Men can be victims, too.

Also in the news today, if you recall my earlier post about the Scottish Parliament discussing male victims of domestic violence, it appears that the debate seems to have created just a little bit more gender equality in the Scotland. A new advice line aimed at male victims of domestic violence will be starting next month, funded by the Scottish Government.

The Men's Advice Line is a free phone number that is open 30 hours a week (don't worry, there's a voicemail system) for men in both heterosexual and same-sex relationships. The website also helpfully has a page about covering your tracks (though most people would be suspicious if they had no cookies left). They also have a nice little assessment thing to help people know if they're in an abusive relationship:

Does your partner:

• Humiliate you, call you names or make fun of you in a way that is designed to hurt you?  
  
• Threaten you that you will never see your children again?
  
• Threaten you with violence or hit, kick or throw things at you?
  

Or do you:

• Change your behaviour or your appearance so your partner doesn't get angry?
  
• Feel scared, anxious or like you are ‘walking on eggshells'?
  
• Cut yourself off from your friends or family?  
  

If you answered yes to some or all of those questions you may be experiencing domestic violence. You can find out more here.

 Most of the webpage contains information and views similar to most female-orientated domestic violence assistance groups. To someone familiar with the range of activities that abuse can encompass, there are no surprises. The only major difference is that this page is aimed at men.

There are still problems in getting this information out to men. Do they plan on putting flyers in all health clinics and hospitals? Will they be putting up any billboards to raise awareness? On a simpler level, what does a man have to google to find this webpage?

Preliminary searches show that "men's advice line", "domestic violence male"and "domestic violence men" all serve up the Men's Advice Line. But it should appear in general searches about "domestic violence scotland" and even "scotland my wife is abusive". ("scotland my husband is abusive" reveals help some help groups.)

Another issue that should be studied is the way in which domestic abuse affects men. It is noted on the website that:

A significant number of men calling the Men's Advice Line who initially identify as victims change their own identification by the end of the call or provide information about the violence in their relationships which strongly suggests that they are either not a victim or in fact are the perpetrator (monitoring the Men's Advice Line calls in December 2008 and January 2009). Men's Advice Line staff are skilled at working effectively with all callers, including genuine victims and those who present as victims but are using violence themselves. Our focus is increasing the safety and minimising the risk.

 The question in my mind is "can a victim use violence?" If you google "my wife hits me until I hit back" you'll find all sorts of stories of women hitting their spouse or boyfriend and driving them to use violence. This is inline with research that says that men have a limited number of acceptable emotions to express (happy, horny, angry, but not hurt), and it could well be that the range of available emotions to men in Scotland leans more towards violence as an acceptable reaction. If violence is how men in Scotland communicate in general, then when pressed they would naturally use violence again. So I challenge the Men's Advice Line to not look at all male violence as abuse, especially where there is evidence of female violence (emotionally or physically). Yes, it is wrong to hit someone in anger, but like children, sometimes it's all you have left when they don't listen. If you have no other way to express your hurt, sadness and anger, sometimes violence is all that remains. Better would be to encourage other communication skills to reduce the retaliation violence so that the true abusers are exposed.