In Denial

I was challenged to write a blog about men making false allegation of Domestic Violence.  In fact, men are reluctant to make any sort of accusations for fear of not being believed.  The person who issued the challenge had taken offence at something I had written.  However, rather that debate a differing viewpoint, she took to verbally insulting me instead in a very aggressive manner.

What I did discover was a report following a review by the Crown Prosecution Service that such allegations are extremely rare:

http://metro.co.uk/2013/03/13/false-rape-and-domestic-violence-allegations-extremely-rare-3539568/

Appearing today in my newsfeed was a story about a businesswoman who brutally murdered her 8 year old son.  Bizarrely, her defence argued that the reason she killed was due to some accusations she made against two ex-partners.  There was no evidence to substantiate such claims.  In other words she was making false allegations against two men

http://edition.cnn.com/2014/09/13/justice/new-york-autistic-death-trial/

Some women’s organisations will grudgingly acknowledge that men can claim to experience Domestic Violence, but will then claim that a male victim is really a perpetrator. There is no evidence to support this claim, rather it is another smokescreen to hide the real truth.

Women, as well as men, can be violent in relationships.  This is nothing new.  Back in 1971, Erin Pizzey opened the first Refuge (Shelter) and discovered that of the first 100 women to enter, 60% were as violent or even more violent than the men they were claiming to flee from. 

http://www.avoiceformen.com/mens-rights/domestic-violence-industry/refuting-40-years-of-lies-about-violence/

Pizzey has been the subject of death threats and boycotts because of her research into the claim that most domestic violence is reciprocal, and that women are equally as capable of violence as men. Pizzey has said that the threats were from militant feminists.

Such claims have been consistent with academic studies taken all throughout the last 40 years including PASK 2012

Partner Abuse State of Knowledge Project (PASK) 2012 reveals the following:

The majority of Domestic Violence incidents is mutual – that is where both parties fight each other.

Population Surveys : 57.9%

Community Samples 59.6%

School & College samples 51.9%

Female oriented clinical samples 72.3%

Between 51.9% - 59.6% are mutual Domestic Violence situations. The big surprise is the figure of 72.3% which comes from clinical samples from Lesbian relationships.

In other words, the highest incidents of domestic violence have been found in lesbian relationships!!1

So what about scenarios where there is no reciprocal violence? PASK also asks that question.

The figures for Male assaults against female (non-mutual IPV) are:

Population Surveys : 13.8%

Community Samples 17.5%

School & College samples 16.2%

Perhaps surprisingly the figures for Female assaults against male (non-mutual IPV) are:

Population Surveys : 28.3%

Community Samples 22.9%

School & College samples 31.9%

Notice how woman are twice as likely to attack a male partner, than a male assault a woman without any reciprocal action.

And yet, society is still by large disbelieving about women aggressors.

I feel that many women remain in denial about their violent behaviour towards partners or ex-partners.  My ex certainly is even now.  Our children have challenged her about the assaults on me that THEY witnessed.  They saw her hit me, pour hot drinks over me and smash dinner plates (with food still on them) over my head.  And yet, she wasn’t violent!  She will admit to being a little clumsy and dropping things, but remains in denial about more severe deliberate violent acts.  I have also spoken with women who have eventually admitted hitting their partner.

For men when they hit a partner, there is no hiding place when reported or witnessed.  Some women though, remain in denial.  They believe that they can strike their partner because the partner is male therefore it doesn’t really hurt or their emotional/hormonal condition allows them to behave in such a way etc.  They think that because society doesn’t want to recognise that women can act in such fashion that they can deny they have anger issues or violent tendencies.  After all, no man will want to claim that their female partner is abusive to them, will they.  And even if the male is brave enough to speak out, who will believe him?  They can deny it and remain in denial about their own problems.

Offensive?

I got more reaction from my last blog than any other.  I was told it was offensive.  I was accused of making Domestic Violence gender-specific when it isn’t.  I was called sexist and a narcissist.  All my attackers were female. 

I found the charge of making Domestic Violence gender-specific quite ironic because regular readers will know that I find all violence abhorrent and I often state that there is never any excuse for any form of abuse, irrespective of gender.  What I do campaign about and highlight through this blog (and my own personal story)  is the inequality and the gender-bias way in which Domestic abuse is viewed by society.  The way in which it is reported suggests that men are always the aggressors and women the victims.  The truth, however, is different and that is what I try to show.  Men and Women can be Domestic Violence perpetrators and both genders can also be victims.  It is not a Gender issue, but was made one by the women’s movement (who continue to perpetuate this myth) and too many people are either too miss-informed or afraid to challenge this misperception. 

