Imagine for a moment that you are a guy living in Western Australia. You are enduring periodic violent outbursts from your partner, and one night you go online looking for help. You come across the following web page:
Now I ask you, would you be likely to contact this agency for help? Or would you think, “I’m embarrassed enough already, I don’t want to speak with people who are going to automatically assume that I am the one responsible for the violence.”
Personally I think the web page displays disgraceful anti-male bias and so on 19 May 2014 I emailed the relevant agency stating:
Please be advised – and surely I should not need to inform your department of this fact – but there are in fact such people as female perpetrators of IPV and male victims of IPV. Indeed some studies assert that there is symmetry between genders, ie. equal or almost equal numbers of male/female victims/perpetrators.
If your staff are not aware of this fact then please circulate and study the list of references provided below. As it stands now, the content of your web page is outrageously biased against men and should be re-written to be gender-neutral and not suggest to all readers all men are perpetrators of DV.
For your attention and action at the earliest opportunity please.”
I received the following reply the next day:
“Thank you for your email dated 19 May concerning the language used to describe the roles of the Men’s and Women’s Domestic Violence Helplines.
The Men’s Domestic Violence Helpline is funded to provide telephone based counselling, information, support and referral for men who self- identify as at risk of, or who are using violence. It is acknowledged that both women and men can be victims of family and domestic violence. Should a man experiencing such violence contact the Men’s Domestic Violence Helpline he would be provided with any necessary services and supported accordingly by the telephone counsellor. Counsellors are experienced and their training enables them to identify all scenarios and work with the caller and their presenting issues.
Women’s Domestic Violence Helpline is funded to provided telephone based counselling, information, support and referral for women who are experiencing family and domestic violence.
This is the purpose of the Helplines and the description provided on the website reflects as such.
For all individuals and families who are experiencing violence, the Department for Child Protection and Family Support also provides the following support options:
24/7 Crisis Care service, this is a crisis intervention service providing an immediate response to an individual or family experiencing a crisis, examples include any person experiencing family and domestic violence.
Family helpline, 24/7 telephone counselling service providing counselling, support, information and referral to an individual or family experiencing a range of issues.
These services are also on the department’s website.
I hope this response has been useful in advising you of the department’s services to those who are experiencing family and domestic violence from all perspectives. Thank you again for your email.”
And on the 21 May I wrote back to the department saying:
“Thank you for your prompt response to my concerns regarding the content of the web page provided in relation to your helplines. I take it from your response that you do not consider that the wording of the page displays undue bias against men, and consequently you do not propose to amend the content of the page.
We do however agree on the key point that there are both male and female aggressors and male and female victims of aggression, and that all should have access to support and assistance from your organisation.
It is my position, as I think it would be that of any reasonable person reading your web page, that the second sentence of each respective paragraph implies that your service is provided for the use of males who are aggressors and females who are victims, viz.:
“This service provides support and counselling for women experiencing family and domestic violence”, and “This service provides counselling for men who are concerned about becoming violent or abusive.”
I see no reason why the wording used in relation to the two helplines should not be identical, and I would suggest that such an amendment would be entirely appropriate. Consider for example the following suggested re-wording:
WOMEN’S DOMESTIC VIOLENCE HELPLINE
The Women’s Domestic Violence Helpline is a state wide 24 hour service. This service provides support and counselling for women who are either experiencing family or domestic violence OR who are concerned about becoming violent or abusive. Our service offers phone counselling, information and advice, referral to local advocacy and support services, liaison with police if necessary and support in escaping situations of family and domestic violence. The service can refer women to safe accommodation if required.
Telephone (08) 9223 1188 Free call 1800 007 339
MEN’S DOMESTIC VIOLENCE HELPLINE
The Men’s Domestic Violence Helpline is a state wide 24 hour service. This service provides support and counselling for men who are either experiencing family or domestic violence OR who are concerned about becoming violent or abusive. Our service offers phone counselling, information and advice, referral to local advocacy and support services, liaison with police if necessary and support in escaping situations of family and domestic violence. The service can refer men to safe accommodation if required.
Telephone (08) 9223 1199 Free call 1800 000 599
Darren, I do hope you will give these suggestions due consideration and that you will see merit in removing the gender bias evident in the current page content, via making the proposed amendments. I firmly believe that the current bias is not just discriminatory and inappropriate in a general sense, but would surely also alienate men who might otherwise seek sympathetic assistance from your organization. I look forward to receiving your further response in due course.”
I never received a response to my email, but while I was waiting I scanned the various publications available in the Department’s web site. Unsurprisingly, they also display a high degree of gender bias against men. Some examples:
See page 7 under definition of ‘perpetrator’ where it helpfully points out that “some women also offend against their children“, but that it’s not their fault as “sometimes this reflects an attempt to prevent greater harm from the primary perpetrator of violence …” And yes, that would be a man.
