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SB
miss_s_b
[theyorkshergob]
25 December 2008 @ 09:20 pm
What Does it Say about the Level of Debate on Domestic Violence in This Country...  
Featured on Liberal Democrat Voice

... that I have just watched the most sensitive and informed treatment of abusive relationships I have ever seen on British television, and it was in Wallace and Grommit?

Fluffles was the archetypal battered partner, and Paella the archetypal abuser. It was harrowing, and it was triggery as hell, and I only wish that kind of dramatisation was more common, and then there wouldn't be half-arsed ill-informed bollocks typed like most of the comments on this entry.

Ironically, given that this entry was prompted by a children's programme, I think we need to grow up.

We need to stop pretending that domestic violence doesn't happen. That our next door neighbour is just a bit quiet or the house down the street from which the shouting and screaming always comes is both partners being equals in a slanging match... Domestic violence happens because we let it. Because when a friend stops contacting us, we don't worry about it, shrug, and move on, instead of wondering if they have come under the influence of an abuser. Because when a work colleague turns up with bruises and says they fell down the stairs, we believe them, even when they jump at shadows and rock themselves when they think no-one is looking.

Abuse is not some bogeyman in every home or anything like that, but I bet you a tenner you know someone who has suffered from it. Probably several people. Do you know who they are? Would you notice? I hope so.

I'll get off my hobby horse now, shall I?
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30 rants | rant
 
( 30 rants — Post a new comment )
doccy: Not Happy Bunny[info]doccy on December 25th, 2008 10:38 pm (UTC)
GAH!! I just read Newmania's comment (the 5th one) and now need to scrub my brain...
SB[info]miss_s_b on December 25th, 2008 10:41 pm (UTC)
Ah, yes, Newmania. Such a lovely chap.
doccy: Pain[info]doccy on December 25th, 2008 10:46 pm (UTC)
It's good to see someone who is finally defending the rights of men in this woman-ruled society o_O
shishmish: DW - Weeping Angels[info]shishmish on December 25th, 2008 11:11 pm (UTC)
I read the first paragraph and worried for the future if there are more men like him in this world.
endless psychologist[info]endless_psych on December 25th, 2008 11:56 pm (UTC)
As regards newmania posting such a thing on a liberal website...

Obvious troll is obvious?
shishmish: DW - Weeping Angels[info]shishmish on December 26th, 2008 04:00 pm (UTC)
Very damn obvious. Sadly he's the sort of troll you can take the piss out of as he's really only there to cause trouble; I much prefer the ones who come in hot headed and not sure what they're doing XD
Uncle Steve: facepalm mp[info]tyrell on December 25th, 2008 11:36 pm (UTC)
He's very... special.

And I'm with Sunny on this one.

Edited at 2008-12-25 11:42 pm (UTC)
The Evil Atheist Your Mother Warned You About: Marvin[info]davegodfrey on December 25th, 2008 11:11 pm (UTC)
I think it also shows that Nick Park is a creative genius. But we knew that already.

I gave up reading the comments on the LC article because I'm quite enjoying this christams and don't want to ruin it by shouting at the wall.
shishmish: Actors - Simm does geeky dancing[info]shishmish on December 25th, 2008 11:14 pm (UTC)
Besides the abuse (you could also call it animal abuse, which I do not tolerate either), Wallace and Gromit kicked ass. This needs to be the standard of TV, not the Stricly Come Ice Dancing Get me Outta Here crap.
[info]bleedingheartshow.wordpress.com on December 26th, 2008 12:08 am (UTC)
Y'know what, about half-way through writing that thing I stopped for a smoke and a mulled wine refill and I remember thinking "do I really want to finish this? What if it ends up at LC and the comment thread goes the same way these things ALWAYS go?" Anyway, I kept going with it, woke up the next morning to find it on LC and then watched as the comment thread developed EXACTLY as I thought it would. So it's entirely my fault, which is annoying because in my own meandering, policy-wonk kinda way, I did actually mean well. I swear that if I ever displace Sunny in a bloody coup I'll enforce a comments policy that's more strict than the Chinese...

