This is an excellent article. I have worked in both gender-based violence response and prevention for many years and the lack of progress is very depressing. I fully support reviewing the current approach. I oversaw a project that investigated the link between gambling and family violence a number of years ago and despite the findings we simply couldn't get any government buy into the issue (even though it was funded by a government funded statutory authority). We definitely need to start thinking about how to tackle the issues that underpin frequency and severity of violence against women and children.
Fabulous article. I align with much of what you raised. My observation of working in frontline primary prevention is there is never adequate investment/funding from federal/state to have an impact. Therefore it is difficult to say what we currently have as not working when it has never had the resources and funds behind it in the first place to implement change. In my experience funding for prevention is drip feed or none at all.
Excellent piece. Very encouraging to finally see some acknowledgement of the causal connection between trauma experienced in childhood, especially by boys, and their later adolescent and adult behaviour. Evidence of this has been available internationally for several decades but has not sufficiently informed Australian discussion of DV. Ambient socio-economic determinants as stressors need to be taken more seriously - they were very apparent during the lockdowns but the dots were not joined. Sexual aggression can also be driven by trauma and socio-economic disadvantage, and boys are not all inevitably seduced by porn simply because it's available. More use of half a century of research on human sexuality and its unconscious drivers would be desirable. Some coercive control is unconscious survival and compensatory strategies learned during childhood abuse and trauma and taken unconsciously into adulthood as normalised, but because the impact of trauma is not sufficiently acknowledged, and because the dominant narrative around DV assumes misogyny - which is the opposite of what is often really occurring - we still don't understand coercive controlling behaviour adequately. Childhood abuse and trauma caused not only by DV but by ANY form of abuse and disadvantage (including poverty, juvenile detention, bullying, sexual abuse etc.) can result in multiple mental health issues that are still being ignored in their contribution to alleged DV, as evidenced in responses to multiple high-profile cases. Good support for all victims at all ages and stages requires a universally and immediately accessible public mental health system, which Australia does not have, and until we DO have it, most victim survivors will be failed, and hence problems perpetuated. Resilience and recovery also require a far more socially just and inclusive and supportive society than Australia is today, which means that no matter how resilient survivors may be, they can still be failed at any later stage of their lives and revert back to previous stags of mental and behavioural distress. Suicide can be a direct consequence of DV, but suicide prevention in Australia is also still in the dark ages.
The discussion of the Scandinavian example appears to assume that men are being violent in reaction to the equality that women enjoy in those societies, as if the only possible explanation of male behaviour here can be as some form of their own perceived loss of power and privilege. That kind of argument might have some kind of validity, and cannot be entirely excluded in every case, but on the one hand, normal scholarly requirements would involve canvassing every other possible explanation and demonstrating that none of them iis valid except the one proposed - which has not been undertaken here - and on the other hand, it remains a very reductionist kind of argument, and still fails to consider whether there might be more than merely one single explanation for this pattern. There are widely discussed socio-economic factors also now feeding much purported misogyny and male aggression around the western world, also evidenced in Australia during the lockdowns, which have little directly to do with women but much to do with extraneous stressors, and these ought to be more prominent in current discussion of DV. That would then mean that intimate partners become victims at least some of the time not by virtue of being women (same sex partners also become victims), but rather by virtue of being closest to the alleged perpetrator. The reliance upon Allan Schore is encouraging insofar as it - almost alone amongst all discussion of DV in Australia, and hence very riskily, acknowledges that any form of childhood trauma and abuse can and in a statistically significant number of cases does contribute to problem behaviour (perhaps even in a majority of cases, although we can't quantify it because we don't gather the relevant data). This draws upon several decades of international research still seemingly unknown in our "knowledge society" and "clever country", and certainly not referenced by almost anybody commenting on DV/"gendered violence" in Australia. However, this evidence also then means that such violence is motivated arguably by factors the exact opposite, and largely sub-consciously, of what is being assumed, and again have little to do with purported misogyny. On the contrary, coercive control in particular is often about male emotional and psychological dependence upon intimate partners and fear of losing them, due to emotional deprivation and abuse during that childhood trauma. These are things unfortunately not acknowledged by Evan Stark. And while, according to this discussion, Schore is made to imply that girls could not be affected in the way that boys are because their brains develop more quickly, this has the effect of suggesting hat women do not perpetrate DV in any form due to such childhood abuse and trauma at all, but that it his only a boys thing. That implied assertion, if intended, is contradicted by the available evidence, where arguably most female DV is in the form of coercive, controlling, manipulating and bullying behaviour. As far as we have evidence for this under-reported problem, it is also acknowledged in Australian DV studies and inquires, and should therefore not be dismissed.
A brilliant read and such an honest and thought provoking analysis of what isn’t working and the need to target intervention/prevention more effectively. Let’s reboot ambitiously with a quick four you’ve already flagged : (i) aggressive advertising & promotion of gambling - multiple apps etc closely aligned to sport eg Rugby League and horse racing, suggesting that ‘all real blokes gamble.’ (ii) readily available porn portraying sexual coercion ‘enjoyed’ by young women; (iii) a reasonably sound Family Law system, yet so effectively weaponised by coercively controlling men along with their legal representatives to further harm women and children; (iv) the fact that leaving a DV situation is the ‘path to poverty and homelessness’ as it has always been for so many women and children. I’d suggest that the current housing crisis alone would thrust these women into conditions as bad or worse than pre Parenting Single payment of 1975.