If you too feel that the Department should adopt a more professional and gender-neutral approach then I suggest you make your views known to the relevant Minister, the Honourable Helen Morton MLC (email to Minister.Morton@dpc.wa.gov.au). Alternatively, or in addition to a Ministerial letter, it might be appropriate to lodge a complaint in relation to sex discrimination.
Still in Western Australia, I noted a phrase in this March 2015 article about a new form of restraining order that is very telling in terms of its inherent anti-male bias:
“Family violence starts usually with the partner controlling every aspect of a woman’s life, the banking, who they speak to, where they go,” [Police Minister Liza Harvey] said.
I guess Liza didn’t say “every aspect of their partners life” as she is of the mistaken belief that all family violence is initiated by men. Shame on you Ms Harvey! But look at the Facebook posts concerning this article – clearly not everyone is buying the feminist perspective.
Yet another case of two steps forward and one step back. In two earlier posts in this blog I described how members of the ‘Sunrise’ TV show purposefully stood their ground against strident feminist criticism. I had hoped that they would keep the positive momentum going with some segments about the excesses and mistruths of the contemporary feminist movement. Unfortunately that was not to be the case. Well, at least not yet. (Postscript: Pleased to see ‘Sunrise’ step up with this interview with MRA Paul Elam on 5 July 2014 … kudos to ‘Sunrise’)
I just watched a segment on ‘Sunrise‘ – an interview involving Michael Kaufman of the ‘White Ribbon Campaign‘ and Sunrise’s resident ‘White Knight‘, Andrew O’Keefe . The segment came across as something of an attempt by ‘Sunrise’ to win back some street-cred with pro-feminist viewers. It’s sad that they feel the need to curry favour with a movement represented by this, this and this.
The ‘White Ribbon Campaign‘ is a pro-feminist organisation whose goal is to stop violence by men towards women. They ignore violence by women, and for the most part they ignore violence by men towards other men. They do acknowledge problems that disproportionately affect men like suicide and homelessness, but claim that these are a reflection of the pressures of gender stereotypes imposed on boys and men (i.e. be a man!). The solution, they say, is for men to be comfortable showing what are seen as feminine attributes – and then they would not have to hurt women. The ‘White Ribbon’ crowd thus conveniently choose to ignore more potent forces such as the increasingly toxic environment in schools and universities for male students, the pervasive anti-male bias in the media, etc etc.
By all means please do address the problem of violence – violence by people of all genders. And by all means address the imposition of negative gender stereotypes – again, by people of all genders. But by focussing entirely on violence by men towards women, the White Ribbon Campaign reinforces the prevailing stereotype of men as brutes and women as victims. That being the case, they are as much part of the problem as they are part of the solution.
One of the outcomes of this telescopic view of ‘domestic violence = mens violence towards women’ is the trivialising of the other dimensions of intimate partner violence (i.e. womens violence towards men, male on male violence, and female on female violence). This bias is a pervasive influence across society, and is discussed and demonstrated in another blog post which includes links to videos showing public reaction to male and female actors playing out different scenarios of partner violence.
The concerns of others regarding the White Ribbon Campaign can be ascertained by googling on the words ‘White Ribbon Campaign criticism’ (some examples here, here, here, here, here and here).
In November 2010 a Canadian organisation called ‘Sexual Assault Voices of Edmonton‘ (SAVE) devised an ‘educational’ poster campaign. They called it “Don’t be that guy“. True to the feminist narrative, and despite statistical evidence to the contrary, it ignores male victims and female perpetrators of sexual assault and domestic violence.
By way of background, in this post I note that a large proportion of the perpetrators of sexual assault are women and girls, whilst elsewhere I talk about the issue of false rape allegations. In this post I discuss the incidence of paedophilia and underage sex by females. Here, in this post, I note that the initiators of domestic violence are about 50/50 male and female. And finally, in this post I highlight the increasing extent of violence by women and girls.
Thus there can be no question that it would have been equally valid (or invalid) to run a parallel “Don’t be that girl” campaign – which SAVE did not do. Perhaps there was a funding constraint … or maybe it was an ideological one. Anyway, in recognition of this anomaly, an organisation called ‘Mens Rights Edmonton’ (MRE) launched their very own “Don’t be that girl” poster campaign.
Clearly targeting male perpetrators is seen by many as not merely appropriate, but as ‘striking a righteous blow against <insert feminist term of your choice here>’. But turn the spotlight onto female perpetrators and oh dear, suddenly that same approach is – you guessed it – HATEFUL and SEXIST.
Thus the feminist response was along these lines …
@BryonyHouse Never thought you would be. It just sucked seeing your name being used for hate.
Nope, that’s right, it doesn’t matter if the statistics back it up. It doesn’t matter if sending out a message to ALL likely perpetrators might be more productive in terms of, you know, actually protecting innocent victims. No, no, no, the important thing here is that due respect is shown to women, and particularly feminist women, at all times.
