THIN BLUE LIE - PART 2
In April
of 2014, Ken Lay, as Chief Commissioner of the Victoria Police, wrote the
following on the topic of family violence, a definition that mashes together
two words that are fundamentally opposed as concepts, and neatly removes the
disturbing nature of what family violence really is: brutal physical,
psychological, and emotional abuse inflicted on (mostly) women and children.
As a community we are again searching for answers that will prevent some men from abusing, bashing and killing those they profess to love.
Whilst the first response of many is to blame someone other than the killer, the challenges and issues are sometimes very clear. We need to look no further than the victims like Rosie Batty, together with the thousands of other anonymous victims, to understand the depth and complexity of our challenges.
Many victims speak of the terror of living and dealing with unpredictable, violent and possessive men. They also speak of the frustration of the inconsistent response from those agencies whose job it is to protect them. And they speak of the sometimes incomprehensible journey through a justice system that can be confusing, confronting and at times humiliating.
The central premise of Rosie Batty's recent article- "Time to Make it Right" (Herald Sun, April 18, 2014) is - there is an element within our community who see it as women's fault when they are being abused by violent men. As Rosie writes..."You get people asking...'Why doesn't she just leave?' "
But as Rosie describes, violence against women is a men's issue and our response to this fundamental fact is at times inadequate, confused and harmful to those women experiencing such abuse.
I agree with this sentiment. It is men who predominately do the hitting, abusing and killing. It is men's fault that harm is caused to those they abuse, not the victims. The full focus of our response must be to place the needs of the victim at the center of our legal and court system, as well as our social and policing services.
We must also believe women when, after often years of abuse, they finally find the courage to ring triple zero and say I am living with violent man and I want it to stop. We must do the most powerful thing we can do as a community and not be skeptical, accusing or judgmental, we simply must believe and then act appropriately.
As a community we must ensure there is adequate safe refuge for abused woman and their children. We must work to make legal system, accessible, comprehensible and supportive. We must ensure that the full range of community sector support is focused on ensuring women are no longer forced to live in abusive relationships.
Those of us who have the responsibility to intervene before, during or after the violence occurs, must ensure we become better integrated and see the signs that indicate the risks and the opportunities before the violence escalates.
As a community must redefine what is acceptable behavior by men towards women.
Misogyny and disrespect for women is a dark shadow over parts of our community. Some of our men learn these attitudes from their fathers, at school, the footy club, work and from their mates at the pub. But from wherever they learn their disrespect- it leads fundamentally to some men finding an inherent endorsement of their violence towards women.
I have said before that violence against women is rampant and is driving this state's level of reported crime. Victoria for the year to March 2013, there were over 60,000 recoded incidences of family violence. In the previous financial year, the Women's domestic Violence Crisis Service received more than 50,000 calls to its crisis hotline in Victoria alone.
We have got to do better at this!
Men need to develop the courage to make it clear to their male friends and family members that violence against women is totally unacceptable.
And we as a community must start believing women when they tell us they are being abused by their husbands, lovers, brothers and fathers and then act immediately to stop it.
It will require a lot of work by governments and their agencies. It will demand a fundamental shift in how men relate to women, but that shift will happen when we start listening, really listening to the victims of family abuse...women.
The answers to preventing family violence in our community are complex. They are costly and they are challenging because they require a significant change in attitude by many.
But if we are to stop the horrific journey that can often start with callous and threatening behavior and then end with violence and murder, we need to listen to the victims. We need to listen with empathy, belief and understanding to the fear and terror experienced by victims of violence. When finally we really listen, when we place the victim at the center of everything we do, we may be in a position to prevent some of the recent catastrophes we have witnessed.
What Lay wrote was stirring. Inspirational. A ray of light in a dark
world where victims are blamed, forced to remain silent, and persecuted for
daring to speak. It was a call for positive change, a complete reversal of the
vile attitudes that have lingered long after they should have been put down.
And yet it has proven to be nothing more than the usual false hope, cruel
deception, discarded within the very place of its posting. My response was
deleted by the Victorian Police Moderators. Clearly they did not want people
like me exposing their lie, decades of ongoing systemic failure and the entrenched
culture of corruption.
But fear not, I have posted my comment here. How many others, like me, I wonder, have also had their comments removed for giving voice to the same revelations. And if they were permitted to speak, if the media had the guts to help us reveal the unsettling facts, how many would be enough to warrant real action to address the failures and rot? To dig out and burn away the root and branch that allows it to fester? How many forced to suffer in silence is acceptable? Or don’t some victims count? Adult survivors? Children of low socio-economic backgrounds? Women? Aboriginal victims? Catholic or Muslim kids?
While this rhetoric sounds like someone is finally taking a step in the right direction, it rings hollow to victims who have suffered the brutality of child abuse and domestic violence, struggling with the damage it causes decades later, one day at a time... until they don't. In addition to the horrific abuse that was inflicted on us, we suffer from PTSD, anxiety, depression, and worse.
But perhaps the most insidious and vindictive aspect of 'family violence' is the entrenched culture of corruption within the police and public services that are supposed to help victims but, instead, allows too many police and public servants (from multiple agencies) to inflict further harm through indifference, apathy, incompetence, idleness, negligence, insensitivity, mockery, insults, unfounded and defamatory accusations, and intimidation.
