Another mother abducting her 4 children

[SkippyYourFriendEverTrue]

There's another thread about the Australian woman abducting her children from Italy.

This one involves four children being abducted in similar circumstances but this time between Spain and Wales:
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-19974604
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2218594/Jennifer-Jones-High-Court-judge-orders-nationwide-hunt-missing-children-centre-custody-battle.html

The second time she has done this apparently.

[EldritchCleavage]

Newspaper reports of court cases are very frequently poor.

I'm quite prepared to believe the mother was desperate and the situation for the children is awful. The mother still did an utterly stupid thing though. She's destroyed her own credibility in the eyes of the courts and handed the father the upper hand. If he really is abusive, she's completely undermined her children's best hope of rescue.

[JugglingWithPossibilities]

Also thinking it isn't necessarily sexist to acknowledge that mother's generally have a very special and primary bond with their own children. I think father's often have a very important and special relationship with their children too, but I suppose I wonder should they have equal rights with the mother ?
If the relationship between the parents breaks down and custody is considered by a court then usually children will continue to be looked after by their primary carer who has often been their mother. Must be hard for mother's if this is not the case and/or custody or joint custody is not given to them.

[Snorbs]

I don't have a problem with courts tending to assume that whoever was the primary carer before the breakdown of a relationship should probably continue being the primary carer afterwards. Which, of course, is what courts do indeed tend to do unless there are good reasons why this should not be the case.

But I'd campaign very strongly against any attempt to make mothers automatically the primary carer simply by virtue of their sex. That is without question sex discrimination.

Must be hard for mother's if this is not the case and/or custody or joint custody is not given to them.

How do you think fathers feel? Or are their feelings not as important?

[JugglingWithPossibilities]

My response to your question Snorbs is simply that I'm a mother and the primary carer to our children, I'm probably just seeing things from my own and my DC's perspective, and empathising with other mothers.

As someone said recently on another thread we all tend to use our own experience to help form our view-points (hence term "view-point" ?)

• Though we can try to empathise with those who have had different life experiences too.
  

I can see that family break-up is difficult for everyone including fathers - and of course agree with others on the thread that the more amicably things can be settled the better for everyone including the children - but then all families are different too, and that's not always possible in all situations.

[Snorbs]

Yet I'm a father and the (sole) carer for my children yet I can feel empathy for both mothers and fathers and am able to realise that just because a person has a particular set of X and Y chromosomes it doesn't automatically make them the best parent.

Isn't that odd?

[Ohhmydaze]

why is it 'odd' snorbs?

[JugglingWithPossibilities]

No, I did say that "we can try to empathise with those who have had different life experiences too" Snorbs

• It's just it doesn't come quite as naturally to us as empathising with others who have similar lived experiences - which is possibly why you are, quite naturally, sticking up for Fathers here !

[Snorbs]

I don't see that I'm particularly sticking up for fathers, I'm just not automatically assuming that a mother is axiomatically the best parent unless proven otherwise.

Or, to put it another way, depending on the circumstances I'm willing to believe that either parent could potentially be the better choice regardless of their sex.

[JugglingWithPossibilities]

Well yes Snorbs depending on the circumstances I'd agree with you ... but we probably do see things from a slightly different perspective ... As they say - "But that's OK too" !

[BoneyBackJefferson]

I curious as to how a "desparate" mother would leave her eldest child with a nasty father.

[edam]

Maybe the eldest child is old enough to make their own mind up. Or maybe the eldest child does not experience the same kind of treatment that the other children do. Who knows.