Domestic violence is the greatest cause of harm in British society, one of Britain’s most senior police officers has warned.
Chief Superintendent John Sutherland of the Metropolitan police was speaking at the Tackling Britain’s Gang Culture conference, where people whose lives have been affected by gangs and street crime gathered to discuss the causes of the problems, the impact and possible solutions.
Sutherland said he had concerns over sexual exploitation and the absence of positive role models, but said children growing up with violence in the home was the biggest contributor to problems in society.
“I think we’ve barely begun to understand the secondary impact that violence has on these people whose homes it’s happening in,” he said. “I promise you, it’s having a devastating effect. I regard domestic violence as the single greatest cause of harm in society. I think we have moved a long way in our understanding of [it, because] 25 years ago it was regarded as pretty much a private issue. Violence begets violence, and as a society we’re addicted to it.”
Sutherland said the problem with gangs was not limited to a specific age group, neighbourhood or ethnic background.
“It’s a whole-society problem that demands a whole-society solution.”
He described the absence of “good fathers” as a critical issue, while the sexual exploitation of women, particularly in gang culture where, the conference heard, young girls are raped and used in initiations, is “a horror story, hidden from view”.
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Wrong Chief Superintendent – male violence against women and girls is the single most cause of harm to women and girls globally. So don’t try and turn the issue of pandemic male violence against women and girls into different categories wherein ‘domestic violence’ meaning intimate male terrorism against women and their children is the most important category and male sexual exploitation/male sexual violence against women and girls a second category not as important as’domestic violence.
News flash Chief Superintendent – males commonly commit intimate male terrorism and also male sexual violence against their female/ex female partners and/or her female children. So how do we separate out intimate male terrorism from male sexual exploitation/male sexual violence against women? Answer we don’t because male violence against women is on a continuum and going to the root of the problem is reason why so many males commit violence against women is because males need to enforce their pseudo male right of controlling/dominating and maintaining sexual access to in their view, supposedly dehumanised beings – females.