‘If there's a punishment, that's abuse’: Professor Smith at Longford conference

For any reader - male or female - whose gut is telling them something’s not right in how their partner is treating them but yet who may feel unsure if it’s abuse per se, Professor Monckton offers practical advice.

“Anyone who's asking themselves ‘is this abuse?’ or thinking, ‘I don't like this,’ that's your instincts telling you something is wrong. Never ignore your instincts, ever.

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They are your body's internal alarm system because your body will look after you. So if you've got the instinct that something's going wrong, listen to that and then ask yourself what would happen if you did something to upset your partner?
Ask yourself what would happen if I was late? What would happen if I was caught talking to an ex? Then you can gauge whether it's possibly abuse or not.

So if you say, what would happen if I said no to something? And the answer to yourself is that person would go mad, would stop money or they wouldn't speak to you for days or they might even hit you, if there's some form of punishment, that's abuse.

No matter whether you are being beaten or not, that is a dangerous person. And if you are saying that to quite a lot of things, ‘what would happen if I was late, if I burned his chips, etc’ and you're getting the same answer that there’s a consequence every time … that’s abuse.”

Professor Monckton Smith adds that professionals and the public alike need to adopt a more critical perspective on domestic violence incidents.

She explains, “It’s important to start seeing domestic abuse as a serious crime rather than a social problem.

At the moment, we look at it like, oh, it's two people arguing and why don't they just calm down and why don't they just get on, but of course we're actually talking about a very dangerous person and a victim.

We put so much responsibility on the victim to manage the situation but they're with a really dangerous person who doesn't look dangerous.”

The renowned criminologist said that while not every case involves serious violence, it does involve other elements such as, “manipulation, threats, blackmail, following rules, and all of those kinds of things that put victims in a situation where they're thinking, ‘I won’t upset them’, ‘I won’t upset them,’ and then that becomes a way of life. Of course you can't not upset them (the abuser). They're determined to be upset. I think for professionals, they need to walk into domestic abuse thinking this is actually a serious crime; this is the crime where we're more likely to see deaths than any other are likely to get, so we must treat it as a serious crime.”

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To speak with a Longford Women's Link (LWL) Domestic Violence Specialist, call 043-3341511 or visit LWL at Willow House, Ardnacassa Avenue, and request a DV specialist. No appointment is necessary.