I'm grateful for your work on this, Jess. While I note the gap I'm going to raise is not the only one, it's the one I'm intimately familiar with, so it's also the one I note never seems to be addressed: how the immigration system is weaponised by perpetrators, and is thus complicit in abuse of migrants. Too many people are re-traumatised by the immigration system that seeks to remove them from this country if they seek safety by leaving their violent partners. While I'm aware the system has changed for the better since I was in that position (and I'm here to tell the tale because I won my legal battle), I fear too many migrants slip through the cracks for systemic reasons. Healing is hard at the best of times, but especially so when we're subject to a system that puts us at increased risk. My own journey was long and arduous, and the PTSD I experienced was, I believe, exacerbated by the system I had to seek refuge in that did not have my back, and further facilitated my perpetrator's aggression against me. I think it's important to tell stories like these so that people know who the most disadvantaged people are: those who don't even have rights or access to resources when they leave their abusers. I think most of us are silent because we've been effectively silenced, not because we don't have stories to tell that need to be heard.
Interesting to see how gendered violence has changed over time. Edith Cowan, the first Australian woman in parliament, saw the interconnectedness of issues such as gendered violence, public health, education and child abuse. For example, she strongly supported alcohol licensing legislation - When she was 15, her father very publicly and drunkenly murdered his second wife. She also believed that similar to women’s suffrage, the fight for women to sit in parliament was about more than just rights, and that “men need a reminder sometimes from women beside them that will make them realise all that can be done”.
So, the penny has dropped: unjust and plain stupid smearing all men (and no women) as DV perps has back-fired. But guess what? The result is, for many men: why defend a woman in public? She'll only hate you anyway. No more opening doors, helping with strollers (unless its a bloke driving), chatting to a lone woman at a party or a pub: just chatting. No more giving way to a woman in a queue or at a doorway; after all, why would a man? They would only hate us more.
It doesn't help that 99% of anti-child abuse/child going missing public service announcements and movies/TV mini-series use little girls as the child lead. 45% of child abuse/murder victims are boys - and that is just the official stats -- the real tally is likely much higher -- The simple reason: for a girl to admit to her violation is to label her a victim, but for a boy it's also emasculating, which is like a double assault.
This is a brilliant article. I am a pharmacist and in my professional life, I have seen the aftermath of physical DV all my career. My father was abusive and dangerous for any child in his orbit. My ex-husband was coercively controlling, but I did not have personal experience of physical DV. My wife has personal and professional experience in ALL aspects of DV and coercive control unfortunately. She works in the welfare sector, and deals with the aftermath of DV on children every day.
That changed thanks to my step-son "L" (21), who I love and fear in equal amount. L is neurodiverget, and very very violent. He is also over 6 foot tall, and can dead-lift over 200kg. When he CHOOSES, he can be sweet, loving and caring. However, he often chooses violence and coercive control towards his mother and me. I'm gone through 3 Classic DV cycles, and I can't even guess how many my wife has gone through. This is not the forum to go through exactly what he does, but he has caused thousands of $$ of damage to our home, and caused both his mother and me significant psychological damage. After the 2nd last incident, he was banned from living with us (but free to visit when he wanted to) and now after the latest incident, he is fully banned from our property on pains of having a DV Order placed upon him.
After the last "incident", his father's wife came and collected any of L's belongings that remained at our house. She said "this is due to his father "N" NEVER holding him to account for his behaviour", and that L has "always been derogatory towards women all his life". She claims that she is also afraid of him. She refused to own her comments to us after L's father became involved.
His FATHER's response was crushing. "N" refused to believe that his son could be deliberately violent, and if HE is not afraid of L, then he can't see why we would be. He refused to hold L accountable, and put the violence down to "his autism". N was angry at US because an neighbour called the Police, so now L is on their radar for DV. Basically, N blamed US for L's behaviour. We are left with a physically broken home, that I have to work out how to fix with little excess resources. Somehow, its our fault that he destroyed our home.
Now I see where L gets the green-light for being domestically violent towards us. L is NEVER accountable for his actions - there is always an excuse that lets him off the hook. L's sister S told me in confidence that N "trash talks" about both his mother and me all the time. L has 2 step-brothers - my son, and his other step mother's son. Both young men abhor violence, and are afraid of L. I also suspect that N's wife is being subjected to coercive control DV herself.
I fear the day when L starts dating a young woman - she will be subjected to unending cycles of domestic violence. I will be warning any young woman he is interested in.
The last incident broke his mother's and my heart, as we faced the fact that L IS domestically violent and coercively controlling, and that these behaviours are entrenched. I tried to find him help to no avail. It is gut-wrenching to see that there is very very little help for young men who are domestically violent, and on top of that, his father (and his other step-mother) refuse to support us in trying to get him to be accountable, and to accept help (which he refuses anyway).
Until the day comes when a MAN stands up to L, makes him accountable for his actions and behaviour, L will continue to be domestically violent. I fear that the man who steps up to him will be wearing a police uniform, and the consequences will involve jail time. I also fear for the damage he will do to his future loved ones - esp a wife and children.
Its like I can see the out of control train hurtling down the track, and that there is no way of stopping before it ploughs into the broken down bus full of people stuck on the tracks.
