Jings, crivvens and help ma boab, you should feel priviledged; 2 posts in a week! Doubling the dosage of my meds has had some dubious side-effects (I sleep like the dead for most of the day now) but when I am awake, I'm feeling a bit more normal. In fact, I've just this minute emailed a letter to the Guardian. Yes, I read something and was that moved that I wrote to a national newspaper. I have absolutely no expectation of my letter being printed, in whole or in part, but as Ken says, someone has to read it. Hopefully. Assuming they don't use some automated system of some sort. No, I have no idea how that would work either.

Anyway.

The article that they published was just a short piece, based on a Home Office report that was published on Friday there. Statistics that the HO came up with show that 16% of all reported violent incidents are domestic violence. Right, so. They want to put in place exit support and have removed the legal aid caps in DV cases. Good news. Ditto the specialist courts, even if a conviction may not neccessarily mean any meaningful jailtime or punishment. It's still moving in the right direction. There's a couple of things in this short article, though, that make me feel... well...

"Almost three quarters of incidents of domestic violence (73%) involve repeat offending, with over one in four victims (27%) attacked three or more times."

It's not the facts reported, it's the way they're reported. The focus of the sentence shifts from the abuser ("... involve repeat offending...") to the victims. Which has echoes of "Why doesn't she leave?", shifting the blame for the abuse from the abuser onto the abused. Instead of wasting what could be precious time for an abused partner wondering why they're still there, why not spend more time and energy on why the abuser keeps on abusing? What makes them think that it's ok to do these things? How can we, as a society, stop them from abusing? How can we stop future generations from thinking it's acceptable to abuse their 'loved' ones? How can we get abusers to take responsiblity for their actions, instead of blaming their partners for 'making them do it' when as a whole, society is generally taking their side and going "Yeah, what did you do? Why won't you leave?"

And the thing about the article that has me picking the wrist rest out of my hippocampus? The clued-up, we're-taking-this-issue-seriously-and-really-going-to-make-a-change quote from Alan Campbell, junior Home Office minister. The bit after "putting victims at the heart of the legal system" (don't make me laugh, Mr. Campbell, I'm apparently lacking a sense of humour).

"But we know there is still more to be done, particularly in the area of prevention by better identifying potential victims - working with police and victim support agencies."

Mr. Campbell, I can save you a lot of time and thousands in taxpayers'. Potential victims can be anybody, as long as they have a pulse. That's the only unifying factor. Yes, it's mostly women who are victim of domestic abuse, but about 8% of reports come from men. It happens in marriages, long-term relationships, co-habitations. Heterosexuals, homosexuals, transexuals. Upper class, middle class, working class. Christian, Muslim, Hindu, athiest, agnostic, pastafarian, Jedi. Getting the drift?

Here's a clue for free - try identifying potential abusers, addressing the circumstances which allow certain people to think that it's ok to behave in that way to the person they're supposed to love so dearly. And please hurry up about it; each week that you dilly-dally, trying to figure out what makes someone prone to being abused by their partner, at least 2 people will die. And I'm not even trying to include the suicides that occur because of this kind of abuse. For a lot of people, it really is a life and death matter. Please take it seriously and do something.