Enough is enough
This phrase has been shared countless times in the past month. Enough killing women. Enough with the constant threat of violence. Enough with the current model of resourcing violence prevention efforts.
The statistics show that 1 in 2 women will experience sexual harassment in their lifetime, 1 in three will experience physical partner violence, and 1 in 4 has experienced violence, emotional abuse or financial abuse by a cohabitating partner since the age of 15. These statistics were frightening enough. Now, one woman is being killed every 3.5 days in Australia. Enough!
Those working across the violence against women and women’s safety sectors have been desperate for decades, but this desperation and dire need for change has reached fever pitch, as evident by the national rallies calling for immediate action to keep women safe led by not-for-profit ‘What were you wearing’, and the vigils held across the country on May 1st for domestic violence remembrance day.
To be different, we need to think and act differently—we need to radically reconsider how we are resourcing women’s safety and prevention efforts across the country.
Since the establishment of a national organisation to prevent violence against women in 2013, there has been an increased focus on addressing the structural barriers that drive gendered violence – namely gender inequality and its manifestation through condoning of violence against women, men’s control of decision-making and women’s financial independence, rigid gendered stereotypes and male peer relations that promote aggression and control. However, the national investment into primary prevention, should not and cannot be at the expense of continued investment in recovery, response, and early intervention. These too are forms of prevention. We know from our work and research, that we cannot truly prevent gendered violence and keep women safe if we do not invest in all forms of prevention.
As Michael Salter and Jess Hill, have eloquently shared in their paper ‘Rethinking primary prevention’ “the gender equality approach has not only failed actually to reduce and/or prevent violence, it has achieved only marginal improvements to community attitudes over the past decade. We may be world leaders in funding and developing primary prevention – and that is certainly laudable - but we are not world leaders in actually preventing violence.” While the authors do not dispute the link between gender inequality and gendered violence they posit that there is a disproportionate focus on the ‘gendered drivers’ of violence, at the expense of addressing risk factors to violence, such as alcohol and drug abuse, previous exposure or experience of family violence, other childhood trauma, financial stress, gambling and the impact of pornography.
It is time for national, state, territory, and local governments to work strategically across all forms of prevention rather than cherry-pick initiatives that are not working keep women safe now, and are often creating competition for funding, rather than promoting collaboration across organisations dedicated to this work.
We support the recommendations for increased focus and targeted investment in the short-to-medium term to address risk factors such as regulation of the alcohol, drug, gambling, and pornography sectors, and increasing access to men’s behaviour change programs. It is also essential that we there is investment in the healing and recovery of boys and men who have been subject to violence (largely by other men) in childhood.
As practitioners in Tasmania, we have learnt that prevention work must be localised and tailored to specific geographical and demographic needs to be successful, and yes, this requires investment.
What has been core to our learning and practice is that:
National and state policy should not be reliant on non-for-profits and victim-survivors to lead and do all the work of prevention, recovery, and response without their support.
Incorporating lived experience and being ‘survivor-centric’ is essential, but this must be trauma-informed, resourced and sustainable.
We must move beyond the siloes of recovery, response, early intervention and prevention to ensure that there is an integrated suite of approaches that are resourced appropriately and tailored to different communities.
These changes need to occur now, because the current national plan, and previous plans, have not led to the significant change and increased safety that is so desired.
This does not mean that ending or simply replacing the great work that is focused on promoting respectful relationships, consent, positive role-modelling, bystander action, and gender equity.
However, we can do more than just wait for the significant cultural and behavioural change that will take time. We need to try something different. We need to do more to support men to heal and to change their behaviour, and we need to do more to engage in effective early intervention to address risk factors of violence. Australian women cannot wait any longer. Their safety and lives depend on immediate action.
This article was written by Kelsey Paske and Kathryn Fordyce and originally published by the Mercury Newspaper.
Kelsey is a sexual violence survivor and prevention practitioner, and researcher.
Kathryn is the CEO of Laurel House, a sexual violence organisation in Tasmania.
