Domestic Violence ‘ not a gender thing’

[JessicaWakefieldSV]

Amongst other things, Steve Hansen the All Blacks coach, widely respected in NZ, has said domestic violence ‘isn’t a gender thing’ in NZ as he is trying to minimise the impact of including a player who committed it.

He’s not the only one who says this. I hear it a lot. I’ve only ever seen one poorly designed Dunedin study as ‘evidence’ both men and women abuse their partners.

I’d like to hear the thoughts of women here and if you know whether this is true or not.

https://i.stuff.co.nz/sport/rugby/all-blacks/114049254/steve-hansen-backs-sevu-reece-says-domestic-violence-is-not-a-gender-thing

Saying it’s not just men that commit it doesn’t deflect attention away from the fact that this specific player did though and obviously that needs to be addressed properly.

I’m just responding to the title and going by the article linked in which he says that NZ has a DV problem and his experience in the police shows it’s not just limited to male on female violence.

DV is a 'gender thing' when you look at the statistics. That is not to say that women never commit DV but when you break it down there is an imbalance. Hansen doesn't get down to the details though, funnily enough, just makes sweeping statements. Even if males and females did commit it at the same rates, with the same types of incident, that would still be totally irrelevant to whether he wanted to call up a man with a conviction for violence against his partner.

And if he does think that Reece is worthy of forgiveness and a place on the team, then he should fucking well own that and say that, rather than start spouting irrelevant 'wimmin do it too' shite.

Eaudear

Oh he defended Reece and why he’s included a lot too, but if you think about that in the context of the young man missed one game at the time, and is now better off in terms of the contract and money he’s got, it’s not a great deterrent to violent men. They’re talking a lot about how he hasn’t done anything in a year, avoiding the fact they signed him back in November, a few months after.

The other thing he said that’s not being discussed much, is this idea they are two types of abusers. I find that dangerous. Victims of abuse often want to find a reason to think their partner won’t hurt them again. There’s obviously a lot of emotional and psychological conditioning involved. So sending a message to the country that they’re only lashing out when stressed and not proper abusers is extremely troubling to me.

Also bear in mind that coaches are idolised in NZ even more than players. The coach of Reece at club level is so popular the whole stadium wears face masks with his image. You have to think about the influence this sport and key people like Hansen have in NZ. Rugby has a long ugly history of violence. NZ’s issues are very much linked to rugby and pretty much nobody talks about it very much.

his experience in the police shows it’s not just limited to male on female violence.

He hasn’t been in the force for decades so his experience isn’t that relevant to today’s issues anyway. Added to that is that police reports show overwhelmingly males commit a large majority of violence, both domestic and otherwise.

In my circles I know a couple of women who've lift abusive (financial, aggressive) relationships. I only know one person who left because of physical violence and abuse a bloke.

A close male friend of mine was really badly abused by his male partner. From what I know support and refuge for LGBT is better than it used to be but at the time there was little support in his community.

I had a good reply from the NZ Family Violence Clearing House, University of Auckland

We are also concerned about Steve Hansen's comments about domestic violence.

Data on the perpetrators of domestic violence is available from a couple of different sources. The most recent data that is easily accessible is below:

nzfvc.org.nz/data-summaries
Family Violence Deaths - the NZ Police data on homicides is broken down to 'couple' and by gender of victim (page 4)
Violence Against Women - the data on Protection Order applications is broken down by the gender of applicants and respondents (pages 15-16)

In relation to Steve Hansen's statement about there being "‘two types’ of domestic abuser", some researchers have attempted to develop typologies that distinguish between different types of domestic abuse. However these have not been validated and further, can be very harmful when used in this way, i.e. by non-experts to minimise the dangers and harms of domestic violence.

Please let me know if we can assist further.

I am totally uniformed about sport so wasn't aware of this comment.

So apart from wanting to say it has nothing to do with gender, it is about sex based violence, what difference does it make to whether it is suitable to have a member of a national team who is a known perpetrator of violence. Saying women do it too, doesn't make it okay.

Seriously.

Also, re the prevailing notion that men and women equally suffer DV, I have found these stats from the Government which I am confused by but maybe somebody could explain.

Interesting that they say they are experimental statistics which sorts of implies they haven't recorded DV offences by sex??

See figures 5 & 6 www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/crimeandjustice/bulletins/domesticabuseinenglandandwales/yearendingmarch2018#domestic-abuse-recorded-by-the-police

For UK figures on domestic violence, the ONS also includes familial violence ie children to parents and vice versa. A large proportion of male victim figures come from this if you dig into the data.

I was surprised to read the other day that 70% of parents who murder their children are female, and that the victim is male in circa 60% of cases. That would certainly support the above.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domestic_violence#Gender_differences

Check out some of the wiki entries.

" A 2012 review from the journal Psychology of Violence found that women suffered disproportionately as a result of intimate partner violence, especially in terms of injuries, fear, and posttraumatic stress disorder.[167] The review also found that 70% of female victims in one study were "very frightened" in response to IPV from their partners, but 85% of male victims reported "no fear", and that IPV mediated the satisfaction of the relationship for women but not for men.[167] Hamberger's (2005) review found that men tend to respond to female partner-initiated IPV with laughter and amusement.[168]"

and
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domestic_violence_against_men#Gender_symmetry

The perpetrators of sustained, injurious abuse are overwhelmingly likely to be men. Some studies put that on parity with a woman slapping her partner, or throwing an object at them during an argument or even in self defence - or even verbal abuse. Although lashing out is not good its not really the same as coersive and controlling violence.

Of course there are some cases of violent sustained abuse by women (there was a doc about an awful case on iplayer recently). But it seems to be relatively rare.

It's not a clear cut issue though. Despite men being the main perpetrators of VAW, women are increasingly becoming a threat to children.

70% of children murdered by a parent are murdered by their mother, and sexual abuse of minors by a female has tripled in the last decade. The judge who was ruling on the case of that woman (forget her name) who rang a paedophile ring up north said it was 'the most harrowing case he'd ever seen.'

There is literally complete radio silence on these issues it seems, and you'd expect at least a bit of discussion.