Reading the various feminist responses to the MRE poster campaign it’s quite clear that they just don’t ‘get it’. They saw the MRE posters merely as a “parody” of their campaign, and one that had no purpose other than to antagonise. Some feminists even went so far as to suggest that the MRE campaign advocated rape.
The fact that the MRE campaign was based on a truthful premise and in a way dovetailed with feminists’ own efforts, didn’t enter into their thought processes. So deeply has the ‘women good/men bad/MRA worse!’ mantra permeated into their psyche that they have lost all sense of perspective or reason.
Unless of course the SAVE view was that a different type of approach might be more effective for female perpetrators. In which case the obvious question is what form this approach should take, and when can we expect to see it rolled out?
Ideally of course we would be targeting that small minority of individuals who are perpetrators, not huge slabs of the population comprising mainly innocent people. Have a look at the article linked below to see how the ‘don’t be that guy’ concept might be applied to other groups in society, e.g. ‘don’t be that negro’.
As I’m typing this I’m recalling something said in the February 2014 letter by RAINN to the White House Task Force to Protect Students from Sexual Assault:
“In the last few years, there has been an unfortunate trend towards blaming “rape culture” for the extensive problem of sexual violence on campuses. While it is helpful to point out the systemic barriers to addressing the problem, it is important to not lose sight of a simple fact: Rape is caused not by cultural factors but by the conscious decisions, of a small percentage of the community, to commit a violent crime.
While that may seem an obvious point, it has tended to get lost in recent debates. This has led to an inclination to focus on particular segments of the student population (e.g., athletes), particular aspects of campus culture (e.g., the Greek system), or traits that are common in many millions of law-abiding Americans (e.g., “masculinity”), rather than on the subpopulation at fault: those who choose to commit rape. This trend has the paradoxical effect of making it harder to stop sexual violence, since it removes the focus from the individual at fault, and seemingly mitigates personal responsibility for his or her own actions.”
Most people were sickened to learn of this violent unprovoked attack on an old man in Australia, which was subsequently discussed in this rather insightful article by Jim Muldoon. One perpetrator subsequently went to court in September 2014 and walked free on a good behaviour bond. No surprise there.
This was not an isolated episode though, and there have been many recent instances of violent crimes involving female perpetrators. Including more attacks on the elderly man (a 2018 example). Indeed, the numbers of women committing violent crime is increasing significantly. Further, the gap between the rate at which violent crimes are committed by men and women is slowly narrowing as male perpetration has either plateaued or declined in many jurisdictions. This trend casts further doubt on the veracity of claims that the number of male victims of domestic assault is inconsequential.
“A third of family murders involved a female as the killer. In sibling murders, females were 15% of killers, and in murders of parents, 18%. But in spouse murders, women represented 41% of killers. In murders of their offspring, women predominated, accounting for 55% of killers” (Source)
The paragraph above was extracted from a 1994 publication, not because patterns of gender perpetration have changed greatly but because the feminist filter has been imposed so completely now that we only see articles like this one that present statistics in a manner that suggests that women are the perpetual victims of oppressive male malevolence. (Reddit discussion thread here)
The first group of linked articles/papers below explore the general issue of violence by females. A second and subsequent collection of links relate to specific acts of violence by women/girls.
Given all of the above it’s frightening how few anger management programs there are available for women here in Australia. In fact the only dedicated program of which I am aware is LifeWorks. If you know of others then please let me know and I will list them here.
Links to online sources dealing with the issue of violence by women/girls (other than specific incidents or case studies)
Australian Domestic Violence Homicide Statistics 2018 (19 June 2018) Most DV-related homicides in the first half of 2018 were committed by women. A reality very much at odds with the misandric messages issued by the feminists who have adopted the Eurydice Dixon tragedy as their current cause celebre.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Female_suicide_bomber A google search on the words ‘female suicide bomber’ will also reveal many papers on the subject as well as details of specific incidents that have appeared in the media (example).
“Women have increasingly assumed more operational roles in jihadist terrorism activities, as have minors and young adults. One in four (26%) of the arrestees in 2016 were women, a significant increase compared to 2015 (18%)” (Source)
“The February CDC study found that, over their lifetime, 44% of lesbians had been physically assaulted by a partner (more than two-thirds of them only by women), compared to 35% of straight women, 26% of gay men, and 29% of straight men.”
“Teens cheer as schoolgirl bashed, thrown down stairs“. By another girl – though that bit’s left out of the headline (15 March 2022). Crime occurred at Bundaberg, Queensland. Article is behind the Courier-Mail paywall.
Girl’s teeth knocked out in alleged bashing (6 February 2020) See how far you need to read through the article before it’s disclosed that the attackers were female. Do you think that would have been the case if they were male? Most unlikely
One of many video clips on the net showing a woman beating a man in public, with no-one intervening … until the male strikes back. More such videos can be seen in this post. (September 2019)
“An 11-year-old girl is in a stable condition in a Melbourne hospital with multiple gunshot wounds, after a supermarket brawl between two women allegedly later led to a shooting”
Man shot at Labrador (22 August 2016) Why are both the media and police so coy (i.e. gender neutral) when the perpetrator is a female? The man subsequently died. At least this article told it as it was.
