[NoahJenda]

You're essentially arguing in favour of something called the "tender years doctrine", which says, for children 13 years and younger, custody should be placed with the mother. But the Tender Years Doctrine has been discredited and out of favour for more than 20 years. Some argue for the gender-neutral "primary parent" concept, but given your references to women's rights, clearly your understanding of "primary parent" is pretty much limited to mom.

I have a big problem with the term "primary parent", anyway. That's a term invented solely for the purpose of making a point. Is there a secondary parent, then? We don't use such silly terms for in-tact families, why should we use them for divorced families? In my experience, there's no such things as primary and secondary parents -- just parents that have different roles, styles, personalities, and functions in the family. And I can't see any reason why children shouldn't benefit from both.

Further, I have done tons of research about how much time children should be spending with each parent post divorce. The overwhelming and almost unanimous consensus can be summarized in one word: lots. There is very little dispute now that children typically have the best shot at doing well when both parents are involved and spending as much time as possible with their kids.

There are, of course, exceptions. That's why I would support an assumption of shared parenting, but not a mandate. Naturally shared parenting is a bad idea in some situations.

Parenting time: Decisions should be made based on an attempt to make as little changes to the child as possible.

I strongly disagree. Children experience change far more often, and far more easily, than adults do. Change for children is almost constant, and they show a remarkable resiliency and adaptability. They're not made of porcelain.

There has been little evidence to determine the long term effects on children in shared parenting.

That's not true. But more importantly, there's been an avalanche of evidence outlining the effects on children when fathers are underinvolved. Did you know that 2-3 years after divorce, 25% of children do not see their fathers? And 2/3 of children from divorced families missed not having their fathers more involved; 47% wanted more time with their fathers, and 1/3 questioned whether their fathers loved them.

The main priority for any family should be the children.

Agreed!

...the UN last October (2008) recently reprimanded Canada for its unequal treatment of women in the family court and for not living up to its promise of equality for women....that the pendulum has swung too far the other way, which has created unequal treatment in law, has created a double standard, and taken away women's rights in the process. An assumption of shared parenting would go against the UN's recomendations for fair and equal treatment.

Hey, I thought this was supposed to be about the children!