The evidence of women’s perpetration of intimate partner violence is substantial, incontrovertible, and growing by the day. Most recently Lysova, Hanson and Mackay, the new generation of researchers, added another 64 studies, across several countries, to the already treacherous mountain of data to further find that – guess what… women are just as violent in relationships as men. The world is, slowly, starting to accept these ugly facts, despite such evidence existing for more than forty years. But the job is not done, as now something else happens – Which is, every time I post this data, I get the same comment that, whilst seemingly accepting of the high rates of female perpetrated IPV, will then go on to wave such things away as less important, or ‘not the same’, under the notion of ‘context’ and ‘nuance’. ‘Men don’t fear women!’ ‘Women are injured more!’ ‘The vast majority of those killed are women!’ ‘It’s self defense!’ ‘Women don’t use power and control!’ ‘Men have structural power!’ The same miraculous somersaults of mental gymnastics are performed again, and again, under every post I make about IPV. And whilst there is *some* truth to *some* of these claims, they are often wildly exaggerated, and ironically, are themselves lacking in nuance, and instead lean heavily into antiquated gender stereotypes that are not based on credible evidence. So let’s look at these claims... Is violence by men so contextually different to that of women that it is distinct, and therefore justifies our chronically lopsided interventions? Or is this talk of ‘context’ just another way of minimising male victims? What do you think?

2026-03-24