The policeman was quoted as saying “I certainly don’t condone the behaviour but I can certainly see the funny side of it as well.” Bet he wouldn’t have said that if a man had pushed him.
Court documents reveal Jackson, who only got her licence back in January after a two-year driving ban, has twice had restraining orders taken out against her, both by ex-boyfriends in 2012.
One of the men claimed to have received 72 phone calls from Jackson in a single day. He accused her of later trying to break into his house through a bedroom window after leaving menacing voicemail messages, including “I’m going to hurt you”.
The Unknown History of Misandry A comprehensive blog that discusses the issue of female sociopaths and serial killers, featuring innumerable case-studies
This post mainly deals with false accusations or allegations by women in relation to sexual harassment, sexual assault, and domestic violence.
False allegations in relation to online harassment are dealt with in this post. False allegations in relation to paternity fraud are dealt with in this post.
One of the common false claims made by feminists is that men’s rights activists assert that most women who claim to have been raped are lying. Personally I have never seen or heard this statement made by any MHRA. What is often stated however is that there are substantial and unacceptably high numbers of women making false rape accusations, and that this problem should be acknowledged and treated seriously (including charging the false accuser where appropriate).
Being the subject of a false accusation of sexual assault can be, and often is, a traumatic and life-changing experience for anyone. False rape allegations also minimise and demean the suffering and the credibility of victims of actual rape.
Let’s start with the Wikipedia entry for false rape allegations, which extracts data from many different studies. This highlights the practical difficulty in differentiating between false rape allegations, unproven allegations, and ‘not guilty’ verdicts for example. It does however refute the suggestion made by many feminists that false allegations are either non-existent or absolutely negligible.
Here in Australia I came across the following information:
“A Victorian study, which analysed 850 rapes reported to the police over the period 2000–03, found that only 2.1% of reports were designated as false by the police. In these cases, the alleged victim was either charged or told that she would be charged unless she dropped the complaint. While this only represents a fraction of the sample, there was a much larger proportion of cases where police were confident, or reasonably confident, that the allegations were false, but there was no attempt to institute charges against the alleged victim.” (Source here and related reddit discussion thread here)
This article ‘How often do women falsely cry rape?’ gives quite a fair and balanced intro to the issue and can be read in conjunction with the Wiki entry cited above. Further recommended reading:
I would also draw readers attention to a Twitter thread entitled ‘False allegations kill – help us to make a change’ (@KathleenM__).
A further summary of the false abuse and rape allegation literature can be found in a 2013 book by Phillip Cook and Tammy Hodo titled ‘When Women Sexually Abuse Men‘. While statistics in this literature are problematic, Cook and Hodo report four studies that found false allegation rates of 62 percent, 41 percent, 50 percent, and 60 percent.
How and why do women falsely claim to have been sexually assaulted? There are a number of factors underlying the false rape phenomenon, starting with the widespread and exaggerated picture of men as persistent and unrepentant aggressors.
This article mentions women who claimed to have been sexually assaulted after their drink was spiked, yet in almost all cases were not found to have any drugs in their system. (See also this discussion thread). This video provides a detailed analysis of the issue. I’s suggest that it’s highly likely however that there are in fact far more instances of drink-spiking by women – with the intention of theft (example here).
It might well be that many women are exercising bad judgement and then, rather than accepting accountability for what subsequently occurred, look about for someone or something to put the blame on. Were this be indicative of a broader trend re: women’s propensity to shift blame, clearly there is considerable potential for false rape allegations to occur.
The damage to young men who are falsely accused is further magnified via the growing number of university campuses that run kangaroo courts (quite separate from the judicial system) to punish those accused of rape.
Some of the wording used in this article caught my attention:
“We have concluded that we cannot go forward with prosecution because there is not a reasonable likelihood of conviction at trial,” said Senior Charging Attorney Jane Nicoletti-Jones. “In (this case), the statements of a witness other than the suspect or alleged victim were an important part of our decision.” Although officials declined to comment on this case specifically, it illustrates some of the hurdles that accusers and their advocates face when filing sexual assault complaints.” (my emphasis added)
In this case a witness or witnesses cast doubt on the accuracy of the rape accusation, but in this feminist journalists eyes such eyewitness statements are merely “hurdles”. Who cares about the truth or justice anyway … we just need to get those rapists men in jail.
Whilst false accusations are only one of several factors contributing to false imprisonment, it’s worth mentioning that 99% of the prisoners exonerated due to the efforts of the Innocence Project were male, and that more than half of them were initially found guilty of rape.
The list of links below concern specific cases involving false allegations against men by women (and in some cases by women against other women). Such reports appear in the media quite frequently. As a consequence many further cases can be readily sourced via online searches. Scroll down the page for sources providing a general discussion of this topic.