As children, we were unaware that we had to document the abuse. We had no idea what Statute of Limitations meant. We were not trained in the intricacies of the legal system, nor how to deal with trauma and the horror of child abuse. We struggled to find the courage to come forward only to discover that the Legal System reduces legal outcomes to commodities we cannot access let alone afford, that its laws, policies and procedures can be used to circumvent justice by isolating and silencing victims while concealing and enabling predators, crime, systemic failure, and injustice.
But it is not a problem limited to child protection and the police. It is endemic. It is a festering canker in almost every public service agency and our politicians and authorities do not have the will or interest in taking real action to expose and eradicate it, to affect real positive change. Indeed, too often it is management that is the root of the problem, and the use of 'internal investigation' is a conflict of interest. Seriously, imagine if 'alleged' criminals were tasked with investigating themselves?
For too long the 'not enough evidence to launch an investigation' excuse has been used along with 'take no action'. How's that working out for Tara Brown? Mason Lee? And God knows how many more? George Brandis himself once said, "how can we know what all the evidence is without an investigation?" How indeed. How many lives would have been spared from brutality, life-changing injury, and death if the attitude had been "take no chances."
I notice there are
'police moderators' here. I've arrived a little late (a few years), but I've
also been trying to report forty years of child abuse and other crimes
inflicted on multiple people, that continue to this day, for the last three
decades, so a few years too late is of little consequence. I, too, write a
blog. I've included links to two posts.
The second one
includes a Timeline of Abuse and supporting evidence from other victims. It
details horrific crimes including three suspicious deaths... and the official
police response which acknowledged I spoke the truth but no investigation would
be conducted. The offenders include a former nurse, a police officer dismissed
for misconduct against young women, and the son of a town mayor... all friends
of a Chief Prosecutor. It also reveals multiple examples of systemic failure,
the entrenched culture of corruption, and the extraordinary lengths authorities
went to silence me.
Why did they do this?
You tell me. How many others have suffered the same treatment? How many, like
me, are still forced to remain silent to this day? How many fail to cope and
live in poverty, turn to drugs, or end their pain by killing themselves? How
many have continued the cycle of abuse by harming others? How many have killed
their abusers because nobody will help them?
And this systemic
failure has continued for decades. What I can guarantee, without a shadow of a
doubt, is that my abusers will never be held to account. The crimes they
committed will never be investigated. The best I will get is directions to an
agency that will help me learn how to be silent, something victims already know
all too well. The systemic failures and culture of corruption will continue
unabated because too many people who can help end it are the cause, or a
source, of the rot.
One thing is certain,
as one of my abusers told me, predators and sociopaths brutalise people because
they can, and nobody will stop them. You cannot solve this problem with the
same thinking that caused it. If you are not part of the solution, you are part
of the problem. Those who are silent may be said to condone, but those who
force others to remain silent are complicit.
I’ve asked those questions for decades now. Those of you who read my
blog posts are probably so familiar with them and other expressions repeated
there (in the hope they will imprint upon you, be passed on, and affect
positive change) that you can sing along. But the most obvious point of what
happened here is that a voice of dissent was silenced. The attempt to expose
the fact that all this appearance of change, recognition of failure, and action
to amend it is nothing more than a charade, is just another casualty in a war
where the predators hold all the cards, and victims have no means to defend
themselves let alone fight back. Where can victims go when they are denied a
voice?
Our so-called political representatives? Have you ever tried to contact one as a disadvantaged member of the public trying to expose systemic failure and the entrenched culture of corruption? Let’s have a look at just one such champion of the people, a politician who has demonstrated what appeared to be genuine concern for the victims of child abuse. Never hesitating, while in opposition, to call the government out for systemic failure in Child Protection services. Shadow Child Safety Minister, Ros Bates. But it didn’t take long for her hypocrisy to be exposed.
She herself was guilty of the very same moral and ethical bankruptcy she
challenged, the same entrenched culture of corruption and systemic failure she
was all too willing to expose with demands for accountability. Bates was
accused of workplace bullying and nepotism, forcing public servants to resign
after creating a workplace environment so hostile it caused others stress and
illness. She used her position to get own children, the daughter of another
high-ranking public servant, and a friend, cushy, high-paying jobs. The
competency of these beneficiaries can only be doubted given the drug charges
against one following an incident at work, yet Ros Bates insisted they were all
appointed on merit.
Anybody who has worked as a public servant can tell you
that’s not how it works, and it is indeed nepotism. Especially if the job pays
as well as the one’s those people were given. Those without connections must
work very hard to rise through the ranks to the level of the positions Ben and
Jill Gommer supposedly won through merit, and that’s assuming you are lucky
enough to even get an entry level position. Walking into positions like those,
straight out of university, with no experience, is extremely implausible.
Given the entrenched culture of corruption in the public service, and
the general lack of knowledge of even the most basic fundamentals, mostly at
the top, it suddenly becomes very clear that nepotism is a huge part of the
problem. The most competent staff tend to begin in entry level positions, even
if they do have degrees from university, and advance through a demonstration of
actual merit. Merit, by the way, is a combination of required ability,
attitude, and qualification, not who you know or to whom you are related.
What
Bates did may have been exposed five years ago, but the same problems persist
today, including the systemic failure and entrenched culture of corruption in
the police and public services. The fact that a staff member had a drug problem,
that this spilled over into her job, that she had to be hospitalised, and that she
was charged, is alarming. How much did that drug habit impact on her
performance, and members of the public, as a direct result? What triggered it?
Was it exacerbated by being given a position for which she was ill-equipped to
handle, so out of her depth she turned to drugs to cope? We may never know.
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