At least three women have been murdered by men this week in the U.K.

[HoldingTheDoor]

There's also been an attempted murder of another woman and three children.

I am so fucking tired of reading about male violence against women and children.

Johanita Dogbey www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-65483270

Suzanne Henry www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-stoke-staffordshire-65491816

Maya Devi www.essexlive.news/news/essex-news/elderly-woman-found-dead-elm-8414418

Attempted murder of a woman and three children, currently unnamed www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cw5kpkpwylpo

I may have missed another victim . Apologies if so but I'm scared to look for fear that I'll read of another.

I am beyond done with this shit. I don't even have anything meaningful to say. I'm just way past disgusted.

they would have listened to their mothers throughout their childhood.

Actually my work with pepetrators would suggest that most of them didn't. In any event, maternal influence sharp[ly diminishes after the age of 7. After that, peers and other authority figures, including the woder culture, grow in influence.

That's the opposite of what I'm saying. I say this is a societal problem

I agree with you. And thus far, far too few men are pulling their weight.

And what IS the acceptable figure? Is the 0.003% of women who murder, neglect or abuse their kids okay because it's low enough? Try telling that to the kid.

Not my point and there's no need to veer off into hyperbole and start putting words into my mouth.

Not really on board with your biological determinist reasons (not least because contrary to popular belief, violence produces testosterone, not the other way around).

Apologies for the typos!

The biggest - and thus far insurmountable - barrier to overcome is the cultural assumption that women routinely lie about their experiences
This makes sense to me@AnnieKenney
men put a lot of work in to discrediting and dismissing women's opinions, it seems there is an implicit understanding that they need women to be seen as untrustworthy because that's their biggest weapon against them

Many violent men had terrible upbringings. There is a direct correlation. It’s the uncomfortable truth that incompetent mothers play a part in that
Nowhere near as big a part as that played by absent feckless violent selfish fathers

Sincerely, thank you very much for all that you have done and are doing.

We also have to face up to the fact that oestroeon makes women choose - and stay - with toxic, dangerous partners who are a menace and a danger to their kids, without victim blaming.

You're basing this assertion on what? Women are lovebombed and manipulated into abusive relationships.

But if I were your average man why would I think tackling male violence against women was a priority if I'm far more likely to be killed myself?

Even as a woman I think tackling male violence as a whole is the priority for our society.

To clarify, I do include violence against women and children being taken more seriously by the police and punished more stringently by the courts as part of that.

In any event, maternal influence sharp[ly diminishes after the age of 7. After that, peers and other authority figures, including the woder culture, grow in influence
This certainly chimes with my experience@AnnieKenney with men and boys there seems to be a 'hunger' to look up to and admire/ identify with other men. I feel the only way that we can have good men is if boys have good male role models, I'm not saying that women don't have an influence but it's far outweighed by that of men.

Agree with this.

@ArabeIIaScott😊Thank you - much appreciated (especially after a grim couple of days interviewing grieving family members).

Many violent men had terrible upbringings. There is a direct correlation. It’s the uncomfortable truth that incompetent mothers play a part in that

And many didn't have terrible childhoods. Some did but the jury is still out on whether it's even most. Many just like getting their own way. See here:
Abusive men describe the benefots of being violent

By generalising that women are lovebombed and manipulated, you are hinting that women do not have the capacity to take responsibility and manage their emotional responses and urges.

Yet is seems you believe a man must?

this is classic power and oppression talk: women are victims in a hostile, male dominated patriarchal system and as a result have no power to make their own decisions.

I dont sign up to this line of thought. I don’t believe that women are so weak minded that they should not have to take responsibility for their choices. Any more than I think morally corrupt men should avoid taking responsibility for theirs.

there are pathological men, there are pathological women. There is not a tyrannical patriarch that is promoting for the widespread oppression of women.

as individuals we need to know how to identify and deal with these pathological cases so that risk of physical harm is mitigated

I'm sorry. That sounds unimaginably hard.

I won't lie - it is draining. Even more so than working with victims where you can at least hold out the possibility of hope and a better future.

thanks for the link to the Chuck Derry article @AnnieKenney
once they find a way to dominate and do whatever they like they dont want to give it up do they!! I guess it's a 'power corrupts' issue, few people will willingly cede power and men tend to be better positioned than women to seize and hold onto it.
It has to be nipped in the bud imo, we need men to step up and be better parents if we are ever to deal with the problem of male dominance, but being able to do whatever the hell you like is so compelling & rewarding, will things ever change?

Of those who do change, it's usually because they have faced consequences for their behaviour (which is not the same as those who face consequences always changing). In essence, it's a cost-benefit analsyis - when they lose relationships, homes, contact with their kids, gain a criminal record etc - having your own way all the time loses some of its allure.