Blogging is about sharing your story and opinion.  Our opinions are often influenced by our own personal experiences.   If you choose to read my blog, I thank you sincerely.  You may agree with what I write.  You might disagree and have a different opinion.  You also have complete freedom to express whatever opinion you hold. I respect that and dialogue is always good in sharing different viewpoints.  Where I draw the line is when it becomes personal.  No-body has the right to insult another person.  I may not agree, but I can accept another’s opinion.  What is unacceptable is personal attacks because someone has a different view or opinion.  Hang on a minute, isn’t that how all conflicts and wars begin?  

So what caused such controversy?  I happened to post about a local young woman who made AND admitted to making false domestic violence allegations against her male ex-partner.  Such a story couldn’t be refuted as it was there in black and white.  What caused such offence was my comment that the leniency shown by the Judge wouldn’t have been the same had the wrongdoer been male.  How could I suggest such a thing? 

Making like for like comparisons in case is never easy, but several different stories appeared on my news feed today.

·         2 young women launch an unprovoked attack on a 77 year old  blind male bus passenger.

Punishment:  2 months suspender prison sentence

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/watch-sickening-attack-female-yobs-4281706

·         Female social worker admits falsely accusing Father of Child Abuse

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2720414/Why-I-falsely-accused-father-abusing-daughter-Police-leant-stand-claim-social-worker-told-tribunal.html

·         Judges are ‘ordered’ to be more lenient when sentencing female criminals

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1311004/Judges-ordered-mercy-women-criminals-deciding-sentences.html

So I caused offence when suggesting that women are possible of making false accusations and yet another example in reported.  My comments about judgement leniency caused outrage and yet, it is reported, judges have been instructed to make such rulings.

Trying to find  a like for like case, the closest I could find was a 78 year old Asian lady attacked by a 31 year old male.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1311004/Judges-ordered-mercy-women-criminals-deciding-sentences.html

The 31-year-old was arrested on suspicion of racially aggravated criminal damage, racially aggravated common assault and racially aggravated intentional harassment.  I couldn’t find the outcome of sentencing, but if this man was found guilty I doubt he would have been given a paltry two months suspender prison sentence.  He would have had the book thrown at him and rightly so. And just to re-address the balance, I can’t find any examples of men being arrested after making false domestic violence allegations.

All abuse and violence is wrong.  Those found guilty of such crimes should be punished equally.  Part of the punishment for incarcerated men is separation from family especially their children.  They are told that they should have thought about the impact on their children before they committed whatever the offence may have been.  Surely, the same incentive should be used in trying to deter women from committing crime too?  Instead, because they do have children they hope for leniency and a lighter sentence.  If you do the crime, you should be prepared to do the time.   

Karma

At a recent family gathering, I was asked what my views were concerning Karma.  It seemed a little strange as an opening gambit from a relative who I only tend to see at family occasions.  However, I’ve often posted about my spiritual journey which has taken me from being a Christian church minister  to flirting with Atheism.  So I guess, it wasn’t  that strange a question after all.  I had certainly been reflecting on my own beliefs and the origins of personal belief.  My initial response was to say that “it’s probably easier to say what I don’t believe, rather than what I do believe.”

I don’t believe in the concepts of eternal/everlasting or indeed previous lives now.  The only thing we know with any certainty is that we are living this life now.  There is no factual evidence for anything before or after.  I know that some people claim to have had near-death experiences that equate to their own particular belief of what happens next, and there are those who under a form of hypnosis called past-life regression.   My own take on these ‘experiences’ is that the person’s own belief system has already influenced that person’s mind, so your sub conscious tells you what you want to hear. 

Similarly, well-meaning Christians have tried to convince me of the errors of my ways in turning my back on their faith by employing  Pascal’s Wager.  Pascal's Wager is an argument in philosophy which was devised by the seventeenth-century French philosopher, mathematician, and physicist Blaise Pascal (1623–1662). It posits that humans all bet with their lives either that God exists or not. Given the possibility that God actually does exist and assuming an infinite gain or loss associated with belief or unbelief in said God (as represented by an eternity in heaven or hell), a rational person should live as though God exists and seek to believe in God. If God does not actually exist, such a person will have only a finite loss.  In other words, you have nothing to infinite loss, but everything to gain by believing in a God.  If the Judeo-Christian God doesn’t exist, you lose nothing.  It’s a hedge your bets argument.  Strange when most Christians/church teaching is opposed to Gambling, they ask you to ‘bet on the existence of god.’

