Tag: domestic and family violence

Here, we have a simplistic but compelling comparison. There were 80 one punch fatalities in Australia (2012–2018). https://www.pathologyjournal.rcpa.edu.au/article/S0031-3025(22)00378-6/fulltext
Yet, in the ten months to the 1 November 2023, 43 women have been murdered, victims of domestic and family violence.

Compare and contrast – 80 men dead in 6 years with a legislated response, or 43 women dead in 10 months and regulatory changes that seem to have very little impact on the consistent annual death toll, with an average of one woman dying each week.

Where are our legislators? I’ve seen many promises made by politicians, but very little changes when it comes to women murdered in domestic and family violence. Are these false promises?

False Promises?
I wrote this poem in late 2022. Titled “ False promises”, it explores the tension between a desired future and reality, in a feminist framework. The refrains are from John Donne’s ‘Song: Go and catch a falling star’, and from a book by Daniel Tammett, ‘Every Word is a Bird We Teach to Sing’. ‘Teach me to hear the mermaids sing’ seemed a delightful, whimsical line, but presented a false promise, given the diatribe about women that ‘Song’ is. Similarly, the book, ‘Every Word is a Bird We Teach to Sing’, promised a delightful, whimsical exploration of language, but it was something else, another false promise. Lewis Carroll’s ‘Jabberwocky’ is also referenced, using the Frumious Bandersnatch, the wicked creature that must be killed, as a metaphor for women who must be repressed, oppressed and silenced.

False promises
Lee-Anne Ford

Every word is a bird we teach to sing.
But why is the Bandersnatch Frumious?
Just teach me to hear the mermaids sing.

“Song’s” hateful words, lyrical, seducing.
Beautiful words but naming us notorious!
Every word is a bird we teach to sing.

We have fought and we are still fighting.
Like the Bandersnatch, we are fuming, furious!
Just teach me to hear the mermaids sing.

Equality is distant, still storming, not norming,
Men’s rights, women’s wrongs, claims spurious.
Every word is a bird we teach to sing.

I want to rest, but there is no resting
Words fly, bitter divides, they want us pious.
Just teach me to hear the mermaids sing.

I want a simpler life, one of my choosing.
Where and when will I find it? I am curious.
Every word is a bird we teach to sing.
Just teach me to hear the mermaids sing.