The last few months month has seen further progress in ensuring there are more services for male victims of domestic abuse, however, the justice establishment (and part of the media) still do not take their plight seriously or treat them as equals.
A new charity has been set in Scotland called Abused Men in Scotland who run a helpline (great coverage in BBC, The Sun, Scotsman amongst others) plus new services in Boston (Lincolnshire) and Leicestershire mean that men are able to get more support. There are national charities like the ManKind Initiative out there who provide central support.
On top of this, there is some very good research from the excellent Men's Advisory Project in Northern Ireland who looked at the experiences of male victims they had supported. They like others (Abused Men in Scotland and the ManKind Initiative) do not subscribe to the nonsense anti-male view that domestic abuse is a crime against a gender. Those that believe it is a gendered crime purposely do not want male victims to be supported.
However, while progress is made on that front the judiciary remain in a contemptible state of denial. Not helped by the stereotyping by the media.
We have already commented on the Equal Treatment Bench Book, a book that is clearly unequal.
Then a week or so ago, we had Judge Millford calling Dennis Long, a man who snapped after 30 years of domestic abuse and killed his wife, 'weak'. This was then picked up by the media who ran with the story that he was hen-pecked - when he had been hot repeatedly with an ornamental poker! There is an article on the ManKind Initiative website outlining the issue and is very well worth a read.
Judge Sir Nicholas Wall President of the Family Division gave a speech to Resolution, the family law legal service. The first part of the speech (from 8 onwards) looks at domestic abuse and he unbelievably says:
"In my experience, physical domestic abuse is largely a male problem. There are, of course, women who physically abuse their partners and their children, but they are, in my experience, the minority. This is not a politically correct opinion. The politically correct view is that domestic violence affects both sexes and is perpetrated by both. So, of course, it is, but male violence is, in my experience, more common. Moreover, in my experience, men are notoriously unwilling to admit to being the perpetrators of domestic abuse. Furthermore, it seems to me that if men embrace the comfortable doctrine that domestic abuse affects people of both genders, that is but a short step away from doing nothing about it."
This is unbelievable and chimes with the establishment view. Justice Wall has not got a clue how offensive his comments are to those male victims who suffer in silence. To say that it is politically correct view is Orwellian double speak, when the Government's own figures show one in three victims are male and that new services are springing up all the time because there is a need.
How will men feel comfortable in coming forward if these are the views of judges and of course if you are a male victim who comes before Justice Wall, he has already placed it on record that he thinks you are a liar.
While grassroots services are springing up all the time, the judiciary are holding progress back. They do not believe in equal justice when they think some victims (female) are more equal than other victims (male).
Posted by Skimmington
Sir Nicholas Wall's comments probably do reflect his experience,one of the key problems is the fact that few men come forward. This is highlighted by just comparing the British Crime Survey and the Crime Statistics where DV on men is clearly vastly unrepresented in the criminal justice system. So Justice Wall will judge mainly male as perpetrator cases. This confirms his view, one common in male judges, that men are more resposible than women. Of course the Crime Prosecution Service in particular approach this from a feminist point of view(just read their guidance on DV) and are unlikely to proceed even if the police and male victim wish to. What we have is a strange alliance of an old fashioned Judiciary still convinced they have to protect the "fairer sex" and modern gender feminism in law accademia full of the notion that women somehow can't be held to account for their actions because men are inherently more responsible. The latter is a very strange view to espouse if you want to argue women are equal to men!
The press follow this general line that women are somehow the fairer sex and helpless and men are their protectors or at least accountable for what they do. Bizarrely the earliest people to note this were many early feminists who wanted to challenge the very idea that women were inherenlty incapable of responsibility! For instance much of the early work on sentencing for crime which showed women were seem as sick or misguided if they offended but men were just bad, this fuels the continued differential sentencing. So of course Denis Long is called "weak" as it simply isn't in the patritian mind set to consider a man may have been a victim.
Well done Skimmington on a really good piece bringing together examples of groups and work still pushing this "wall" of prejudice and low gender politics. This mind set plays itself out in so many ways from the sad case of Mr. Long to Violence Agaist Women Strategies to Divorce to Pensions and positive action at work. Reversing this allaince of patritian sexism and selfish gender feminism is hard. Its a mountain to climb but there are men and women climbing it. Well done to them all. And well done TROM
Posted by: Groan | Sunday, 31 October 2010 at 12:32
according to the leader of the liberal party in Canada-men have only two issues
1. is violence against women
2. the gender gap
Posted by: outdoors | Sunday, 31 October 2010 at 13:49
In your article summary of 30th August, I commented on what you refer to (in this article) as a new Leicestershire service for men.
It is in reality, the Leicester Women's Aid i.e. a bunch of feminists discriminating against males but eager to grab what little cash is heading towards male victims.
Posted by: J. MacKie | Wednesday, 03 November 2010 at 08:48
I can see where you're coming from, and clearly, the judge is unfit for office.
However... Mr. Long was not a victim, he was an avid player and now that he has finally 'won' his 30 year hate game competition, the judge is entirely correct to not give him a break here, even if he did it for the wrong reasons.
"Then a week or so ago, we had Judge Millford calling Dennis Long, a man who snapped after 30 years of domestic abuse and killed his wife, 'weak'. "
Those retards had 30 years to move out and get a divorce. Instead, they stayed together, played the hate game and the result was that one of them died. What a surprise!
I don't see why we should support such abusive, stupid people at all, no matter what their gender.
The judge was merely using this case to pose with a political point he vainly thought would give him importance and set policy.
Let's keep out mind firmly on the judges' case here, we should not take Mr. Long's side here either -- although that is what the judge hoped to hide behind, because attacking his judgment means defending the indefensible.
Don't let Mr. Judge Milford get away with that lame trick, it's perfectly possible to point out that Mr. Long is a murderer and that Judge Milford a corrupt, inept shyster squatting on the bench.
Posted by: Hexe | Friday, 26 November 2010 at 16:25
A letter has been sent to the British prime minister by Mr Paul Randle-Jolliffe regarding the case of Hollie Greig, who is a downs syndrome girl who was systematically raped whilst under the protection of the establishment charged with protecting her.
Hollie’s mother Mrs Ann Greig would like to see some justice for member of the establishment, who through their positions were given access to this little girl and abused her as their own personal little sexual play toy. The reason Mrs Greig has never had the opportunity to have her day in court is because the accused paedophiles include lawyers, police and a local High Sheriff.
Various request under the freedom of information act (FOA) have been ignored and several people including her mother and Mr Robert Green have been silenced using gag orders including the BBC’s Panorama documentary channel in an effort to keep the story out of the public domain and the establishments have even gone so far as to make legal threats against Google.
This fight to bring justice has been raging for several years and despite millions of people now knowing about the case, it still seems that the British justice system is unable to live up to its name and has become a tool of the elite and Mr Cameron is hereby put on notice that ‘we the people’ demand this case should go to trial in open court where both sides may present their case.
Put quite simply Mr David Cameron we tax payers are being treated with utter contempt by the elite and are getting a little sick and tired of the system we are forced to pay into when it is you’re duty to ensure due process is observed or expect no mercy when you and the establishment is overthrown by the people you pledged under oath to defend.
MP Mr Kenny Macaskill, Mr Ian McFerran, Mrs Elish Angolini (Lord Advocate ), Frank Mulholland Are all aware of the case details and I am sure they won’t mind in assisting the prime minister in any preceding public enquiry into this disgusting clear breach of justice.
Posted by: jiff davis | Wednesday, 22 June 2011 at 18:26