Sick of reading headlines about dead women? You can do something about it
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Version 0 of 1. I’m sick of seeing headlines about dead women. Not sick in the sense of having had enough of something tiresome, but truly sickened in the most visceral way. “School cleaner charged with murder”; “Mother-of-four stabbed to death”; “Foul play probable”; “Man expected to be charged over fatal stabbing”; “Body found in NSW National Park”. Last weekend, Leeton teacher Stephanie Scott should have walked down the aisle, not been found dumped lifeless in a national park. Seventeen-year-old Masa Vukotic should have been studying with her friends, not being mourned by them. Jackie Ohide should have been playing with her sons, not lying dead in a South Australian cemetery. The heavily pregnant Kris-Dean Sharpley should have been with her children, not buried beside them. Related: 'These women are not statistics' – deaths in Australia in 2015 According to the Counting Dead Women researchers at Destroy the Joint, Scott, Vukotic, Ohide and Sharpley comprise just over 10% of the women murdered in Australia this year – so far, 31 women have met a violent, bloody end. And it’s only April. Some were killed by men they loved or had once loved, some were killed by men they thought they could trust. Some were killed by total strangers, with whom a chance encounter on a train or in a park led to death. Countless others, whose stories haven’t made the 6pm news, have been attacked, raped, beaten and abused. More still have been intimidated and made to feel unsafe in the safety of their own home or in the world they choose to inhabit. Men’s physical strength and ability to physically overpower women can mean a lot, or it can mean nothing, depending on how they choose the exercise that strength. In these cases, a man’s physical power means that women are dead. Jill Meagher was killed by a man, Salwa Haydar was killed by a man and June Wallis was killed by a man. Women are too frequently the victim of male violence in Australia, that much is clear. But despite these horrifying statistics, very little is being done about violence against women on larger scale. Relegating this violent disregard for the sanctity of life as a “women’s issue” is a disservice to the majority of men who believe that they shouldn’t hurt, abuse or kill women. Stephanie Scott’s fiancé Aaron Leeson-Wooley is a man – and for the rest of his life, he has to live with the cruel twist of events that led to a funeral instead of a wedding. Male members of Scott’s family, the male students she taught, her friends and her male co-workers will be forever affected by the murder of someone they loved. We need to start seeing violence against women – who comprised over 50% of the Australian population at the last census – as a stain on our collective soul, and scrub at it on both an institutional and individual level. State governments are making the right noises. The Victorian royal commission into family violence will aim to prevent domestic violence by improving early intervention and better support to victims. On the positive side, publicity around the royal commission is expected to lead to more women reporting domestic violence. On the other hand, cuts to homelessness services by the federal government mean that there may not be sufficient support services if they do. There is an equally contradictory situation in NSW, where premier Mike Baird has created the role of minister for the prevention of domestic violence – a first in Australia. The same government, however, has also been widely criticised for rescinding funding from women’s shelters, leading to the loss of up to 80 centres essential for women fleeing domestic violence. It’s not enough to mutter about what a shame it is when we see yet more dead women on our TV screens This patchwork of responses shows why a comprehensive nationwide response is needed. Like the federal government has done for what Tony Abbott last week called an “ice epidemic”, our minister for women needs to get serious about protecting the 11 million women in Australia from the threat of death they face. Funding for a comprehensive, nationwide approach must be secured – the $200m over eight years for the National Plan to Reduce Violence Against Women and their Children is not enough. Not when you consider the government will spend $4.1m on a propaganda film to deter asylum seekers, or provide $145m to commemorate the 100 year anniversary of the Gallipoli campaign on Anzac Day. It’s not enough to promise to address family violence without recognising that promoting gender equality is integral to the solution. On an individual level, it’s not enough to mutter about what a shame it is when we see yet more dead women on our TV screens. Grassroots activism is needed. It needs to start when men are still boys, through conversations about the total unacceptability of the crime that is violence against women and leading by example. The promotion of gender equality – so that men don’t see women as lesser beings to control, hurt and ultimately kill – is everyone’s responsibility. It’s the only weapon in our individual arsenal, and we must yield it fiercely. |