Punishment fails to fit violent and sexual crimes inflicted on women

There are many difficult things about being a parent but one I struggle often with is how to explain the horrible things that can occur in the world, and why they might happen, writes Alison O’Connor.

The first instinct is to protect your children, but you also have to be realistic. How much information do you give, how much do they need to know, will they end up looking like eejits in the playground, or is ignorance indeed bliss?

In our house, we’ve not yet had any discussion on how it is that men can behave with such sickening violence towards women; how they get into rages, and get jealous, and always blame the woman and the “drink” and that such things happen all the time. I can imagine the chat and trying to explain to someone — new to the concept — how such depraved acts happen regularly. I can also imagine the disbelief from my two daughters upon hearing of how the punishment so frequently does not fit these crime.