A struggle pertetuated in time: Violence against women

Joana Romeiro | Sílvia Caldeira

The 25th of November breaks out in those who are the rubble and exhausted feminine countenances, beaten and amid broken affections. Stripped of their values, their possessions, and their physical, intellectual, emotional, and/or spiritual identity, they walk through the streets or in the corners of their homes with the (in)visible marks of a life stripped of the exercise of their will, of dignity, rights, freedom, or Humanity. This International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, based on the Resolution 52/134 of the United Nations (UN), recalls a timeless and generational struggle indicative of the perpetuation and perpetration of acts of aggression, whether of a physical nature, sexual or psychological against the Woman. The World Health Organization (WHO) recognises this scourge as a public health problem and a priority intervention. The note serves to recall the foundations of what is condemned worldwide, and in 1993, registered by the United Nations General Assembly in resolution 48/104, that “violence against women” constitutes.

“any act of gender-based violence that results in, or is likely to result in, physical, sexual, or mental harm or suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether occurring in public or in private life.” (Article 1) (United Nations, 1993).

Studies referring to the period between 2016-2018 indicate that one in three women (30% of the global female population), aged between 15 and 49 years were the target, at some point in their lives, of aggression, highlighting physical aggression and/or intimate violence by a partner, or sexual abuse by someone other than the partner (WHO, 2021). Although the types of violence are named depending on the individual who perpetrates it, the mechanism used to cause harm, and which causes it to be classified as domestic violence, sexual abuse, human trafficking, female genital mutilation, or child marriage. Domestic violence has the highest prevalence, affecting 27% of women through physical and/or sexual aggression inflicted by a partner (WHO, 2021). However, the visibility of this number requires consideration in its assessment and measurement, as it depends on reporting (by itself or by someone else who has verified it), is often experienced in the intimacy of a relationship, is difficult to observe, and dependent on tangible and objectified marks.

The global trend is mirrored in the numbers found in the national context, which, between 2016 and 2021, revealed an exponential increase of 113% in situations of violence reported to the Portuguese Victim Support Association (APAV, 2021). It should be added that in 2021, domestic violence was the leading cause of requests for support, equivalent to 76.8% (or 19,846 contacts), of which 9,148 were women (APAV, 2021).

Women with a high level of education would be fortunate, however, this has not effectively served as a way of blocking the violence inflicted on them. Contrary to the assumption, women with higher education studies have been more affected or constitute the largest number of complaints (safeguarding the distinction between situations experienced and situations reported).

A look instigated by Professor Rita Sacramento Monteiro, in what was the “Economy of Francesco” module within the scope of the Post-Doctoral Program in Integral Human Development at the Católica Doctoral School (CADOS) encourages the genesis of the thought: “Where lies the root of the problem?”

The simplicity of the question does not detract from the intrinsic complexity of the multiplicity of responses and factors that dominate and interact with each other, which cause disorder and agitation, resulting in an action initiated against women and which (in)variably spans time, societies, and cultures and which manifests itself with common points of observance depending on the society and culture to which they relate.

Conditioned from an early age, the representations, and patterns of socially expected and employed behaviors take on different contours depending on the cultural environment (Cunningham & Cunningham, 2013; Dyer et al., 2004; Silva et al., 2012). The effective realization of feminine/masculine roles is irremediably imprinted in the socialization process, naively and/or objectively remembered, instilled (by peers, family and/or community) in a normative, stereotyped, and socially imposed constant, which is expected to be fulfilled and obeyed by the woman, invariably bound to marriage, in generating and caring for offspring (Albano & Galhardo, 2015; Bhatti et al., 1999b; Hinton & Miller, 2013; Hudson & Culley, 2013b). Previous studies show that women from different social and cultural backgrounds felt that it was their personal, social, and family duty to bear and care for children and, if unable to fulfill this role, faced social stigma, conflicting relationships with their husband, family, and community members (Daibes et al., 2018; Naab et al., 2019). Take as an example some communities with a patriarchal format and thought, where the absence of children within the family is attributed to women and seen as a legal reason for punishment, making domestic violence, ostracization, perjury, alienation, divorce, and polygamy by the husband (Bhatti et al., 1999a; Conde, 2012; Stellar et al., 2015).

Invariably in the Portuguese context, it is in the intimacy and familiarity of everyday life, of the family, where the violence that victimizes the female gender emerges, whether by the spouse (15.5%) or partner (8.5%), father/mother (7.8%), ex-partner (7.5%), and child (6.4%) (APAV, 2021). Its preventive nature does not align with the reality explained in national, European, and global statistical reports. Oblivious to physical borders threatening women and children at any time in their lives, insistently and socially opposed and rooted in historically and culturally instilled prejudices (Mota, 2011).

Rooted in historical and culturally instilled prejudices, it finds in pre-determined and innate biological processes of vulnerability (such as pregnancy) a sense of physical power and dominance on the part of men and the assumption of a position of subservience/subordination of women to men. One should pay attention to the aggregation of factors that confer an increased status of fragility, such as belonging to minority social groups: indigenous people, refugees, migrants, from rural/remote communities, in situations of armed conflict, indigents, institutionalized or detained, people with disabilities, children and elderly women (Attorney General’s Office, 1993).

One should remember the imperative need to guarantee the exercise of protection, freedom, and dignity of every Human Being, regardless of their gender or creed, in those rights equally enshrined for All and in particular for Women: Universal Declaration of Human Rights; International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights; International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights; Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women; Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (Attorney General’s Office, 1993). Any violations of these rights or assumptions have a punitive nature.

The dissemination of concrete data that testifies to the inequality that women suffer over time should be praised, such as the work carried out by Dr. Claudia Goldin, a researcher at Harvard University, recognized with the Nobel Prize in Economics, for her 200-year study of the contribution of women to the labor market. Let´s applaud the State’s support and support measures for those who were not protected, whose rights were violated, and who found a fresh start in a symbolic economic aid. Let the words that distort the nature of effective support for victims of violence, perpetuating or instigating the mentality of a society that restricts the principle of defense of those who are vulnerable, be heard but not followed. The undeniable assumption of “No one is left behind if no woman is left behind” based on the idea of one of the 12 Villages (“Women in the Economy”) promoted by the “Economy of Francesco” program, should be praised and cherished.

May loose hair be a symbol of respected femininity, of an assumed and freely expressed identity, and that women’s restlessness and strength in assuming not only their vulnerability but in showing themselves resilient in the face of vulnerability, be at the heart of transformative action, repelling discrimination, based on the vision of an effectively equitable society.

REFERÊNCIAS BIBLOGRÁFICAS:

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