Thanks for sharing this experience. It offers a perspective rarely heard in public discussion of DV. I don't understand much about what neurodivergence is or how it works, and I suspect it once went under different names and diagnoses. However, as with other mental illnesses or disorders in which violence can also manifest, and also including the lifelong neurological effects of childhood abuse & trauma (which I have personal experience of, and which I have also seen in women), as well as things like PTSD, which also includes violence and DV, I am unable to see how this is typically fully conscious or intentional or calculated, especially when some kind of dissociative or quasi-psychotic state is involved, which clearly isn't fully conscious. The effects of these traumata are visible on an MRI scan, so they are both psycho-social and physiological (in that order). Unfortunately, in the entire matter of DV, we are still seriously under-estimating the significance of mental illness as a major contributor to it, we are not seeing mental distress that is palpably being experienced (not only in relation to DV but also in other contexts), and it has too often been overlooked as a relevant factor when there is clear evidence of it. I understand the need for accountability, and that therapies like behaviour management - when done well, which it isn't always, nor is it an adequate "cure" for complex trauma - can be useful. But I can't see that it is an either/or problem, and I tend to think that all such individuals also need to live in a society in which they themselves feel safe, not threatened (that is often a sub-conscious and instinctive perception, not a fully visible thing), and in which they are able over time and with therapeutic support, to have sufficient and meaningful positive life experiences capable of overriding the effects of negative instinctive behaviours. That necessarily includes successful intimate relationships, which is, obviously, a major challenge. I don't agree with everything that Bessel Van Der Kolk proposes as therapies, but I do wish that everybody in this country concerned with such problems had read him (and others working in the same areas). Our society does not provide them with that sense of security and support, nor do we have many clinicians who sufficiently understand the nature of these problems and offer appropriate longer-term therapies, nor do we have a public mental health insurance system that makes all of that affordable - other countries do, but we don't. Barnardos estimates that currently around 1.25 MILLION children are living at risk in DV environments, while another estimate places it at almost double that - well over 2 MILLION children. That statistic needs to also include every child subjected to any other form of abuse and trauma as well - sexual abuse, incest, juvenile detention etc.. What of the accountability of all the individuals, government departments, child welfare workers etc. who perpetrate or fail to act to protect children here? What government has ever been held criminally culpable for our juvenile detention system and all the abuse it dishes out or the suicides and self-harming occurring in it, or the mistreatment and disadvantage that preceded that detention? Or for the poverty of more than 1 million children and the lifelong effects of that? These are all inter-locked problems. This is a ticking time bomb that we are doing nothing about, because some of those children will become adult DV perpetrators and/or develop other mental health conditions, social problems, commit suicide, have shorter life expectancy, become unemployed and homeless etc. etc. I'm not sure where neurodivergence fits into that, but it is no doubt also an element. We have absolutely NO mental health system capable of addressing all of this, not to mention the abused and traumatised women, nor any other adequate welfare & social service settings. Until we get a handle on all of this as well, we are already schooling the next generation of perpetrators.
So Neurodivergence is a catch all for Autism, ADHD, Dyslexia etc. These aren’t mental illnesses per se as we were born with a different neurological pattern - which can be seen with a fMRI scan. The latest thinking is that our brains aren’t just wired differently, but also seriously underproduce dopamine. Please don’t quote me - it’s not my area of expertise (I’m a pharmacist) and the research is changing our understanding almost on a daily basis.
So bit of background. EVERYONE in our home is neurospicy. I’m diagnosed with ADHD, Dyslexia & very mild autism (and severe cPTSD from the first 17 years of my life being abused). This is also my biological son’s (L’s stepbrother) diagnosis (not the abuse thankfully). My wife is mildly autistic as well. I suspect she also has PTSD as
her due to her first boyfriend putting her in hospital twice, quote “that was before I learned to swerve & duck when he tried to punch me”
My wife has been extremely supportive of L all his life and she has fought for services to help him from the time he was diagnosed at 11. This includes counselling, OT, Speech Therapy etc. As soon as he turned 18 he dropped the lot.
I suspect his father has been white-anting all her efforts from the get-go. This means that he has grown up
with conflicting messages sense he was a little boy. One house trying to teach him that women are fully capable of doing ANYTHING and the other teaching him that women are subservient to men. The sad thing is that his mum only found this out last month.
Unfortunately L has modelled himself on his father and now has ingrained misogyny. He doesn’t see anything wrong with the abuse & violence he inflicts upon his mother and myself. Please note that he’s coercively controlling and violent only towards his mother and I, he’s NEVER acts like this in his father’s house nor at work - no matter the provocation. That’s another reason why I KNOW that his behaviour is DV and not an autistic meltdown.
L was diagnosed with autism early on and ADHD last year. He holds down a full-time job (not a NDIS supported role). He has his own car and worked out at the gym for a minimum of 3 hrs every day. The only issue he has with work revolves around following safety standards to the letter and criticising anyone who doesn’t.
Every time he is extremely violent, he is cold -he’s never in a “red-mist rage”. He may scream abuse at us before and after he commits physical damage, but we can tell he’s NOT in an autistic meltdown - I’ve seen him in many, and he shuts down or he runs away.
We can see a great difference between the DV physical “episode” and an autistic meltdown. He also follows the classic DV cycle pattern. Currently, he’s in the honeymoon stage - with very big helping of self-pity. That’s why I was looking for help for him. As soon as he’s done with self-pity, that window of opportunity for intervention shuts.
Research has shown that Neurodivergent people are more likely to be the victims of violence rather than the perpetrator.
With L we have the perfect storm on our hands. He uses his autism as an excuse to get away with extremely bad behaviour. He’s also over 6 foot and is the most well-built man I’ve seen. His father N facilitates his abuse by chalking everything up to Autusim, and he has done so all his life. He’s also been taught to detest women (he’s straight btw) - I suspect this started with his father’s ineptitude, but I shudder to think about what sites he’s frequents on the Internet.
When he turnes up at our home, he refuses to talk - even to say hello. He just drops his work gear, showers & doesn’t care whose towel he uses and then demands that I find him something to eat. When he is like this, I feel like we have a dangerous animal in the house. I make no sudden movements, NEVER look him in the eye and do what he tells me to do to the letter. After he’s eaten, he gets up and leaves. I’m then left with a dirty kitchen, my towel needing to be replaced but relieved that he didn’t explode. I am aware this is FAR from normal behaviour and it’s coercive control.
He is obsessed with going to the gym, and he will read ANYTHING gym related. Unfortunately, this has left him very vulnerable to self-radicalisation. His doctor is also very worried as he has bulked up more than what is considered “natural”
His doctor also is concerned with possible steroid abuse. This would fit with the latest bout of violence. I’m very very glad that nobody was home when he turned up.
