Working to Fight Violence Against Women and Girls with Isabel Chapman and Sandra Onai | Transcript
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Sandra Onai
So those things would come up, but when you talk about the other subtle things, the emotional, psychological abuse, those things weren't unnecessarily being picked up. And you couldn't go to the police and say well, he -
Hannah Witton
Calls me mean names.
Sandra Onai
Yes.
Hannah Witton
When it is a constant, and when there is even that threat of violence or anything -
Isabel Chapman
Because, at the moment, you couldn't be charged for domestic abuse.
Hannah Witton
Welcome to Doing It with me, Hannah Witton, where we talk all things sex, relationships, dating, and our bodies. Hello, welcome back to Doing It.
Hannah Witton
This is one of those episodes where I am so grateful to be able to do this podcast and sit down and have a chat with people with different areas of expertise and knowledge. I learned so much recording this episode, and I think it is a really valuable conversation, and I hope you get something out of it too. First of all, though, content warning for domestic abuse and sexual violence.
Hannah Witton
So my guests are Sandra Onai and Isabel Chapman. Sandra is a domestic abuse and sexual violence specialist, working in areas such as domestic abuse, sexual violence, forced marriages, so called honour based violence, and safeguarding. Isabel is a communications inclusion and diversity specialist. She's a young people's violence advisor, and an independent sexual violence advisor. She does a lot of work in engaging hard to reach communities. She's also a public speaker, and we actually met in 2015, at TEDxClapham, where we both gave talks. So in this episode, we talk about violence against women and girls, or VAWG. VAWG is the overarching term used to cover all forms of violence against women and girls. And so that includes domestic abuse, sexual abuse, coercion, and control, honoured based violence, and FGM. In this episode, we talk mostly about domestic and sexual abuse. We also talk a lot about the reality of services in the UK for young people and adults, and Sandra's experience with working with perpetrators. Like I said, I learned so much recording this, and I hope that you do too. Here's the episode. Thank you both for joining me. I'm really excited to have this conversation, and learn a lot from you. Firstly, like, how do you describe what you do?
Isabel Chapman
So I'm Isabel, and I'm a freelance specialist. I work across a range of organisations helping them to reach slightly harder to reach communities. I'm a trained domestic and sexual abuse advisor. So I work with people who've experienced different kind of abuse or trauma as victims, and kind of everything around that informs the work that I do around making projects or campaigns more inclusive, more accessible, and actually have more genuine impact.
Sandra Onai
And my name is Sandra, and I am a domestic abuse and sexual abuse advocate. I work with people who are experiencing domestic abuse. And more recently, I've started working with perpetrators of domestic abuse as well.
Hannah Witton
That sounds kind of terrifying, interesting
Sandra Onai
Yeah
Hannah Witton
Fascinating, like, important as well, like all of those things. I think we're gonna talk a lot about some heavy topics here, but we're also going to try and have a good time. I don't know if that's asking for too much. But yeah, Isabel, first of all, do you want to give us an overview of VAWG, violence against women and girls.
Isabel Chapman
Yes
Hannah Witton
Yeah, this is the first time I heard you say it, VAWG, I'm like, what, oh.
Isabel Chapman
So well, violence against women and girls, is what we refer to as the kind of wider sector, in terms of people working in this field. But also, it's sometimes referred to as a kind of global epidemic around violence against women and girls.
Hannah Witton
I want to specify, you both work in London.
Isabel Chapman
Yes.
Sandra Onai
Yeah.
Isabel Chapman
Yes. So in terms of the training that we've had, I specialise in working with young people, Sandra kind of works with, with victims of, of all ages. And I think, really, the work is kind of around, you know, the stats that lots of people already would know that, you know, in the UK, two women on average die every week, at the hands of their current or former partner. We know globally, you know, women are going to experience you know, statistically one in three, they're going to either be raped, or beaten, you know, on a global scale in their lifetime. So I think it can be quite overwhelming in terms of those statistics because it kind of just seems so huge. And I think, particularly in the UK, we think of ourselves as quite progressive, you know, and, you know, as a first world country, and I think often people don't really associate that there is this kind of issue around violence against women and girls actually happening here. So, you know, the work, the work that we do is about working with individual victims, in terms of supporting them through those different pathways. So it might be that they, you know, something's happened, and they've had an interaction with the police, or they might have gone to, you know, access a support service. And it's about, you know, how do you, every case is different. So it's about how do you individually support young people, you know, or victims, through, you know, the different services. They might be engaging with five different services, you know, at one time.
