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Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

Original poster

Love You To Death: A Year Of Domestic Violence Tonight 9pm BBC2

153 replies

Hillfarmer · 16/12/2015 19:28

Vanessa Engle documentary focussing on the lives of the 86 women killed by their male partner or ex-partner in 2013.

When oh when is this going to change?

We need to protect women, but when and how is male behaviour going to change? Who is working on that? Where is change happening on that?

OP posts:
wannaBe · 17/12/2015 12:02

I didn't watch this, about to go and find it on iPlayer.

I think it's incredibly sad still how little coverage DV gets over all. Even on MN. This documentary talks about 86 women killed at the hands of their partners and yet there is only a small thread about it here? Sad and perhaps it could be argued that there's nothing to say really, but in truth we most likely all encounter people who are victims of domestic violence on a daily basis, and to an extent it' still brushed under the carpet because people don't really want to know.

I think that the kids being able to talk about it is a good thing. there's a fine line between protecting children and refusing to allow them to talk about something which has impacted them so deeply. And perhaps the ability to talk about it as children will mean that they will grow up able to avoid falling into the same types of relationships as adults. So many women who are abused come from homes where their own fathers were abused and their mothers were victims. But the inability to talk about it means that they can never grow up knowing what is wrong and thus they see it as their normal. We need to break that cycle.

Flowers to everyone on here who has suffered DV.

Hobbitwife001 · 17/12/2015 12:19

A very powerful documentary, very hard to watch, but everyone should, maybe by bringing it to attention more could be done to highlight it and raise awareness.

WitchWay · 17/12/2015 12:40

I'm going to look it up on iplayer later

myfirstandonlylove · 17/12/2015 13:59

I know someone who lived with a situation like this for years. I watched the first 30 mins on iplayer and will watch the rest later. It is heartrending to watch and I am very very sorry for all those who have been affected by this. It never ceases to amaze me how much contempt there is towards women. There needs to be some kind of targeted prevention strategy that educates boys and men about this. Like so many other things in life it is an issue a problem with men and the onus should be on men to stop it happening not women to deal with the tragic fallout.

wannaBe · 17/12/2015 14:13

Have just watched it on iPlayer now. I went from Shock to Angry to Hmm to Confused over the daddy's girl, and I wonder whether there is more to that relationship and whether she has actually been abused by him all her life hence the loyalty to him. If you listen to that phone call without seeing any of the visuals her reactions don't sound childlike at all to me, more those of a partner IYSWIM. I can't. See the screen, so when the phone call started I initially thought that it was someone on the phone to a BF. It took a couple of seconds for the penny to drop but even then it wasn't comfortable at all.

Offred · 17/12/2015 14:47

I think, although the courts don't really recognise it IMO, if there is an abuser in the house all the other people are abused. The daddy's girl has therefore been abused for sure. It may not be sexual abuse but it certainly was a case of her being the golden child. The psychology of that being 'if I keep on his good side he won't hurt me, I'm different to the others' which is awful in itself.

As for it being a problem with men, well I think that's slightly unfair. Men are certainly more frequently perpetrators of abusive behaviour towards women. I think that is a problem for the whole of society though. It's abou what adults accept, how the culture says they should behave and how we raise our children - what we raise them to believe and expect. It is not something any one group of people can solve, it needs to be a whole society involved in it and working together. Not least because there is a minority of male victims and female perpetrators. It is dangerous thinking to conflate majority with it being a problem with men as a whole group IMO.

Offred · 17/12/2015 14:56

For me it's about abuse being wrong.

About studying adequately and learning from the fact that men are more frequently perpetrators of violence against women and other men. Looking at reasons for this, features of different crimes which may amount to a recognisable pattern, looking into the history that lead to serious crime, speaking to victims who are living in similar situations. Recognising that it does not justify a war on men as a group, that there are a minority of male victims too, looking at their issues. Linking up common patterns and making strategies on how to deal with things properly so that they don't get to the stage where people are being killed and working back from there with all kinds of abuse.

