Most women in England and Wales have seen abusive male behaviour in past year, poll finds
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/jun/30/most-women-in-england-and-wales-have-seen-abusive-male-behaviour-in-the-past-year-poll-finds
Posted by ThatchersDirtyTaint
27 Comments
Boys will be…
… Exactly how you raise them to be.
I keep seeing this and it is disappointing that it is a thing. I was just reading about woman runners getting spat on which is abhorrent.
I read the comments and peoples experiences and it is truly mind blowing what is going on.
I would like to do something about it and the only thing I can see is for me to stand up to it. The problem is I have never seen it. I am relatively social, I spend a lot of time in bars and walking around my local area in town, and have never witnessed anything for me to stand up to.
I am absolutely NOT suggesting it doesn’t happen. I am concerned that this is happening specifically when nobody is around to assist. Like people waiting till nobody is around to call them out before doing it, which is even more worrying. Because I feel if they get away with it enough times things will escalate.
But at that point I feel a bit lost in how I can help. I am not exactly a person people would look up to and certainly not anyone would feel safe around if they felt threatened and needed help.
I haven’t experienced it personally. But I have seen it from both men and women in the past couple years. I think the lockdown screwed some people up mentally as it just seems more common than it was prior to the lockdown. Who knows.
I’m not even scrolling down before I comment but I’m going to say the top comment is about how this happens to men too or that men are being ignored by this or some shit?
Saw a neighbour and her friend get attacked in a very public place by her “partner” recently. Lots of people saw it and the police were called. A week after that, she had acid poured on her car during the night.
The change in the guy’s behaviour from his usual charming self to what I saw him become that day was truly horrifying. I’ve seen him around since so assuming she’s stayed with him, which makes me so sad.
Does it include abuse over the internet via something like Twitter, ie someone replied in an abusive manner?
Why is this thread full of incels and bitter divorced dads who’ve completely failed to comprehend the link OP posted? No wonder women avoid you guys 😂
Nothing says “the internet” more than a story about women and abuse filled with “what about men” replies underneath.
‘Seen or experienced’, how about we stick to just experienced rather than skew the headline for an agenda because we all see all sorts of things wondering around.
Ah yes, polls, the highest way of making up bullshit factoid things on the Guardian of all papers/news websites.
Seriously though, 1800 women polled, how can you verify a statement from each one of them as absolute fact, not to mention there’s not another poll made to investigate the other way around.
I’m still holding my view that the news outlets are desperate for a story to put out because it’s a slow news….well I’d say day but more like decade.
Violence against women is of course a problem, but this particular article annoys me because of its vagueness.
>Survey reveals 69% of women have seen or experienced sexual harassment, domestic abuse, violence, stalking or other offences in the past year
That includes if you know someone who has too, so that’s not the whole 69% experiencing it themselves either, but what is the percentage who have experienced it themselves vs know someone who has? I feel like it’s a lot more useful to know these as separate statistics? Maybe the poll included that and the article chose not to include that number.
That’s also over a whole year, so what conclusions are you supposed to draw about how many men behave that way, and how frequently?
Again, not trying to argue it isn’t a problem, I’m just struggling to usefully describe the extent of the problem from what’s included in the article.
You cannot even walk your dog on your own housing estate before some vulgar man pulls up in his car, asks your name and would you like to get in his car, proceeds to get out of his car when you don’t reply, then calls you a stupid cunt when you try to run away.
How do I know this? Because it happened to me on fucking Friday! I’m so, so, so tired of men who do not know how to behave around women in a western country. It’s abhorrent.
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Unsurprising since the questions put to the very representative number of 1800 individuals were so open that they allowed each person to consider their own definitions of abuse. Always useful if you what to produce the results you are aiming for.
I wonder how many men have discovered they only care about male victims of sexual assault and the like because female victims are mentioned here. And otherwise do not mention male victims at all. Nor do they support them in any way.
Also, lots of incel type men saying it’s made up or they don’t believe it, lol.
Also full of people who otherwise don’t give two shits about women’s rights suddenly pretending they do so they can be anti immigration. Seriously, check how many of them comment on feminist issues or abuse against women without mentioning immigration.
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I’ve seen just as much, if not more abusive, female behaviour. But nobody ever mentions that.
*seen* abusive behaviour. That’s a bit vague isn’t it?
Its easy to turn a blind eye and pretend its not a problem
But i saw something, where on the surface there was no abuse or anything
But a few guys basically oggling some women who were exercising
On the surface, some men may think its harmless
But when you actually look into it
Its an horrendously intimidating behaviour, unfortunately, some men will do the “wish i had women watching me”
When they should be asked, howd they feel if some guys much bigger than them were ogling them
That would soon turn the tables
So much of it is power and i genuinely believe a fair few men get a bit of a kick out of it
How many flashers are occuring now?
Guys will wait for a runner or walker isolated and then flash and quickly run off
Its pure intimidation and it needs to be taken seriously
It really is shocking when you pay attention.
I live in a major city and I very rarely go out out anymore but to get to my gym me and my Mrs have to walk down the high st and the amount of predatory behaviour is scary on a Saturday night.
A couple weeks back I saw a bloke outside a co-op call a gang of young woman who looked like students a “bunch of slags”.
There’s a bunch of weak mean about.
And vice versa. Watch love island and bam, abusive female behaviour. That’s 1000% of men and women have seen abusive behaviour. What’s the narrative? That men are bad, okay then… by same female logic women are bad too. It sounds like hatred against men again.
Grim if not exactly surprising. I wonder how many men have at least *seen* abusive female behaviour?
Not surprising to any guy whos friends with women and doesnt even need to be said for the women themselves.
Its shitty.
I’m sick of hearing about it. There’s no solutions proposed, it’s just ‘men bad’ hour after hour.
Okay – I get it. There’s a problem. Got it.
Solution then?
You can’t have a simple article about women being abused by men without the bulk of the discussion debating the validity of it, or pointing out that men are victims too. That is quite telling.
The directly quoted question: “In the last 12 months, have any of the following behaviours happened to a woman/girl that you personally know … or have you heard or seen them happening to any woman/girl …” The list of behaviours then goes on to include the ambiguous and subjectively defined ‘sexual harassment’, and ‘taking or sharing pictures without consent’. So, true story – My friend’s daughter’s friend sent a nude picture of herself to a boy she knows, and he showed it to his friend without her consent. So if I were taking this survey I’d be in the 69%. Seriously – when the question is this generalised and unspecific I think we should be celebrating the fact that only 69% of women said yes! Men of the UK – you’re doing great!
I just wish on all these surveys and polls they asked men the same things about women, but they never seem to.