Hannah Witton
Oh, really?
Sandra Onai
Yeah.
Hannah Witton
Is that because of just bureaucracy reasons? Or because of lack of funding, so it turns out, it's lots of nonprofits trying to do this work? Like, why is it so many?
Sandra Onai
I think it's because when, when we look at people who are experiencing violence, domestic abuse, it affects different parts of your life. It can affect your health, it can affect your ability to parent, it can affect your mental health, it can affect your substance misuse. So all of those components will need a different service, will need a different support service. So depending on different people's experiences, they might be working with a number of people, and on one hand, it's positive, but sometimes it can be a challenge, because you're having to tell your story potentially to five people.
Hannah Witton
Do they, because you said you're an advocate, does that mean that you help people through all of those different -
Sandra Onai
Yes.
Hannah Witton
So you're like the one constant?
Sandra Onai
Yes.
Hannah Witton
Okay.
Sandra Onai
So I think what a huge part of my role is trying to minimise that repetition. So there's a lot of professional meetings where I'm like, okay, the victim has informed me of sort of their experiences, and I will share it with all the professionals, we come to an agreement in terms of who does what, just to minimise that repetition of having to tell your story over and over again, and being really traumatised by that.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, and the questions, and stuff.
Isabel Chapman
And I think, you know, when there's so many different services involved, and that's kind of how I got involved through working, you know, at Housing Association, and housing is, obviously, a big part. And I think, you know, the role of the advocate is to really make sure that what the victim wants is, is at the centre of those discussions.
Hannah Witton
And being heard, yeah.
Isabel Chapman
You know, and often, everyone's getting, you know, everyone's getting in a room, and everyone's deciding these things. And actually, it's not always what the victim wants. And particularly, you know, when I've been working with younger victims, often their voice just gets kind of completely lost. Or actually, you know, what they want, isn't what the services want, or it's not what school wants, or it's not what the family wants, or it's not what, you know, social care want...
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Isabel Chapman
And actually, your role as advocate is to just keep being like, this is what the young person wants, this is what we can get them to do, now. That might be different in the future, but always making sure that their voice is heard, because they can't go to all these different meetings, because they have other commitments. And also, it's like a full time job. So it's kind of making sure that you keep bringing it back to what they want, because also, ultimately, they're going to make their own decisions anyway. So if we agree a plan that they don't want, they're not going to, it's not going to happen.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. If it doesn't involve them in the process of the decision making. Is there ever conflict within the different organisations of what they think is best for the person?
Sandra Onai
Yes. I think there is a interesting researcher called Marianne Hester who talks about the idea of these three planets when involves domestic abuse. So there's one planet that is focused on, it's the police and their focus with the perpetrator being someone who needs to be held accountable, they are bad, they need to be made responsible for their behaviour. Then we look at planet where it's Children and Family Services. Their focus is on their children, they are looking at ways to maintain contact with parents, they are looking at ways to ensure that that child is protected. And often the responsibility of protecting that child is on the victim, in most cases, which is the mother. Again, there's a different change in terms of who is accountable. And then we move to planet where it's the family courts, and the family courts are at a position that children should have access to dad and mum. So in family court, they're willing to give both parents responsibility and access to the children. So often women, who are sort of the most the people who are most affected by domestic abuse, they find it very hard to navigate these different spheres. And there's conflicting priorities, conflicting ideas in terms of what they should do. And they find it sometimes a little bit interesting and difficult.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, there's I guess there's just so much to deal with in terms of your own safety, your child safety, and different allegiances. Sounds like, I've got Game Of Thrones in my head.
Isabel Chapman
Yeah, it's relationships. It's complicated. And I think myths also then play, you know, play a part in that because either people believe that domestic abuse happens to both genders equally, which it doesn't. Statistics show, it's gendered crime, you know, it happens disproportionately to women. It does happen to men as well, but not to the same extent. And often what you see in the statistics around male domestic abuse, those statistics, they include male on male violence within that. So there's a lots of different kinds of myths, that then also complicate this idea of the planets. And often, you know, people thinking they're making the right decision for their family. Child contact is a huge, huge thing when you're working with a victim, because -
Hannah Witton
What do you mean, child contact?