Oh, and was it just me, or was the new Wallace & Gromit thing better than the film they had on before it?

Neil
SB[info]miss_s_b on December 26th, 2008 12:17 am (UTC)
I dunno about your last point, as I was in the bath between Who and W&G. But it was VERY good.

If you ever displace Sunny in a bloody coup can you sort out the site design, too?

...

* goes to fetch saucer of milk *
[info]bleedingheartshow.wordpress.com on December 26th, 2008 12:44 am (UTC)
Sorry, I meant the W&G "Curse of the Were Rabbit" film, which they showed in the afternoon. Never mind the fact that the story was better in the one you wrote about, there were also *far more* food puns and cheese references. That kind of thing never fails to make me happy.

As for the coup (and I'm sensing an opening here), I'll clearly be far too busy maliciously deleting Newmania's comments to worry about site design, so I'll be happy to delegate that, if you like...

Neil
SB[info]miss_s_b on December 26th, 2008 11:26 am (UTC)
I think Curse suffered slightly from Hollywoodisation.

I'm not condoning censorship, but wouldn't it be easier to just set up the troll trap that lets them think they have posted when they actually haven't? Then you are guaranteed that nobody feeds the troll, but you don't have to actually read the comments.
[info]bleedingheartshow.wordpress.com on December 26th, 2008 12:56 pm (UTC)
But... then they won't fear my almighty wrath, which is surely the whole point of the coup?!

Being slightly less daft for a moment, I like the idea of a troll trap, but I think my favourite solution is still xkcd's (http://xkcd.com/481/). Maybe it'd encourage trolls to take up self-improvement.

Neil
SB[info]miss_s_b on December 27th, 2008 12:47 am (UTC)
Ah, but that assumes a minute level of self-awareness on the part of the troll...
alex_wilcock[info]alex_wilcock on December 26th, 2008 11:16 am (UTC)
((HUGS))

We both thought that, too.

And I notice that it not only topped the day's ratings, but topped the year's, beating anything of Simon Cowell's, which is surely a cause for celebration: 14.3 million and a 53.3% share.
SB[info]miss_s_b on December 26th, 2008 11:30 am (UTC)
That was the biggest ratings of the year? I remember the days when Corrie used to get 20+ as a matter of course... No wonder the tv companies are worried.

Still, beating Simon Cowell is always a cause for celebration.
alex_wilcock[info]alex_wilcock on December 26th, 2008 11:42 am (UTC)
Corrie came eighth. It didn't even win its own time-slot, got less than two-thirds as many viewers as Doctor Who, just over half what the new Wallace and Gromit did and only just beat Were-Rabbit's afternoon score by 0.2 million.

Bwhahahaha. Ahem.
if it bites it's probably interesting.[info]ginasketch on December 26th, 2008 11:19 am (UTC)
I heart Nick Park.

Newmania, however, needs his balls removed to decorate a Christmas tree.
SB[info]miss_s_b on December 26th, 2008 11:31 am (UTC)
You'd have to do a lot of glittering to make them acceptable tree decorations...
(Anonymous) on December 26th, 2008 06:11 pm (UTC)
Why don't you try responding to some of those "ill-informed" comments instead of just huffing at them repeatedly and to little effect, Jennie? What would Mill say?
(Anonymous) on December 26th, 2008 06:16 pm (UTC)
Oh yes, and re: Newmania, so far as I can tell he is not a troll. He just really hates liberals, effectively rendering every LC writer an (inadvertent) troll of him. His fury and snarling are entirely earnest and more than a little humourous in an entirely unintentional way. I vary between finding his posts too long to amuse (like stuff the CPGB(ML) comes up with) and bang on tub-thumping reactionary tripe of the most hilarious variety.