“This dishonest woman might exist – in fact, lots and lots of dishonest people exist – but there are thousands more victims for whom the stigma of reporting domestic violence, and not being believed, means they’ll never come forward.
When we see the front page story about a man falsely accused of rape, or framed for domestic violence, we’re allowed to feel sympathy for him. But we need to remember that his story is the exception, not the rule, and often the rule – in this case, countless honest victims – fades into obscurity.
Because when something is normal, it doesn’t make the news. And that’s the saddest part.”
“Pointon broke down in tears and asked if she could drop the charges when her account was challenged by police … Judge Christopher Batty told her: “Your malicious complaint has done a huge disservice to those seeking justice through the police and courts.”
Why do judges never make the point that false rape allegations are very damaging to men, in part due to their lack of anonymity, and offer them some sympathy?” (Source)
“… the court agreed with Joy’s arguments that the lender’s investigation was handled differently because he’s a man.
“The whole factual matrix on which the decision to dismiss was based was, in itself, infused with, and tainted by, discrimination,” Judge Graeme Hodgson said in the ruling. “The conclusions on the claimant’s behavior are founded on stereotyped assumptions of how a man behaves.””
“I’m sorry Kelly but 3 days is rubbish. My ex partner went straight to the Courts and just filled out a form 5 days before Christmas and alleged that I had stalked her, threatened her and abused her and our son. I had to wait three MONTHS before I had my day in court.
I went to court armed to the gills with evidence of her lies and after waiting 6hrs in the court rooms I had 5 mins in court where no body asked me anything, not a word. Her lawyer changed the story at the last minute and then the lovely magistrate decided to postpone the next determination hearing 6 weeks down the track.
I went close to 5 months without seeing my son all because of my ex partners lies. No evidence. Nothing. Never touched her, never threatened her. Ever.
But I was determined to be guilty until proven innocent, and all on the say so of one bitter, twisted person. No one cared about me or my side of the story. The only ones who cared were the lawyers (a prominient law firm) who asked for $10K up front before they would even represent me.
In the end she dropped her accusations after we had to go to court the second time. Her penalty for perjuring herself twice? Nothing. Her penalty for slandering me for 6 months? Nothing. Her penalty for denying my family access to their grandson over Christmas? Nothing. Her penalty for denying my son access to his father? None.
I came so close to topping myself on several occasions during those long dark months that I had to endure being treated like a criminal, like the worst of the worst, the dregs of society.
But I kept on saying to myself that I had to fight for the most important person in the world; my son. I am glad that I had immense support from my family and friends otherwise I probably wouldn’t be here to write you this note.
I am all for very harsh penalties for any person who assaults another but the changes to DV that were made several years ago make basically every possible argument or disagreement in a domestic environment grounds for DV, and all it takes is one person to accuse you and you’re nicked. Well you are if you are a bloke.
There were penalties for perjury in the DV legislation but they were removed. Penalties for knowingly making false statements to police and the courts should be treated just as harshly in my mind. If there are no penalties for lying in court then who can believe what people say in court?” (Source – See reader’s comments from Brett)
Albury sex assault: Investigation finalised (1 May 2015). Notice how no-one actually comes out and says the girl made a false allegation, presumably all too scared that the feminists would get even angrier. No repercussion for the girl making the claim because that would be ‘victim’ blaming. In this article the police even state that they “were adamant they didn’t want the outcome to dissuade people reporting similar incidents. “We encourage anyone who has been the victim of a crime to come forward,” police said. It appears unlikely the teenager who reported the incident will be charged.” Hello! The only crime here was the false allegation. Idiotic PC. Related reddit mensrights discussion thread here
Two girls on a bus in India start beating some young men with their belts. The claim the men groped them. They became internet heros for defending themselves (and womanhood generally). Then the truth gradually leaked out (4 December 2014) And more videos surfaced of them beating men on other occasions.
How to get rich: Accuse a man of rape (15 March 2016) Australian feminist journalist thinks the idea of women lying about rape for financial gain is funny.
Ever wondered why most doctors insist on a chaperone with female patients – but not with male ones? It’s generally not motivated by abuse prevention, but rather to prevent false allegations of abuse. A reddit discussion thread (July 2014)
Domestic violence (DV), also referred to as Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) or Family & Domestic Violence (FDV), is a shocking blight on the community. This is a scourge that inflicts substantial negative impacts on the lives of countless men, women and children. Whilst definitions have evolved and broadened, DV is loosely defined as “physical, sexual, or psychological harm by a current or former partner or spouse“.
It is important to acknowledge that DV encompasses man on man, women on women, man on woman, and woman on man violence (both cis- and transgender). Further, in many instances violence is perpetrated by both partners as shown in the accompanying diagram. There is also a strong nexus between the incidence of child abuse/neglect and subsequent perpetration of domestic violence by affected individuals upon reaching adulthood.
