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Is domestic violence a gender hate crime, and why does it matter?

By Jennifer Wilson - posted Tuesday, 5 July 2011


The National Plan outlines the Gillard government's intention to reduce DV, IPV and family violence over the next 12 years. In reality, the Plan will address only male perpetrated violence.

In so doing, the Plan will continue to effectively silence the voices of victims of female perpetrators in both heterosexual and same sex relationships.

The Plan continues to use the outdated and increasingly contested framework of gender hate crime. There is certainly more than enough reason to question the use of this framework as a basis for public policy, not least its ineffectiveness to date.

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We urgently need a far more holistic approach to the problems of domestic, intimate partner and family violence, one that demands policy makers incorporate alternative frameworks of perception, of which there are several, into the official definitions and understanding of DV on which policy is based.

Domestic violence is problem that dearly costs our society both financially, and in terms of extensive physical, psychological and emotional damage, often life-long, to the women, men and children who are its victims.

Is domestic violence a gender hate crime? I would argue that evidence increasingly suggests that is not.

Does this matter? When policy designed to reduce this crime is based on a false ideological premise that cannot help but detrimentally affect services and outcomes, I would suggest the definition of the crime matters a great deal.

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About the Author

Dr Jennifer Wilson worked with adult survivors of child abuse for 20 years. On leaving clinical practice she returned to academia, where she taught critical theory and creative writing, and pursued her interest in human rights, popular cultural representations of death and dying, and forgiveness. Dr Wilson has presented papers on human rights and other issues at Oxford, Barcelona, and East London Universities, as well as at several international human rights conferences. Her academic work has been published in national and international journals. Her fiction has also appeared in several anthologies. She is currently working on a secular exploration of forgiveness, and a collection of essays. She blogs at http://www.noplaceforsheep.wordpress.com.

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