What we saw in the meetings of men who attack women

“I wanted to look good. I shaved off my beard, arrived with a smooth face at the Barra Funda Criminal Forum (in São Paulo) for my first hearing with the judge of the Domestic and Family Violence Against Women. I saw a large prisoner transport vehicle. From it descended equally shaven men. One, escorted and handcuffed, passed by me. I thought: ‘Justice has laid a hand on us. We are in the same condition – that of a defendant’. I tried to imagine what barbarity he would have committed – I hit my wife. I had diarrhea, I pulled myself together with difficulty and went to the room indicated in the subpoena. The atmosphere is tense. I kept repeating mentally: ‘How far have I come? What level have I descended to? They called my name. I walked in and eyed the judge intently. If only she could read my look… He was promising, ‘I’ll never come back here’.” The testimony is from architect Júlio, 36 years old, who, like all the characters heard over the course of three weeks, has his name changed. Júlio was carrying out a protective measure, he hadn’t been close to his ex for four months and he hadn’t seen his 6-year-old son, who started to reject him. “She is beautiful, pampered by people, she achieves everything she plans and grows in her profession. We got along well until 2014”, he summarizes. The marriage stalled; the architect would “peck” outside the house – “nothing serious” – and the woman decided to have fun too. Her husband’s blows broke two of her ribs, left her face purple and her incisor in half. The promise, she explained, was not for the judge, but for himself. “I don’t want to repeat that anymore. I saw the shit I did.”

“They are not brutes and drunks. Normal men respond to processes, with good and bad feelings”

João*, arrested in the act of slapping his wife

Julius doesn’t know how he could have avoided the violence. He suspects that the trouble is “the fruit of the dispute between men and women for pole position, the most advantageous place in society”. In general, men have little repertoire to react to frustration, to something that ends, goes wrong, means rejection or affront. The response ranges from verbal to physical attack. Or he looks for the escape route in alcohol and risks, such as speed. “The guy doesn’t learn to dismantle the bomb about to explode,” he says. And he doesn’t know the law. Women progressed, social roles changed and, to guide gender relations, rules of law were created, such as the Maria da Penha Law, in force for 10 years. Nearly 100% of our respondents consider it a feminist and biased law. “It is an instrument that protects women and f… men”, defines João, 35 years old, machine programmer. He himself called the police and was arrested red-handed after slapping his wife, who wore braces on her teeth and bled profusely. “I was terrified, I cried.” Four cars stopped at his door. “The policeman who drove me said: ‘If you tell the police chief that you hit him, you will be signing your sentence’.” In eight years of marriage, they experienced six separations. It was always her initiative, leaving the house while he worked. “When I started dating someone else, my ex asked to get back together”, he recalls. One morning, the machine programmer suggested: “Take a piece of paper and write why you think we should stay married. You cursed me out in front of my friends and had already told them that you were only with me because I had nowhere else to go.” John expected apologies. She, however, put the clothes in the suitcase to leave him for the seventh time. “I relived years of humiliation, jealousy, anger and reacted like that.” At the police station, she kept crying. “To be there and for aggression against someone I loved, that was the end.” He was released on bail.

The conversation with him took place on a Thursday, at the Butantã Forum, in São Paulo, where he attends a reflection group for perpetrators of domestic violence. With him were sales manager Heitor, 43, who hit a 25-year-old woman, his girlfriend’s daughter, and mass worker Antônio, 36, accused of molesting his ex-wife, which he denies. “I never raised a hand against anyone,” he guarantees. “Separated, I went to the court to deal with my children’s pension. She imagined that I would ask for custody of the children and invented the assault in a police report.” For him, Justice needed to better investigate what women say.

Revolt, victimization, revenge

Men arrive at groups blaming women. They think they won’t learn anything, they’ll just waste time. “Feelings range from shame, victimization, revolt, perplexity to estrangement”, lists psychologist Tales Mistura, one of the advisors of the Coletivo Feminista Sexualidade e Saúde group, in the São Paulo neighborhood of Pinheiros. They do not refuse to attend the sessions for two reasons: some judges oblige; others warn that, by going to groups, they will have their sentence reduced. Heitor is an exception; he begged to be accepted. “I caused a problem. I lost the woman I love and I want to understand what makes someone go against their convictions, their education and leave for ignorance.” The son of a feminist and a father who defends gender, race and creed equality, he is still surprised by what happened. He had been drinking a lot and had a falling out with his girlfriend’s daughter when the three of them were leaving a barbecue. “I do not remember anything. But my attitude was horrible. And I must confess: I got hit a lot. She is a tae-kwon-do fighter.” Antônio, born in Minas Gerais, in a poor, rural family, with ten brothers obedient to their father, comments: “Many males are beaten and do nothing. It is a shame, the worst, to complain about it to the police ”. He believes, “The law messed everything up. Women are finding themselves.” To repair what he faces, he will sue his ex. Heitor argues that the law is necessary; the problem is your operators. Upon reading the statement he had just given at the police station, he asked the clerk to remove phrases attributed to him.