The Wikipedia entry for ‘Epidemiology of domestic violence‘ provides readers with useful background information on this topic. For those willing to read something a little meatier, I would recommend this paper by esteemed DV researcher Malcolm George. Malcolm walks the reader through the historical context to the current debate about gender differences in violent behaviour and the way that society responds to the issue.
Many of those working within the DV sector, particularly here in Australia, only choose to acknowledge one element of the problem – that part involving male perpetrators and female victims. It is no coincidence that most staff within these government agencies, universities and NGO’s are strongly influenced by, and biased towards, feminist ideology. The feminist position is unequivocal, and it is that domestic violence = men’s violence towards women. Here is an example of that mindset, and here are many others.
This routine failure by feminists to recognise and discuss male victims, female perpetrators and bi-directional violence is no accident or coincidence. It is a deliberate strategy to build their brand, and in so doing demonise the overwhelming majority of men who have never, and would never, hurt or abuse their partner.
As a result, and in order to support the feminist narrative, a great deal of ‘cherry-picking’ and misrepresentation occurs in relation to the statistics provided in DV literature. In addition, the design and implementation of survey instruments is too often tainted with bias. This issue, that of feminist efforts to hide or discredit legitimate research and/or generate false or misleading statistics, is explored in this further blog post.
You will note, as you scroll down this page, that there are a multitude of sources of DV statistics, particularly the United Kingdom and the United States. Here in Australia, much less research has been undertaken – particularly in relation to male victimisation. One of the more significant sources is the Australian Bureau of Statistics Personal Safety Survey 2012, which found that one in three victims of domestic abuse were male. The results of overseas studies generally found levels of male and female victimisation that were closer to parity, and in some instances even higher rates of victimisation for men that women.
Unfortunately many journalists display remarkable tunnel-vision when addressing the topic of IPV. Indeed some have suggested that the media is complicit in the same sort of systemic gender bias against males noted earlier amongst those working in the field of DV.
Turning to my first example, an article called ‘Til death do us part’ which appeared in The Australian newspaper. It consisted of five pages of heart-wrenching coverage of men’s violence towards female partners, but made no mention of any other form of domestic violence, i.e. m-m, f-f, or women on men. Similarly this February 2014 article from The Mail newspaper also neglected to mention that men can be victims too.
Fiona McCormack also ignores male victims and female abusers this item on Australian ABC TV … except in an aside where she implies that anyone who raises the issue of women abusers is only seeking to “excuse” the behaviour of male abusers. This is very much akin to the feminist predilection of labelling anyone who questions various aspects of sexual assault (e.g. false rape allegations) as being “rape apologists” “victim blamers” etc.
Now let’s turn to this article by Charlie Pickering (more about Charlie here). Charlie is concerned that more attention is paid to the issue of random one-punch attacks on men, than on the violence visited nightly on women people in their homes. He goes on to state:
“For a long time, the termdomestic violence has softened and normalised what is really going on. A more accurate term is ‘men’s violence against women’. Not ‘violence against women’, because that takes the responsibility for it away from those who need to be made responsible.”
This belief, that by acknowledging male victims and female perpetrators, we are somehow ignoring the validity and the pain of female victims is absurd, yet unfortunately commonplace in public discourse. The fact that there may be somewhat fewer male victims does not, nor should not, make domestic violence a gendered issue.
A precious few writers, like this one, suggest a more practical and unbiased approach to the issue:
“When it comes to the statistics about domestic abuse, it doesn’t matter to me how many men to how many women experience domestic violence. Domestic violence is a power issue more than a gender issue. Intimate Partner Violence affects men and women, and I really do not care in what proportion …
Within anti-domestic violence advocacy, there seems to be a trend to pit female victims against male victims and vice-versa. I do not know who is behind it, nor do I know if there is a “who” to blame. I do know that blame has no place in this fight against domestic abuse, especially when victim blames victim for any reason …
In a perfect society, men and women are equally protected under the law not because more laws were made to protect one sex but because in each mind and heart of all people, women and men are respected equally, and the individual contributions or crimes are our only measures of judgment. However, this ideal is as far away from our current reality as the idea that no person would seek power over another.”
Many others within the wider community have, however, embraced a biased and incomplete representation of DV, liberally salted with misinformation, at face value. Who could blame them, given that so many sources are bellowing out the same relentless message about male perpetrators and female victims, whilst studiously ignoring other elements of the issue.
Here in Australia, let’s look at this page within the web site of the Department of Social Services entitled ‘Women’s safety’, and the linked 28 page literature review prepared by ‘Urbis’ consultants at a cost of $220,000. One would have assumed, especially given the enormous cost, that the review would have encompassed all forms of abuse and perpetration. But, unfortunately, it did not.
In fact the review states that “Male perpetrators of domestic violence or sexual assault against men and female perpetrators of either offence against men have not been considered in this literature review. It is acknowledged that in practice the great majority of programs will be targeted towards men who commit domestic violence or sexual assault against women.”
