Domestic Violence - Far from gender neutral

[scallopsrgreat]

Domestic abuse could not be further from gender neutral. Wake up Britain

Yep so those MRAs are gaslighting us. Just in case you had any doubt.

I've just skim read it and it doesn't seem to link to the research which I'd be interested to read.

"This is due to a 'cap' on the number of crimes recorded, which stops counting after five repeat incidents against one victim. When this cap is removed, she said, violence against women by intimate partners rises by 70 per cent and violence against women by acquaintances by 100 per cent. It particularly affects those women who know, or even live with, the perpetrator. " Pretty shocking.

"...the Crime Survey of England and Wales (CSEW) doesn't account for a significant proportion of attacks on women (and that nearly half of all violent crime is committed against women)."

It also links to another article about the same thing: Million violent crimes a year 'cut out' of official figures

[thedancingbear]

To be fair, this is hardly a neutral study. And whilst I don't doubt that domestic violence against women is more frequent and more severe than against men, it boils my piss when people try to minimise the latter.

I completely appreciate that the feminist position is that violence against men is not its problem. But I don't see why it then needs to explain away and belittle the experiences of abused men. I don't see it as an either/or; by all means, petition for better funding for women's aid and I will support that endeavour. But for cripes' sake, it doesn't need to be at the expense of others in comparable situations - people already see female-on-male violence as a joke subject.

I should declare an interest here - my brother was in long-term relationship in which he was physically abused by his female partner (including having a plugged-in iron chucked at him - the cable stopped it from reaching him). So this is a subject that gets my goat, as you can probably tell.

[FloraFox]

Thanks scallops that's good information. MRAs are always trying to claim there is some sort of equivalence between the rates of male violence and female violence when it's completely untrue.

[thedancingbear]

FloraFox I hope you are not suggesting that I am an MRA. I think it's clear enough from my other posts on this site that I don't fall into that category. I would hate for you to be seen to be closing down debate by using that label.

I'd also note that nowhere have I suggested there is an equivalence with regard to incidence, quite the opposite - domestic violence against women is more frequent and more severe than against men

[PuffinsAreFictitious]

Of course the MRAs are gaslighting us, Scallops. They want the world to believe that DV is sex neutral, when every piece of reputable research shows that it isn't. The cap on how many incidents that are counted for the CSEW at 5 is utterly ridiculous. It skews figures. It makes a mockery of everything we know about DV.

[TheXxed]

dancing Bear you don't understand the feminist position.

[YonicScrewdriver]

Bear, I don't think Flora was referring to you.

[Mide7]

Does it matter who's doing the abusing? Dv is wrong whatever the persons sex is. Yes one is more frequent and severe than the other but doesn't mean it should have 100% of the focus.

[QueenStromba]

It matters who's doing the abusing when the majority of the abuse is by the dominant sex class against the oppressed sex class and that is part of a systemic pattern of violence.

[Mide7]

So does that make abuse by the oppressed sex class towards the dominant sex class not as bad?

And I understand it's the majority of abuse but doesn't mean it doesn't happen

[QueenStromba]

It makes it different as it's not part of a whole system of violence and oppression.

[YonicScrewdriver]

The article is by the CEO of Women's Aid and mentions Respect, aimed at male victims.

If an article had been written by the CEO of Respect, I would expect a similar lev of mention of Women's Aid, TBH.

Surely it is a good thing if the ONS is properly collecting data on repeat attacks?

[YonicScrewdriver]

... After all, that's what the article is about. If this data provides additional information to target services, that must be better than the current situation, right?

[scallopsrgreat]

"But I don't see why it then needs to explain away and belittle the experiences of abused men." Who is minimising?

"but doesn't mean it doesn't happen" Who says it doesn't happen?

Why do you think its not a "neutral" study - I mean in comparison to all the other "neutral" studies thedancingbear? Is any study neutral? Where's Buffy when you need her. Surely studies/research can look at specific things. That is the whole point of them isn't it?

[scallopsrgreat]

So I cite a research study in FWR showing the underrepresentation of violence in statistics in general (if you read the second article I linked it also found that violence towards men was up 50% if you counted all incidents) and two of our recently active male posters are on there criticising it. Way to go guys. Thanks for the solidarity.

[Mide7]

Scallops, I'm not criticising the articles at all. I was commenting on the post up thread about people talking about dv being sex neutral.

I also don't know what gaslighting is.

[SenecaFalls]

It matters who's doing the abusing when the majority of the abuse is by the dominant sex class against the oppressed sex class and that is part of a systemic pattern of violence.

Well said.

[QueenStromba]

Buffy deregged because she got fed up of the men who hang around on here.

[soapboxqueen]

You can't begin to solve a problem if the information you have isn't accurate.

How do you assign resources or know what those resources should be if you don't have the information? At best it's incredibly inefficient at worst it perpetuates the status quo.

[YonicScrewdriver]

Bear has been around a while, scallops. Long enough to know that several other male victims of sexual assaults by women have found support on FWR, not minimisation.

[SweetAndFullOfGrace]

Why is it, when someone says "there is a major issue with violence committed by men against women", some people hear "no one gives a fuck about violence committed by women against men". No one said that, and that is not the point. Not every conversation needs to involve men (sometimes I think we need a bechdel klaxon for this board for every time someone says but what about the menz).

If the stats showed a balance where violent crime was evenly split between the genders, fine. No class-based analysis needed. When it's massively skewed towards male violence being the norm then maybe, just maybe, that's something worth pointing out and discussing? It's not a coincidence.

[SenecaFalls]

So sorry to hear about Buffy. I hope she comes back.

[thedancingbear]

Look, scallops, I support feminism. Please don't doubt me on that front. I wouldn't come here to read, learn, and try to contribute where I think it's appropriate if that wasn't the case - I've got better things to do than troll this place. And I recognise that my first post on this thread was more antsy than it should have been, and I apologise for that.

But I also care about domestic violence against men, for the reasons I've given upthread.

I've had time to mull this over a bit more now, and it just seems to me that the conclusion of the article you've linked to doesn't follow from the premises. It just seems to me that the key finding of the research is that domestic violence, and particularly violence against women. is more prevalent than we previously thought. Against that background, isn't the right approach to say that:

(i) domestic violence is a bigger problem than we thought
(ii) we need to spend more money on improving services
(iii) that the additional spend should all go on services for women?

It just doesn't follow for me that the extra money should come at the expense of men's services in a field that's already not taken seriously - it's not as if the problem of violence against men has shrunk in absolute terms. By all means take it from some other service that men benefit from equally. But please don't take it from abused men. it's not a competition.

[thedancingbear]

Bear has been around a while, scallops. Long enough to know that several other male victims of sexual assaults by women have found support on FWR, not minimisation.

Not usually on here, yonic, and I completely acknowledge that. But generally, in society, absolutely. And even on here I have seen posts along the lines of 'most of the female-on-male' violence is probably self-defence'. Maybe I'm unduly touchy on the subject, but that always feels like minimisation to me. If the genders were reverse those posters would rightly be called out on it.

[scallopsrgreat]

So are you saying that men need 40% of the resources available (as cited in the article that some councils are provisioning)? Because that sounds like the resourcing of combatting domestic violence is coming at the expense of women, not men. It isn't a competition. It is a reality. It is about where the limited resources should be directed.