Tuesday
Oct122010
Celebrating A Decade Of Dads On The Air
Tuesday, October 12, 2010 at 10:30AM 
With special guests:
- Dr. Stephen Baskerville
- Sue Price
- Geoffrey Greene
- Barry Williams
- Warwick Marsh
- John Flannagan and
- Tony Miller.
In a remarkable show of solidarity and a sign that hope can defeat despair, a determined group of fathers and supporters gathered at Sydney radio station 2GLF this week, to celebrate 10 years of Dads On The Air. Both past and present members of the DOTA team came from far and wide, and proudly renewed a steadfast resolve to continue with their mission, to expose the immoral practices of an atrocious family justice industry, made possible by appallingly ineffective Family Law legislation.
As they stood around the studio kitchen table, focused on a birthday cake, singing happy birthday DOTA, these traumatized Dads resembled a group of returned soldiers who, having been highly traumatized by the ravages of war, are in the process of rebuilding their lives. Their common bond was forged by the trauma suffered at the loss of access to their children, which has been forced upon them against their will, by a number of Government agencies.
Successive Governments continue to inflict this trauma upon their citizenry, by persisting with the protection of the child removal industry, rather then protecting the family bonds of their constituents. For many years now, Governments of all persuasions have allowed their social policy platforms to be hijacked by a corrupt and inhumane anti-family, anti-male, Family Justice Industry, which is removing children from families in ever increasing numbers, leaving every family vulnerable to the destructive ravishes of this Industry.
But what is now the world’s longest running radio program dealing with Men and Father issues, Dads On The Air, will continue to expose and broadcast to the world, the excesses of these crimes against humanity.
Members of the DOTA team in the studio, were co-founders of DOTA, respected journalist John Stapleton, retired Police Detective Rick Torning [Uncle Buck], and former police officer Rod Hardwick, other team members present were, Author and Musician Ian Purdie, Musician and Entertainer Peter van de Voorde, Co-ordinator of Dads in Distress Phillip York, Researcher with Men’s Health Australia Greg Andresen, Lawyer and Mediator Bill Kable.
They were joined on air by a number of other leading advocates calling for urgent changes to Family Justice legislation, from both Australia and overseas, all of whom are united in purpose and working hard to inform Governments, that they are failing in their duty of care to protect the bonds of parent/child relationships Internationally.
Our first guest was celebrated American Author and Assistant Professor of Political Science, Dr.Stephen Baskerville, ‘Taken Into Custody’ , followed by Sue Price, Men’s Rights Agency, Geoffrey Greene, former federal director Shared Parenting Council of Australia, Barry Williams, President, Lone Fathers Association, Australia, Warwick Marsh, Fatherhood Foundation, John Flanagan, Non Custodial Parents Party, and Tony Miller, Order of Australia Medal recipient, and founder of Dads in Distress.
The survival and ultimate prospering of Australia’s world famous Dads On The Air radio program over the past ten years is little short of a miracle.
There were numerous points over the years where it survived only by the narrowest of threads. Or to put it another way, the tiniest chain of dads prepared to devote time and energy to the cause. It has now prospered and consolidated to the point where it has attracted a regular team of professionals such as lawyers and men’s councillors, academic experts and people with considerable talent in the journalistic and entertainment fields.
The Internet has expanded the influence of Dads On The Air from a small community radio show in western Sydney to the present point where father and childhood activists, academics, authors and commentators from around the world regularly appear on the show. It has become not just a stand out as one of Australia’s most successful community radio programs but literally the world’s longest running radio program dedicated to fatherhood issues.
Dads On The Air was begun by a small group of separated dads, most of whom will be in the studio for the tenth anniversary celebratory show, Ten years ago they were united by an overwhelming outrage at the social injustices being perpetrated by Australia’s deeply troubled family law and child support systems. With the mainstream media almost uniformly granting its social affairs rounds to old fashioned 1970s all men are bastards style feminists, Dads On The Air provided a much needed outlet for alternative, saner views.
With the taxpayer funded Australian Broadcasting Commission and major left-leaning newspapers such as The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age ignoring both the fatherhood movement and public opinion and repeating the family law, child support, child welfare and domestic violence industries’ propaganda as gospel, the program acted as a kind of release valve. It aimed to expose to public view the truth about the nation’s dysfunctional.family courts, its inept, secretive and anti-male child welfare systems and the hysteria and false statistics under-writing much of the domestic violence industry.
