The comments of the Commission for Equality and Human Rights show the campaign to construct domestic abuse as what (some) men do to (some) women shows no sign of relenting (The Herald, November 28).
The commission points out that the figure of 41,498 women reporting domestic violence at the hands of men to the police is likely to be affected by under-reporting. It also points out that these women face a postcode lottery in terms of services. Both these propositions are true and need to be addressed.
It must surely be the case that the figure of 5489 men who report domestic abuse by their female partners and 882 for abuse reporting in same-sex relationships is an even greater under-representation. With the years of campaigning and with networks of support services such as Women's Aid and an awareness of domestic violence in services like the NHS, many women still do not report abuse. These supports are denied to male victims and victims in same-sex relationships. Research indicates many victims in same-sex relationships do not even recognise the sustained abusive behaviour of their partners as domestic abuse.
It is probably true that male victims, victims in same-sex relationships and the children associated with them do not face a postcode lottery - there are next to no services. The Scottish Government is funding a small-scale project to raise awareness of domestic abuse in same-sex relationships but it will not come to a magazine or billboard near you soon.
More needs to be done to address the plight of women victims of male abusers but that need not be at the cost of making other victims and their children invisible.
Brian Dempsey, School of Law, University of Dundee.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article