“Any man’s death diminishes me, for I am involved in mankind…………….”
John Donne – `For whom the Bells Tolls’.
Written jointly by the Associates of Kids In Distress Australia Inc.
Suicide is an immense tragedy for everyone concerned and there are few who have not been touched by this in some way. Each year in Australia too many men and women have reached a point in their lives where they have lost all hope and belief in a better future for themselves. They may feel their problems are so unsolvable, that they take the awful step of ending their own lives and leaving behind shocked and heartbroken friends, partners and families.
While our heartfelt condolences are with all those who suffer, and we add our voice to the call for more funding and research into the high male suicide rate, our focus here is on the misuse of suicide statistics to gain political leverage in the actions by “fathers rights” activists to gain unfettered contact with children after separation, with little or no regard to determining allegations of violence or abuse or whether that father had a meaningful relationship with his children.
The situation now is that protective parents of both genders are often powerless to keep their children from continuing harm when it occurs during Court-ordered contact with a non-resident parent. The requirement by "fathers's rights" associations for limiting contact is always stated as "proven" abuse. It is a common experience for many parents, and in the knowledge of others involved in child protection services, that it is virtually impossible for allegations of "abuse" to be proved in the Family Courts of Australia.
It is similarly extremely difficult to obtain convictions or findings of fact in other jurisdictions. At the same time, any AVO's or DVO's are discredited by the `Father’s Rights’ associations as being "handed out like lollies" and usually little or no account is taken of them in Family Court proceedings.
Father’s Rights Groups claim that "Five men a day commit suicide" implying that five fathers die each day due to isolation from their children. Media statements repeat these claims in varying guises – misquoting and under quoting research material. Yet such a statement is blatantly untrue for several reasons.
Firstly such a claim would need to be supported by the findings in every case of a Coroner’s Inquest that the father had indeed taken his own life due to being unable to have contact with his children. There is no such evidence.
Secondly, research indicates that separated men commit suicide at six times the rate of married men. This broad finding is often used to imply that all of these separated men died primarily due to the stress of the separation and further, because they were kept unfairly from their children or ruined financially due to property division and child support requirements. However, the statistics available do not indicate if in fact these men were fathers, or the circumstances of the separation and contact with any children.
Conclusions have been drawn that payment of onerous child support liabilities increases the risk of suicide. These assertions may have some merit and warrant further investigation - but are a separate matter from the problem of ongoing contact with an abusive parent. The arguments for and against a presumption of shared parenting, commencing from separation, are often bound in with financial matters which makes it hard to distinguish if it is the child's welfare or money that is the primary motivation regarding contact and residency activism and parental applications. The sharp increase in male suicide since the introduction of the Child Support Agency and the resultant hardships on some paying parents who remain in paid employment is noteworthy.
The Child Support Agency does not supply conclusive figures that can be used to isolate cases where the payer died from stress or related illness caused by the burden that child support payments place on some payers. Other research available to date, does not state whether the relationship had to be resolved through the Family Court or if there were major financial losses due to the separation.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics surveys also shows that women attempt suicide at six times the rate of men, but do not succeed as they use less decisive methods such as prescription drug overdoses. Research also shows that the majority of these women were separated also. Studies mention that women’s suicide rate dropped during the years that they could be expected to be nurturing children – while conversely married male rates increased in the expected nurturing years as did the rate for separated men. This observation leads to the query if there are other factors in this age bracket that affect men’s emotional and mental health?
The implication that associates all "separated" male suicides with alienating or vindictive behaviour of former wives and partners is misleading and offensive. This placement of blame on one sector of society is especially offensive to those women who did their best to maintain a relationship between an ex partner and their children, despite his other serious problems. It implies that all these relationships ended by female whim with no consideration taken of the role the male took in the relationship breakdown.
No consideration is made either of all the many other factors that may have contributed to the fatal decision. Gambling, drug abuse, health issues, financial or employment worries. In general though, it is known that deliberate self harm is often indicative of difficulties in dealing with problems, especially those of an interpersonal and intrapersonal nature.
Research does show without doubt, that when people have relationship breakdowns they are most at risk. That, combined with other issues,(that may or may not have contributed to the relationship failure), proves too much for some. But we do not know in what combination and what role each or any of these factors played.
Many of the researchers state categorically that there are no accurate figures to determine the parenthood of suicide victims. Nor are there any reliable statistics to indicate how many suicide victims were pushed to that extreme because of separation from children. There are no figures available that state how many men paying child support have committed suicide. There are no accurate figures as to contact with children, financial situations or other risk factors that were instrumental in the deaths of these men.
We believe that all the social problems that beset our community need to be addressed and that funding must be made available for suicide research. If that can be done, quality of life will improve for all and relationships, especially within the family unit, will flourish and the overall rate of suicide will diminish.
In the meantime, the safety of children after separation cannot be compromised and quantum leaps of conjecture in the absence of factual supportive evidence by the Father’s Rights Groups, serve no other purpose than to mislead and misrepresent the situation.
These conjectures are singularly unhelpful in the search for solutions to ensure that the health, welfare, safety and future happiness of all children is protected and promoted while also enabling parents to carry out their duties and responsibilities properly towards their children.