I fear that if LC starts getting posted on more frequently it will give him an aneurysm, though.
SB[info]miss_s_b on December 27th, 2008 12:41 am (UTC)
I don't know, he's dead.
A Yorkshire Muffin[info]muffin_nuffin on December 27th, 2008 12:26 am (UTC)
I agree. And it were a crackin' good half hour, too! Im watching it back now to find the little puns and injokes and everything.

And I want a toaster in my car.
[info]ukcommentators.blogspot.com on December 27th, 2008 11:37 pm (UTC)
A question ...
"I bet you a tenner you know someone who has suffered from it. Probably several people."

Do you think there was more DV in the past than there is now, or are things getting worse ? Are we living in a relative Golden Age or sliding towards a new Dark Age ?

And is there any concrete evidence for any of the above ?

I'm confused because one liberal myth (the 'myth of the Myth of the Golden Age') tells me that it was damn dreadful in the past, women treated as property, marital rape a commonplace, stick to be used no bigger than thumb etc etc, the other (the 'One Woman in Four') tells me that male violence is increasing as men fail to come to terms with women's newfound freedoms, women treated as objects, date rape a commonplace etc etc.

Which gives the truer picture ? Are we living in the best time ever to be female (but the struggle continues etc etc), or was it better in the past ?

Mat Bowles[info]matgb on December 29th, 2008 12:53 am (UTC)
Re: A question ...
I think things today are a lot better than they were 50+ years ago, and probably better than they were 10 years ago.

But from a start of "fucking awful" it doesn't take much to get it better. But there's still a long way to go—especially as the situation with male victims of domestic violence is still somewhere in the stone age, men that "can't handle themselves" aren't "real men", etc.

The problem needs addressing and moving further forward. I think it is moving forward, but I know of people still stuck in problematic relationships, and it sometimes feels that there's nothing further that can be done. I don't know what could be done, but I think increased knowledge and coverage has to be a good thing.
SB[info]miss_s_b on December 29th, 2008 12:41 pm (UTC)
Re: A question ...
Violence isn't increasing, it's just reported more often.

I also don't think that it's helpful or useful to characterise domestic violence as exclusively male on female - yes, it is disproportionately so, but not exclusively, and saying that it is means that it can be filed away under women's problems - i.e. not important - by (mostly) male politicians.

Muggings, which are disproportionately committed by men against men, are not called men's issues, after all...
(Anonymous) on December 29th, 2008 07:20 am (UTC)
This reminds me of something I saw in the local city centre a good few years ago.

A man and woman were having a domestic near a bus station, her treating him to some lovely language about something or other that was going on between them (NOT domestic violence), the man being violent would hit her once or twice then WALK OFF.

And he would have continued on his merry way, would have LEFT HER ALONE, but of course she was having none of that. She wanted to continue haranguing him about the petty little something or other (not DV) and every time she did, very predictably, he'd come right on back like an obedient little doggy. To carry on the argument she wanted to have in his own fashion, with his fists.

In short - not being abused by her partner wasn't her priority, if it was, she could have kept quiet and let him WALK AWAY INSTEAD OF HITTING HER. But no. Since she was just as abusive and nasty (if not nastier) as her partner, she wanted to continue abusing him more than she wanted to avoid violence.

I have two questions for you about this wonderful display I witnessed. 1 - Do you think I should have intervened, and 2 - What do you think would have happened if I had?
SB[info]miss_s_b on December 29th, 2008 12:48 pm (UTC)
In a situation where both partners are clearly holding their own I think it's slightly different from a situation in which one partner is bullied and controlled by the other.

And yeah, if you had intervened they would have probably told you to fuck off and mind your own business.

I'm by no means saying that the problem of domestic violence is an easy one to solve, but merely that trying to solve it necessarily means talking about it.
(Anonymous) on December 29th, 2008 05:52 pm (UTC)
Yeah, as far as those two were concerned I reckon she was the one 'bullying and controlling' the other. Seeing as how, y'know, she clearly had the stronger 'bullying/controlling' personality (and the man had a correspondingly weaker personality).