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Russia Officially Made Domestic Violence Legal

It’s easy to ignore injustice that doesn’t apply to yourself. But that doesn’t make it go away. While “meninists” argue the irrelevance of feminism in modern day, it only demonstrates their inability to grasp a reality outside of their own privilege.

Just this month, Vladimir Putin passed a Russian law that decriminalizes domestic violence. The act is only classified as a crime under repeated offenses that result in hospital treatment- though that can still be bypassed with a fee of five-hundred dollars or maximum jail time of fifteen days. The most concerning, capitalist notion of this law is the power that it surrenders to the upper-class. Someone whom which money is no object quite literally holds others lives in their hands, not to mention its effect of destigmatizing domestic violence.

While women have just as much capability to hold the position of an abuser, statistics show that it is predominantly men at fault, with women being the victims in 85% of cases, while domestic abuse is the source of over 14,000 annual female deaths, proving women and children to be the most popular and vulnerable targets in Russia. One dire fault in the law, is the consequence of the repeated crime. It punishes the victim as well, since they most commonly share a household and finances with the abuser. It then sends them back into isolation with the abuser. The constant abuse won’t come to a halt, but instead go on silently and lead to a greater number of fatalities, seeing how the purpose of reporting domestic violence is diminished the moment that they deny that person the safety and solace that they seek, sending them back into confines with their abuser.  The legislative votes appallingly supported the measure almost unanimously- a result likely slighted by the influence of extremely right winged law-maker Yelena Mizulina, the figure to propose both the bill at hand, and the law forbidding gay propaganda in 2013. Her logic behind the law was the argument that parents should have the freedom to hit their children despite the already prominent levels of mistreatment within homes and families.

Experts predict that murders will go up along with domestic violence. This step-backwards ensures the endangering of the already fragile rights of women and children that seem to be deteriorating in Russian law and culture. The notion that this law was not only proposed, but passed as well, is a disturbing reflection on our “developed” society and how it values some lives dangerously more than others.

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