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Struggling to make a difference for male victims in Wales

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What’s it like being a man fighting for male victims of domestic violence in a world dominated by people whose primary concern is keeping the spotlight on female victims? Glen Poole of insideMAN speaks to Tony Stott of Healing Men, who has been campaigning on the issue in Wales for several years.

I’ve been watching men trying to influence public policy on gender issues for 20 years. I’ve seen fathers fighting for dads to have an equal right to be part of their children’s lives when parents separate. I’ve seen men who say their genitals were mutilated without their consent as children, fighting to protect boys from medically unnecessary circumcision. And I’ve seen men fighting for male victims of domestic violence to have equal protection and support.

The gender political war around domestic violence, in particular,  is one the most difficult gender battles to stomach as it puts anyone who attempts to advocate on behalf of male victims in direct conflict with those who work to help female victims—and nobody in their right mind would ordinarily choose to place them self in opposition to people speaking out for female victims.

Feminism has a problem with male victims

I have written elsewhere on the way the emergence of male victims and female perpetrators threatens the very existence of feminism and feminists who are the primary advocates of female victims. So it is a brave (or foolish) campaigner who attempts to tackle the status quo in a domestic violence sector that is dominated by feminists running services and programmes for female victims and male perpetrators.

One such man is Tony Stott of Healing Men who has been campaigning for male victims of domestic violence for many years, most recently in Wales, where he has been fighting the passage of a new Violence Against Women Bill—not because he supports violence against women, but because he believes it excludes male victims.

Last week Tony was at the Welsh Assembly watching the Bill being debated. He told me:

“I have been campaigning, pointlessly so far, against deeply sexist and unequal legislation being debated within the Welsh Assembly and wanted to see this at first hand in the Assembly chamber.”

Tony believes the Bill demonstrates that Wales has become a “Feminist One Party State”. He says the architects of The Bill have a gender political approach to domestic violence which can be characterised by the following passage from the book “Perceptions of Female Offenders” which describes the feminist view of the issue as:

“A result of patriarchal social systems where men are exclusively the batterers and females are exclusively the victims….This Neo-Marxian model posits the masculine (bourgeoisie) as occupying the upper rungs of privilege, authority, and power over the feminine (proletariat). Thus, domestic violence is the physical manifestation of his social dominance as it is forcibly imposed on her submissive feminine body. Conversely, female violence is initiated reactively, purely as a form of self-defence.”

Masculinity is seen as the problem 

Tony is particularly incensed by a passage in the “Task And Finish Group Report” which informed The Bill:

“Masculinity is associated with violence in most cultures and Wales is no exception; thus, all preventative work and interventions must be designed to address men’s violent behaviour, while at the same time recognizing that both men and women may be the victims of violence that is overwhelmingly perpetrated by men.”

Tony believes this viewpoint is nothing short of discrimination against men. “Would such a gross and wholly stupid statement be tolerated against black or Muslim peoples?” he asks. “No! But this statement against men and boys is supported and uncritically welcomed by the Welsh Government. “

Tony is genuinely concerned that all victims of violence get the help and support they need. He has followed and engaged with every complex stage of The Bill since its inception in 2012 and even launched a epetition that gathered support from campaigners around the world.

Radical gender warriors

He feels that the entire process has been “hijacked by the radicalised gender warriors” in Wales and transformed from a project which could recognise the complexity of intimate human relationships (and the necessity of including mutual and female abuse and violence for the sake of children) to the Violence Against Women, Domestic Abuse and Sexual Violence (Wales) Bill.”

After spending 90 minutes listening intently to the Welsh Assembly debating the Bill last week, Tony told be he was in “despair for men in Wales and fearful for the boys and girls in Wales who will be left to learn violent and abusive behaviour at the hands of violent and abusive parents”.

“The main discussion,” he says “was around the question of how quickly the Welsh Government could get organised to teach seven year boys the “masculinity is associated with violence .. and all interventions must address men’s violent behaviour” theme.”

“Some wanted this ‘education’ to be put in the Bill”, he said, “but the Minister, rather chillingly I thought, sought to appease by stating that the charity Women’s Aid have volunteered to send in staff to teach ‘Healthy Relationships’ in schools.”

Tony is deeply frustrated at what he sees as the refusal of the Welsh Government to give consideration to the needs of male victims, despite his constant hard work to bring the issue to the table.  But he isn’t giving up and he has one message for those who share his concerns—do not be silent!

—Photo credit: Flickr/ky_olsen

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Why I’m fighting a charity that supports female domestic violence victims

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Why would a man who wants to end violence end up fighting with a charity that helps female victims of domestic violence?

