Women being sexually harassed in record numbers. Sexual violence against women on the rise. These were the headlines late last year when the Australian Bureau of Statistics revealed the latest Personal Safety Survey. The media stories were all about women as victims of dangerous men.
Yet they left out the real news – a dramatic increase in men being attacked and abused by their partners. Since 2005 the proportion of men reporting violence in the last year from their current partners has risen more than five-fold while the proportion experiencing emotional abuse has more than doubled.
“We don’t know whether more men are being abused by their partners or whether men are finally willing to admit to being victims of violence instead of being shamed into silence,” says Greg Millan from Men’s Health Services who runs Australia’s only training course for working with male victims of family violence.
In either case, the true extent of women’s violence against their partners is now emerging. The biggest leap in sexual harassment involves men being harassed by women. The survey shows growing numbers reporting their partners are depriving them of basic needs such as food and shelter and contact with their children.
Every third victim of intimate partner violence is a male. Almost half the people being emotionally abused by their partners are male. These latest statistics show domestic violence is not just about violent men – increasingly males are victims of abuse from their partners. So how come our media chooses not to report the whole story?
Here is the other side of that story, the facts the media won’t tell you about the 2016 Personal Safety Survey results (more details in attached infographic, also at 1in3.com.au/infographic):
- The proportion of men experiencing current partner violence in the last 12 months between the 2005 and 2016 ABS Personal Safety Surveys rose more than five-fold (a 552% increase), while the proportion of men experiencing emotional abuse from a current partner in the last 12 months more than doubled (a 223% increase).
- During the last 12 months, more than one in three people who experienced violence from an intimate partner were male (35%) and almost half the people who experienced emotional abuse by a partner were male (46%).
- 14% of men who experienced emotional abuse by a current partner were deprived of basic needs such as food, shelter or sleep, compared to 6% of women.
- 9% of men reporting emotional abuse by a current partner experienced threats to take their child/ren away from them, compared to 5% of women.
- 39% of men who reported emotional abuse by a previous partner had that partner lie to their child/ren with the intent of turning them against them, compared to 25% of women.
- More than 1 in 3 persons who experienced sexual harassment were male (34%) – usually involving a female perpetrator (72%).
- The biggest increase in sexual harassment between 2012 and 2016 was males harassed by a female, which rose by a massive 68% (females harassed by a male rose by 15%).
- Almost 1 in 3 persons who experienced sexual assault were male (28%), with females the most likely perpetrators of sexual violence against men (83%).
- Male victims of domestic violence were far more likely than women to have never sought advice or support, less likely to have contacted police, and far less likely to have had a restraining order issued against the perpetrator.
The latest homicide figures from the Australian Institute of Criminology paint a similar picture, with 75 males killed in domestic homicide incidents between 2012-2014, an average of one every ten days.
“With these official statistics revealing this complex picture of both men and women as victims and perpetrators of domestic and sexual violence, surely it is time for governments to stop pretending the cause of domestic violence is the lack of respect for women,” said Millan.
The One in Three Campaign is calling on the Federal Government to include male victims of violence in the National Plan to Reduce Violence against Women and their Children, and to heed the findings of the recent state and federal inquiries and royal commissions recommending more services and support for male victims of family violence.
MEDIA CONTACTS
Greg Andresen, Senior Researcher, One in Three Campaign, 0403 813 925 or info@oneinthree.com.au. See Greg Andresen discussing this news with Bettina Arndt on her latest YouTube video.
Greg Millan, Director, Men’s Health Services, 0417 772 390 or greg@menshealthservices.com.au.