As for Karma I can’t hold the view that my existence in a previous life, affects my current position now.  I have made conscious decisions and then had to live with the consequences of those decisions, many positive and some negative.  Nothing from an unknown past has influenced those decisions. 

However, there is a different type of Karma that we all often refer too.  Phrase like “What goes round comes round,” and “they’ll get what coming to them” has entered our vocabulary.   When someone hurts us or commits an injustice against us and isn’t punished, we use the afore-mentioned statements hoping that everything balances out, that the pain we have felt will soon be inflicted on the person that hurt us.  Does it happen?  It would be nice and rather comforting to think that it does, but in all reality it probably doesn’t.  My abuser has never accepted any responsibility for her actions and has failed to grasp the impact and consequences of her violent actions have had on me or our children.  While I hoped that natural karma would happen, so far it hasn’t.  She carried on living her live oblivious to the destruction she’s caused.  For me, I had to let go of wanting such karma to happen and move on with my life.   While I was anxious for my abuser to receive retribution for her crimes against me, the angst it caused me was a way of still allowing her to abuse me.    I guess I don’t believe in any form of Karma either. 

All that matters to me is the here and now and what I make of it.

Apply with Caution - Adventures in Job seeking

I commenced writing this blog  when I lost my last job.  My dismissal came about because I received a police caution and I declared this caution at work.  Although the crime was not connected, or as far as I was concerned, bore any relation to the work I was doing, I felt the decision was harsh.  My conduct was deemed inappropriate despite the fact that there had been no issues with my conduct prior to my declaration.

I shared with my then employers, my whole back story and the context in which I gained the caution believing/hoping that they would understand.

They didn’t.

Since then, I’ve been searching furiously for work.  I can get plenty of volunteer roles.  People seem to want to make full use of my skills, talents and experience for free.  However, when it comes to paid work, no-one wants to take a gamble on me.

Most application forms ask for a declaration of criminal convictions.  Some also ask for warnings/cautions etc as well.  I’m not totally convinced whether prospective employers actually appreciate the difference between a conviction and a caution either.  If I get to an interview and  there’s possibility that my caution will be revealed in post-interview checks, I volunteer the information to the interview panel.

Usually on the forms, there’s a disclaimer stating that your conviction/caution will not be a factor in my potential recruitment.  When I’ve declared it to an interviewer, I’ve always been thanked for my honesty and told that my application will be judged on its merits and my caution will not influence the overcome.

However, I tend to receive the following feedback:

“We liked you as a person, you gave a strong interview BUT because of your caution we don’t want to take a chance.”

When I reveal my caution to prospective employers, I also tell them the context in which I received it and this has led me to question myself whether they really believe my testimony.

There I am, a big burly chap sitting in front of them, telling them that I was a victim of Domestic Violence and my caution was result of my befuddled attempts to try and minimise the conflict at home.    Do they really believe that men can be victims and affected by Domestic Abuse?  I fear they don't.

The reality is that I know that , without any blemish on my record, I would walk into  the vacancies I’m applying for without any problem.

Prior to receiving the caution, I was offered every job that I’d been called to be interviewed for.  Post caution, nothing.

All I can do is stay positive, keep knocking on doors and believe that very soon someone will take a chance on employing me.

The impact of a Father leaving his children Part 3

This third part has been the hardest to write as it features my third and youngest child.  This child has some mild learning difficulties and sometimes exhibits challenging behaviour.  There has been a delay on early stage of his early growth development.  His behaviour and attitudes are sometimes reminiscence of symptoms of Asperger’s  Syndrome and Autism.   Despite this and numerous medical examinations since birth, no clear diagnosis has ever been given.  His gait and posture is very infantile and he displays frustration which quickly turns into vented anger when things don’t go right for him.  School has always been a struggle for him.

His problems were one of the key factors that kept me in the abusive marriage for many years.  I believed that my leaving would cause him further and greater damage and would severely affect his well-being. 

