Clementine Ford’s Distorted Vision Of Australia

By Jim Muldoon: Melbourne is routinely billed in our media as the world’s most liveable city. The various groups who declare the world’s top cities don’t always agree on the number one position, but Melbourne, as well as Australia’s other major cities, always appear somewhere in the top 10 or 20. Each group has a different list of criteria for what it is that makes particular cities “the best”, but every one of them sees personal safety and low crime as crucial.
Clearly, none of these groups asked Clementine Ford what she thinks, because for her, in her latest rendition of the Sacred Babble, the disturbing backlash on speaking out about violence against women, life has never been more dangerous for Australian women.
How bad is it?

“The reality is that simply being alive constitutes a ‘dangerous situation’ for women.”

There are no points for guessing what, or should I say who, makes the most liveable city so dangerous for women:

“It is astonishing how much more offended men seem to get by the possibility that they’ll be lumped in with a group known to pose a risk to women than they are by the fact that, empirically speaking, the greatest risk to women’s lives is men.”

She goes on to tell us how women are murdered by their partners at rate of one a week. For those of you not so good with statistics, let me assist you through the murk:
One a week is 52 a year, and the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), in their study on Domestic / Family homicide in Australia, confirm that in the 10 years from 2002-03 to 2011-12 some 488 women, or 48.8 per year, were killed by an intimate partner.
In terms of the total women in Australia, that is 0.0006% per annum.
It is difficult to see how men are the “greatest risk”, however, when, again according to the ABS in 2013, 52 women were killed as pedestrians in traffic accidents, 1007 women were killed in accidental falls and 19,438 women died from some form of cancer.
But am I making light of the women who were murdered? Consider this heady mixture of victim-claiming while victim-blaming:

“We’re bullied for the ‘sexism’ of focusing solely on women, as if we should be prioritising the minute numbers of men who are victimised in hostile domestic situations although overwhelmingly not at risk of domestic homicide.”

She also wrings her hands like this:

“We’re chastised for not including caveats that remind people that ‘not all men’ are involved in this extensive war on women.”

Now, is she really claiming that some 8 million Australian men were involved in the murder of 52 women last year? But also consider that the Domestic / Family homicide in Australia figures put the “minute number” for men as 166 for the decade, which is 16.6 per year. So one-a-week is an “extreme war on women”, but more than one-a-month is not enough for right-thinking feminists to give a shit.
Extraordinarily, she then goes on a rant as to how unfair it all is for men to object to her fear-mongering citing of false statistics to give her drivel a disguise of scientific authority. Of course, she claims that she has “an entire folder of emails” of threats. We are to assume that this folder is big, the threats are genuine, from men, and they are not all from the same nutter. Given her use of statistics, I have my doubts.
Consider this piece of numerical magic:

“So far, 2015 has seen 35 women murdered in acts of violence, with the latest unnamed victim discovered overnight at a property in Dallas, Victoria. At least 29 of these murders are alleged to have been committed by men. The majority of these alleged perpetrators were in, or had previously been in, a form of intimate relationship with the murdered women.”

Let me help you follow the bouncing ball here. 35 becomes 29 becomes some undefined number less than 29. Now, this article was written on May 12, 2015 – so we have had 20 weeks for the year thus far. Less than 29 divided by 20 is something like one-a-week. Right?

“As the statistics stand now, two women are killed every week in Australia as a result of violence.”

Did you miss it? Are you wondering how we got from one a week to two? It’s the “as a result of violence” that requires your attention. This figure has nothing to do with domestic violence. She’s now including women being killed by strangers, and maybe even killed by other women.
The next bit might upset Dr. Michael Flood and all the Good Men at White Ribbon Australia:

“In regards to men’s violence against women, [men are] praised for even acknowledging the problem, festooned with compliments and gratitude simply for offering what should be the fairly standard view that ‘it’s not on mate’… And they do this because it’s a way of maintaining control and power, insisting that other men are the enemy but that this man must be freely accepted as a protector and ally.”

Even when you try to help them, boys, it’s oppression.
Most bizarre of all is Ford’s next complaint:

“Women still aren’t allowed to take ownership over our own defense and protection.”

What does this mean? Who’s not allowing them? The oppressive men? The Good Feminist men? All men?
But even more, is she calling women to real action? Not just a poetry reading, or a season of the “Vagina Monologues”, but real action? Is she calling for women to take responsibility for their “own defense and protection”?
Don’t be silly.

“Men’s violence is the problem. Let’s name it, and let’s end it.”

For those not familiar with the Sacred Babble, allow me to interpret:
Ford’s work, having whined and complained enough to make her sound important, is now done. She has completed the gargantuan task of naming “it”.
“Let’s end it” is the cue for the Good Feminist Men, now that they have been suitably chastised for their preening and posturing and oppressing, to get on with the task of actually ending the “extensive war on women”. Preferably, they will do this in a quiet, efficient manner that leaves the women blissfully unaware of the civil rights abuses and carnage that comes from blaming 8 million men for the actions of a few.
I wonder how Tourism Australia’s campaign, “There’s nothing like Australia” sells the feminist moral panic to potential international visitors? The City of Melbourne’s own website makes out that Melbourne is a great place to visit, without any warnings to women about the “extensive war” being waged.
Weren’t the other countries concerned when their women came back abused, dead or worse? Or are those countries also run by Patriarchy and they thought it was all part of good international relations?
In which case, what’s going to happen when the Good Feminist Men appoint a Misogyny-Finder General to conduct secret tribunals to rid us, or at least women, from this manufactured scourge.
Won’t those Patratriarchs be worried when their men are incarcerated or, worse, indoctrinated, due to trumped up charges of oppression?
I can see the new campaign now “Australia – Safety for Women, Lessons for Men.” And Melbourne, the World’s Most Ideologically Correct City.

About Jim Muldoon

Jim Muldoon is an Australian men's human rights activist and Australian Editor for AVfM. He is an advocate for the equal rights and responsibilities for men and women.

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