- The problem of domestic/family intimate partner violence is largely a problem of violence by men against women and children.
- Comparing men’s violence against female partners & ex-partners and women’s violence against male partners & ex-partners, men’s violence:
- Is far more common
- Has much worse impacts
- Is far less likely to be self-defence
- If we only ‘count violent acts’, males look like 1 in 3 or 4 of victims. But as soon as we look at impact, meaning, context, & history, we find profound gender contrasts.
***
Note: In the past we have steered away from discussing statistics about domestic abuse on this blog, especially stats about gender and DV. But because people perennially share questionable stats about gender and DV on social media, we have decided to publish this post.
Related items on this blog
Male Privilege is the underlying driver of domestic abuse. — Ken Lay, former Police Commissioner
Violence against women: it’s a men’s issue — a talk by Jackson Katz featured at TGC
Do you have resources for male victims?
A Cry For Justice 
Thank you, Barbara. I think it is a pity that such statistics have to be laid out to counter the narrative that originates from men’s rights activists (MRA). The average person knows that men are victims too, and nobody in their right mind who advocates for women is trying to imply that only men abuse. By having to clearly lay out the reality according to research, the MRA are in fact not doing male victims any justice because it seems like we are saying male victims should take the back seat, when this is not the case.
Abused men are also victims of injustice, but they should be in a different discussion. It appears that the dynamics, patterns, causes, and interventions for female-on-male violence are very different from male-on-female violence and should be discussed in a different space. Shouting down any discussion of male-on-female violence by quoting misleading statistics about male victims is not helpful, for women, as well as men.
Well said, Not Too Late. I agree with you.