Photographer : Thom Watson
Following on from the page 'Domestic Assault' by Bridie, men are also the victims. Her page explains the issues well, but it should be noted that while women are over-represented as victims, men are far less likely to report domestic assault.
"To violence against women, Australia says no." Says the Federal governments campaign, but what about violence against men? What about violence in general? Are we not really sure? Is the jury still out? Are we a bit undecided?
A recent report by the Redfern Legal Centre was damning of the way Police handled domestic violence cases. The report said that in a few instances, there was a favouring of males. It's important to remember when he hear information like this that men are also the victims of domestic violence (DV), which can be perpetrated by women. The statistics show that women experience more DV from men, however, it is also known that men are far less likely to report DV from women (Phillips, 9/11/2000).
British columnist, Melanie Phillips, wrote back in 2000 in London's Sunday Times (9/11/2000) that an analysis by Professor John Archer, psychologist, of nearly one-hundred British and US studies into DV, revealed information very different to what we intuitively think about DV. His analysis revealed: women are more likely than men to initiate violence against their partners; women are more likely to be aggressive more frequently; women do initiate violence, it is not only self-defence; women are encouraged to be violent towards men because men are expected not to retaliate.
He does acknowledge, however, that men inflict more injury. That isn't to say that men aren't visibly injured, he says 1/3 of those with visible injuries from DV were men. Phillips provides some of her own anecdotal evidence to support the findings: "A police officer conceded that even when the police were called to a domestic and saw the man bleeding and the woman unscathed, it was the man who was commonly arrested. "One man said his former wife set fire to his bedspread while he was asleep and twice attacked him with a kitchen knife, once in the throat. I didn't go to the police because it was my home and my family and I didn't want anyone else involved...I couldn't walk out because she was being violent to the children. But in the end I slept in a locked room with a shotgun." The end of the story is that he is accused of DV, when according to him, he was defending himself. Interestingly, Philips tell us, she is now in jail for the murder of the boyfriend she had after him.
Support services all reflect the statistics that women are mostly the victims. They are overwhelmingly aimed towards female victims. From looking at the services available, you would form the impression that DV just doesn't occur to men. Which, of course, isn't true. The Redfren Legal Centre, for instance, has the graphic of a female gene symbol behind their links to DV support services. Clearly, this service is not for men, like many others.
Triple J's Hack program did a report on DV (5/12/2006), and as part of that report, they discussed DV with a counsellor, Alison, before taking some calls. Alison said the way to identify DV was, "...if you're very apprehensive about what mood he's going to be in when he get's home from work or from the pub, if you're scared when he's been drinking or doing drugs..." (emphasis added). She talked about DV in exclusively male-perpetrator terms.
Thankfully, this ridiculous situation was broken by a male caller who described his experience with DV. Nick's girlfriend hit him and threw things at him, and whenever he tried to end the relationship, she threatened that she would commit suicide. He couldn't get away from her abuse, and he said he wasn't a violent person, so he couldn't physically stop her. Although, of course, if he did try to restrain her, a case could be made against him on charges of DV. Alison admitted that there aren't many services for males. Except for a couple of call services- the Domestic Violence hotline and Mensline Australia. Yet it wasn't long before she moved on to talking of males as the perpetrators, as she suggested the services available to male-perpetrators. I found this extremely disrespectful, to talk in the same breath of male-perpetrators.
Mensline Australia is a non-judgemental counselling service where men can talk about their issues and relationships. Not to question the non-judgementality of their counsellors, but it should be noted that the website's home page leaves the impression that men are the perpetrators and women the victims. It asks, in bold type, "Lonely, angry or out of control?" Then on the 'About Us' page, you'll find a definition of DV against women.
No such attention is given on the site to DV against men. Imagine this reversed, a women's counselling service that says, "Feeling hysterical?" Still, I'm sure this is just the website. They probably had to fill it with something, so why not try to help male perpetrators? I'm not saying they don't exist, they do. What I'm saying is that if you're a male victim, you have to trawl through suggestions that you're the problem. No one is reaching out to you to say, 'we understand'. The bias is based on research, the statistics are saying that women are predominantly the victims. But with attitudes like this, why would men feel comfortable about reporting DV carried out by their female partner?
Further information on this issue and men's rights is available on the Human Rights and Equal Opprtuntity Commission's (HREOC) website.
If you need support regarding this issue head to Reach Out! www.reachout.com.au
