been studied between a low point of 2001 and a recent high point of 1.93 per woman in 2008. The increase is strongly associated with the rising prosperity of that period.  With the financial threats and the continuing prevalence of children bei ng born to single mothers Barry argues for a change in family law and policies to encourage family stability. This would be a major factor in being able to sustain the buoyant birth rate.

Our second interview is with Dr Elizabeth Celi, well known Psychologist and social commentator who in the course of her work in mental health has encountered examples of domestic abuse which are sometimes too subtle to affect our sensibility. Elizabeth discusses recent television advertisements that would cause immediate offence if a female character were to be substituted for the male character in the script. We also talk about communication strategies and ways that can improve relationships and mental health.

Our final interview is with Sue Price from the Men’s Rights Agency. Sue has been conducting a survey on the Family Relationship Centres and we discuss progress with the survey. One of the problems that has been identified so far is with regard to a particular psychological theory that may be imposed by the Centres. We might have expected that the Centres would use the Government money to mediate and listen to the parties rather than impose a particular theoretical approach on the parties in dispute.

In coming weeks we will be presenting interviews obtained at the National Men’s Health Gathering held in Newcastle last week, at which Dads on the Air was represented by Peter van de Voorde and Greg Andresen.

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Action On Men's Health

With special guests:

• Greg Andresen 
  

• Ray Kelly and

• Geoffrey Greene. 

We start the program by doing a live cross to the National Men’s Health Gathering 2009, being held in the city of Newcastle. Greg Andresen reports on the planned activities for the four day event. While a significant national event, which only takes place every alternate year, it sees Dads on the Air as the only member of the national news media to attend this important National Convention on Men’s Health issues, for the full week.

Greg Andresen and Peter van de Voorde, who are representing Dads on the air at the conference, will be recording a number of presentations and have planned a series of interviews with leading participants that will be aired in coming weeks on our program.

Our second interview is with Indigenous leader Ray Kelly, an academic based at Newcastle University, who gave the opening presentation at the 5th National Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Male Health Convention. This Convention was the forerunner to the National Men’s Health Conference and the National Family and Relationships Forum, and was devoted to Indigenous issues where men’s health issues are even more predominant than in the general community.

We also speak with Geoffrey Greene the President of the Shared Parenting Council of Australia, about the three separate inquiries into Family Law being conducted by the Rudd Government. He argued that despite the concerted push to wind back the Family Law reforms introduced by the Howard government, the Trade Union movement would be a force within the ALP to block these changes. The Union movement wants to avoid a return to the dark ages when fathers only saw their children intermittently, if at all, following separation.

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