Parental alienation is the key theme of a research paper recently published. University College London researcher Dr. Sonja Ayeb-Karlsson identifies two related issues as arising from her study: “These cases show the harm of the ‘alienation’ belief system, which has become a legal weapon that serves to punish and control those who speak up about their lived abuse experiences. They also show the potential harm of the family court-appointed ‘experts,’ unregulated as well as regulated, who claim to be trained and able to identify so-called alienation.”
In our last blog, we looked at the latter concern around regulation of family court experts, and today we’ll examine the arguments raised around the concept of “parental alienation”.
The concept of parental alienation has a chequered history, being born out of “Parental Alienation Syndrome”, a now completely discredited junk science. But “parental alienation” is essentially just an umbrella term for a collection of child-aligning behaviours designed to undermine a co-parent’s relationship with the child. However, the concept has become a very controversial one in the past few years.
In Australia, some academics have argued that the term has now become hopelessly gendered, due to abusive fathers having hijacked the term to use against the mothers who have alleged abuse. It’s said that mothers are falsely made out to be an alienating parent, which colours how the court then treats them, and has even led to children being sent to live with violent dads.
With claims the term has been weaponised, is it no longer useful in the family law system — and even dangerous in how it apparently fails victims?
Dr Ayeb-Karlsson wants the term dropped completely, and she’s not alone in that opinion. This report will no doubt fortify arguments in Australia by academics like Dr Zoe Rathus, who’ve long argued the term “parental alienation” has been weaponised and must be rejected as a concept bandied about in family court disputes. There are, however, academics on the other side of the debate, such as Dr Mandy Matthewson from the Divison of Psychology at the University of Tasmania, which prides itself on having the first Australian laboratory dedicated to research on parental alienation.
And family law practitioners regularly see parents of both genders engaging in behaviours designed to harm the other parent’s relationship with a child. If we don’t call it parental alienation, what then should we call it?
Parental alienation: who’s telling the truth?
It seems, really, the crux of the problem seems to be that courts need to be able to better identify when parental alienation is genuinely occurring and when it is not. For instance, in cases where a mother withholds a child because of safety fears, such behaviour should be able to be readily identified as being protective and not alienating. It’s the ability of the courts to be sensitive to the reality of a situation, including considering any history of family violence, when considering if claims of parental alienation are false allegations.
Note the comment by Dr Ayeb-Karlsson:
“The highly contested concept of ‘parental alienation’ was criticised last year by the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women and Girls, who called upon governments to ban the use of the label in custody and family law proceedings, citing ‘the tendency of family courts to dismiss the history of domestic violence and abuse in custody cases, especially where mothers and/or children have brought forward credible allegations of domestic abuse, including coercive control, physical or sexual abuse.’”
Such a tendency of the courts to be dismissive of abuse claims and history would seem to be where the real problem lies, rather than in use of the term parental alienation. Similarly, when Dr Ayeb-Karlsson writes, “In the analysed case law, the courts went to brutal lengths to reconcile children with their fathers despite the children’s feelings and fears related to living with them,” the question surely arises, why on earth does that happen, and how can it be remedied?
It seems more like a failure of the courts to accurately assess all the evidence and the credibility of parties and arrive at the right conclusions. And, perhaps seems to call for more appropriate judicial training in these areas.
Clearly, some sort of consensus needs to be reached on the term “parental alienation” so that health and law professionals are on the same page as to its appropriate use. But is banishing the term altogether the answer?
And stay tuned, because we have further blogs coming up wherein we discuss this important issue with law professors and other experts.
To speak with Canberra family lawyer Cristina Huesch or one of our other experienced solicitors here at Alliance Family Law, please call (02) 6223 2400.
Please note our blogs are not family law advice. For information on how to obtain the correct family law advice, please call Alliance Family Law.