Wow! That shifts the goalposts of what we're talking about with DV quite a bit, definitely makes it an even more complex and multifaceted problem than we are perceiving, and difficult to know where or even how to start, if you want to prevent cases like this escalating into more DV. You indicate the role of misogyny, but imply that that is coming from a different kind of situation than what tends to be assumed, and that it isn't necessarily a primary cause. It will take me a while to digest this :-)
I would never have considered dyslexia in this basket at all. I tend to think of autism partly, at least, in terms of older developmental psychology (Frances Tustin et al.), granted, we now think more in terms of a spectrum, but it also looks somewhat like schizophrenia, if we view that not in terms of genetics (which are absent as a probable cause half the time anyway) and more in terms of how some sensitive individuals react to unperceived and sometimes self-imposed stressors, which is what one strand of the research has argued for half a century and which seems to be confirmed by inter-cultural comparisons where schizophrenia doesn't occur (it is literally unknown in some cultures), hence, viewing it as a product of our modern industrialised societies. That explanation is also confirmed by some memoirs of people with schizophrenia, as well as by the considerable range of severity and prognoses.
All of the diagnostic symptoms of ADHD are depression, anxiety, trauma and stress symptoms occurring in other conditions as well and easily (IMO) recognisable as being due to ambient determinants - I don't know if that's always the case, but I think it often is, and so I have a different understanding of this to what you appear to be suggesting. I think we are being affected by environmental stressors that we're not actually recognising, and which would explain why the WHO warned a decade ago that mental illness is becoming the global No. 1 health challenge - that can't be due to increased biomedical or genetic incidence, it has to be being caused by socio-economic change. I can't see any evidence in the DSM-5-TR that proves beyond reasonable doubt that it is a purely inherited biomedical condition. But there is always a question about what is called "inherited", isn't there? And it's difficult to discuss it without implying responsibility, but what is called "inherited" can be caused by an environment in which certain behaviours, emotions, attitudes are, however unconsciously and unintentionally, perpetuated, and so I'm not sure we are always justified in assuming a purely biomedical or genetic inheritance. I'm familiar with some continuing genetic-focussed research in relation to suicide and mental health, but so far, it looks as if genetic vulnerabilities are only activated in response to psycho-social triggers and only in some individuals, so it doesn't actually explain every case of anything. Anne Harrington, Allan Horwitz, Andrew Scull, for example, are interesting reads on some implications here. In any case, I think that depression, anxiety, and trauma - or at least the effects of it - all need to be viewed as mental illnesses.
Thank you for being so brave to share your very personal experiences.
This was so well researched and argued. Hopefully it can be a start of changing the dominant narrative and policy perspectives ( so many vested interests here). Particularly important how it calls out politicians lazy and ineffective proposals ( so pleasing to the chattering classes ideological predilections to say that it’s all men’s responsibility to fight misogyny as the root cause, when most of us don’t know any DV or coercively controlling men, or at least who would openly admit to it).
Insightful & intrinsically addressing all the issues, challenges & excuses prevalent in Australia regarding gender based violence against women. A must read. Congratulations on a phenomenally researched study encompassing so many facets of this insidiously abhorrent crime.
Reminiscent of the feminist drive for alcohol prohibition which was about preventing domestic violence: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jan/03/women-alcohol-drink-culture-prohibition-temperance. And the White Australia policy - the propaganda was that the Chinese settlements were seducing white women into opium sex slavery; the reality was that white women were escaping abusive drunken husbands, and the Chinese gave them sanctuary
Re the Grim Reaper: there was within the Health Department at the time knowledge that the Grim Reaper campaign was based on a lie - the lie that everyone was at risk of HIV. We knew that was not the case, from early on - but we also knew there was no constituency for socially challenging things like needle and syringe provision. The point of the Grim Reaper was not to create an awareness that HIV was threatening injecting drug users, which from what we saw in NY and New Jersey we knew it was; it was to create a belief that if HIV spread among drug users they would be 'the bridge to the general population'. We knew that was not true - but it worked: the campaign created a constituency of support for needle and syringe programs ... not to protect drug users from HIV, but to protect us from them. This put Australia in a world-leading, almost unique, position in prevention of an HIV epidemic driven by injecting drug use - one of the public health triumphs of the 20th century
As usual, the authors ignore the violence and abuse perpetrated by women and girls, as if that has nothing to do with the violence and abuse perpetrated against women and girls. Conflating violence against women with violence against children is also disingenuous since it is primarily mothers who are responsible for the neglect, emotional abuse and violence perpetrated against children. Children ought to be the primary focus of prevention programs since they are the most vulnerable in society and it is traumatised children who are the ones most likely to use violence and coercive control as adults. However, that would inevitably draw attention to who is mistreating children, which feminists are loathe to do because it undermines the myth of women as virtuous victims.
Prevention programs that do not recognise that males and female can be both perpetrators and victims, and are often both, do nothing to end the cycle of violence, as demonstrated so well in this article. All they do is breed mutual mistrust and resentment between the sexes, which is now at stratospheric levels and threatening the future existence of our civilisation. If we don't replace ourselves then we will be replaced.
There was a time when I cared about violence against women. Like most boys, I was raised by my father to believe that boys should never hit girls, and that males had a duty to protect females. However, life taught me to question and then reject those sexist, gynocentric assumptions. Having experienced physical, emotional and financial abuse from a former fiance, endless sex discrimination in education and employment, abandonment and neglect by my mothers, and 24/7 demonisation for the unforgiveable sin of being born male, I think of violence against women as karma for the appalling behaviour of women towards men and boys. I would prefer there to be no violence or abuse in the world but while women steadfastly refuse to take any responsibility for their ongoing aggression, violence against women is of zero concern to me. I wouldn't rule it out myself because people who take away the basic civil rights of others do not deserve safety.