A huge turning point for me was when he mirrored one of his mother’s attacks on me.  A couple of days prior to this episode, his mother had turned violent, first of all she was verbally threatening.  When I didn’t respond, she deliberated overturned her dinner plate over my head so that the food cascaded down me and then smashed the plate on my head.  I had learnt that no response could calm her so I just sat there and absorbed it without making any response.  Because this action hadn’t provoked me into retaliation of any description, she then grabbed my dinner plate and threw that over me too.   She then stormed out the house and I started to clear the mess up.

A few days after this,  I’d cook and served dinner for all the family and was in the kitchen washing the dishes.  My son, who was 10 years old at this stage, brought his plate out and threw the remains over me.   I was cross with him and shouted at him, he was visibly upset and had a look of shock on his face.  

I realised that he thought his actions were ‘normal’ and okay because he’d seen his mother do similar just days before.  It also dawned on me that my staying in that abusive environment and absorbing such violence wasn’t protecting the children from the impact of domestic violence after all.

Shortly after this, during another violent assault, I chose not to return to the marital home.  It broke my heart to leaving all three children behind. 

My son had always been close to the middle child who was like a second mother to him.  He’d started playschool while she was still there and she took the parental instruction of “Look after your brother for us” seriously.

This relationship seemed to change once the eldest child came to live with me, and my second daughter has written in this blog about the events that led her to coming to live with me.  Part of that was her own brother attacking her.

This is the situation that worries me most and I feel helpless about.  My son still lives with his mother.  He stays with me every other weekend.  I know he feels a loyalty to his mother as he’s seen me and his two sisters leave, so he feels he can’t abandon his mother and cant come and live with me.

For the most part, he is a delightful young man.  When he stays with me, he never hits out.  There are occasions when he sulks, but either I or his siblings are able to bring him out of the mood before he get angry and violent.  However, I do worry about the time he’s not in my care.

There have been a couple of episodes at school when his frustrations have boiled over.  The school have been very good in managing him and have realised that the majority of the time, others have been provoking him to try and elicit a reaction. 

I see in him similar behaviour to his mother.  I’ve tried talking to her about this for I’ve questioned whether this is something genetic or learnt.   When he stays with me, I always try to encourage him to talk.  He will talk on any subject that he’s interested in but won’t talk about his feelings or emotional state.

Interesting, when he was staying with me, one of his sisters intercepted a facebook conversation with a school colleague where he was telling this other person that he was saw the Doctor every week for depression.   I shared this with his mother, but when  I asked my son why he felt he needed to tell someone this fabrication (although of course I didn’t phrase it like that) he won’t talk about it.  To me, however, it was rather insightful because I think he recognises that he needs to talk to someone.

Recently, his school contacted me again because they are concerned about some of his challenging behaviour.  There had been bullying in the past, so they do take things seriously.  My son had complained to a teacher that he was being attacked and his descriptions were quite vivid.  However, they had been watching closely and had seen nothing untoward taking place.  When I spoke to my son about this he was adamant it was happening.   When I questioned it, he got very aggressive and challenged whether I believed him or not.  This tactic, I know, would stop his mother from seeking more information.  However, I persevered and eventually he admitted that he’d make the whole thing up and told school that.  He was then remorseful and contrite.

He needs some help but won’t talk to anyone.  I have tried to involve other agencies.  When his second sister left, I called social services and child protection because I was concerned.   They did a quick onsite assessment, but because they deemed him not at any physical risk from his mother, they closed the case.  No-one wants to assess the emotional or mental risk. 

The only thing that gives me hope is that he’s fine when triggers aren’t breached, although he won’t recognise triggers or the impact of his behaviour.  He does display some of the aggressive traits of his mother, although the one area where they differ is that afterwards, he is remorseful and recognises his wrong doing.  I only hope that as he grows older, he’s able to talk through the things and emotions that he’s obviously bottling up.  I just wish the help was offered and provided that I believe he needs.

Honesty

The issue of honesty has been weighing heavily on my mind. I have tried to be completely honest about all my experiences but feel I have suffered for it and on reflection, wonder if I have been too honest. I have gone from being silent and falling into deceit to being honest and open about all I have done and gone through.

