Bristol Post and the “RESPECTED family man”
The Bristol Post excels itself in victim blaming in this story of a man who is stabbed, by a “RESPECTED family man”. Why was the need for 'respected' to be in capitals? It quite clearly seems to be that the journalist is expressing his personal feelings towards the case.
The second line is a despicable display of of accusing anyone but the offender and justifying the offender's behaviour. “The horrified” (and quite possibly, now traumatised) “onlookers did not know the background – and the trigger – that led Mr Barrow to pull out the knife and use it”. The journalist writing this obviously feels that the background is a justification.
Nothing can justify this evidently planned behaviour. Someone's (in particular a man's) sexual prowess being questioned, is no excuse, for any type of assault. This article's whole approach appears to be a moral judgement on the woman, (with very little mention of the man who was assaulted and injured).
But RESPECTED family men, don't go out into shopping centres on Saturdays , where children and young people are often present and draw a knife on a man walking away from an argument – the article fails to address this.
Yes the accused man may have lost everything, but everything he lost was down to his behaviour, and a journalist who sympathises and seeks to blame a woman or her partner for a viscous assault needs to take responsibility for inaccurate, biased reporting. The journalist and editor responsible for this article appearing the way it does, should be thoroughly ashamed.
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Even when a male is convicted for having committed ‘wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm’ yet once again a woman is blamed for supposedly causing this violent male to enact his choice and agency in committing physical violence against another male.
One wonders why the woman wasn’t convicted instead of David Barrow given this male apologist claims he not the court knows Barrow did not commit the crime of ‘wounding with intent to commit bodily harm!’
Quite right – respectable family men do not commonly go out into public spaces and physically attack another male.
But as usual women are always to blame for mens’ choice and agency to commit violence irrespective of whether said male violence is committed upon women or men. Women are to blame for everything men enact because men must never ever be held accountable for their choices and their agency.
Any argument that the assault was triggered by anything the victim said is disproved by the fact that the perpetrator bought the knife on the preceding day. This is an appalling piece of journalistic victim-blaming.