Isabel Chapman
So navigating child contact between parent and child -
Hannah Witton
Right, okay -
Isabel Chapman
So if you've got a father who's the perpetrator, but the mum, who's the victim, wants to maintain child contact, it can just get really, really complicated. Obviously, really, really quickly. If you've moved into a refuge for your, you know, family safety, the perpetrator is not supposed to know where you're living. You know, the child might want to stay in contact with the with the perpetrator, depending on the age. It's one of those things where every case is so different, and there's all these different multi layers that make it complicated. Once you have mental health, substance misuse, disability, often we work with families who haven't been here very long, they don't speak English as their first language so you have language barrier, all these different things can make it quite hard for them to then navigate these different services.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. And you're also seeing them at the point where either something extreme has happened, that they've gone to hospital or to the police, and so they're in the system. Or they've come forward, somehow - whereas - and there's also a lot of other people who are, who aren't getting help yet.
Isabel Chapman
Yeah, absolutely. And I think that's why the early intervention and prevention work is so important, because if we can educate people, if we can upskill everyone to understand about healthy, non violent, equal relationships, that's going to be so much more beneficial in the long term.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, because you do a lot of work with young people, and one of the projects that you worked on, the nail bar -
Isabel Chapman
Yeah.
Hannah Witton
Do you want to talk a bit about that, because that's so cool. I really love that project.
Isabel Chapman
Yeah, so one of the organisations that I work with is an organisation called Art Against Knives. They are based up in Barnet, and they work with young women on a programme called, In Our Hands, so they run two weekly pop up nail bars, in Barnet, one in Woodside park, so North Finchley, and then another on the Dollis Valley Estate in High Barnet. And they work with young women, aged 12 to 24, open-access, every week, same time, same place, they can come and get their nails done but -
Hannah Witton
And they can also learn how to do nails as well
Isabel Chapman
Yeah, so they have an intensive, so they can learn within the nail bar setting, and then they also have an intensive programme where young women can learn how to do nail art, shellack, then they can earn money through Art Against Knives as well, doing pop ups all over London. So it's amazing, amazing model, but within the nail bars, they have specialists. So they have a young person violence advisor who sits with them in the nail bar. So when I worked there, that was my role, and every week they know they can get access to specialists who know about violence against women and girls, who know about you know, the care system, they know about youth violence within that model, within the nail bars, they can get that regular support from experts.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, and it's like a setting where you can gossip, and you're like talking about your lives.
Isabel Chapman
Absolutely.
Hannah Witton
But you're then, you know, if something comes up -
Sandra Onai
Yeah.
Hannah Witton
You can do that prevention, and that education.
Isabel Chapman
What's so amazing about the way that Art Against Knives are set up, the projects, you know, it looks like an actual nail bar. You know, the girls pick up their phones in there and they're like I'm in the nail shop. You know, it looks like somewhere you want to hang out, and I think Sandra would agree, so much of your role as an advocate is basically saying, my client doesn't want to go to that space. They don't want to engage at the police station. You know, they don't want to engage in the borough service, which might be a disused council building, or you know, organisations don't have big shiny buildings and things like that. But it's also about understanding for the victim. You've already been through all this trauma, and then last place you know you want to go is some building that you don't want to be seen at.
Hannah Witton
Because also if it's, you know, if you live in a quite a tight community -
Isabel Chapman
Absolutely.
Hannah Witton
If you are seen at certain places.
Isabel Chapman
You know, and in the nail bar model, Art Against Knives knows those girls, or they get referred in and we have a backstory. So we know, okay, when they come, we'll link them with this person. Or another person in the nail bar, that's similar to age them, they can learn from each other, they can make friends, these are socially isolated people. They're not meeting each other, you know.
Sandra Onai
And I also think one thing that we also forget about, which is why I love this idea of the nail bar, is that it's very hard to open up and talk about some of the hardest things that you've experienced to what is the stranger, that's what we are. You're asking these very personal questions, you're asking things about people's sexual experiences, they're talking about violence, you're talking about families. So this idea of creating a relationship for us, allowing people to, when they're ready to have the conversation to disclose to be have the, the freedom to have those conversations. I think that's really powerful, and especially for young people who are very distrusting of adults.
