In the name of the Fathers-4-Justice
Why we posted this: Fathers-4-Justice is a high profile campaign. It encapsulates much that is wrong with modern-day protesters.
The original story:
Fathers4Justice website and campaigns.
Extracts from the website:
The current system owes more to a defunct East European dictatorship or North Korea than it does to a progressive Western democracy.
Naturally politicians, judges and the family law industry are targets for protests that are one part Monty Python, one part Pantomime and one part high-wire Circus act.
On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to comply with the Jim Crow law that required her to give up her seat to a white man. Using this same principle, supporters of Fathers 4 Justice will at a future date enter closed family courts across the UK to quietly and peacefully bear witness and testimony to proceedings and in doing so challenge the authority of the courts.
The judges that sit in Britain’s secret family courts are unaccountable and act with impunity and unfettered discretion. Fathers 4 Justice want the majority of Family Court Judges removed and replaced with Family Magistrates.
The best parent is both parents. The starting point after separation should be to maintain where possible what the status quo was before separation. Before couples seek legal recourse, the government must recognise that ALL couples should be bound to enter into mandatory mediation, with appropriately trained mediators.
livingissues comment:
F4J highlights a serious issue which is not so much fathers’ rights as family breakdown. It is an unhealthy society that sees so many fathers denied access to their children.
The question is how do their tactics help fight their cause: staging a mock chemical attack in the House of Commons, a stunt that may have inspired others, at least as a defence case; paying dawn visits to the homes of judges; publishing the names and addresses of judges on the F4J website; disrupting courts of justice? Their hyperbole comparing Britain to North Korea is just nonsense. Given the emotional state of its sympathisers there is a real danger that some of them will take this seriously and act accordingly. In fact, F4J halted its activities following a supposed plot to kidnap Tony Blair’s son Leo in early 2006, but when they re-launched later 2006 it was business as usual. Though legal reform might be a good move, a Bill of Rights for the Family would not take the heat out of family breakdown. Open courts could inflame emotions still further as reputations will be affected directly by accusations. However it is a ”serious option to consider. But for F4J it is personal, all about me, just like it might have been with their ex-wives or vice versa.