This is an excellent article. I have worked in both gender-based violence response and prevention for many years and the lack of progress is very depressing. I fully support reviewing the current approach. I oversaw a project that investigated the link between gambling and family violence a number of years ago and despite the findings we simply couldn't get any government buy into the issue (even though it was funded by a government funded statutory authority). We definitely need to start thinking about how to tackle the issues that underpin frequency and severity of violence against women and children.
Fabulous article. I align with much of what you raised. My observation of working in frontline primary prevention is there is never adequate investment/funding from federal/state to have an impact. Therefore it is difficult to say what we currently have as not working when it has never had the resources and funds behind it in the first place to implement change. In my experience funding for prevention is drip feed or none at all.
Excellent piece. Very encouraging to finally see some acknowledgement of the causal connection between trauma experienced in childhood, especially by boys, and their later adolescent and adult behaviour. Evidence of this has been available internationally for several decades but has not sufficiently informed Australian discussion of DV. Ambient socio-economic determinants as stressors need to be taken more seriously - they were very apparent during the lockdowns but the dots were not joined. Sexual aggression can also be driven by trauma and socio-economic disadvantage, and boys are not all inevitably seduced by porn simply because it's available. More use of half a century of research on human sexuality and its unconscious drivers would be desirable. Some coercive control is unconscious survival and compensatory strategies learned during childhood abuse and trauma and taken unconsciously into adulthood as normalised, but because the impact of trauma is not sufficiently acknowledged, and because the dominant narrative around DV assumes misogyny - which is the opposite of what is often really occurring - we still don't understand coercive controlling behaviour adequately. Childhood abuse and trauma caused not only by DV but by ANY form of abuse and disadvantage (including poverty, juvenile detention, bullying, sexual abuse etc.) can result in multiple mental health issues that are still being ignored in their contribution to alleged DV, as evidenced in responses to multiple high-profile cases. Good support for all victims at all ages and stages requires a universally and immediately accessible public mental health system, which Australia does not have, and until we DO have it, most victim survivors will be failed, and hence problems perpetuated. Resilience and recovery also require a far more socially just and inclusive and supportive society than Australia is today, which means that no matter how resilient survivors may be, they can still be failed at any later stage of their lives and revert back to previous stags of mental and behavioural distress. Suicide can be a direct consequence of DV, but suicide prevention in Australia is also still in the dark ages.
The discussion of the Scandinavian example appears to assume that men are being violent in reaction to the equality that women enjoy in those societies, as if the only possible explanation of male behaviour here can be as some form of their own perceived loss of power and privilege. That kind of argument might have some kind of validity, and cannot be entirely excluded in every case, but on the one hand, normal scholarly requirements would involve canvassing every other possible explanation and demonstrating that none of them iis valid except the one proposed - which has not been undertaken here - and on the other hand, it remains a very reductionist kind of argument, and still fails to consider whether there might be more than merely one single explanation for this pattern. There are widely discussed socio-economic factors also now feeding much purported misogyny and male aggression around the western world, also evidenced in Australia during the lockdowns, which have little directly to do with women but much to do with extraneous stressors, and these ought to be more prominent in current discussion of DV. That would then mean that intimate partners become victims at least some of the time not by virtue of being women (same sex partners also become victims), but rather by virtue of being closest to the alleged perpetrator. The reliance upon Allan Schore is encouraging insofar as it - almost alone amongst all discussion of DV in Australia, and hence very riskily, acknowledges that any form of childhood trauma and abuse can and in a statistically significant number of cases does contribute to problem behaviour (perhaps even in a majority of cases, although we can't quantify it because we don't gather the relevant data). This draws upon several decades of international research still seemingly unknown in our "knowledge society" and "clever country", and certainly not referenced by almost anybody commenting on DV/"gendered violence" in Australia. However, this evidence also then means that such violence is motivated arguably by factors the exact opposite, and largely sub-consciously, of what is being assumed, and again have little to do with purported misogyny. On the contrary, coercive control in particular is often about male emotional and psychological dependence upon intimate partners and fear of losing them, due to emotional deprivation and abuse during that childhood trauma. These are things unfortunately not acknowledged by Evan Stark. And while, according to this discussion, Schore is made to imply that girls could not be affected in the way that boys are because their brains develop more quickly, this has the effect of suggesting hat women do not perpetrate DV in any form due to such childhood abuse and trauma at all, but that it his only a boys thing. That implied assertion, if intended, is contradicted by the available evidence, where arguably most female DV is in the form of coercive, controlling, manipulating and bullying behaviour. As far as we have evidence for this under-reported problem, it is also acknowledged in Australian DV studies and inquires, and should therefore not be dismissed.
A brilliant read and such an honest and thought provoking analysis of what isn’t working and the need to target intervention/prevention more effectively. Let’s reboot ambitiously with a quick four you’ve already flagged : (i) aggressive advertising & promotion of gambling - multiple apps etc closely aligned to sport eg Rugby League and horse racing, suggesting that ‘all real blokes gamble.’ (ii) readily available porn portraying sexual coercion ‘enjoyed’ by young women; (iii) a reasonably sound Family Law system, yet so effectively weaponised by coercively controlling men along with their legal representatives to further harm women and children; (iv) the fact that leaving a DV situation is the ‘path to poverty and homelessness’ as it has always been for so many women and children. I’d suggest that the current housing crisis alone would thrust these women into conditions as bad or worse than pre Parenting Single payment of 1975.
I'm grateful for your work on this, Jess. While I note the gap I'm going to raise is not the only one, it's the one I'm intimately familiar with, so it's also the one I note never seems to be addressed: how the immigration system is weaponised by perpetrators, and is thus complicit in abuse of migrants. Too many people are re-traumatised by the immigration system that seeks to remove them from this country if they seek safety by leaving their violent partners. While I'm aware the system has changed for the better since I was in that position (and I'm here to tell the tale because I won my legal battle), I fear too many migrants slip through the cracks for systemic reasons. Healing is hard at the best of times, but especially so when we're subject to a system that puts us at increased risk. My own journey was long and arduous, and the PTSD I experienced was, I believe, exacerbated by the system I had to seek refuge in that did not have my back, and further facilitated my perpetrator's aggression against me. I think it's important to tell stories like these so that people know who the most disadvantaged people are: those who don't even have rights or access to resources when they leave their abusers. I think most of us are silent because we've been effectively silenced, not because we don't have stories to tell that need to be heard.
