Tell No One

With special guest:

• Brendan Watkins
  … in conversation with Bill Kable

The title of this book Tell No One has an ominous ring to it. We can imagine sex offenders threatening their victims should the story ever get out. As Brendan discovered there may also be another reason for this instruction involving a power imbalance.

Brendan knew at a young age that he had been adopted but when he started looking for his biological parents he did not know if his conception may have resulted from a sexual offence or young love or something else. One thing that kept driving Brendan was his desire to know the truth wherever that may lead.

The first part of his story was surprising. His mother had been 27 when Brendan was born so she was not the teenager in trouble who adopts out her child under pressure from her family. Then the shock of finding out that his mother had been a nun, a bride of Christ. Having made this discovery Brendan was mightily disappointed when the Catholic agency acting as intermediary advised that his mother said they must never meet.

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Don’t Dream It’s Over

With special guest:

• Jeff Apter
  … in conversation with Bill Kable

Jeff Apter has written the definitive story of Neil Finn, one of the Finns, including some remarkable things about this Kiwi icon we claim as an Aussie.

Neil first appeared in our consciousness as a freaky member of the band Split Enz. He was the one up front singing I Got You which he also wrote. The band was not a one hit wonder but there were tensions among the members particularly between Neil and the leader of the band, his brother Tim, which cut short the life of the band.

Ultimately Tim gave his brother good advice, go and form your own band and this led to Crowded House arriving and taking over the world record charts.

Jeff Apter tells us that his book focusses on the music while filling in a lot of the background to the songs and the life of Neil Finn. For many of us a song Neil wrote will have a special meaning because it appeared at an important stage of our lives and the beautiful melody burns the message into our brains.

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Tell No One

With special guest:

• Brendan Watkins
  … in conversation with Bill Kable

The title of this book Tell No One has an ominous ring to it. We can imagine sex offenders threatening their victims should the story ever get out. As Brendan discovered there may also be another reason for this instruction involving a power imbalance.

Brendan knew at a young age that he had been adopted but when he started looking for his biological parents he did not know if his conception may have resulted from a sexual offence or young love or something else. One thing that kept driving Brendan was his desire to know the truth wherever that may lead.

The first part of his story was surprising. His mother had been 27 when Brendan was born so she was not the teenager in trouble who adopts out her child under pressure from her family. Then the shock of finding out that his mother had been a nun, a bride of Christ. Having made this discovery Brendan was mightily disappointed when the Catholic agency acting as intermediary advised that his mother said they must never meet.

Podcast (mp3)

Click to read more ...

Don’t Dream It’s Over

With special guest:

• Jeff Apter
  … in conversation with Bill Kable

Jeff Apter has written the definitive story of Neil Finn, one of the Finns, including some remarkable things about this Kiwi icon we claim as an Aussie.

Neil first appeared in our consciousness as a freaky member of the band Split Enz. He was the one up front singing I Got You which he also wrote. The band was not a one hit wonder but there were tensions among the members particularly between Neil and the leader of the band, his brother Tim, which cut short the life of the band.

Ultimately Tim gave his brother good advice, go and form your own band and this led to Crowded House arriving and taking over the world record charts.

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An Awesome Ride: Through a father’s eyes

With special guest:

• Cameron Miller
  … in conversation with Bill Kable

In 2012 Shaun Miller made a YouTube video in his bedroom called MY FINAL GOODBYE. In this video Shaun managed in only 2 minutes and 54 seconds to get out some important messages before it was too late.

Shaun was only 17 years of age but he knew that he had at most a few weeks to live because of his heart condition. He said that he had no regrets and that we should live life to the fullest. We should express our love to the people around us. Importantly he said to make sure that his dad Cameron was OK.

Overnight there were 30,000 hits and a week later that number had gone to over 1 million. Now it is over 7 million. Clearly this is an extraordinary person.

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Raising Boys in the Twenty-first Century

With special guest:

• Steve Biddulph AM
  … in conversation with Bill Kable

It was hard enough to raise boys in the 20^th Century. What are the new challenges facing parents who want to raise their sons to be the open-hearted, kind and strong men they can be?

Our guest today has revised and updated his classic parenting book released in 1997, a book that is found in over three million homes around the world. There is a lot of new information and surprising research for Steve to draw on in his new book Raising Boys in the Twenty-first Century. There is a new understanding of hormonal changes as boys turn into men, changes that mean the age from 6 to 14 is when fathers count the most.

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Man Raises Boy

With special guest:

• Rob Sturrock
  … in conversation with Bill Kable

What? The title of Rob Sturrock’s new book can still surprise even in the twenty-first century. Somehow the idea of fathers taking on the primary role of raising children sits a little uncomfortably.

