Thread by @DrJessTaylor

After I posted my blog yday about being subjected to male violence, I just woke up to an email from someone who believes in the ‘cycle of violence’ and has told me that they ‘know’ I must have also committed crime and acts of violence because of what I have been subjected to

Absolutely horrified to get that email. But let me just break this down.

There is no ‘cycle of violence’.

We all make choices. Never bullied anyone. Never harmed anyone. Never been in trouble with the law.

I make an active choice to never be violent.

I made an active choice to be a calm, supportive parent. I try to never lose my temper.

I’m proud that I’ve never perpetuated anything I’ve lived through.

People who use their experiences to excuse their violence are just not ready to accept that they made active choices.

It’s a dangerous and harmful myth that those of us who have been subjected to abuse and violence will simply go on in this never ending cycle to perpetuate it.

Lots of us are the opposite, and we work hard to never copy our parents or our abusers.

We shouldn’t let people use their backgrounds or childhoods to excuse their violence and abuse.

‘Oh they just did that because they were abused in childhood’

Nope. Sorry, that’s not why.

They did it because they chose to, and wanted to.

This is precisely why I don’t support academic theory or practice which seeks to excuse sex offenders, DV offenders, child abuse offenders etc based on their traumatic childhoods or their experiences of abuse.

That’s not why they commit offences. That’s an excuse.