—This is article #75 in our series of #100Voices4Men and boys 

I’ve been fighting for male victims of domestic violence in Wales to be given equal treatment by the state for around seven years. As a result, one of the organisations I cross swords with in on a regular basis is Welsh Women’s Aid (WWA), a charity which has been supporting the introduction of a new bill that seeks to help women and girls in Wales, to the exclusion of men and boys.

As part of this work I co-ordinated an online petition which recently prompted WWA to send me an official letter, outlining their response to my campaign. The first thing I noticed was that the letter heading for WWA states very clearly “ putting women and children first”.

This raised a question for me “who comes second?”. One answer is boys who, unlike girls, are excluded by WWA from refuges for victims of domestic violence from quite a younger age. WWA’s letter also carried the statement and logo “ children matter” and yet they makes no reference to keeping girls and boys safe from all forms of domestic violence, including abuse by their own mothers.

WWA frequently mentions the number of women killed by their partner each year but not the 60 to 70 children who are killed each year by their parents. Surely this shocking fact in connection with domestic violence should be clearly recognised by those proclaiming that “ children matter”!

WWA also fails to address the human suffering and distress caused by domestic violence against women ins same-sex relationships. Surely this would be a priority in “ putting women first”?

Suicide amongst men is a major issue in Wales. Recent research has shown that men kill themselves after suffering domestic violence and that this could bring the number of deaths attributable to domestic violence to something like equality between men and women.

I believe that the shaming of men is contributing to these grim statistics and the WWA approach—i.e. “men second”—can only be making matters worse. I also wonder what impact the concept of “men second” may have on young Welsh boys and how young girls may feel about what is, or is not, it is an acceptable way to relate to boys.

Research by Dr Erica Bowen at Coventry University has found that it is seen to be OK to hit boys because “he probably deserves it”.

In a recent paper called “women more aggressive to partners than men”, given to the British Psychological Society, Dr Elizabeth Bates from the University of Cumbria said her research found that:

 “ … women engaged in significantly higher levels of controlling behaviour than men …. This study found that women demonstrated a desire to control their partners and were more likely to use physical aggression than men … Thissuggests that [domestic abuse] may not be motivated by patriarchal values and needs to be studied within the context of other forms of aggression, which has potential implications for interventions …”

Patriarchy theory 

I find it somewhat troubling that the current policy of the Welsh government continues to be based on the neo-Marxist “patriarchal” theory, which is increasingly inappropriate to new legislation looking forward into the 21st century in Wales.

Solid, evidence based research and practice that protects children and subsequent generations from all sources of domestic abuse (including violent women) must be the central principle that guides government policy and new legislation in Wales moving forward into the 21st century.

In my view, the neo-Marxist “patriarchal” theory continues to dominate the Welsh Government’s thinking as it has not undertaken to treat all victims (both men and women) “equally” in accordance with the Equality Act 2010.

Dr Amanda Robinson, who is the lead author of the report which informed the drafting of the Welsh Bill defines the neo-Marxist theory of domestic abuse as follows:

“The gender paradigm of [domestic abuse] argues that domestic violence is a result of patriarchal social systems where men are exclusively the batterers and females are exclusively the victims of male dominance and privilege.”

Neo-Marxist sexism 

“This Neo-Marxian model posits the masculine (bourgeoisie) as occupying the upper rungs of privilege, authority, and power over the feminine (proletariat).

“Thus, domestic violence is the physical manifestation of his social dominance as it is forcibly imposed on her submissive feminine body. Conversely, female violence is initiated reactively, purely as a form of self-defence.”

In my view, female instigators of, and active participants in, domestic abuse in Wales must be recognised equally and correspondingly with male victims in order to formulate interventions that help break the generational cycle of learned dysfunctional and abusive behaviours that perpetuates domestic violence.

Violent women and male victims must not be ignored or marginalised in the formulation of new legislation in the 21st century in Wales because of blind, radicalised dogma and Marxist theories that date back to 50 to 150 years ago.

It is time for us to take a new approach.

—Picture credit: DFAT

Tony Stott campaigns for men in Wales as “Healing Men”.

You can find all of the #100Voices4Men articles that will be published in the run up to International Men’s Day 2014 by clicking on this link—#100Voices4Men—and follow the discussion on twitter by searching for #100Voices4Men.

The views expressed in these articles are not the views of insideMAN editorial team. Whether you agree with the views expressed in this article or not we invite you to take take part in this important discussion, our only request is that you express yourself in a way that ensures everyone’s voice can be heard.