Rob is calling for no less than a revolutionary approach if we are going to transition to a world where boys are free to be whatever they want to be, including being a stay-at-home Dad if they want. Many young women in our society have for some time enjoyed the freedom of choice when it comes to being a mother in the home or a career woman. Yet when women set out to be high flyers in the business world there are some things we do not hear. Women are usually praised for saying they want a good well-paying job and that they are prepared to work hard. But do they ever say this is so that they can support a family? The community still sees men as the main bread winner and so the sentiment is common if not universal among young men.

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Five Years From Now

With special guest:

• Paige Toon
  … in conversation with Bill Kable

In today’s episode we speak to author and citizen of the world Paige Toon who has written a novel exploring the relationship between two children from opposite ends of the world and their fathers.

We drop in on these lives every five years to see how things have changed and we find there are plenty of surprises as we trace the emotional development of the main characters.

The fathers in the story start from different points. One is close to his daughter and always has been. The other did not get to meet his son until he was seven. Yet both children see the importance of that father/child relationship as they make their way through life. The book is all about relationships and how timing can be all important.

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High Adventure

With special guest:

• Mike Allsop
  … in conversation with Bill Kable

Mike Allsop was worried that marriage would spell the end of the adventurous life he had been living. He also had experienced a difficult family upbringing himself. So when he met the love of his life he certainly did not rush into that long walk down the aisle. But these days he has the “full disaster” with his wife Wendy and three beautiful children. And there are lessons to be learned from Mike’s progress that we can all appreciate.

Talking to Mike makes you feel like you were there with him when he reached the summit of Mt Everest with nobody in front of him. We learn about the setbacks when he was getting ready to run 7 marathons in 7 days on 7 continents starting with his belief that he wasn’t really a marathon runner.

This love of setting and reaching goals started when he was a child and he saw an Air New Zealand jet passing overhead. He had the goal of becoming a pilot and finished up getting his pilot’s licence before he had his motor vehicle licence. By gaining the confidence of some airline pilots he went on to achieve his dream.

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Sam’s Best Shot

With special guest:

• Dr James Best

How many Dads will walk away from their jobs for six months, sell their home and then travel to the wilds of Africa in the hope that it will be good for their son?

We like to think most Dads would do it. Today we get to speak to Dr James Best who did exactly that with his 14 year old son Sam. Sam said he went away as a boy and came back as a person summing up what his parents had hoped for when they embarked on this adventure.

Sam has special needs because he has been diagnosed as being on the autism spectrum. Sam is around about the middle of the spectrum not at the extreme ends of either those who cannot talk or the savants. Sam can read and write; he is good at maths and music. He comes out with quirky interpretations of what others see and is often described as a charmer. Sam’s greatest difficulty is with social communication, maintaining eye contact and focussing on a task. He is prone to outbursts, even violent outbursts when frustrated.

Behind the thinking of James was that they had tried all the conventional approaches to dealing with autism and yet they still worried whether Sam would be able to form relationships, get a job and to all the other things we regard as normal in Western society. So having done a lot of scientific research on their own and with the support of the experts in the field Sam and his wife Benison decided to take on something different.

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Albanese – Telling it Straight

With special guest: 

• Karen Middleton
  … in conversation with Bill Kable

Everybody loves Albo - even many of his opponents in the national Parliament.

We can identify the three drives he lists as having influenced his development, namely the Catholic Church, South Sydney Rugby League team and the Australian Labor Party. These drives were all inherited from his fiercely loyal and protective mother Maryanne but behind the relationship between Albo and his mother is another fascinating story that has never been revealed until the release of Karen Middleton’s book Albanese - Telling it Straight.

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The Shepherd’s Hut

With special guest:

• Tim Winton
  … in conversation with Bill Kable

For our regulars this week’s interview is a bit different. Due to technical problems we do not have a sound file of the interview with Tim Winton. However set out below is a transcript which we hope you will find interesting. In the interview we talk about Tim’s latest book The Shepherd’s Hut and also explore some of the issues raised in the book in a wider context. In particular we are interested in Tim’s thoughts about his characters, where they come from in his mind and the relationships between them.

Tim has often explored the relationships that boys form. In this book Tim’s feral young male comes to an uneasy and difficult peace with an old man living in the wilderness as a hermit. The relationship is set against the timeless and beautiful West Australian remoteness described in Tim’s usual colourful language even as his characters speak in a less literate way.

The attached sound file is an excerpt from a speech Tim presented in Melbourne earlier this year kindly made available to us by Tim’s publishers Penguin Random House.

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Our Boys: Raising strong, happy sons from boyhood to manhood

With special guests:

• Richard Aston & Ruth Kerr

On this program we get to talk to good people who are making a difference in our society. Our guests today, Richard Aston and his wife Ruth Kerr, fit this category and they speak to us from across the ditch in New Zealand.

For fifeen years Richard and Ruth through the Big Buddy program have been providing fatherless boys with a buddy, someone who can show them the way to manhood. These buddies are volunteer mentors who are carefully chosen by going through a detailed screening. The boys know they can rely on their buddies to turn up when expected and listen to what is happening in the boys’ lives. And they get to do fun things.

