Chapter 155 : domestic violence

Somewhere in Hobart a couple is sitting down to eat dinner.

He plays with the hokkien noodles and says, “What do you call this?”

She raises her eyes, groans and says, “What’s your problem? Why are you always in a bad mood?”

He then says, “Well, what is it?”

She says, “I’m wasting my time cooking for you.”

This couple can now go in various directions.

They might have a few drinks then arrive at the domestic violence station. Which will be full of police, lawyers, politicians and media experts.

The police will arrest him, lock him up, fill out forms and charge him with domestic violence. The police would prefer to deal with burgs and drunk drivers. The police will get a statement from her and dream about burgs and drunk drivers.

The lawyers will huddle and talk amongst themselves; discuss where each person will live; decide where the children will live: divide the furniture, look at the photo albums, and decide who owns the pot plants and the pet dog. And then give them both a bill.

The politicians will talk about an epidemic of domestic violence and say, “I am passionate about domestic violence.”  Facebook will become active with posts from all sides.

Maybe the dining couple will not get off at the domestic violence station.  Maybe the meal will continue serenely.

After finishing the meal the male will say, “Sorry what I said before. Thank you for the food, thank you for all your work. Nice to try something different.  Can I help by doing the dishes?”

She will say, “I’m also sorry what I said. Can you suggest an improvement to the food? A way of making the dish even better. I love cooking but I also love eating. In the future I look forward to us both enjoying cooking and eating. I love cooking for you and I want you to get the same pleasure out of cooking for me. Suggest some guidelines so that we can both make this happen.”

How can the dining couple avoid violence? How can they be a non-violent couple? Well I have a few gratuitous suggestions.

The couple need to learn how to survive, benefit from and welcome disagreements. They can start by taking their headphones out of their ears, turning off their I-phone and turning off the blaring TV and listening to each other.

They then need to learn to not judge everything. Not every post or restaurant or cafe has to receive a like, comment or be shared with their Facebook friends. Not everything everybody sees has to be assessed.

They also need to learn that there are at least two people in any relationship.  That everybody in every relationship is responsible for the way it goes. If everybody puts in, then everybody wins. If everybody thinks about everybody else and everybody does what they can for others then they all win.

They also need to learn that everybody is different. Everybody has different experiences and different thoughts and these differences should be celebrated.

They also need to learn a relationship contains people who achieve things they couldn’t achieve by themselves. In a relationship people get the support and help of other people. At the same time everybody will have to help and support everybody else.  There is give and take. Everybody has rights and responsibilities. The more one gives the more they will receive.

Time for me to state what everybody knows. I have made every mistake possible but I identify more with the non-violent couple. I belong to the generation raised as Christians who then rejected organised religion. Our generation wants to keep the love, fellowship, caring and compassion of organised religions and throw out the racism, the sexism and the homophobia. 

We need to keep the god is love and add an addendum where everybody has equal opportunity and equal rights. Everybody includes all races, sexes, sexuality, abilities and nationality. And with no violence between anybody. Because violence is unlike football. Violence is a match where both sides lose and no side wins.