Isabel Chapman
And I think as well, especially when you have a referral, because they can come each week, it takes the pressure off them disclosing. So you know, when I worked at Art Against Knives, when I was in the nail bar each week, I might work with a young woman who wouldn't disclose to me for up to a month.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Isabel Chapman
But she knows that we know something. She knows that, you know, she has been referred for a reason. But she's choosing to come back. And she knows that we're going to be there when she does choose to disclose.
Hannah Witton
But you're not forcing her to say anything.
Isabel Chapman
Yeah. And it's not like, first session, right, tell me about all this really horrific stuff that's happened.
Hannah Witton
Tell me your trauma.
Isabel Chapman
Exactly. Which, you know, often some services, if you don't engage in the first session, or they can't get through to you -
Hannah Witton
You're dropped off the system.
Isabel Chapman
Absolutely. Yeah.
Sandra Onai
I think that's one of the most heartbreaking things. Some organisations have three calls, a different time of the day, and then if you haven't picked up, your case has been closed and -
Hannah Witton
And you might have been at work.
Sandra Onai
Yeah.
Hannah Witton
Or like looking after your kid?
Sandra Onai
Yeah. Or it's a private number. I don't answer private numbers. So I think there's all these challenges and barriers for people accessing support. We need more funding, we need more funding in terms of more domestic abuse advocates, but we also need to share the responsibility. I think this idea of just leaving it all to domestic abuse workers, I think that is not it's not sustainable. We need to be getting more people involved. Domestic Abuse should be everyone's business. We've gotten to a point where, with safeguarding of children, we're at that place that everyone is sharing that responsibility. Everyone's keeping an eye out. I think we need to be equally involved when it comes to domestic abuse, and sexual violence.
Hannah Witton
How does that look? Does that come in like education when you're much younger? I wonder if stuff like domestic violence would be on the new curriculum that the government are bringing in for relationships and sex education?
Sandra Onai
I think they struggle, so how it ought to be dressed up, it'll be talking about healthy relationships, what to do when you notice challenging things within your relationship. But I also think sometimes it's important for us to just name it. If we're saying that it is domestic abuse, and if you're in a relationship, and your partner is doing x, y, and z, it is abuse.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. And I think there's that whole like, this is what a healthy relationship looks like. These are signs of abuse, and like even like early signs of abuse, and labelling different kinds of physical, emotional, and we're going to get onto talking about the coercive behaviour thing as well. Yeah, I don't think I've ever been taught like, okay, actually, if this is happening to you, where do you go? And what happens next? Just so you have some kind of knowledge and expectations of like what you're getting into, if you report something.
Sandra Onai
Yes.
Hannah Witton
There's no like, here is your guide to being a victim. Like, that doesn't exist.
Isabel Chapman
Absolutely. And I think just also you know, how quickly things can escalate, you know, particularly in relation to young people. Their relationships, on the whole, largely speaking, they're very intense. They might start being in, you know, not even an exclusive relationship, but some kind of relationship that then might escalate to being violent or physically abusive, or sexually abusive, very, very quickly. And actually, before you even know what's happened, you're in this situation that you can't really get out of, and you're not feeling in control. And also, young people give each other, often, bad advice. Because if they're in an unhealthy relationship, and then they see someone else -
Hannah Witton
They're like, oh yeah, my partner does that all the time. It's totally normal.
Isabel Chapman
Yeah, you know, and we have a whole generation of young people now dealing with whole new tech that we've never had, you know. When I was a teenager, you know, we didn't have this kind of same access. We certainly couldn't share picture messages because it was like £2.50
Hannah Witton
Oh my God, yeah, couldn't do that.
Isabel Chapman
So if you wanted to share a sexual picture yourself, you were gonna take a digital camera, and put it on the family computer, it was like high risk stuff. We're not supporting young people to understand how that tech also impacts their relationships.
Sandra Onai
Yes.
Isabel Chapman
And you know, how you navigate, how do you feel and your self esteem? You know, we know that people get into relationships, particularly at a younger age, because they think it's going to fix something, it's going to solve something. It's like, I just want to go out with anyone because I, you know, just want to have a boyfriend or a girlfriend, even if it is unhealthy
Hannah Witton
Because it feels like a rite of passage as well. I've got a boyfriend or a girlfriend.
