Stacey Dooley Investigates, Russia's War on Women

Authored by bbc.co.uk and submitted by texlorax
image for Stacey Dooley Investigates, Russia's War on Women

Behind closed doors, Russian society has a dark secret. It's estimated thousands of Russian women are murdered every year by their husbands or partners. Domestic violence is so deep-rooted in Russia there's even a well-known saying - “If he beats you, it means he loves you”.

Despite the scale of the problem, in February 2017 the Russian government decriminalised certain forms of domestic violence.

In Stacey Dooley Investigates: Russia's War On Women, Stacey travels to Russia to explore the reasons behind this decision and the impact the law-change is having on women. She meets the victims forced into hiding to escape their abusive partners and comes face to face with a prolific violent offender.

She visits the hard-line Orthodox Christians championing Russia's return to traditional values and spends time with the young feminists fighting for equality despite threats and intimidation.

gonewildecat on February 3rd, 2018 at 18:31 UTC »

It’s not just Russia. It’s most Soviet bloc countries. And it persists even when people emigrate to western countries.

My fathers family is Ukrainian. His parents were first generation Americans born in the 1910s. The attitude toward women persisted with my grandparents, my father and uncle, and my cousin.

Women are second class. They are not respected and are useless unless they are doing their “womanly duty” of being a mother and housekeeper.

I was the first person in my family to go to college. I was discouraged by them because it’s only for men to get an education. When I started my IT career I was scolded for taking a job away from a deserving man. I was also repeatedly told my life was a failure because I was not married with children. I had a senior position, made over $100k a year, owned a nice car, and my own home. But I was still considered a failure to them.

My father verbally and emotionally abused my mother and I till the day he died. According to my grandparents, it was our fault.

It IS a cultural difference. It’s ingrained. It’s how it’s always been.

Keetaby on February 3rd, 2018 at 17:37 UTC »

reposting my comment from r/Documentaries

am russian, can confirm.

domestic violence is such a huge problem, it's so deep-rooted, that it is horrendous.

firstly, it's decriminalized to beat for the first registrated and proven time. if the woman shows up to the police, the chances are high they will not do anything. IF they decide to step in, the husband is fined ~30k (the average monthly pay in some regions is ~23k), and is back to beating her for the fact that she went to the police.

secondly, almost everyone is victim-blaming. it's always the woman's fault for everything that happens to her. if she speaks up, she is condemning herself to endless bullying from her coworkers, her family, his family, even friends.

thirdly, the official murder rate is non-existent. the government does not want the population to know that bad things happen inside the country at all. you will not hear anything on the news. you will not find official statistics anywhere. there are estimates made by organizations that protect people (which are few and bullied by the government), and they are through the roof.

example: there have been incidents of school attacks by young boys, they have been covered by the TV media in summary of like 1,5 MINUTES. not per channel. AT ALL.

here are some links (sorry, in russian) to back up some of the things i said:

school attacks: 1 https://meduza.io/feature/2018/01/19/napadenie-v-ulan-ude-shkolnik-prishel-v-klass-s-toporom-i-kokteylem-molotova-glavnoe 2 https://meduza.io/news/2018/02/02/v-kaluzhskoy-oblasti-shkolnik-napal-s-nozhom-na-odnoklassnika-i-vyprygnul-v-okno

an extensive article with links about how the government condemns and assigns jail time for women who accidentally kill their husbands in self-defence: https://meduza.io/feature/2017/12/27/on-tebya-tolko-golovoy-o-stenku-bil-a-ty-ego-nozhom-porezala

a fairly recent event, a husband chops off his wive's arms because of "jealousy". she had already had gone to the police about how he beat her, they did nothing https://meduza.io/news/2017/12/14/zhitelnitsa-serpuhova-kotoroy-muzh-otrubil-ruki-zhalovalas-v-politsiyu-na-ugrozy

a very recent thing (off-topic a bit, though): a student kills his ex-girlfriend because she found someone else, and kills himself https://meduza.io/feature/2018/01/23/student-mgtu-ubil-svoyu-podrugu-iz-za-nerazdelennoy-lyubvi-i-napisal-ob-etom-vo-vkontakte-glavnoe

very off-topic, but interesting: a serial rapist and murderer was caught fairly recently (2015?), netted more than 80 women raped and killed during a period from 1992 to 2010 https://meduza.io/feature/2017/03/15/kak-v-angarske-20-let-pytalis-poymat-samogo-strashnogo-manyaka-v-istorii-rossii-reportazh-meduzy

a story of one of the organizations i mentioned, that wants to help people: https://meduza.io/slides/pravozaschitnikov-iz-memoriala-na-kavkaze-pohischayut-sazhayut-v-tyurmu-ubivayut-pochemu-ih-tak-zhestoko-presleduyut

of course, notallrussians are like that. but it's ingrained really deep in the society. bad things are happening very frequently, and very few have actual knowledge of the events.

Baldwon on February 3rd, 2018 at 16:41 UTC »

I feel like the cultural gap between Russia and Western nations is deeply under-estimated.

The response in Russia to the #metoo movement has mostly been bewilderment. They see this as the natural state of things, and not a problem to be addressed.