Lack of support for same-sex relationship violence
1985
“I tend to
try to hang out with people who aren’t mentally ill, these days! Me and
my friend, the first thing we say if anyone gets involved with anyone
else is, ‘Are they sane?’ I wonder what it is about the lesbian
community, I think there are a lot of damaged women around, and there
aren’t the same systems for support, you’re more on your own, certainly
at that time there was no awareness or understanding about violence in
same sex relationships. I remember one woman came to Women's Aid, her
girlfriend had been shimmying up the drainpipe and in through the
window to attack her at night, and we said ‘Go away’, we’re not
interested, this is about male violence’. That’s astonishing to me now,
we just didn’t understand the difference between institutionalised
oppression and individual – when you’re experiencing it, it doesn’t
matter that it’s not institutionalised, you feel like shit, but because
it doesn’t have the same societal impact doesn’t mean it didn’t happen
and I don’t think we realised that, because our view of women was so
political it was somewhat idealised”.
Contributed by: Trisha McCabe, 51