Isabel Chapman
Absolutely. And I think it's just about having those open discussions, also with young men around what's acceptable, what's not acceptable, and also what's driving abusive behaviour. You know, we focus so much on the physical side of domestic abuse, we think, oh well, I know about domestic abuse, because I'd see people with black eyes, you know, walking around. And it's like, you know, if you're in a really, really abusive relationship, the threat of violence is enough. If you're perpetrator of domestic abuse, you're not going to punch your partner in the eye.
Hannah Witton
You're not going to do it somewhere where it's visible.
Isabel Chapman
Absolutely.
Hannah Witton
That can't be covered up.
Sandra Onai
And if you did, she would put mascara, makeup, and concealer and
Hannah Witton
Yeah. Do you want to briefly talk about the new law around coercive behaviour? And then would love to talk about your work with perpetrators? Okay.
Isabel Chapman
Yes. So last year, in 2018, the government has made a pledge that the law is going to come into play in terms of coercive control. So that actually means that they could charge, or bring a charge, against someone for coercive controlling relationships.
Hannah Witton
I didn't realise that that wasn't even a thing before. Because I, I guess I just never really understood where the line is between like, what what is bad behaviour, and what is illegal behaviour.
Sandra Onai
I think, as a society, we can agree that domestic abuse, no. But when it comes to legalities, it was a lot of the physical stuff; bodily harm, grievous bodily harm -
Hannah Witton
Sexual violence, rape -
Isabel Chapman
Yeah, physical assault.
Sandra Onai
So those things would come up. But when you talk about the other subtle things, the emotional, psychological abuse, those things weren't unnecessarily being picked up. And you couldn't go to the police and say, well, he
Hannah Witton
He calls me mean names.
Sandra Onai
Yes.
Hannah Witton
Which sounds so petty when you say out loud, but like, when it is a constant, and when there is that even that threat of violence or anything that -
Isabel Chapman
Because at the moment, you couldn't be charged for domestic abuse.
Sandra Onai
Yes.
Isabel Chapman
As it stands, it's not a crime, in legal terms.
Hannah Witton
But domestic violence, yes?
Sandra Onai
Physical violence.
Isabel Chapman
Yeah.
Sandra Onai
Actually bodily harm. That is a crime. But domestic abuse, as an arching concept, no.
Hannah Witton
Wow, I had no idea.
Isabel Chapman
Yeah, and it's very difficult to prove, because there's -
Hannah Witton
There's no evidence.
Isabel Chapman
And also the point that people phone the police, in relation to being in an abusive situation, it's something like 25 times that a violent or abusive incident occurred, before somebody actually calls the police.
Sandra Onai
Yeah, it takes people about 35 to 37 before they actually call the police.
Hannah Witton
And that's of physical abuse, or just?
Isabel Chapman
Incidents of domestic abuse. But even then, it's like when you actually call the police, if this has been happening to you for years, how can you possibly prove that a violent incident happened 10 years ago, it's absolutely impossible. So with the domestic abuse bill, it will actually make domestic abuse a crime that they could actually bring legislation under that. Coercive control already is, is a law and exists, but it's quite difficult to prove, and obviously, because it's a new law, it's obviously complicated. But it's that more kind of pervasive side of it, you know, in terms of somebody controlling what you wear, whether you leave the house or not, you know, what you spend your money on -
Hannah Witton
Yeah, I was gonna say financial control as well is a big one, because often that can be a reason why someone doesn't leave.
Isabel Chapman
Yeah, absolutely.
Sandra Onai
Yeah. And we're finding financial abuse even trickier with Universal Credit. Yeah. So the idea -
Hannah Witton
That literally makes everything worse
Sandra Onai
Yes, so it's this idea that, yes, domestic abuse is so attached to so many, it creates this web, that it makes it seemingly impossible for some people to leave. Because if your partner who's abusive is the person who's getting your Universal Credit, then how can you even begin to untangle your lives?
