How do we address men’s violence against women as an epidemic?

I expect most violent men were once nasty little boys. It's obvious to anyone in a school who the bad boys are but there's usually very little serious early intervention aimed at turning them around long term.

The statistics bear out the opposite.

Men are at more risk from men.

But women die at mens hands at a far greater scale.

A mans punch at 75 years old is at force stronger than a women's at 25.

If it's framed as violence against everyone it misses the key issue that this is a gendered crime.

That men target women.

That women at society level are ignored, demeaned and marginalised. We are uniquely vulnerable due to physical differences like pregnancy and others which means that this isn't mental against everyone. It's against us.

The young woman in NI was the first item on woman's hour rn.

It's case in point. And utterly chilling.

Category of missed opportunities at scale to help her and get justice for her.

Her perpetrator - previous convicted for DV- history of coercive control, financial abuse and SA. Known by the police as a "philanderer". Since his death at his own hands, there's been dozens more victims of his found.

She's seen multiple times in A&E. At the time of the fatal, brutal assault (for the "crime" of having a boyfriend who actually loved her). The perpetrator was allowed into the ITU bed where she lay dying. No photos were taken. No crime scenes were examined. No swabs.

It's things that happen over and over again. The patriarchy, toxic male entitlement, and being repeatedly let down by services trained in DV.

It's the same errors. Over and over.

I agree that means violence is absolutely the issue.

But erasing the concept of MVAWG risks erasing important factors which are different between male and female victim crimes.

Physical strength disparities (it is women's lives primarily that change in response to threats of violence).

Structural differences - MVAWG is the result of a patriarchal culture which has historically objectified , opressed and enslaved women and assumed them to be the property of men. Women do not trust the police. It is reasonable to assume most male victims of violent crime report the crimes. Whereas DV and sexual crimes, where the majority of victims are women, are extremely underreported by the victims. DV might eventually get reported, but every incidence experienced by the victim will not always get recorded separately.

MWAWG has been found to follow patterns. Eg the link between DV and terrorism. Or the fact sexual offences often escalate (indecent exposure, rape, murder).

Gang crime accounts for a lot of male victims and is a hugely important issue, also requiring deep societal shifts, which risks being ignored.

You make a good point here. The government has rightly given £25m to support security at Jewish synagogues and schools in response to the antisemitism. And while there are some good initiatives for women's safety, it doesn't feel the same.

The dial hasn't shifted in decades. It's still two women a week killed by their current or former partner.

Agree with much of what has been said, but surely it’s a cultural problem. The violent men are usually the ones that have been brought up in a violent household, have had violence normalised to them as a solution to issues and are likely (although not always) to be dissatisfied with how their life has turned out. They then punch down at the women who have ended up with them, especially if those women ever decide to leave or push back.

The “nice” not my Nigel men often haven’t been subjected to this normalisation of violence and often wouldn’t know what to do with it if they came across it. which makes it u likely that they are going to solve the problem.

Somehow, we need to change the culture and stop the normalisation of violence that exists for some men.

Banning violent porn and taking it seriously at school could help. Plus intervention when difficult attitudes are recognised, by the time it gets to custodial sentences it will be too late; and as has been said, no man comes out of prison less violent than they went in.

The problem with the solutions is that its really expensive and hard work to change attitudes and it’s a generational task that probably wouldn’t bear fruit for 20 years. and you’d also come up against daily mail types suggesting that the wokes are trying to feminise the manhood of England.

just depressing really.

Start by listening to Maggie Oliver and the victims and having robust prosecutions of the northern rape gangs that were covered up for years -also prosecute those who were covering up and facilitating.

This list is a good start. I would add severe restrictions on violent porn and being much, much stricter about boys’ access to porn generally.
Also, schools should actively address the issue with all pupils, not just boys.
Police need to act faster and be tougher on all crimes that have a male violence element.
Prison of course for those convicted of actual offences but that’s treating the symptom and not the cause.
Ultimately we need a complete societal shift. That is not going to happen quickly but nor will it happen organically. Active steps need to be taken if we want to see change. This is why I’m in favour of a minister for men. Men need to be central to this change.

(edited to correct typo)

It's common, I don't know that calling it an epidemic is actually all that helpful. It doesn't suggest a way forward or give any special insight.

Men will always be more violence prone than women. So how do we manage that?

I suspect the most low hanging fruit would actually be to address drinking culture, and to some extent drug culture. Impaired control of self is the catalyst of a large proportion of all types of violence.

