Why do men commit such terrible crimes against women?

In a hard-hitting presentation at the Books For Life Live event in Cheltenham yesterday, theologian Elaine Storkey outlined the predicament of women who suffered violence and discrimination in many different spheres. She spoke of rape used as a weapon of war, child marriage, domestic violence, selective abortion and – graphically and horrifyingly – of female genital mutilation or FGM.

A recurring question in her address was, "Why?" She examined the various explanations put forward to explain the violence inflicted on women throughout the world – it's a function of poverty, it is programmed into our genes by male desire to reproduce, male psychology is fundamentally dominant and aggressive – and dismissed them all.

"I think it's human beings that are to blame, not our genes," she said. "It's time human beings took responsibility for our own actions. We do it and we have to bear the responsibility."

She said: "There's a simple word that expresses the Christian understanding of human beings: sin. It's sin that shapes exploitative agendas, distorts relationships and weaves its way into power structures. Sin will leave its impact on all these things. It shows itself particularly in the global oppression of the vulnerable – the poor, disabled and children."

Storkey continued: "A proper theology of sin will realise how it weaves its way into our structures and minds through patterns of behaviour and laws. It is destructive, tearing down what God has built as good. It turns truth into lies and half-lies, so we believe our own propaganda. Sin is addictive, it gets inside our bodies like any other kind of drug. It's self-generating, it produces its own energy. It's structural, it gets into banking, policing and politics."

She said: "A proper understanding of sin gives us a starting point to understand violence against women."

However, she added that understanding violence against women as the result of sin "opens up the whole possibility of redemption. We can do something about it. Sin need not have the last word."

Storkey is a former president of Tearfund and the author of Scars Across Humanity (SPCK, £9.99), which explores gender violence. She began her research when she visited the Democratic Republic of Congo with Tearfund and was confronted with the scale of women's suffering there and the indifference of the authorities to their plight.

Among the shocking statistics she relayed at her presentation yesterday was that in the UK, 140,000 women are living with the consequences of FGM and that 10,000 girls under 15 are likely to undergo cutting. In India, selective abortion has meant 10 million girls have been lost in 20 years, leading to a male-heavy population and a corresponding increase in trafficking and rape. Around 1.4 million women in England Wales suffer domestic violence annually. Figures around child marriage are equally shocking: every three seconds a girl under 18 is married, usually without her consent and usually to an older man who might have several other brides. Storkey said there were huge health risks to the girl, both in pregnancy because her body was not mature enough and in terms of the loss of her childhood. "There are horrendous scenarios where small girls are raped and raped and raped by their husbands," she said.

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