One big problem. You can't connect with men because you don't understand them.
... and they don't understand men because of their prejudice against them.
Interesting to see how gendered violence has changed over time. Edith Cowan, the first Australian woman in parliament, saw the interconnectedness of issues such as gendered violence, public health, education and child abuse. For example, she strongly supported alcohol licensing legislation - When she was 15, her father very publicly and drunkenly murdered his second wife. She also believed that similar to women’s suffrage, the fight for women to sit in parliament was about more than just rights, and that “men need a reminder sometimes from women beside them that will make them realise all that can be done”.
An excellent summary and useful addition to the literature on DFV/IPV.
So, the penny has dropped: unjust and plain stupid smearing all men (and no women) as DV perps has back-fired. But guess what? The result is, for many men: why defend a woman in public? She'll only hate you anyway. No more opening doors, helping with strollers (unless its a bloke driving), chatting to a lone woman at a party or a pub: just chatting. No more giving way to a woman in a queue or at a doorway; after all, why would a man? They would only hate us more.
It doesn't help that 99% of anti-child abuse/child going missing public service announcements and movies/TV mini-series use little girls as the child lead. 45% of child abuse/murder victims are boys - and that is just the official stats -- the real tally is likely much higher -- The simple reason: for a girl to admit to her violation is to label her a victim, but for a boy it's also emasculating, which is like a double assault.
This is a brilliant article. I am a pharmacist and in my professional life, I have seen the aftermath of physical DV all my career. My father was abusive and dangerous for any child in his orbit. My ex-husband was coercively controlling, but I did not have personal experience of physical DV. My wife has personal and professional experience in ALL aspects of DV and coercive control unfortunately. She works in the welfare sector, and deals with the aftermath of DV on children every day.
That changed thanks to my step-son "L" (21), who I love and fear in equal amount. L is neurodiverget, and very very violent. He is also over 6 foot tall, and can dead-lift over 200kg. When he CHOOSES, he can be sweet, loving and caring. However, he often chooses violence and coercive control towards his mother and me. I'm gone through 3 Classic DV cycles, and I can't even guess how many my wife has gone through. This is not the forum to go through exactly what he does, but he has caused thousands of $$ of damage to our home, and caused both his mother and me significant psychological damage. After the 2nd last incident, he was banned from living with us (but free to visit when he wanted to) and now after the latest incident, he is fully banned from our property on pains of having a DV Order placed upon him.
After the last "incident", his father's wife came and collected any of L's belongings that remained at our house. She said "this is due to his father "N" NEVER holding him to account for his behaviour", and that L has "always been derogatory towards women all his life". She claims that she is also afraid of him. She refused to own her comments to us after L's father became involved.
His FATHER's response was crushing. "N" refused to believe that his son could be deliberately violent, and if HE is not afraid of L, then he can't see why we would be. He refused to hold L accountable, and put the violence down to "his autism". N was angry at US because an neighbour called the Police, so now L is on their radar for DV. Basically, N blamed US for L's behaviour. We are left with a physically broken home, that I have to work out how to fix with little excess resources. Somehow, its our fault that he destroyed our home.
Now I see where L gets the green-light for being domestically violent towards us. L is NEVER accountable for his actions - there is always an excuse that lets him off the hook. L's sister S told me in confidence that N "trash talks" about both his mother and me all the time. L has 2 step-brothers - my son, and his other step mother's son. Both young men abhor violence, and are afraid of L. I also suspect that N's wife is being subjected to coercive control DV herself.
I fear the day when L starts dating a young woman - she will be subjected to unending cycles of domestic violence. I will be warning any young woman he is interested in.
The last incident broke his mother's and my heart, as we faced the fact that L IS domestically violent and coercively controlling, and that these behaviours are entrenched. I tried to find him help to no avail. It is gut-wrenching to see that there is very very little help for young men who are domestically violent, and on top of that, his father (and his other step-mother) refuse to support us in trying to get him to be accountable, and to accept help (which he refuses anyway).
Until the day comes when a MAN stands up to L, makes him accountable for his actions and behaviour, L will continue to be domestically violent. I fear that the man who steps up to him will be wearing a police uniform, and the consequences will involve jail time. I also fear for the damage he will do to his future loved ones - esp a wife and children.
Its like I can see the out of control train hurtling down the track, and that there is no way of stopping before it ploughs into the broken down bus full of people stuck on the tracks.
