Waleed Aly has questioned the widespread belief that male violence against women ultimately stems from disrespect, instead suggesting the desire to hurt females actually comes from attackers feeling shamed and humiliated.
The Project host addressed the current domestic violence crisis in Australia in an opinion piece following shocking statistics that show a woman is being killed every four days.
Aly, who is also a lecturer in politics at Monash University, said he’d put off writing the piece for nearly a decade.
He referenced words from former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull who in 2015 said: ‘Disrespecting women does not always result in violence against women. But all violence against women begins with disrespecting women.’
Aly said that he always thought Mr Turnbull’s comment was incorrect, but had never said anything publicly – until now.
‘I couldn’t repress a simple thought when I heard Turnbull’s comment: I just don’t think that’s correct,’ Aly wrote for the Sydney Morning Herald.
‘That’s because my academic work was studying the roots of violence, where research overwhelmingly identifies factors like humiliation, shame and guilt as motivating drivers, not a lack of respect.’
Waleed Aly has questioned the idea that men who are violent against women are disrespecting them, instead suggesting the violence stems from the attackers feeling shamed and humiliated
The television presenter said research had shown that perpetrators of violent crimes had often felt they had been disrespected themselves.
He referenced American prison psychiatrist James Gilligan who said he was yet to see a violent act that ‘was not provoked by the experience of feeling shamed or humiliated, disrespected and ridiculed’.
Mr Gilligan had claimed the most dangerous men ‘are those who are afraid they are wimps’.
The issue of domestic violence in Australia has been thrust into the spotlight in recent weeks after 28 women have been allegedly killed this year alone.
Calls have been made for men to start having conversations with each other about domestic violence, and in Aly’s words ‘for the ‘good’ men to set the ‘bad’ men straight’.
Aly’s comments come a day after the funeral of Molly Ticehurst, 28, who was allegedly killed by her ex-boyfriend Daniel Billings
‘This delivers a conventional wisdom that this is ultimately a men’s problem, and one that every one of us has to own and solve,’ he said.
He said it ‘makes little sense’ to treat every man as violent, when a minority is to blame.
Aly added that associating all men with violence could lead them to ‘retreat and defend an identity they feel is unfairly maligned’.
But he said there is still hope for Australia’s DV problem.
He said tackling the minority who are responsible for the violence by addressing their risk factors as opposed to looking at all men in general was the way forward.
‘It accepts the enormity of the task, but doesn’t drown in it. It makes the invincible intelligible. It is fierce, but restrained. In sum, it deserves the next decade of respect,’ he said.
Aly’s comments come a day after the funeral of Molly Ticehurst, 28, who was allegedly killed by her ex-boyfriend Daniel Billings.