“Violence is the result of the dispute between men and women for pole position in society”

Júlio*, who broke his wife’s rib and tooth

“I was wrong and she refused to answer me; she yelled at me. The man lives there the feminine revanchism accumulated for 300 years”, she says. For the trio, women manage the Maria da Penha universe: there are only judges, prosecutors, public defenders. “The guy is already condemned. I don’t expect anything else for myself”, laments João. But he recognizes it: he became tolerant and stopped judging. “I thought I would only see drunks and brutes in the group. I thought that a man who beats is no good. Is not true. They respond to normal male processes. We are made of feelings, good and bad.” João repeated yes three times to CLAUDIA’s questions: Is the man asking for help? Does he see himself poorly assisted? Does he feel that there is no room to review the patriarchal culture and does not know how to break with it? “Women are more independent, they have more attitude,” he explains. “The mother protects and pampers the child. If he doesn’t have a good background, he will suffer drastic consequences, because he will not be pampered by his wife.” The titular judge of the Domestic Violence Court of Barra Funda, Elaine Cristina Cavalcante, adds: “Almost every link comes from childhood. In the child’s ideals, violence enters as a way of educating. The mother loves and beats”. Promoter Erica Canuto, from the Potiguar Public Ministry, gives more weight to culture. “I’ve heard from men that I accused justifications like this: ‘I didn’t hit her. I gave it to her nerve’. Or: ‘It’s wrong to hit another woman. In mine, I can. I’m teaching you how to be a good housewife’.”

A blow to machismo

During the sessions, the men are instigated. In the group maintained by the City of Santo André (SP), João Batista de Souza, one of the facilitators of the dynamic, confronted a lawyer convicted of violence who was there by court order: “You try again to find loopholes in the law to defend your own interests. For you, man is a victim, always psychologically persecuted; and the woman knows how to do this trick. You need to review your concepts”. The lawyer had said: “The woman takes the man out of the house easily. And, on the corner, she teaches her friend how to do the same”.

An athletic guy, wearing a baseball cap, accused the women: “They go to the registry office, name anyone as the father of their child and come out with his name on the certificate”. A gentleman, apparently 60 years old, said that, in his case, it was not a beating of his wife: “I scolded my daughter”. Reginaldo Bombini, an educator, replied: “Your daughter is a woman. When you establish a bond with her based on power, you are creating a relationship of violence”. The lines flowed, there were also jokes and profanity. On that Wednesday, the mediator Paulo Cagliari, a psychologist, was listened to with attention when he stated that it was necessary to recognize that the previous laws protected a certain segment of society: men. The revolt was understandable: the male was being deprived of the protection he had always counted on. “The man made a son and disappeared. At most, he would send a basic basket”, recalled Cagliari. “Now he has to give 30% of his salary. It’s fair.” The athletic type ended up telling that he asked for a paternity investigation. A colleague commented that, until the decision comes out, he will have paid months of pension. “And they still talk about equal rights,” someone replied. A certain sarcasm came from an excited newbie. The mediator intervened: “I am prepared for your ironies. But you didn’t come because you chose to. And you need to understand that we have a sexist society. I’m. You’re. School, church and institutions are. A centuries-old model that we try to deconstruct”.

“I lost the woman I love and I want to understand what makes someone go against their convictions and leave for ignorance”

Heitor*, who sought out a group after hitting his girlfriend’s daughter

Politics came up in the conversation. Santo André has only two councilors for 21 chairs. One of the men was going to research and take, in the next session, the answer on whether or not there is, in the world, a parliament with equal representation, based on 50% for each gender. There was talk of quotas for women; it was found that male strength means nothing, other than being able to load a truck tire. And a historic fact appeared: they only discovered sexual pleasure in the 1960s. A plump young man commented: “It’s good to discover pleasure”. A citizen who had already completed the course entered the room. A good-humoured man from the Northeast who always disarms his colleagues saluted him: “You won’t say you hit her again!”. One of the youngest was completing the course (20 sessions) and was moved with gratitude for the welcome. He confessed that the time spent there had been very good for his wife too. “My way of thinking and acting was wrong. I hope that many leave here with an important life experience and feeling what I feel now, ”he revealed.

There are no groups for everyone

The Maria da Penha Law provides, in article 35, that governments fund centers to educate and rehabilitate aggressors, but it is necessary to look for a service with a magnifying glass. They have 15 to 25 spaces and do not take in rapists or murderers. In October, São Paulo served 55 men. Only to the Vara da…