YEARS of reported abuse experienced by a 48-year-old mother of two ended in her recent death. Her name was Malini Wahid, a domestic worker and caterer. And, based on eyewitness reports, she was beaten and strangled to death.

When the news of the woman’s death emerged, it was noted that regular arguments between her and her partner would result in her being abused. This was seen by neighbours and known by numerous family members.

I don’t know the intricacies of the situation, and so it would be unfair for me to say that the people around her could have done much more to protect her. Yet, I firmly believe that such tragedies occur when our understanding of and response to violence is not enough.

When I reported on domestic violence, one of the more thought-provoking sentiments shared with me was that domestic violence and gender-based violence are not just a man getting drunk and beating his wife, or him beating his wife. Such occurrences are merely symptoms of a system that oppresses women and women’s rights- patriarchy.

And, gender inequality, gender discrimination, and the social system of patriarchy are the ‘root causes’ for getting out of jail for free. According to Abeda Sultan (2010), feminists use the term ‘patriarchy’ to describe the power relationship between men and women and find out the root cause of women’s subordination.

In Wahid’s case, based on reports, it appeared as though she needed to tend to the man ‘around the clock’ as though she was his caregiver or maid, and not his partner. Not doing so meant that she could be abused.

For me, this illustrates the very same root causes that we ought to be interrogating more-the inequalities and discrimination between men and women and the uneven power dynamic between men and women. And, it means that programmes needed to tackle these root causes are necessary.

In November, it was reported that more than 1,300 reported cases had been recorded up to the end of October. Let me emphasise that these were only the reported cases; there may be many more unreported ones.

Of course, these large figures illustrate the prevalence of the scourge, but it also reduces the tragedies to mere statistics. Certainly, statistics are crucial to decision-making, but I think it is important for us to remember that the people affected by violence are real human- just like the rest of us.

And that means that when we think about how we can help, we are thinking about what we can do to help each individual.

During the 16 Days of activism observance-a global, annual observance-several new initiatives were rolled out to help provide some sort of redress to people affected by violence.

Community engagement and the provision of pro-bono legal services to 500 gender-based violence victims were among those initiatives that could have a more profound effect (at least, in my opinion). And I believe these are some of the initiatives that will help us tackle the root causes of violence.

You see, I believe that our efforts at protecting vulnerable people in society, like women and children, means that we must be willing to look within our community spaces and clarify misconceptions that violence occurs as some ‘one-off’ event because of alcohol or drug abuse. We must think about stigma and discrimination festering in our communities and preventing these vulnerable individuals from speaking out.

We ought to think about what behaviours we allow people to perpetrate in our communities without stepping in to guarantee that there is appropriate social learning. And, we have to work to ensure that we provide all the support we possibly can- whether it’s shelter, legal recourse, or just a listening ear.

We cannot only rely on the activists and advocates to engage in the enduring work of fighting against the scourge of violence in our country. We each need to understand the threat that plagues our communities and we each need to know that there are things that we can do.

If you would like to discuss this column or any of my previous writings, please feel free to contact me via email: vish14ragobeer@gmail.com