Fucking hell, Nigella picture, WTF? [includes links to upsetting images]

[BoffinMum]

twitter.com/suttonnick/status/346017840106704898/photo/1

Tomorrow's Sunday People cover. Where do we even start with this?

Many many years ago I spent time working in a leading divorce law firm. It was a depressing as it gets. The only difference being that the clients were hugely wealthy. I felt so sorry for the children, many of whom witnessed their parents behaviour towards one another (on the odd occasion they were actually in the same country/house as their parents and not at school). At least one time a couple chose to start attacking each other at their child's sports day. Having lots of money doesn't protect you from DV at all.

This blog briefly considers the implications of the caution but the key one, as a police officer said on another thread (sorry can't remember poster's name) is that he has admitted assault, in contrast to the denial of it in his issued public statement.

I wonder if Russell Brand will write something about this. I have been amazed and delighted by the thoughtfulness and articulacy of his articles over the last year. He does take a few days to produce them though.

Full credit to the tabloids tbh for breaking the story and persisting with it. The express piece is brilliant. As a DV survivor it really touched me.

The broadsheets seem to have lost sight of the issue blinded by the glamour and wealth of the parties involved.

Chub the broadsheet editors are probably scared that they won't be invited to parties any longer if they make an issue of it.

this is quite shocking...don't know if Saatchi is a product of the cultural inequalities in Iraq, because I don't know his background - but it says:

Violence Against Women
Gender-based violence in Iraq is one of the
factors preventing women?s full political, social,
and economic participation. Domestic violence,
honour killings, and human trafficking remain
a threat to many Iraqi women and girls due to a
complex mix of misconceptions in cultural beliefs
and traditions. Most of the violence against
women occurs at home. 46% of girls aged 10-14
were exposed to violence at least once by a family
member. 46% of currently married women were
exposed to at least one form of spousal violence:
44.5% to emotional violence, 5.5% to physical
violence, and 9.3% to sexual violence. Sexually violent
situations with a spouse are reportedly faced once or twice per month by 38.3% of women
and almost daily by 3.4% of women.

51% of women aged 15-49 believe that a
husband has the right to hit or beat his wife in
some circumstances.

I wonder if this is relevant at all?

That's interesting Rooney.

He did move to England when he was 10 years old and his family is, of course, Jewish so they wouldn't follow anything like Sharia Law, would they?

I've no idea...but I wondered if he might have been exposed to some disrespectful treatment of women early in his life. You know, to make him think it was acceptable.

I'm not trying to excuse his behaviour at all, btw...just to analyse it, given very little to go on really.

I know where you're coming from, but I get the feeling that in his case it might be an innate character flaw. He genuinely seems to think he's above everyone else.

I'm sure there are many factors from my ex's childhood and upbringing that affected his views towards women/relationships and helped shaped his unacceptable EA behaviour. Goodness knows I spent too many years trying to work out what is was that could cause such a lovely man to behave in such an arse of a way on such a regular basis.

Eventually, thankfully I got it (as many women in these situations do):
A: he is a selfish overly entitled arse
& B: He CHOOSES to behave like this.

As does Saatchi.

End of.

Oh come on, ladies. How many of you haven't had a partner or husband put his hands round your throat during a playful tiff, or haven't done it yourself??

How in the name of fuck did he think that was a justification of what he did?? The layers of this just beggar belief - he thought it was OK to throttle his wife in public, he thought calling it a playful tiff would make it OK, he thought we would believe that Nigella wasn't crying because he was hurting her, but because she doesn't like arguing (newsflash, Charles - maybe she doesn't like arguing because you get physical and abuse her when the two of you argue) - and he thought issuing that statement would make us all go, 'OK then, that's fine'!

I just hope that Nigella stays the hell away from him now and forever.

Abusers always think they are entitled to abuse, regardless of their cultural/religious background or status. I, for one, am decidedly uninterested in understanding why Saatchi thinks it is OK to choke his wife - to see where he is coming from is to adopt his warped perspective, at least to some degree. He is a despicable bully.

Meanwhile, after an appalling article in the Guardian yesterday so many of us complained about, Greenslade writes an apology.

I like how perceptions of DV are changing. The only people defending Saatchi are professional trolls with religious agendas, who fail to see women as human.

This is dreadful. Poor Nigella

What happens behind closed doors, that's all I can say.

oh yes i just got an email from reader's ed about that. fair play to him, he's an old man and no doubt as prejudiced as the next person, probably just needed to think a bit before he typed that piece.

Full marks to greenslade for his apology.

Fair play to Greenslade, that is a proper apology.

Gosh, yes! That's how you do a mea culpa.

I agree MadBusLady; completely unreservedly with no undertones of passive agressive shit. Guess he was humbled by the public backlash.

I wonder if the odious Odone has anything to say?

Good one, Roy. Much respect.

Apart from acknowledging the public outrage, what I think also comes through in Greenslade's piece is an understanding of having failed a vulnerable friend. How his reluctance to judge too quickly actually leaves an assaulted victim alone.

I wish more friends and family members of victims were able to spot abuse and call it for what it is. DV would be far less common a phenomenon if we all judged the perpetrators more and the victims less.

God, not only is this an awful story for all involved - and I feel desperately uncomfortable for NL's children the more I learn of her and CS's relationship - but it has proved absolutely fascinating how the media have handled it.

The People splash it, the Telegraph get it right first (then oh so wrong..), the Guardian completely stuff it up, the Express, or all places, publish some incisive comment. I don't know if it's because of who it involves, two people who are so utterly central to the British media establishment, but it's like all the usual rules have been torn up and every editor is handling it alone rather than in a pack mentality. Very odd, and very revealing.

April and the Evening Standard publishes his ridiculous statement (and probably continues to employ him as a columnist).