Domestic violence is at the moment a buzz word and at the moment a lot of money is being thrown at it. As a society we should be appalled and ashamed of how much of it is going on in our society.
What disturbs me about the attention that domestic violence is getting is that there seems to be no focus or money being allocated to why we have so much domestic violence in our society.
I would have thought that the cause would have had to be the focus of most of the attention and funds being allocated.
Just what is it in our society that has led to so much domestic violence?
Is it the fact that parents are not setting boundaries and enforcing a culture of respect? Is it sport which seems to have a culture of disrespect for women and for that matter men? Is it socioeconomics? Is it early exposure to violence via the media and video games?
I suspect it is a variety of reasons but underlying it all is that respect for each other is taught at home. It is not the responsibility of schools or other institutions to teach respect and tolerance, it is the responsibility of parents. It’s the responsibility of society to stop tolerating domestic violence and pretending it is not happening.
It is easy to say this and some circumstances do not allow for parents to enforce respect. What I do think though is that as a society we need to be paying more attention to what it is in our cultures and societies that is causing this culture of domestic violence.