Yes, that makes perfect sense … there are no programs for female offenders so let’s pretend they don’t exist. Such circular logic is (almost) unbelievable. And no, there is no corresponding ‘Mens Safety’ page within the DSS web site.
To be fair, the authors of some studies do admit that there are many female perpetrators and male victims, and that little research has been directed towards these groups. They also admit that there are probably many similarities between male and female perpetrators of IPV. They then invariably proceed, however, to offer a variety of justifications to continue their focus on the ‘domestic violence = Mens violence towards women’ model (example).
When misleading statistics are repeatedly exposed the feminist reaction is to move the goalposts by expanding the reach of the definition of domestic violence to encompass sexual violence, and less tangible forms of non-physical ‘violence’. This serves to both maximise the perceived magnitude of the problem, as well as support the anti-male narrative.
Naturally those areas where female perpetration is substantial, such as child abuse and elder abuse, are totally ‘out of bounds’. This theme is explored in this separate blog post. The same approach has been taken by feminists to prop up the notion of the existence of a ‘rape culture‘ in western societies.
Those of us concerned about men’s rights seek to have all aspects of domestic violence considered, as well as seeking remedies to specific issues such as:
the lack of resources to assist abused men and their children
laws and legal procedures that are based on the assumption that the male in the relationship is the abuser
negative and biased behaviour towards men who seek assistance, for example the screening of (only) male callers to abuse help-lines to determine if they are in fact perpetrators (example)
A selection of statistical sources that haven’t been doctored to support the feminist narrative
References examining assaults by women on their spouses or male partners: An Annotated Bibliography by Martin S. Fiebert. This bibliography examines 286 scholarly investigations: 221 empirical studies and 65 reviews and/or analyses, which demonstrate that women are as physically aggressive, or more aggressive, than men in their relationships with their spouses or male partners. Here is a link to an updated June 2013 version of Fiebert’s bibliography.
Partner Abuse, Volume 1, No. 1, 2010 The first edition of a new journal created to showcase academic research into domestic violence without gender bias
“Almost 24% of all relationships had some violence, and half (49.7%) of those were reciprocally violent. In non-reciprocally violent relationships, women were the perpetrators in more than 70% of the cases.”
More than 125,000 women homeless because of domestic violence (15 February 2016). The only figures for male victimisation that were mentioned – because they appeared to support the feminist perspective – were drawn from this media release from a government agency. What’s not mentioned though is that the relatively low numbers of men seeking assistance are indicative of factors other than simply lower rates of male victimisation, incl.:
the rampant genderbias of ‘help-lines’, advocacy groups and even government agencies
the (widely-known) lack of resources available to help male victims (with or without children, and
the much greater incidence of non-reporting of DV by men (compared to women)
This article and related reddit discussion concern a move in Victoria, Australia, to alter the law in relation of using self-defence where death of a partner occurs (article) (discussion)
Domestic abuse: The latest lie (19 July 2019) UK. This article addresses, amongst other things, the feminist myth that most men who suffer domestic violence are the victims of other men.
“The proportion of male victims who told police about their domestic abuse increased from 10.4% in 2014-15 to 14.7% this year as charities said more men were shaking off the stigma of talking about their suffering.“
How Victoria’s family violence system fails some victims – by assuming they’re perpetrators (14 November 2017) I thought this paper was going to talk about men being misidentified as DV aggressors, but oh no, apparently it happens to women all the time <facepalm> and men exploit this to obtain intervention orders to protect themselves (& their children) from women who aren’t really hitting/abusing them.
Shocking domestic abuse statistics don’t show the real picture: it’s even worse (14 December 2016) UK. This is one of several articles written by feminists in response to the recent release of stats showing the large (and increasing) number of male victims. Essentially they say ‘it doesn’t matter how many men are victims, women have it worse and we should focus entirely on them’.
Stopping Fathers Committing Family Violence (13 December 2016) The Victorian Government (Australia) ignores female perpetrators of domestic violence – it’s something only dads do! Disgusting bias
This is one of countless examples of how feminist DV advocacy groups seek to minimise both women’s role in perpetrating abusive behaviours, and its degree of impact on male victims.
“The findings of an in-depth domestic violence study, which showed violent conduct almost evenly split between the genders, are potentially cause for concern, a senior police officer says.”
The gender of domestic violence (8 June 2016) NZ video concerning the difficulty experienced by researchers whose findings showed that women were equally likely to abuse.
For Nelson Women’s Refuge manager Katie O’Donnell, the solution to New Zealand’s domestic violence problem is more straightforward. “People say it’s a really complex issue. Well, it is a complex issue but also it isn’t – guys just have to stop doing it”
The surprisingly common reason John hits his partner (14 October 2015) Of course a male batterer is profiled, but watch the fur fly when someone suggests a contributing factor that doesn’t fit the feminist Duluth Model.