The program has also done its best to expose the maladministration of Australia’s despised Child Support Agency, highlighting the claims by father’s groups that it is directly implicated in the high death toll amongst separated men. In the face of successive governments and bureaucratic figures continued refusal to release statistics on the Agency’s death rate, Dads On The Air estimates that more than 12,000 of its clients have died since Labour came to power in 2007. These figures have never been denied by the government or the Agency and could well be an underestimate.
No other institution public or private could continue to operate with such ineffective results, the average child of a separated parent now receives less than before the creation of this multi-million dollar bureaucratic behemoth, or with such disastrous outcomes in so many individuals lives. It is a sign of just how unfashionable the Agency’s victims, fathers, are that nothing has been done to address this public administration scandal. The government continues to ignore recommendations that the social impacts of the scheme be examined. The truth would hurt.
Dads On The Air also played a vital role in the nation’s long struggle for family law reform. While there was a time when politicians across the political spectrum queued up to come on the program, keen to demonstrate their father-friendly qualities and support for shared parenting outcomes post-divorce, the current Labor government, including the Attorney General Robert McClelland, have ignored repeated requests to come on the show. McClelland is the first Attorney General in our history to treat us with such contempt, and by doing so also treats our audience, fathers and their supporters with contempt. He neatly exposes the fraud behind the Labor Party’s pro-family rhetoric - while in reality they remain slavish supporters of the family law industry and senior anti-father propagandists within the bureaucracy.
Our celebratory tenth anniversary show will feature founders including Uncle Buck aka Rick Torning, Rod Hardwick and John Stapleton, From this distance and after so much similar exposure around the world over the past decade it is perhaps difficult to appreciate how ground-breaking the early pioneers of Dads On The Air really were. This small group of dads, without any professional training in radio, dared to criticise the media’s mono-cultural support for supposedly progressive pro-feminist left-wing institutions such as The Australian Family Court and the Australian Child Support Industry. With minimal resources they made a very earnest attempt to expose malfeasance and hypocrisy.
And as always we will continuing to bring you the many talents of the present Dads On The Air team, including lawyer Bill Kable, DJ impersonator Ian Purdie, musician and all-round work horse Peter van de Voorde, Phil York, a senior men’s counsellor with Dads In Distress, along with researcher and as of the 27th September proud new dad Greg Andresen. Mother Kylie and son are doing well.
We should also mention the great work of our news director Lindsay Jackel, as well as the long standing technical and programming support provided by community radio station 2GLF.
As they stood around the studio kitchen table, focused on a birthday cake, singing happy birthday DOTA, these traumatized Dads resembled a group of returned soldiers who, having been highly traumatized by the ravages of war, are in the process of rebuilding their lives. Their common bond was forged by the trauma suffered at the loss of access to their children, which has been forced upon them against their will, by a number of Government agencies.
Successive Governments continue to inflict this trauma upon their citizenry, by persisting with the protection of the child removal industry, rather then protecting the family bonds of their constituents. For many years now, Governments of all persuasions have allowed their social policy platforms to be hijacked by a corrupt and inhumane anti-family, anti-male, Family Justice Industry, which is removing children from families in ever increasing numbers, leaving every family vulnerable to the destructive ravishes of this Industry.
But what is now the world’s longest running radio program dealing with Men and Father issues, Dads On The Air, will continue to expose and broadcast to the world, the excesses of these crimes against humanity.
Members of the DOTA team in the studio, were co-founders of DOTA, respected journalist John Stapleton, retired Police Detective Rick Torning [Uncle Buck], and former police officer Rod Hardwick, other team members present were, Author and Musician Ian Purdie, Musician and Entertainer Peter van de Voorde, Co-ordinator of Dads in Distress Phillip York, Researcher with Men’s Health Australia Greg Andresen, Lawyer and Mediator Bill Kable.
They were joined on air by a number of other leading advocates calling for urgent changes to Family Justice legislation, from both Australia and overseas, all of whom are united in purpose and working hard to inform Governments, that they are failing in their duty of care to protect the bonds of parent/child relationships Internationally.