Isabel Chapman
Yeah. And also, it links to this idea around like fixed gender roles, you know, and less progressive, you know, communities. If your male partner says no, I'm the person that's going to be the named person to receive universal credit. It's very unlikely that you could challenge that. And yes, okay, domestic abuse victims can share at the job centre if they're in abusive situation, but it's also what's the reality if you did share that at the job centre? You know, what's the impact of that going to be, you know, on your life?
Sandra Onai
Yeah. And again, another person you have to disclose to, another person that you have to go through all these dramatics, sometimes embarrassing situations that you're having to share. So it just creates this web of barriers that prevents for people from sharing, because how can you even begin to start in job centre, they're like, boom, boom, boom. People are overworked and want to get to the next person, it makes it difficult -
Hannah Witton
Like difficult to get the care that you need.
Isabel Chapman
And I think one of the really important things about the coercive control law, that was brought in because of the correlation between highly controlling relationships, and then serious instances of violence, or death. So this notion that the violence is always getting worse, and that might lead to someone, often a woman, being killed, isn't actually true. So the correlation between being in this really controlling relationship for years, but not physically abusive, then a serious incident happening. That's why it's so important that we talk about relationships, and we talk about control, shared power, shared understanding, because, you know, something then could just escalate, perpetrator then feels that they've lost all power of the relationship, and then their only other option is to either kill the victim, or you have a case like family annihilation, where the perpetrator kills the victim, and then kills anyone else in the family as well.
Hannah Witton
Woah. And that has a name. So that happens a lot.
Isabel Chapman
Yeah.
Hannah Witton
Family annihilation, yikes
Isabel Chapman
There's an organisation called Level Up, and they're doing a lot of work around how domestic abuse is reported in the press.
Sandra Onai
Yeah.
Isabel Chapman
And this idea around, you know, caring husband of 25 years flips out, you know, and murders family, you know, and not actually really -
Hannah Witton
A switch just got flicked one day.
Sandra Onai
Yeah, exactly.
Hannah Witton
Just one moment,
Isabel Chapman
Exactly. Rather than actually, you know, the likihood it is it's years of kind of controlling, abusive behaviour, culminating in this incident of family annihilation.
Hannah Witton
And so how, how does this all tie into, like, your work with perpetrators?
Sandra Onai
The work for perpetrators all came out of realising that a lot of responsibility was being placed on the victim. The victim has to report to the police, the victim has to engage with social services, the victim has to engaged with domestic abuse advocate
Isabel Chapman
And the safety plan -
Sandra Onai
And the safety plans, and then this, and this. And we came to a point where we're like, okay, this person -
Hannah Witton
It's like they're being punished by admin.
Sandra Onai
Yes. And it's like, this person is a victim. They're not responsible for the violence. So why do they have the responsibility of dealing, and ensuring that they're safe, ensuring the children are safe. So we started looking at ways that we can start engaging with perpetrators. So research around work with perpetrators is all very new. The evidence is not really impressive. However, we need to start somewhere. Having conversations with perpetrators, and holding them accountable for their behaviour is so important. The struggle with that, however, is that people have a expectation that you do this 26 week programme, or eight month programme, and then this person never uses violence again. Never uses abuse ever again. Ideally, that's what we would love. But it's about starting to have the conversations, trying to unpick the motivations around why someone uses violence, why someone is abusive. Sometimes it's linked to them witnessing violence within their families. For some -
Hannah Witton
It being normalised.
Sandra Onai
Yes. For some, it's about a cultural piece where within the cultures they have lived in, the idea that women are less than, that women be within the home, women should only look children, women should not speak. Sometimes that influences those ideas. And for some, they're just violent people. So it's about ensuring that when unpicking it for every perpetrator, and trying to highlight that this behaviour is problematic, and trying to equip them with different strategies and techniques of how to deal with difficult situations, how to -
Hannah Witton
Like in moments when they're angry or feel insecure.
Sandra Onai
Yes. Or even just unpicking in terms of why, how does it come to that? Everyone talks about this idea of red mist, oh, I swore that's red mist, and then I hit her. And in sort of speaking with victims and perpetrators, that rarely happens. The incident is planned, it is executed in a specific way, there is a start, a middle, and an ending, which gets the perpetrator what they want.
Hannah Witton
Which is control.
Sandra Onai
Yes, of the situation. So this idea of red mist. So it's an unpicking those things.
