Unnecessary bloodshed

While the government expresses plenty of sympathy for mothers who lose their sons in conflict (do fathers not mourn their dead children?), does it show the same sensitivity to those who shed tears because they are abused at home or face the threat of death at the hands of those closest to them?

In the last week of November, governments usually mark International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, which falls on the 25th, by highlighting the steps they have taken to curb this universal scourge.

As far as I can see, no new steps were unveiled in Turkey on Nov. 25. Turkey has in the past few years introduced some important measures: the number of shelters has increased, policemen have been trained and members of the judiciary taught to exercise more sensitivity in their implementation of existing laws. But recent figures show that current policies are insufficient to keep up with the trend in domestic murders.

A few weeks ago, Justice Minister Ergin released figures in parliament that showed a 1,400 percent (yes, 1,400 percent) increase in murders committed against women in the past seven years. While in 2002, 66 women were reported killed, in the first seven months of this year alone 953 have lost their lives -- the majority of them at the hands of a relative, spouse or ex-partner.

These statistics are consistent with the kind of losses usually incurred in a war, yet there is no sign that politicians are truly worried by the scale of the problem. Media organizations do not always display much more sensitivity. Women are either depicted as saintly mothers or as scantily clad temptresses, and homicides are still reported, day after day, as individual incidents.

The crimes only reveal the tip of an iceberg of domestic abuse that, according to research released earlier this year by the Directorate on the Status of Women, affects on average 39 percent of Turkish women.

Countries that keep a close eye on such data are already seeing a spike in domestic assaults as a result of the recession and increased joblessness. Given Turkey’s chronic unemployment problem, this is a dimension that the authorities must take into account.

There is still a concern, often expressed throughout society, that encouraging women to speak out about the violence they face at home will lead to the destruction of the family. But what kind of family are we talking about? Exposure to family violence is a traumatic experience not just for the abused wives, but also for their children, who carry the psychological burden into adulthood. And even if the cases that make it to trial are only a fraction of all violent incidents, the nearly 12,678 trials opened since 2002 that the Justice Minister mentioned also carry a heavy financial cost. Clearly, tackling the problem at its roots makes more sense.

The training of officials must obviously continue at all levels, but new approaches also need to be considered. The United Kingdom has just announced it would include gender relations in the school curriculum for all children between the ages of 5 and 15.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon, for his part, has just formed a Network of Men, which includes dignitaries such as Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, to fight gender-based violence.

Increasingly, domestic and other forms of gender violence are seen as a problem of social notions of masculinity rather than just a women’s issue. Getting the men on board to promote alternative, more gentle expressions of manhood is therefore crucial.

International institutions such as the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) have already started work on this front in Turkey, but their efforts would certainly get a boost if well-known male figures were to publicly join the fight.