Thanks for sharing this experience. It offers a perspective rarely heard in public discussion of DV. I don't understand much about what neurodivergence is or how it works, and I suspect it once went under different names and diagnoses. However, as with other mental illnesses or disorders in which violence can also manifest, and also including the lifelong neurological effects of childhood abuse & trauma (which I have personal experience of, and which I have also seen in women), as well as things like PTSD, which also includes violence and DV, I am unable to see how this is typically fully conscious or intentional or calculated, especially when some kind of dissociative or quasi-psychotic state is involved, which clearly isn't fully conscious. The effects of these traumata are visible on an MRI scan, so they are both psycho-social and physiological (in that order). Unfortunately, in the entire matter of DV, we are still seriously under-estimating the significance of mental illness as a major contributor to it, we are not seeing mental distress that is palpably being experienced (not only in relation to DV but also in other contexts), and it has too often been overlooked as a relevant factor when there is clear evidence of it. I understand the need for accountability, and that therapies like behaviour management - when done well, which it isn't always, nor is it an adequate "cure" for complex trauma - can be useful. But I can't see that it is an either/or problem, and I tend to think that all such individuals also need to live in a society in which they themselves feel safe, not threatened (that is often a sub-conscious and instinctive perception, not a fully visible thing), and in which they are able over time and with therapeutic support, to have sufficient and meaningful positive life experiences capable of overriding the effects of negative instinctive behaviours. That necessarily includes successful intimate relationships, which is, obviously, a major challenge. I don't agree with everything that Bessel Van Der Kolk proposes as therapies, but I do wish that everybody in this country concerned with such problems had read him (and others working in the same areas). Our society does not provide them with that sense of security and support, nor do we have many clinicians who sufficiently understand the nature of these problems and offer appropriate longer-term therapies, nor do we have a public mental health insurance system that makes all of that affordable - other countries do, but we don't. Barnardos estimates that currently around 1.25 MILLION children are living at risk in DV environments, while another estimate places it at almost double that - well over 2 MILLION children. That statistic needs to also include every child subjected to any other form of abuse and trauma as well - sexual abuse, incest, juvenile detention etc.. What of the accountability of all the individuals, government departments, child welfare workers etc. who perpetrate or fail to act to protect children here? What government has ever been held criminally culpable for our juvenile detention system and all the abuse it dishes out or the suicides and self-harming occurring in it, or the mistreatment and disadvantage that preceded that detention? Or for the poverty of more than 1 million children and the lifelong effects of that? These are all inter-locked problems. This is a ticking time bomb that we are doing nothing about, because some of those children will become adult DV perpetrators and/or develop other mental health conditions, social problems, commit suicide, have shorter life expectancy, become unemployed and homeless etc. etc. I'm not sure where neurodivergence fits into that, but it is no doubt also an element. We have absolutely NO mental health system capable of addressing all of this, not to mention the abused and traumatised women, nor any other adequate welfare & social service settings. Until we get a handle on all of this as well, we are already schooling the next generation of perpetrators.
Hi. Thanks for your reply.
So Neurodivergence is a catch all for Autism, ADHD, Dyslexia etc. These aren’t mental illnesses per se as we were born with a different neurological pattern - which can be seen with a fMRI scan. The latest thinking is that our brains aren’t just wired differently, but also seriously underproduce dopamine. Please don’t quote me - it’s not my area of expertise (I’m a pharmacist) and the research is changing our understanding almost on a daily basis.
So bit of background. EVERYONE in our home is neurospicy. I’m diagnosed with ADHD, Dyslexia & very mild autism (and severe cPTSD from the first 17 years of my life being abused). This is also my biological son’s (L’s stepbrother) diagnosis (not the abuse thankfully). My wife is mildly autistic as well. I suspect she also has PTSD as
her due to her first boyfriend putting her in hospital twice, quote “that was before I learned to swerve & duck when he tried to punch me”
My wife has been extremely supportive of L all his life and she has fought for services to help him from the time he was diagnosed at 11. This includes counselling, OT, Speech Therapy etc. As soon as he turned 18 he dropped the lot.
I suspect his father has been white-anting all her efforts from the get-go. This means that he has grown up
with conflicting messages sense he was a little boy. One house trying to teach him that women are fully capable of doing ANYTHING and the other teaching him that women are subservient to men. The sad thing is that his mum only found this out last month.
Unfortunately L has modelled himself on his father and now has ingrained misogyny. He doesn’t see anything wrong with the abuse & violence he inflicts upon his mother and myself. Please note that he’s coercively controlling and violent only towards his mother and I, he’s NEVER acts like this in his father’s house nor at work - no matter the provocation. That’s another reason why I KNOW that his behaviour is DV and not an autistic meltdown.
L was diagnosed with autism early on and ADHD last year. He holds down a full-time job (not a NDIS supported role). He has his own car and worked out at the gym for a minimum of 3 hrs every day. The only issue he has with work revolves around following safety standards to the letter and criticising anyone who doesn’t.
Every time he is extremely violent, he is cold -he’s never in a “red-mist rage”. He may scream abuse at us before and after he commits physical damage, but we can tell he’s NOT in an autistic meltdown - I’ve seen him in many, and he shuts down or he runs away.
We can see a great difference between the DV physical “episode” and an autistic meltdown. He also follows the classic DV cycle pattern. Currently, he’s in the honeymoon stage - with very big helping of self-pity. That’s why I was looking for help for him. As soon as he’s done with self-pity, that window of opportunity for intervention shuts.
Research has shown that Neurodivergent people are more likely to be the victims of violence rather than the perpetrator.
With L we have the perfect storm on our hands. He uses his autism as an excuse to get away with extremely bad behaviour. He’s also over 6 foot and is the most well-built man I’ve seen. His father N facilitates his abuse by chalking everything up to Autusim, and he has done so all his life. He’s also been taught to detest women (he’s straight btw) - I suspect this started with his father’s ineptitude, but I shudder to think about what sites he’s frequents on the Internet.
When he turnes up at our home, he refuses to talk - even to say hello. He just drops his work gear, showers & doesn’t care whose towel he uses and then demands that I find him something to eat. When he is like this, I feel like we have a dangerous animal in the house. I make no sudden movements, NEVER look him in the eye and do what he tells me to do to the letter. After he’s eaten, he gets up and leaves. I’m then left with a dirty kitchen, my towel needing to be replaced but relieved that he didn’t explode. I am aware this is FAR from normal behaviour and it’s coercive control.
He is obsessed with going to the gym, and he will read ANYTHING gym related. Unfortunately, this has left him very vulnerable to self-radicalisation. His doctor is also very worried as he has bulked up more than what is considered “natural”
His doctor also is concerned with possible steroid abuse. This would fit with the latest bout of violence. I’m very very glad that nobody was home when he turned up.