Hannah Witton
That's so interesting, because I feel like that idea of it being your emotions like take over and it's this act of passion, but not passion at all. But it's actually kind of terrifying to hear that the majority of the time, it is like a planned calculated -
Isabel Chapman
Victims will often say they don't want to leave the relationship. They just want the abuse to stop. Often, there are parts of that relationship that are incredible, you know, and amazing, and so intense. That then it's kind of this roller coaster of really big highs, and really big lows.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, because it's compared to like a drug addiction, those hits that you get, and then that withdrawal.
Isabel Chapman
Absolutely. It's the same with working with perpetrators. People are complicated.
Sandra Onai
Yeah.
Isabel Chapman
We don't just fit into boxes on spreadsheets. And I think it's about finding ways to work with them, to positively challenge behaviour, you know, support them, early intervention.
Hannah Witton
Especially if they're not going to be going to prison, and they're going to be like, in society
Isabel Chapman
Yes, absolutely. And also accepting that perpetrators don't look like how we think they look, you know, they're in society, same as victims.
Sandra Onai
Everyone thinks these perpetrators are horrible, terrible, men. They walk around and beat everyone all the time, and they're terrible, terrible, terrible. But when you look at the reality of it, they're usually really charming, and highly manipulative, and highly intelligent. So you can see how a victim gets in tangle.
Hannah Witton
Swept up in it all.
Sandra Onai
Yes. So I think, yeah, I think if there's one thing we can learn about this, is that victims and perpetrators come in all shapes and sizes. And just being aware of what's healthy, and what's unhealthy within relationship, is the start, being able to identify those people.
Hannah Witton
I wanted to talk about the education side of things and the kind of prevention, and we were talking a little bit before we started recording about sex positivity and that movement, because that's like, how I got into like, the sex education space and everything. How do you make relationships and sex education accessible, inclusive to communities that haven't had access to sex positivity?
Isabel Chapman
So I would say, the work that I've done in diverse communities, I come to those communities as a complete outsider. So it's always about learning about those communities, those young women's experience, and understanding then how different communities, from the Muslim community, from the traveller community, you know, girls who are in school in Westminster, completely different communities. But it's about learning about what does home look like, the expectation -
Hannah Witton
Meeting them where they're at?
Isabel Chapman
Yeah, absolutely.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, with the kind of sex education space that I see online, if you kind of just copied and pasted that on to any of the communities that you both work with, they'd be like, what the hell does that word mean, that makes no sense to me. And also, I don't care about this. That's not what's happening in my life.
Isabel Chapman
Lots of the young women that I've worked with in you know, in lots of households in the UK, they're not able to talk about sex, or relationships, or contraception openly.
Hannah Witton
Like we take that for granted.
Isabel Chapman
Absolutely. It's just not something that's up for discussion, for various different reasons.
Hannah Witton
And it's not going to work, just being like, we just need to have open conversations about sex, like, talk to your friends and family. Which is like stuff that I say all the time.
Isabel Chapman
Exactly. So I think it's just about understanding the different ways in which communities work, and how do we support people to make safe choices within those communities, that are actually their choices?
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Sandra Onai
I think for me, one thing that pops up, I think respect. I think sometimes as people were so focused on, this is right, and this is what I believe in, that we forget the idea of respecting people and meeting them where they are at. Also ensuring that services that are specifically targeted with this community, a part of the discussion, because I think there's a lot of organisation movements, specific organisations that are doing amazing work. And for them, it's a little bit easier to be having those conversations, because they're sitting there, they know exactly what sex means within the community, they know exactly what it means to be in that place where, yes, within school and this sphere, you can be British, and but when you go home, you're Muslim, you're black, you're this, you're that.
Hannah Witton
That's a word I learned recently, code switching.
Sandra Onai
Yeah.
Hannah Witton
Which I learnt when The Hate U Give came out. Yeah -
Sandra Onai
Yeah. And it's interesting that all these people, like, these things are happening. Weirdly enough, I recently had to make explain that in a roomful of like middle class, white, men and they're like, surely that doesn't happen. I was just like, okay. So yeah, so it's about knowledge, and being okay that sometimes you don't know at all. But the fact that you're open and willing to learn, I think that's the best that we can do.
