“Those pushing the highly gendered view of DV are not doing so honestly. They quite deliberately hide and suppress information that does not suit their agenda's.”

The much touted ‘One in Three’ mantra is an example of this. What does it mean to say that one in three women experience domestic violence in their lifetimes? Does it mean that they once had a slap in the face in a forty year domestic relationship or does it mean that one in three are being beaten senseless on a daily basis? It tells us nothing. The measure of the amount of domestic violence should be measured by the number of acts of violence and the severity of those acts. This is how things are measured in every other form of crime. We don’t say one in three people are likely to experience robbery in their lifetime. We say that there have been x number of crimes of a certain type committed and let the listener draw their own conclusions.

Deliberately trying to mislead people by abusing the way statistics should be delivered is a sign of desperation.

"Don't forget the woman in Cairns who murdered 8 children."

This represents a truism of modern Australia: men's problems are criminalized while women's problem's are medicalized.

As I've often posted on OLO, it comes back to responsibility. Women just aren't expected to take responsibility for their actions like men.

It is absolutely disgusting that Batty was made Australian of the Year; a complete degradation the award. When people like Fred Hollows were made Australian of the Year it mattered. People who dedicated their lives to helping others. Now all you need is a personal tragedy and 'activists' will take advantage of you for their own agenda.

We might as well trash the award.

At least I can say the article itself was excellent. It's so nice to finally see more balance on these issues.

"It is absolutely disgusting that Batty was made Australian of the Year"

Dane I don't think enough is known at this point to support that view. I've not heard a lot of her speaking and what I have heard has mostly centred on the women as victims approach but I have also heard from her more than I've heard from many others in the field in terms of speaking against all violence.

From what I've seen I suspect the choice was tied in somewhat with Abbott chasing the women's vote and some to do with his paternalistic approach to women. Rather than a misogynist I suspect he is more old school paternalist.

There is a list of Australian of the year recipients at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Australian_of_the_Year_Award_recipients and given the high proportion of sports people and entertainers on the list I'm not in a rush to be critical of Rossie Batty without good cause.

R0bert

R0bert,
Paternalist or patriarch I wonder? Paternalist would fit most people's perceptions of Tony Abbott, he's one variation of the White Knight, the other is the male Feminist, the patriarchal view of women boils down to "different but equal", paternalism implies that women are "different but special".

Jay I tend to the view that it's paternalistic. I suspect many of us male and female in our society have elements of that. We were raised that way, women first, protect women etc. I still see parents teaching their children some of those values.

I'm not entirely adverse to some it as courtesies but object when it becomes government policy.

R0bert

R0bert.
Depends on how you were brought up, I didn't encounter any "princesses" until I was an adult, all the women I knew as a young person were practical and hardworking, they didn't need much looking after.
Even my older aunties, some of whom were full time housewives who never had a paying job were experts in their field, they had heads full of recipes and remedies and most of all they were fonts of wisdom and practical advice.