Families Commission ideologically driven
I’ve decided to forgive Simon Collins for his Preventing Violence in the Home promotion after reading his well researched Monday NZ Herald article: Domestic violence campaigners accused of bias
Two top health researchers have accused the Families Commission of “ideologically driven” bias in presenting domestic violence as a problem of men battering women.
Professor David Fergusson and Associate Professor Richie Poulton said their respective long-term studies of people born in Christchurch and Dunedin in the 1970s showed that most domestic violence was mutual.
“In a high proportion of these couples, we are seeing mutual fighting. It’s brawling,” said Professor Fergusson.
…In an email to the Herald, Professor Fergusson said: “It is my frank view the commission’s stance on domestic violence is not being guided by a dispassionate and balanced consideration of the evidence.
“Rather, it is being guided by an ideologically driven model that assumes on a priori grounds that domestic violence is a male problem and that female-initiated domestic violence does not exist or is so trivial that it can be ignored in the commission’s policy focus.”
The subject was taken up on Radio New Zealand’s show ‘The Panel’ on Monday evening. You can listen to it here until Monday 20th November. (Item of interest starts 16 mins in).
Chris Trotter said
I am very glad that these two gentlemen have raised the objection because there’s something vaguely unsettling and a rather distressing about being asked to identify yourself as some sort of reconstructed killer or batterer of your fellow human beings, and by wearing this white ribbon in a sense hurl stones at your own gender.
Who beats up on the who?… The evidence would suggest that it’s reasonably evenly balanced. Now that is completely at odds with the extreme feminist agenda of the 70s and 80s you know: “all men are rapists”… When you have a slogan like that all you do is alienate people both men and women and I think it’s been unhelpful… there is an echo of that and this White Ribbon Day.
Professor David Fergusson was interviewed by phone and said:
Domestic violence occurs almost equally amongst males and females and there are massive amounts of data to support that. What is the case however, is that as we move to the extremes, and the murder is the extreme, we find more men. But even when we are at that extreme for example it is not exclusively a male domain.
There was a review by Felicity Goodyear-Smith of domestic violence murders in New Zealand that pointed out that on average we have about 11 a year of which three are committed by females and the remaining eight by males. So I think that trying to align domestic violence with a gender blame; saying this is a male problem that males must take ownership of; is not the right sort of message that we need to be having.
Asked about his finding that more women instigate violence, Ferguson made the interesting point:
We found in both the Christchurch and Dunedin studies that woman instigates violence more frequently than men and there is a good reason for this. Men have been bought up not to hit women. Women haven’t been bought up not to hit men.
According to the Commission principal policy analyst Radha Balakrishnan, Mr Curry now accepted that he had made a mistake but stood by the claim that the worst domestic violence was perpetrated by men.
“We are talking about the most serious and lethal cases where perpetrators are predominantly men and the sufferers are predominantly women and children,” she said.
Radha Balakrishnan has also made a mistake. The most extensive research ever carried out on domestice violence (Straus and Gelles in the USA, all states) showed that the most severe viloence is perpetrated by women. This is because women use weapons such as knives and guns. Straus and Gelles also found that offending between males and females was about equal.
Feminist bigots and their dull-witted lawyers have been very good at taking anecdotal accounts of violence against women and extrapolating them to appear as the norm.
Taking the sociological measure of everything, the ‘average’, it could be said that ‘women’ are much more likley to poison their spouse or partner than men. A more honest person would ask, which women are these because the average indicator provides nothing but false information about every individual.
Comment by eye of the tiger — Thu 16th November 2006 @ 8:09 am
Sent to [email protected],Police Commissioner – from [email protected] today 16/11/06
Dear Sir,
I am writing regarding your the up and coming event against violence towards women highlighted through a white ribbon day . It is with much regret to write to inform you, that both the New Zealand Families Commission and Police fail to understand that both men and women are victims of domestic violence (DV). Recent balanced and untainted studies from Christchurch School of Medicine and Otago University clearly show that DV is not specific to one gender.
Unfortunately many decent Fathers are tarred as DV daddy’s because at one end of the scale we have a minority group of nutter thugs, who are the perpetrators of irrational extreme acts of violence, thus stereotyping all fathers as dangerous to women and children.