Offred · 17/12/2015 14:59

What struck me is how often debt or relationship problems have lead to the men in this video believing they are justified in killing a female partner. It's just so proprietorial. It must be linked to these toxic ideas that men must be good providers and women become possessions on marriage.

Offred · 17/12/2015 15:00

Debt is a surprising one really. It seems entirely insane to kill your partner because you are in debt. Entirely mental.

Offred · 17/12/2015 15:03

To feel that way you must believe that your wife finding out you are in debt is worse than murder, worse than going to prison for life, than losing your children. How insecure these men must be and how deeply they must be driven by an obsession over keeping their partners.

Offred · 17/12/2015 15:07

And the other thing that drives me mad is how there is no provision for increased sentencing based on violence being a hate crime even when the perpetrators motive in killing even numerous times has been a deep hatred of women.

OneFlewOverTheDodosNest · 17/12/2015 15:32

I think that sexism is so insidious people can't even see it. If this was a race-hate crime committed by some white power loon then it would be clear as day, but point out that all the victims are women and the murderer is a blatant misogynist and it's unremarkable.

Offred · 17/12/2015 15:36

I think it's not just that it's insidious but it's so widespread. Tackling it would be a massive job compared to say disability hate crime.

Offred · 17/12/2015 15:37

So people have shut their eyes to it.

Offred · 17/12/2015 15:38

People fell over themselves to say Elliot rodger's crimes were not motivated by misogyny but I've never seen a clearer example of someone who was...

Elendon · 17/12/2015 16:02

It's because the deaths of these women are seen as 'isolated incidents'. I think it's an act of terrorism. If Daesh started killing 84 people each year in this country in 'isolated incidents', by beheading, stabbing, Spanish windlass, strangling, fire, shooting etc; it would be seen as an attack on the country.

It's never an isolated incident though because the deaths affects so many people.

Offred · 17/12/2015 17:05

Yes, the refusal to see them as part of a cultural problem is shocking. They won't even collect proper stats on it. Then you have policemen on the film saying 'it's a big step up blah blah nothing anyone could have done blah blah'. Someone who has a non-molestation order against a partner who exhibited such worrying behaviour and repeatedly ignored the order should have been better protected. What's the fecking point of the order otherwise?

FeedMyFaceWithJaffaCakes · 17/12/2015 17:15

I wish they'd shown some men getting killed by women on the programme too, (or even mentioned the stats, I believe it's 1 in 6.)

Original poster
Hillfarmer · 17/12/2015 17:28

1 in 6 what?

'I wish they'd shown some men getting killed' ???

OP posts:
Elendon · 17/12/2015 17:36

Feedmyface could you provide a link to that?

Often men are killed by women who have been abused, or by ex partners of the women they are with.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-22610534

Iflyaway · 17/12/2015 17:53

Brilliant and disturbing documentary.

And I agree it would've been good to have included some men.

Very good idea to include some children in it because it never shows the impact it has on children in other documentaries etc.

I watched it on youtube as I don't live in UK so can't get Iplayer.
Anyone in a similar situation just fill it the title at the top on youtube.

The whole documentary I was aghast and thinking there but for the grace of God.....

Offred · 17/12/2015 18:25

It is not 1 in 6. The overwhelming majority of men murdered are killed by other men. Where female partners kill men there is often a history of DV where the man had been the perpetrator. It isn't the same issue. It wouldn't have been appropriate to show the reverse situation I think, especially given they only went into depth with a tiny number of the murdered women.

Elendon · 17/12/2015 18:33

This makes for some very disturbing reading. It also includes men who have been murdered by their partner or their new partner's ex.

One case in particular:

Maria Jones murdered by her husband Graham Jones. He was 40 at the time and was sentenced to eight years in jail. This was in 2004. This man, who stabbed his wife 100 times, is now out of jail and possibly on online dating.

Frightening.

Offred · 17/12/2015 18:46

That's an excellent article.

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