Tara Moss: ‘We can’t let trolls hijack the domestic violence conversation’ (5 March 2015) Australia. This is the feminist concept of a “conversation” – we talk & you shut-up. If you try to join our conversation then you are a troll. And, as is becoming increasingly common of late, no reader’s comments were permitted on this article.
Can domestic abusers be rehabilitated? (1 February 2015) Gynocentric/pro-feminist bias but worth reading in conjunction with the comments contributed by readers
Telstra introduces domestic violence leave (13 January 2015) Australia. Article implies only women are victims of domestic violence and leaves us guessing as to whether the company policy is sexist/discriminatory – or just the journalism
Why don’t we speak up when we see signs of domestic violence? (1 October 2014) This article in a pro-feminist web site provides a stereotypical feminist perspective on the subject. What was notable was that almost all the readers comments attacked the author’s obvious anti-male bias. This article forms the focus of this blog post.
In this article a feminist writer, Amanda Hess, attempts to rationalise why domestic violence by a female sports star should be addressed differently than in the case of a male sports star (22 September 2014) Most of the 600+ readers comments that followed disagreed and told her so in no uncertain terms.
‘Lollies at a childrens party and other myths: Violence, protection orders and fathers rights groups’ by Miranda Kaye and Julia Tomie (1998). Another detailed but flawed paper in support of the feminist position on DV. Its main line of attack is that available statistics don’t support claims made by men’s rights advocates. It conveniently ignores the fact that most Australian DV research is undertaken by feminists and biased towards finding ‘evidence’ to support a pre-determined conclusion. Thus the accuracy and impartiality of the research is the real issue, rather than the credibility of the whistle-blowers.
The paper also misinterprets and/or takes out of context, many of the comments it attributes to fathers groups in an attempt to portray them as irrational or unreasonable. Finally the authors attack specific statements put forward by fathers groups despite the same arguments having been used (at other times) by feminists in support of their own (feminist) perspective. The authors of this paper, for example, want to jump from one camp to the other (and back again) in relation to the issue of whether behaviour other than physical violence should be included in the definition of domestic violence.
We need to show it’s just not manly to hit out (9 July 2014) Nonsense article dripping with white knight bias … “The idea that the woman may be equally to blame, even if she is also violent and even the initiator of the violence, is simply not acceptable”
A reddit discussion thread about the anti-male bias evident in the web site of an American domestic violence centre’s web site. Unfortunately such bias (i.e. stating or implying that all men accessing the site are abusers and that all women are victims) is also common in domestic violence centres in Australia.
I went to court armed to the gills with evidence of her lies and after waiting 6hrs in the court rooms I had 5 mins in court where no body asked me anything, not a word. Her lawyer changed the story at the last minute and then the lovely magistrate decided to postpone the next determination hearing 6 weeks down the track.
I went close to 5 months without seeing my son all because of my ex partners lies. No evidence. Nothing. Never touched her, never threatened her. Ever.
But I was determined to be guilty until proven innocent, and all on the say so of one bitter, twisted person. No one cared about me or my side of the story. The only ones who cared were the lawyers (a prominient law firm) who asked for $10K up front before they would even represent me.
In the end she dropped her accusations after we had to go to court the second time. Her penalty for perjuring herself twice? Nothing. Her penalty for slandering me for 6 months? Nothing. Her penalty for denying my family access to their grandson over Christmas? Nothing. Her penalty for denying my son access to his father? None.
I came so close to topping myself on several occasions during those long dark months that I had to endure being treated like a criminal, like the worst of the worst, the dregs of society.
But I kept on saying to myself that I had to fight for the most important person in the world; my son. I am glad that I had immense support from my family and friends otherwise I probably wouldn’t be here to write you this note.
I am all for very harsh penalties for any person who assaults another but the changes to DV that were made several years ago make basically every possible argument or disagreement in a domestic environment grounds for DV, and all it takes is one person to accuse you and you’re nicked. Well you are if you are a bloke.
There were penalties for perjury in the DV legislation but they were removed. Penalties for knowingly making false statements to police and the courts should be treated just as harshly in my mind. If there are no penalties for lying in court then who can believe what people say in court?” (Source – See reader’s comments from Brett)
False rape accusations tell us something important about America (17 July 2015)
Woman demanded lift home, then falsely alleged rape: prosecution says (20 July 2015)
Mother Incarcerated after Forcing Daughter to Falsely Accuse Father of Sexual Abuse (25 June 2015)
Another example of the deplorable way reporters cover false rape claims (24 June 2015)
Woman Who Accused Her Husband Of Beating Her Is Arrested For Domestic Battery (11 June 2015)
Monash University awarded $900,000 in indemnity costs for failed sexual harassment case (11 June 2015)
Scots woman cried rape after man she had first date train sex with ran away at his stop (9 June 2015)
Carole Thomas charged with public mischief (9 June 2015)
Why do women lie more than men? Because we’re ‘nicer’ (5 June 2015)