Men Can Be Victims Too

Letter to the editor: Daily Telegraph (Sydney)

Discrimination against men by the NSW Government continues. Community Services Minister, Linda Burney, has launched a program entitled “Staying Home Leaving Violence”. This program aims to remove perpetrators of domestic violence from their homes. However, Ms Burney makes it plain that she and her Department do not consider that men can ever be victims of violence by women.

As Ms Burney states “Staying home leaving violence helps to prevent homelessness by removing the perpetrator from the family home, meaning women and children can remain safely where they are. The program places accountability firmly on the shoulders of the violent offender and ensures women and children are not driven to homelessness…”.

Feminist influence on social; policy has been biased and inept. Categories of family violence, where women comprise a large or in fact a major proportion of the offenders (assault and homicide of children under 5 years of age and abuse of the elderly), are not classed as domestic violence.

Publications from the Federal Office of the Status of Women have stated that “Domestic violence is violence by a man against women and children” and that “Men can’t be victims of domestic violence, they can only feel they are.”

Men who are victims of domestic violence and their children are truly on their own. As well as the stigma and shame for male victims, government agencies and legal support services routinely discriminate against men.

The dreadful impact of female family violence can be seen in the childhood story of Jon Venables, the Bulger child murderer. My heart sank as I read of Jon lining up his teddy bears at night to protect him from another brutal beating at the hands of his mother. I urge people to look at the material available at the ‘One in Three campaign’ website at www.oneinthree.com.au.

Andrew Humphreys
1 Normandy Street
Narrawallee NSW 2539