Our first guest was celebrated American Author and Assistant Professor of Political Science, Dr.Stephen Baskerville, ‘Taken Into Custody’ , followed by Sue Price, Men’s Rights Agency, Geoffrey Greene, former federal director Shared Parenting Council of Australia, Barry Williams, President, Lone Fathers Association, Australia, Warwick Marsh, Fatherhood Foundation, John Flanagan, Non Custodial Parents Party, and Tony Miller, Order of Australia Medal recipient, and founder of Dads in Distress.
The survival and ultimate prospering of Australia’s world famous Dads On The Air radio program over the past ten years is little short of a miracle.
There were numerous points over the years where it survived only by the narrowest of threads. Or to put it another way, the tiniest chain of dads prepared to devote time and energy to the cause. It has now prospered and consolidated to the point where it has attracted a regular team of professionals such as lawyers and men’s councillors, academic experts and people with considerable talent in the journalistic and entertainment fields.
The Internet has expanded the influence of Dads On The Air from a small community radio show in western Sydney to the present point where father and childhood activists, academics, authors and commentators from around the world regularly appear on the show. It has become not just a stand out as one of Australia’s most successful community radio programs but literally the world’s longest running radio program dedicated to fatherhood issues.
Dads On The Air was begun by a small group of separated dads, most of whom will be in the studio for the tenth anniversary celebratory show, Ten years ago they were united by an overwhelming outrage at the social injustices being perpetrated by Australia’s deeply troubled family law and child support systems. With the mainstream media almost uniformly granting its social affairs rounds to old fashioned 1970s all men are bastards style feminists, Dads On The Air provided a much needed outlet for alternative, saner views.
With the taxpayer funded Australian Broadcasting Commission and major left-leaning newspapers such as The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age ignoring both the fatherhood movement and public opinion and repeating the family law, child support, child welfare and domestic violence industries’ propaganda as gospel, the program acted as a kind of release valve. It aimed to expose to public view the truth about the nation’s dysfunctional.family courts, its inept, secretive and anti-male child welfare systems and the hysteria and false statistics under-writing much of the domestic violence industry.
The program has also done its best to expose the maladministration of Australia’s despised Child Support Agency, highlighting the claims by father’s groups that it is directly implicated in the high death toll amongst separated men. In the face of successive governments and bureaucratic figures continued refusal to release statistics on the Agency’s death rate, Dads On The Air estimates that more than 12,000 of its clients have died since Labour came to power in 2007. These figures have never been denied by the government or the Agency and could well be an underestimate.
No other institution public or private could continue to operate with such ineffective results, the average child of a separated parent now receives less than before the creation of this multi-million dollar bureaucratic behemoth, or with such disastrous outcomes in so many individuals lives. It is a sign of just how unfashionable the Agency’s victims, fathers, are that nothing has been done to address this public administration scandal. The government continues to ignore recommendations that the social impacts of the scheme be examined. The truth would hurt.
Dads On The Air also played a vital role in the nation’s long struggle for family law reform. While there was a time when politicians across the political spectrum queued up to come on the program, keen to demonstrate their father-friendly qualities and support for shared parenting outcomes post-divorce, the current Labor government, including the Attorney General Robert McClelland, have ignored repeated requests to come on the show. McClelland is the first Attorney General in our history to treat us with such contempt, and by doing so also treats our audience, fathers and their supporters with contempt. He neatly exposes the fraud behind the Labor Party’s pro-family rhetoric - while in reality they remain slavish supporters of the family law industry and senior anti-father propagandists within the bureaucracy.
Our celebratory tenth anniversary show will feature founders including Uncle Buck aka Rick Torning, Rod Hardwick and John Stapleton, From this distance and after so much similar exposure around the world over the past decade it is perhaps difficult to appreciate how ground-breaking the early pioneers of Dads On The Air really were. This small group of dads, without any professional training in radio, dared to criticise the media’s mono-cultural support for supposedly progressive pro-feminist left-wing institutions such as The Australian Family Court and the Australian Child Support Industry. With minimal resources they made a very earnest attempt to expose malfeasance and hypocrisy.
And as always we will continuing to bring you the many talents of the present Dads On The Air team, including lawyer Bill Kable, DJ impersonator Ian Purdie, musician and all-round work horse Peter van de Voorde, Phil York, a senior men’s counsellor with Dads In Distress, along with researcher and as of the 27th September proud new dad Greg Andresen. Mother Kylie and son are doing well.
We should also mention the great work of our news director Lindsay Jackel, as well as the long standing technical and programming support provided by community radio station 2GLF.