Hannah Witton
It's interesting how it's, it's all about, like meeting people where they're at. And actually, ultimately, what it comes down to is specific needs. And so you've got to have specific tools and resources out there, which is so tricky when, like we've said, underfunding.
Sandra Onai
Yeah.
Isabel Chapman
Absolutely.
Hannah Witton
And access and, and all of this. Whereas like, a lot of the work that I do, I try and make it broad. But ultimately, I know that like, middle class people are tuning in to what I have to say. And that's why I really wanted to have this conversation with you both, to open up my eyes, and also open up the eyes of my listeners who maybe are aware of this stuff, but not quite sure of really the scale of it, I guess. And maybe they'll do jobs like you.
Isabel Chapman
It's, you know, it's about what we were saying before, never making someone feel bad or feel shame because they don't know something.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. Because they don't know the correct terminology. Or like, about, like, transgender issues and things.
Isabel Chapman
Yeah, or they believe a myth, you know, you know, I had it, I had a young woman who, you know, her family had said to her, you shouldn't have a have a bath, you know, when you have your period, it's not clean. And I did some work with her, you know, just around the fact that that was absolutely fine, you know, for her if she did want to take a bath. You know, it wasn't, you know, it wasn't going to affect anyone else -
Hannah Witton
Without shaming her for thinking that.
Isabel Chapman
Yeah, absolutely. I want to give you the knowledge that actually that might make you feel better, you know, to have a bath, and also that there's no shame in doing that. It's just unpacking some of those things, and making feel someone feel included and okay.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, definitely.
Sandra Onai
Yeah. And I just to sort of echo what you said, I think curiosity is the best thing, because I think you come from a position of, tell me more, tell me more.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Sandra Onai
And you're in a position where you just want to absorb and learn from other people. And I think that position allows you to have these open conversations where you try as you can to be mindful of how you respond to someone's story. But being curious to me, for me, it's the best way forward.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, definitely. Always asking questions and, yeah, like you said, like, having that base knowledge is really good. But not making many assumptions on top of that.
Isabel Chapman
Yeah, and challenging your own assumptions.
Hannah Witton
Oh, my God, definitely.
Sandra Onai
And sometimes you will get it wrong. I think, as people, we struggle with that idea that sometimes you will say the wrong pronoun. Sometimes you will say the wrong thing.
Isabel Chapman
Yeah.
Hannah Witton
I definitely struggle with that, especially because I'm getting things wrong with lots of people watching.
Isabel Chapman
Oh, my gosh, yeah. But you know, we do you know, and I think it's about the intention, you know. It's about learning, you know, learning from each other, remembering -
Hannah Witton
And listening. So, for anyone listening who is in a situation of domestic abuse, or domestic violence, where can they go?
Sandra Onai
So I think the best place to go is the National Centre of Domestic Violence. They offer people non molestation orders, if they require. Another organisation is National Domestic Abuse helpline. The number for that is 0808-247-2000.
Hannah Witton
I'm going to leave all of this information in the show notes as well.
Sandra Onai
Yeah.
Hannah Witton
All of the phone numbers and websites.
Sandra Onai
Yes. Another organisation that is interesting, just in terms of learning about violence against women and girls, is the Rights of Women. It provides all the information, all the legal stuff, and yeah, it's a nice read if you're interested.
Isabel Chapman
And in in London, it works kind of borough by borough. So every borough will have a commissioned domestic abuse service. So either people can often self refer, or they can be referred through an agency, through school, through college, you could be referred through your GP. Each council has to commission a service to support victims. So I think if you're looking, you know, to be assigned an IDVA, which is an independent domestic abuse violence advisor, go through the council, or you might get assigned someone like an IDVA, you know, if you've reported an incident to the police, for example -
Hannah Witton
And also I guess, Childline, if you're under 19.
Sandra Onai
Yeah, yeah. And I would always say, in an emergency, if you're frightened, if you're scared, first things first, just call 999.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, yeah. Again, I will put all of this info in the show notes for people to find Thank you so much
Isabel Chapman
Amazing, thank you.
Sandra Onai
Thank you.
Hannah Witton
Thank you so much for listening. If you enjoyed this episode, I would really appreciate it if you left a rating and a review, you can find show notes at DoingItPodcast.co.uk. Do go follow us on social media, @DoingItPodcast on Twitter and Instagram, and I'll catch you in the next episode.