So sad to hear another father has killed his wife and child

[spongefingeranyone]

Have heard on the news today that a recently sacked police officer has killed his wife and youngest child, with the eldest two escaping with dreadful injuries. It just makes me so sad for his family and very very angry that another father has seen fit to do this terrible thing.

My condolences to the family.

Very sad yes but we do not know all the circumstances - so best leave it there.

why 'best to leave it there'?

There is a pattern of men (yes, almost always men) who lose their jobs/income/run up debts etc who then mass murder their families. these are not isolated incidents but part of a worrying, wider trend. we need to sit up and take notice and do something to stop these tradgedies re-occurring.

The circumstances are that he killed his wife and child, attempted to kill the other children and then killed himself.

Or do you think it was an accident?

Although I disagree with the statement that it is nearly always men - I can think of at least three women in the past year or so who have killed their children.

Where have you gleaned the details of what exactly happened? I live in melton, nothing but nothing ever occurs here. There was a burglary in my street last year, they're still talking about it. This is truly shocking.
I can only read basic facts that his 15 yr old went for help but i certainly havent seen any details of what happened in that house.

it's all over the news.

Just type "policeman kills wife" into google and it'll come up with about 300 or so results.

but

\link{http://www.channel4.com/news/ex-policeman-kills-wife-and-daughter-after-losing-job\here}
is just one example...

aubergine Does the gender of the perpetrator really change anything though?

It is nearly always men - there are women who do it but they are much less common.

I say ' best to leave it there' because every time something like this happens ( and I agree it happens far too often) then MN are like vultures on the topic . to be blunt bodies aren't even cold !

We don't know what the reasons are behind this awful tragedy but obviously some MN know .

Yes, but does it matter? Can you use that knowledge for prevention? I doubt it.

StewieGriffinsMom - then explain to me, how the knowledge about gender bias in family annilhilators can be used to prevent it?

If such a deed happened out of the blue without any warning signs, then knowing that more men than women do such things, doesn't change anything.

If there were warning signs which could have been acted upon, surely they would be present without taking gender into account.

So how do you propose can the knowledge that more men than women do such things be used for prevention?

Also, if you concentrated only on men in prevention strategies, women at risk of committing such deeds would be neglected.

Awful, on top of the storry which made it to court yesterday of the Man who was vbeing evicted from his flat and had a history of domestic violence - killed his children then called the mother to tell them. Very sad.

Why does this seem to be happening so much?

Aslo - there's a thread somewhere I think where each one of these women (and children) is remembered. Can anyone link to it?

I always wonder what their history of dv was, makes me so sad/angry.

So are you claiming that narcissism is something which is found on only on the Y-chromosome?

Just a few threads below this one is a thread about a woman who killed herself and her two daughters due to financial hardship.

Is it narcissism only in the men's case, whilst when a woman does it it's empathy?

It's important to look at the psychology, not the gender.

It's very, very rare widowwadman -
"In almost all of these cases, the killer is a white, non-Hispanic man [1].

Cases in which women kill their male partners, their children and themselves are extremely rare and thus gain even more widespread media coverage. "

From here

Well, I don't dispute that men are doing it more often than women. I asked what difference that knowledge makes from a prevention point of view.

Thank you wannabe for the link. I hadnt found anything of that detail. Truly horrible.

There is always an attempt to soften it when a woman takes her children's lives.....PND, about to have shared residency, or to prevent a father having contact. Or a disabled child. Or caring issues.

Doesn't matter though, one consistent through both genders is that it's all undoubtably sad.

I thought one of the compelling things about the book We need to talk about Kevin was the helplessness that America feels in trying to prevent school shootings, despite being able to categorise them terribly efficiently once they had happened.

Just seen it on the news. Horrific.

YuleingFanjo I can remember reading ages ago about the unseen side of a recession, there are more burglaries in a time of recession apparently and family crimes such as this are more common too. It said that during the early 80s and early 90s recessions this sort of father loses job/business goes down the toilet then kills family in a murder-suicide crime became more common then it reduced when the economy got better. Can't remember where I read it though. Its so sad.

It's not only "sad", it's disgusting and unacceptable, and I agree that as a supposedly modern, egalitarian society we should be sitting up and taking notice and doing something. It is mainly men who wipe out their families (yes, you hear of women murdering their children, but how many of them take their children's father with them? And it's much rarer that a woman then kills herself, she usually waits for the authorities to come and cart her off) and whilst I am no card carrying feminist necessarily I believe men do it because they quite simply can.

I just don't get it. Kill yourself by all means, but leave your family the fuck out of it.

And whatever the "circumstances" it's never ever going to justify it.