You can join the #100Voices4Men discussion by commenting below; by following us on Twitter @insideMANmag and Facebook or by emailing insideMANeditor@gmail.com. 

Welsh gender politics putting male and female victims at risk says men’s charity

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The Welsh government is putting male and female victims of domestic violence at risk by failing to manage a gender political row that has broken out in the principality over proposed legislation designed to tackle violence in Wales, campaigners have claimed.

Legislators in Wales initially planned to introduce a Violence Against Women (Wales) Bill to tackle domestic violence and other forms of abuse against women and girls. Advocates for male victims claimed the legislation excluded men and boys and the Welsh government responded to these concerns by changing the title to the Gender Based Violence, Domestic Abuse and Sexual Violence (Wales) Bill.

The move has angered advocates on both sides of the gender political debate with Welsh Women’s Aid, which plays a key role in the Wales Violence Against Women Action Group, leading the call for the Bill to revert to its original name, the Violence Against Women (Wales) Bill.

According to Paul Apreda, National Manager of FNF Both Parents Matter Cymru (a charity with links to Families Need Fathers  in England), the name of the bill is somewhat irrelevant as The Welsh Government’s plans are clearly focussed towards a Violence against Women agenda, but run the risk of failure because of an ill-conceived attempt to make them appear gender inclusive.

Women’s groups downplay problems facing men

According to a press release issued by Apreda last week,  pressure to recognise male victims within existing women’s services has resulted in a zero-sum game of men’s groups calling for equality of approach which have been countered by women’s groups downplaying the extent of the problem facing men.

Apreda took the unexpected move of backing Women’s Aid’s request for the Bill to focus on women and girls and called for the Welsh government to develop an additional strategy for helping men and boys.

“Having read through the consultation responses received from a variety of Women’s support groups we understand their concerns about commissioners ‘coercing’ women-only DV services to open their doors to men,” said Apreda. “We share their worry about the dilution of the focus on protecting women and girls – and have come to the conclusion that the Welsh Government has completely miscalculated with this proposal.”

‘We believe that if the Welsh Government fails to put forward a credible, realistic, appropriately funded and timely response for male victims they will be in breach of UK legislation on Gender Equality,” said Apreda. “We stand ready to work with Welsh Government on this separate agenda and we hope we can count on the support of Welsh Women’s Aid to return the support we’re giving them now”.

Lies, damn lies and statistics

However, any hopes that Women’s Aid would support the development of a separate strategy to help male victims were deflated when it was revealed that the charity had made a new submission to the consultation on the bill that stated:

“WWA believes that the term ‘violence against women’ does not exclude men and boys as it refers to a crime type rather than a particular class of victim. As women and girls are the overwhelming majority of victims of these types of violence and abuse and 95% of perpetrators have been found to be men, the benefit of retaining the term within the Bill far outweighs any initial confusion that may be cause in regards to coverage.”

This statistic was angrily challenged by the campaigner Mike Buchanan of Justice for Men and Boys who said in an open letter that this “lie” was a misrepresentation of data contained in a 2008 report by the Crown Prosecution Service. According to Buchanan:

“That report does not state that ‘95% of perpetrators have been found to be men. It states that 95% of those charged (over April – September 2006) were men – a very different matter. There are a number of reasons for this high proportion. Over many years British Crime Surveys have consistently reported that male victims are far more reluctant than women to report their abusers to the police and others. The justice system is institutionally biased against men, and treats women far more leniently.”

We must keep trying to find a solution

While not everyone on the men’s side of this gender political debate agrees with Paul Apreda’s approach, he does appear to have the good will and support of many advocates for male victims. Tony Stott of Healing Men who has campaigned tirelessly for the legislation in Wales to be gender inclusive told insideMAN:

“All those involved in domestic abuse should be treated equally and as individuals whether they are instigators or victims or both.  Support, resources and justice should be made equally available to all regardless of gender.  That is not to say that men and women should be treated the same – clearly men and women are of equal importance but each may well have different needs.

“Unfortunately, “different” has all too often meant denying the importance of men’s experiences of domestic abuse and the approach taken by FNF Both Parents Matter Cymru will help bring the inequalities in importance that men face into sharp focus.  This is a hugely difficult struggle but I feel it is so important that we keep trying to face and resolve this discrimination and inequality.  I hope this approach works!”

The challenge for the Welsh Government is to navigate the turbulent world of gender politics and come up with an approach to tackling violence in Wales that doesn’t favour either side of the debate and is equally capable of helping all victims irrespective of  gender.

—Photo credit: Flickr/Peter Harrison 

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