Impunity is a big issue and (slowly) changing that has resulted in some significant gains. It is still the case though that people want to focus on the victim's agency / responsibility / character flaws rather than the perpetrator's. The best of that ilk insist they mean both parties taking responsibility but the reality is that focusing on victim behaviour yields limited results and much of what does result from such a focus is negative.

There is not a tyrannical patriarch that is promoting for the widespread oppression of women.

I quote @Mezmer and I strongly disagree. The whole of society, for hundreds of thousands of years (since the advent of tillage farming at least), has promoted the idea that women are the property of men. Just because we have moved gradually towards a position of more power and less ownership in the past 120 years, (in parts of the West), does not mean that millennia of conditioning is going to disappear overnight. This is a marathon and we are only at the first mile.

The current backlash against women via trans issues and online hate, as well as the roll back of abortion rights in the US, demonstrates the naïveté of depending on these rights and on the belief that men are somehow all heading in the same direction on the path to an enlightened, female friendly future.

"There is not a tyrannical patriarch..."

I agree, there are many. NAMALT but some certainly are.

Abusers target and work on victims. A women in an abusive relationship is no more responsible for the abuse than the victim of burglary is responsible for the crime.

AnnieKenney, is there anything I can do to help?

@ArabellaScott: Having spent many years changing individual agencies and systems, my current focus is on changing communities (some of the most exciting work in this area is not taking place in the northern hemisphere but in much poorer countries that lack state / government services and thus are more open to community responses - think Bangladesh, Namibia, Mexico, Nicaragua, Gujarat etc. Oh and New Zealand (the outlier!)

What I mean is (for example) what do we need to change so that a woman would feel utterly confident that if she appealed to her neighbours for support, it would be forthcoming? That if she exposed his abuse, he would be shunned by local people who would also keep an eye out for him lurking near her home? What would we need to do to ensure that refuges weren’t actually needed because her neighbours made it possible for her to stay and impossible for him to stay? What do we have to change so that when the subject of domestic abuse comes up in the pub or at the school gates, there is only support and sympathy for the survivor and no judgement or victim-blaming?

This is where I think the next step change will be in developing a response - overwhelmingly survivors turn to friends and family for support - and many get it from their immediate social network but not necessarily from the wider community in which they live. 'Naming' your experience as abuse can take some women a long time (as opposed to part of the ups and downs of a relationship that isn't always a bed of roses / something that will get better when he gets a job / the baby has a regular sleep pattern / etc etc) and I have seen a HUGE shift in people identifying behaviours as abusive but I think we can do more.

Domestic and sexual violence is often framed as a ‘women’s safety issue’ but I think it is both an issue of men’s dangerousness and of women’s right to occupy space in the world, to be their full selves, without intimidation, criticism, violence or shame. Physical safety is the baseline – but what we are aiming for is freedom and liberation.

Any contribution you can make towards this vision in your social circles would be warmly welcomed! (I know - no pressure!)

Then there is the 22/23 women in Belgium whose killer/s have never been found.... beyond shocking and very depressing

Thanks for those insights, Annie.

I will think about it.

I'm often taken aback by how little the dynamics are understood.

men’s dangerousness and of women’s right to occupy space in the world, to be their full selves, without intimidation, criticism, violence or shame
AMEN TO THAT🙏

The current backlash against women via trans issues and online hate, as well as the roll back of abortion rights in the US, demonstrates the naïveté of depending on these rights and on the belief that men are somehow all heading in the same direction on the path to an enlightened, female friendly future.

Tbf most of the data I've seen suggests that more women than men are against abortion. A lot of the pro trans demographic seem to be liberal feminists too.

Polls consistently show … that women are more likely than men to support a reduction on the abortion limit. In the 2011 YouGov poll 28% of men supported a reduction, 46% of women did. In the 2012 YouGov poll 24% of men supported a reduction, 49% of women did. In the Angus Reid poll 35% of men supported a reduction in the limit, 59% of women did. In the ICM poll 45% of men supported a reduction to 20 weeks, 59% of women did.

Other polls have appeared since that article, and they show the same thing. A 2013 YouGov poll on behalf of the University of Lancaster found 26% of men supporting a reduction or ban, versus 43% of women. Interestingly, 53% of women in that survey believed that life begins at conception, against 35% of men – not exactly "every sperm is sacred", but not too far off.

The difference even holds up when you poll Catholics. A second University of Lancaster survey carried out last autumn found that 40% of Catholic men supported a reduction or ban, against 57% of Catholic women. Exactly the same difference in percentage points that they found among the general population.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/science/the-lay-scientist/2014/apr/30/why-are-women-more-opposed-to-abortion

Indeed