It might seem strange to admit, but the church inadvertently encouraged dishonesty. This is not the official statement of the church and might seem to be a controversial statement. Let me expand. When prospective minsters were being trained by the church for future ministry, the church’s college liked to emphasis the careers that their students had given up in order to become a minister. In a lot of instances, the truth was stretched so that church members would be impressed by the calibre of new minsters. For example, someone working in a non-trained hospital role might be introduced as a former nurse. I fell outside of this category for the college authorities had little perception of the industry I left behind. In the spirit of humility that I believed all Christians should have, I played down my business achievements. So much so that on one occasion I was summoned for an interview with the College’s Principal. The reason for this was that he had spent the previous evening at a dinner party with a former business associate of mine and at some point of the evening I became the subject of conversion. The College Principal had me described to him as a dynamic, well-acclaimed professional and struggled to recognise me because of the humble persona I seemed to have in the classroom.

The philosophy taught in the classroom was that as congregations expected their ministers to be available every minute of every day, new ministers were to maintain that illusion. Many ministers end up believing they are infallible. Over the years I have heard many ministers lie and create a plausible excuse rather than admit they either haven’t had time yet or had forgotten about whatever was being asked of them.

The illusion continue especially on Sundays when I would stand up before the congregation as the man giving advice on the best Christian way to live addressing all sorts of issues from the pulpit, putting a biblical spin on them.   i'm always wary personally of biblical 'spin', it's more a case of one saying "this is what I want you to think the Bible says.." I used to hate hearing people state quite boldly, "The Bible says...."   because people could and would use scripture completely out of context in order to re-enforce their own personal view.  On a Sunday I entered the pulpit portraying the perfect marriage and family life encouraging others to follow my example.  If only they knew the real truth! 

As a victim of Domestic Violence, the truth of the situation is too horrific to admit for a long period. The scratch marks on my face were because I’d walked into a rose bush, not because I had been attacked by my wife. Everyone, I’m sure has answered ‘I’m fine’ when being asked ‘How are you?’ and realistically you were anything but fine! Telling a lie sometimes, whether big or small, is part of our personal self-defence strategy.

When I was first questioned about my financial misconduct, I know that I was lied to. My bishop told me that because of the sensitive nature of enquires only two people locally knew at that point about the questions being asked of me. That was not correct, however the church may rationalize this falsehood by saying the end justified the means.

The Church trades on guilt.  Churchgoers are told that they are guilty sinners because no one human is perfect.  Part of most churches services is a call to publicly seek forgiveness of such sins.  Churchgoers are also taught such an unrealistic ideal of 'holy' living that they naturally fall short of this 'standard' and need to publicly confess their sins.  Perhaps if the Church didn't encourage dishonesty in the first place, then there would be no need for confession resulting from guilty feelings!

I have always been proud of my attendance of work record. In thirty years of employment, I have only had five days off ill. That was at the age of seventeen when I contracted chicken pox. As soon as I received the police caution and declared it to my then employers, I was sent home on ‘garden leave’ with the rest of the staff being told I was sent home ill. They knew that this was a management falsehood because I was never off sick.

Being ill seems to have been a convenient excuse within that organisation. While I was on garden leave, a service lead and manager had asked to see me about providing me with possible work. I was told that they would be open-minded and acknowledge that everyone makes mistakes. An hour before we were scheduled to meet, the service lead telephoned me to cancel citing that the manager was off sick and they would be in touch later. As that was the last conversation we had, I can only assume that the real reason the meeting was cancelled was because Human Resources black-listed me.

It is only recently that I can be totally honest about the Domestic Violence I experienced. I have tried to be honest about all that has happened to me, about the out of character way in which I finally reacted. It saddens me that in response, people (organisations) have been less than honest with me.

Currently, I find that being totally honest doesn'y endear me to possible employers.  I lost my last job because I declared my caution as soon as I'd received it.  If I had kept quiet and not said anything, I would still be in their employ.  I didn't make any false declarations during the recruitment process.  At some point when a disclosure renewal was due, I would have had to face some questions from management which may have resulted in dismissal, but they dismissed me anyway for being upfront with them.  Now in applying for jobs I either have to make a disclosure or explain why I left my last job.  That's honesty for you!  I would rather be honest with myself now for it took me 20 years to reach this point.

For any victim of Domestic Violence, the biggest step you can take is being honest with yourself about what has happened. From there, it could be a long and sometimes painful journey forward.

People may hurt you and not be honest with you. There’s nothing you can do about that. All you can do is take one step at a time and keep speaking out your truth.