When a falsely accused dad faces DV proceedings before the Court he faces blatant hostility and bias unlawful gender discrimination by Government agencies claiming to act in the child’s best interests. How hard are these men to be driven in the best interests of the child? Their suicides give the answer. So that’s in the best interests of their children!
I am a falsely accused DV daddy who is going to celebrate my sixth consecutive Christmas sad and miserable without my two beautiful daughters, whom I love and miss dearly. On your white ribbon day I will wear a black suit and a purple ribbon for all the Fathers who have committed suicide because of the hateful stance of the New Zealand Government and Judiciary.I will stand outside the Police Station and Courthouse.
For example, RIP In Memoriam Christchurch Press – 7 November 2006 Wayne C , who was a old rugby mate, who blew his head with a shot gun because of false allegations of DV and sexual abuse, just like my ex has done to me for over six years !!!! It was sad watching Wayne’s ex pull up at the funeral in a new car and a new boyfriend laughing her head off. I will tell all children the truth about their mother’s, just like I will tell my two daughters at the appropriate time, as children deserve the truth, as they need dads to love them . Anyway this is what Wayne’s kids said about their dad that was killed by a vindictive and vengeful women helped by a prejudice law system;
” Dad, you left us two years ago today. Memories of your love are still our guide. Although we cannot see you, you’ll always be at our side. Will always be deeply missed.” K & L
Please we need some balance to address DV , the modern day scourge that is manufacturing so many unhappy children. Try linking with fathers groups who care about the situation for ALL KIWI CHILDREN rather than persecuting and demonising them all , as I think this would be more beneficial to the over all situation .
Kind regards
dad4justice
Canterbury
“It’s better to be defeated on principle than to win on lies “- Arthur Caldwell.
Comment by dad4justice — Thu 16th November 2006 @ 5:51 pm
dad4justice,
Great letter.
I encourage you to write more of these letters to those institutional bigwigs. The more theyt wake up to salient facts the better.
You might also like to sign of thus…
Dad4Justice.
Let the letter casing show your proud bro’!
Comment by Stephen — Thu 16th November 2006 @ 11:36 pm
It bewilders me that the media have not been all over this.
They are happy to declare their biased beliefs time and time again, yet when they are proved wrong, they turn a blind eye, and go on to promote the ridiculous “white ribbon day”
This is intentional ignorance by the idiot media who the public (sadly) rely on for information, and to me, this proves that the media are pro-actively biased (for what reason I cannot comprehend) against Men.
There are countless adverts which make Men look stupid and subservient to women, and countless programs which condone VIOLENCE AGAINST MEN
They are getting away with blue murder. They are blatantly lying to us, and no one is holding them accountable, yet it seems people will continue to go on to believe whatever crap the media feeds them without using the old gray matter.
Comment by Moose — Sat 18th November 2006 @ 10:59 pm
Excellent letter dad4justice, and Moose, I too am bewildered.
Only a couple of weeks ago Don Brash gave an excellent speach “from the cradle to jail”, during which he stated “ask any police officer who the most likely offenders where and they will say…. males raised in single parent homes without a father”.
If the police in the front lines are saying this, then the top police and policy makers are totally out of touch with reality and ignoring obvious solutions. But worse…..Don Brashes words died that night….never to be heard again. Why didn’t the media question this further, and why does our society not react to such revelations? I am bewildered
Comment by xsryder — Mon 20th November 2006 @ 11:06 pm
Guys,
The mountain is femenism. Your leaders are femenists. They are the children (girls) of mothers that gave their whole life (time) to fight for women’s rights. The girl’s also protested. They are a click group. The men that are leaders know this and they cannot fight them head on as if femenism is bad because it was not.
We have to express the balance that is needed. We have to express that the consequences today are negative.
They are telling you that they support you and are asking you to give them something to help them. We need to get all our statistics together. We need to play the game that is played today.
Let’s start sharing information. What have you got, e-mail it to me. What I have I will share with you. We can make our own reports and send them to the media.
Comment by julie — Tue 21st November 2006 @ 7:15 am
I need to know – is it a lie that a woman is killed by someone she knows (and presumably loves) every 5 weeks? If it is true, can u say that a man is killed every 5 weeks?
Comment by J — Sat 22nd September 2007 @ 9:06 pm