Having seen up close and personal what makes boys tick Richard and Ruth have distilled for us what works and what does not work when the aim is to develop our boys into adults. This is practical and down to earth advice set out in their new book Our Boys: Raising strong, happy sons from boyhood to manhood.

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Fathering Adventures

With special guest:

• Darren Lewis

He doesn’t claim to have been the beginning of all fathering adventures but in July 2008 Darren Lewis started an organisation by that name which has made many fathers and their children come alive through adventure based activities. Darren quotes Howard Thurman in recognising that the world needs people who have come alive.

We live in a world where fathers commonly spend just 8 minutes a day with each of their children, sometimes it is as little as 57 seconds on a week day. Darren provides an opportunity for Dads to spend dedicated time with their children in a fun environment.

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How much father? How have dads evolved since the 1930s?

With special guest:

• Dr Peter West

How have dads evolved since the 1930s? In the 1990s, Dr Peter West interviewed a wide variety of men who grew up in the decades between the Depression and the final decade on the 20^th Century. The result of those interviews was the book Fathers, Sons and Lovers: Men Talk About Their Lives from the 1930s to Today. From footballers to policemen, from railway workers to farmers, he provided a rare glimpse into the lived realities or everyday Australian dads.

In this program, Glen Poole of Stop Male Suicide interviews Peter about the changing nature of fatherhood since the 1930s, asks how things have changed for dads since he wrote his book nearly 20 years ago and explores what fatherhood holds for the next generation of dads.

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The Making of Men

With special guest:

• Dr Arne Rubinstein

“If we don’t initiate our boys they will burn down the village to feel the heat” This is an African proverb quoted by our guest today Dr Arne Rubinstein that could describe the situation for young men today in Australia and other societies far from Africa.

The Making of Men is a book that Dr Arne Rubinstein has written after seeing first-hand in his medical practice the disasters that can befall boys who are not initiated into life as a man in the community. Arne recognises the qualities valued in young boys when they are naturally loving, energetic, funny, creative and sensitive. What happens then, when so many kids get into trouble as teenagers?

In this program we talk about one of the most important ways in which the community or village can play a role in bringing the boy through to being a valuable man in the community.

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Schools of Fish

With special guest:

• Alan Sampson

Schools of Fish won the 2015 Finch Memoir Prize for author Alan Sampson, a Queenslander, who by telling us about his own experiences lets us find out much about the importance of a father’s relationship with his children. A big part of the story relates to Alan’s role as Principal at the well-known Cavendish Road State High School in Brisbane. There are times at school when personal courage is required as well as unshakable integrity if favourable results are to be achieved.

At the same time as we get this fascinating look into the real world of a school Principal we get a growing realisation that there were issues on the home front with Alan’s youngest child and these could not be ignored. Alan had to find out if his strict authoritarian approach, first taught to him by his own father, and applied in his school roles will also work at home with his youngest child who is definitely different.

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Our Boys: Raising strong, happy sons from boyhood to manhood

With special guests:

• Richard Aston & Ruth Kerr

On this program we get to talk to good people who are making a difference in our society. Our guests today, Richard Aston and his wife Ruth Kerr, fit this category and they speak to us from across the ditch in New Zealand.

For the last thirteen years Richard and Ruth through the Big Buddy program have been providing fatherless boys with a buddy, someone who can show them the way to manhood. These buddies are volunteer mentors who are carefully chosen by going through a detailed screening. The boys know they can rely on their buddies to turn up when expected and listen to what is happening in the boys’ lives. And they get to do fun things.

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Are Fathers Important for Adolescents?

With special guest:

• Dr William (Bill) Fabricius

Most studies in the area of children and families concentrate on the influence of mothers. Fathers are understudied in this area. For this reason we welcome the results of a soon to be published paper on the role of fathers and we have the opportunity today to speak with one of its lead authors, Associate Professor Dr William Fabricius who joins us from New York. The title of the paper is Effects of the Inter-Parental Relationship on Adolescents’ Emotional Security and Adjustment: The Important Role of Fathers.

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The Fathering Project

With special guest:

• John Bond

Our guest today is the son of a very famous father, Alan Bond who is forever linked with Australia winning the America’s Cup in 1983. John Bond was there for this hugely significant event in the USA, one which lifted the whole country. Where to after that?

John Bond returned to Australia and got his motivation when he heard an address by Professor Bruce Robinson which inspired him to support the most powerful force for reducing the chances of our kids falling victim to drugs, suicide and crime. Having an effective father or even a father figure leads to reduced incidence of crime, alcohol and drug abuse; it enhances mental health and self-esteem, leads to improved school engagement and performance, social competence and improved health behaviours generally. Professor Robinson, who has previously been a guest on Dads on the Air provided the research which is compelling.

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