Wow! That shifts the goalposts of what we're talking about with DV quite a bit, definitely makes it an even more complex and multifaceted problem than we are perceiving, and difficult to know where or even how to start, if you want to prevent cases like this escalating into more DV. You indicate the role of misogyny, but imply that that is coming from a different kind of situation than what tends to be assumed, and that it isn't necessarily a primary cause. It will take me a while to digest this :-)
I would never have considered dyslexia in this basket at all. I tend to think of autism partly, at least, in terms of older developmental psychology (Frances Tustin et al.), granted, we now think more in terms of a spectrum, but it also looks somewhat like schizophrenia, if we view that not in terms of genetics (which are absent as a probable cause half the time anyway) and more in terms of how some sensitive individuals react to unperceived and sometimes self-imposed stressors, which is what one strand of the research has argued for half a century and which seems to be confirmed by inter-cultural comparisons where schizophrenia doesn't occur (it is literally unknown in some cultures), hence, viewing it as a product of our modern industrialised societies. That explanation is also confirmed by some memoirs of people with schizophrenia, as well as by the considerable range of severity and prognoses.
All of the diagnostic symptoms of ADHD are depression, anxiety, trauma and stress symptoms occurring in other conditions as well and easily (IMO) recognisable as being due to ambient determinants - I don't know if that's always the case, but I think it often is, and so I have a different understanding of this to what you appear to be suggesting. I think we are being affected by environmental stressors that we're not actually recognising, and which would explain why the WHO warned a decade ago that mental illness is becoming the global No. 1 health challenge - that can't be due to increased biomedical or genetic incidence, it has to be being caused by socio-economic change. I can't see any evidence in the DSM-5-TR that proves beyond reasonable doubt that it is a purely inherited biomedical condition. But there is always a question about what is called "inherited", isn't there? And it's difficult to discuss it without implying responsibility, but what is called "inherited" can be caused by an environment in which certain behaviours, emotions, attitudes are, however unconsciously and unintentionally, perpetuated, and so I'm not sure we are always justified in assuming a purely biomedical or genetic inheritance. I'm familiar with some continuing genetic-focussed research in relation to suicide and mental health, but so far, it looks as if genetic vulnerabilities are only activated in response to psycho-social triggers and only in some individuals, so it doesn't actually explain every case of anything. Anne Harrington, Allan Horwitz, Andrew Scull, for example, are interesting reads on some implications here. In any case, I think that depression, anxiety, and trauma - or at least the effects of it - all need to be viewed as mental illnesses.
Thank you for being so brave to share your very personal experiences.
This was so well researched and argued. Hopefully it can be a start of changing the dominant narrative and policy perspectives ( so many vested interests here). Particularly important how it calls out politicians lazy and ineffective proposals ( so pleasing to the chattering classes ideological predilections to say that it’s all men’s responsibility to fight misogyny as the root cause, when most of us don’t know any DV or coercively controlling men, or at least who would openly admit to it).
https://aifs.gov.au/tentomen/insights-report/mental-health-australian-males-depression-suicidality-and-loneliness
Insightful & intrinsically addressing all the issues, challenges & excuses prevalent in Australia regarding gender based violence against women. A must read. Congratulations on a phenomenally researched study encompassing so many facets of this insidiously abhorrent crime.
Reminiscent of the feminist drive for alcohol prohibition which was about preventing domestic violence: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jan/03/women-alcohol-drink-culture-prohibition-temperance. And the White Australia policy - the propaganda was that the Chinese settlements were seducing white women into opium sex slavery; the reality was that white women were escaping abusive drunken husbands, and the Chinese gave them sanctuary
Re the Grim Reaper: there was within the Health Department at the time knowledge that the Grim Reaper campaign was based on a lie - the lie that everyone was at risk of HIV. We knew that was not the case, from early on - but we also knew there was no constituency for socially challenging things like needle and syringe provision. The point of the Grim Reaper was not to create an awareness that HIV was threatening injecting drug users, which from what we saw in NY and New Jersey we knew it was; it was to create a belief that if HIV spread among drug users they would be 'the bridge to the general population'. We knew that was not true - but it worked: the campaign created a constituency of support for needle and syringe programs ... not to protect drug users from HIV, but to protect us from them. This put Australia in a world-leading, almost unique, position in prevention of an HIV epidemic driven by injecting drug use - one of the public health triumphs of the 20th century
As usual, the authors ignore the violence and abuse perpetrated by women and girls, as if that has nothing to do with the violence and abuse perpetrated against women and girls. Conflating violence against women with violence against children is also disingenuous since it is primarily mothers who are responsible for the neglect, emotional abuse and violence perpetrated against children. Children ought to be the primary focus of prevention programs since they are the most vulnerable in society and it is traumatised children who are the ones most likely to use violence and coercive control as adults. However, that would inevitably draw attention to who is mistreating children, which feminists are loathe to do because it undermines the myth of women as virtuous victims.
Prevention programs that do not recognise that males and female can be both perpetrators and victims, and are often both, do nothing to end the cycle of violence, as demonstrated so well in this article. All they do is breed mutual mistrust and resentment between the sexes, which is now at stratospheric levels and threatening the future existence of our civilisation. If we don't replace ourselves then we will be replaced.
There was a time when I cared about violence against women. Like most boys, I was raised by my father to believe that boys should never hit girls, and that males had a duty to protect females. However, life taught me to question and then reject those sexist, gynocentric assumptions. Having experienced physical, emotional and financial abuse from a former fiance, endless sex discrimination in education and employment, abandonment and neglect by my mothers, and 24/7 demonisation for the unforgiveable sin of being born male, I think of violence against women as karma for the appalling behaviour of women towards men and boys. I would prefer there to be no violence or abuse in the world but while women steadfastly refuse to take any responsibility for their ongoing aggression, violence against women is of zero concern to me. I wouldn't rule it out myself because people who take away the basic civil rights of others do not deserve safety.