BIG MAN: A Wake-Up Call for Women

Introduction

The opening paragraph of the Copenhagen Consensus in regard to violence against women reads: In the 1994 'Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women' the United Nations defines violence against women as "any act of gender-based violence that results in, or is likely to result in, physical, sexual or mental harm or suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether occurring in public or in private life."- page 19.

I recently issued this statement on my personal Facebook account:

"Seeing a lot of posts in my feed about domestic violence - seems to be a very shallow understanding of the subject - tend to think it's about hitting - but that's just the manifestation of a much deeper malaise in the male psyche ..

Domestic Violence & Violence Against Women is:

- the guy who uses you for sex then throws you away

- the guy who gets angry when you reject his advances

- the guy who tells you what to wear, who to talk to, how to think

- the guy who gets obsessively jealous for no reason

- the guy who focuses on your flaws to prevent his from being seen

- the guy who views you as an acquisition, a conquest, a successful invasion

- the guy who believes you owe him sex

- the guy who plays victim to gain sympathy and forgiveness

- the guy who blames everyone else

- the guy who controls you financially

- the guy who uses his children to keep a hold on you

- the guy who says you're asking for it if you show any skin

- the guy who criticises everything you're passionate about

- the guy who promotes his own intellect above yours

- the guy who verbally abuses you in public

- the guy who argues for the sake of it

- the guy who says you have to ask him before you do anything

- the guy who becomes enraged at the first sign of trouble

- the guy who believes he is beyond reproach

- the guy who lays claim to you long after you're through

- the guy who believes his goals in life are more important than yours

- the guy who destroys your self-esteem because he doesn't have any

The list is so much longer than this - but hopefully provides a deeper insight into domestic violence and violence against women as having a groundswell, an ever-present undercurrent long before the physical abuse starts.

I don't write this with any concern for abusive men and whatever solutions might be appropriate for their little problem. God knows it is their job to fix it. Not mine. Not yours, nor any woman's job, should it ever be, to play therapist, or healer of men's souls. I write this for women who don't see it coming, for whom the warning signs are overlooked in favour of a romantic notion. For women who believe this behaviour is a normal part of a healthy relationship, when they're already half-way dead. For women who may never meet the brunt end of a man's physical fist, but whose lives can be destroyed by the violent mentality of disrespectful, slanderous, controlling, deeply ill men who have managed to wear a mask to hide it all.