Answer to criticism from researcher

Dear xxxxxx

Thanks for coming back on this.

Mothers as well as fathers phone our helpline and with this experience I find the ethos of this Briefing 42 is biased. If they could not do an opposite survey then it should never have been made public. That part alone is biased. What is to be gained by publishing this briefing? We know it happens but who really is to blame for it?. The damage this has done sets family unity back years?

Interviewing children that have just gone through a fresh crisis is bound to bring out the worst especially when children are brainwashed into the mothers version encouraged by the other women to make it ten times worse for the father, who is then alienated. Most women in these refuges are not interested in the welfare of children at that point in time, only for revenge. Any research at this time has got to show the worst, not only for the father but innocent grandparents are alienated from the children as well. The children are the ones who really lose out in the end and that is our main concern.

Jimmy


Mother who smacked her son with hairbrush in a 'moment of madness' is forced to give him up to social services
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1168709/Mother-smacked-son-hairbrush-moment-madness-forced-social-services.html
By Luke SalkeldLast updated at 5:53 PM on 09th April 2009


Researcher Critic

Alas as a researcher, and someone who monitors research I must disagree with your view that the work on "After Domestic Violence: Children's perspective on contact with fathers" is biased research. The report states clearly and openly what the subject is, and how the sample was obtained, i.e. children whose mothers were at refuges, and it seems to be an honest portrayal of the views expressed by children in that sample. It may not have tackled the aspect of the problem which you would like to see covered, but that was not their subject. No-where does it says that violence from women towards their partners does not exist and pose problems for children: it is simply that that is not the subject being studied. You could suggest to the Centre for Research that this would be a useful subject to follow up, though I suspect finding a sample would be more difficult, simply because there is not a national system of refuges for abused male partners to provide easily identified subjects. If this were followed up, they might well find that children had similar feelings about contact with absent violent mothers as they had with violent fathers.

I am however grateful to you for drawing my attention to this report, which I think supplies useful information about respecting the rights of children as to who they want to see, or avoid, and why.

I see that other research published by the Centre has drawn attention to the importance of grandparents to children and as support for parents - and we can all say Amen to that!.

With best wishes for your continued success.