I think we have to stop framing it as men’s violence against women but instead men’s violence against everyone (other men are statistically speaking the biggest victims of men’s violence). I personally don’t want to see male violence against anyone so only focusing on women feels incomplete to me. Just my opinion of course

Well then, why haven't you contributed anything 'geared towards problem solving' then?

Your first comment was that you know a couple of apparently abusive women. I'm not sure how that's supposed to be a valuable contribution to the topic at hand?

What on this thread, pray tell (particularly prior to your off-topic, unhelpful comment) would make a person not support feminism?

I think perhaps you should consider why a man blowing up his ex with an explosive device, as an example of the epidemic of male violence against women, made you want to immediately try to turn the conversation towards two (apparently) abusive women you know.

Shame on you.

@SpiritAdder What do you suggest instead?

@PoeticEnding
Your post reminded me that our prison system is the #1 biggest violence factory in our society. Reacting to violence with violence (inherent in criminalization) only generates more and ever increasingly extreme violence.

We need to:

1. Believe women and girls... no evidence needed just act on their words.
2. Restrict the freedom of men who commit minor acts of violence/bullying/harassment. Tags, curfews etc.
3. Longer sentences and chemical interventions for men who offend seriously.
4. Masculine strength should not be seen as a right but a responsibility. A legal framework to protect women and girls from men and boys.
5. Referrals from schools who see boys behaving poorly to act early (criminalize laddish behavior / banter / sexual harassment of girls at school) to make boys realize this is serious and important.

GinJarRogers That's unusually strong from her, fair play to her for speaking up. Thank you.

Totally!! They know the causal links and there is no reason why they can’t start preventing through monitoring and dare I say put everyone coming in from a war zone whether a refugee or one of our soldiers through deradicalization, psych assessments, anger management for at least 20yrs.

Violence being an infection, for example, explains why even child refugees from war torn countries that grow up to be safe, secure adults in a peaceful country still go on to have a higher risk of violent offending than a child born and spending their whole life in a peaceful country.

It explains why veterans are at higher risk of being domestic abusers.

They have studied how even just witnessing violence rewires the brain, it physiologically changes a person and makes them more likely to become violent themselves.

Victims of violence need the same kind of psych assessments and monitoring, especially if they are male. Mild forms of violence between children- bullying- need to be taken much more seriously.

Jameela Jamil recently wrote something on Instagram which compared men’s silence on this issue to the silent complicity of Germans during the Holocaust. I hope it’s ok to post a screenshot here. It’s made me think a lot about how harmful looking the other way is and question why decent men don’t feel like this issue has anything to do with them.

We need more men who speak out like David Challen
More initiatives like White Ribbon

''The women can never be replaced.''

It is so bleak.

What to do? Well. Men should solve their own problems - MVAWAG is only one, ofc - but as they won't because patriarchy, we wims will have to redouble our efforts around MVAWAG: calling-out, writing letters, getting MPs to LISTEN and importantly, ACT more, keep holding the police forces' feet to the fire.
A start, for sure.

Yes this.

The victim in NI's murderer took his own life two days later I think.

Obviously in this man's case he died at the scene and must've known that would be so. And a child has been injured as well as two others.

The women can never be replaced.

Look, I could explain but I'm going to let all of you co-mingle in your circular discussion which is clearly not geared towards problem solving.

Perhaps consider why so many people don't support "feminism" by reflecting on the responses of this thread.

All the best.

Probably with a bit of I told you so in their referral after all that police force has been repeatedly cut.

2023-2024 https://www.southgloslibdems.org.uk/news/news-article/avon-somerset-pcsos-bear-brunt-of-cuts-with-19-reduction-last-year.

2025 https://www.somersetlive.co.uk/news/somerset-news/police-cuts-leave-community-exposed-9908643

2026 https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cjrzwz0z184o.

Fewer police = more lives lost.

It's hard to know what on earth we can do about it. It's been a part of human society to some degree since society began, and it's difficult to figure out how to eliminate something that's so entrenched in humanity itself.

I think a good place to start would be banning and denormalising porn, and anything else that objectifies and dehumanises women and girls.

When I heard about this on the news I knew it would be a man murdering a woman that he probably knew. It just did not occur to me that it was a woman murdering a man. It is truly sickening that men are killing women all the time and however long he is jailed for or if he kills himself, the woman can’t ever come back.