Gender, violence, and killing: Revisiting femicide, and the overlooked realities of male victimization

The term femicide, widely used in reference to the "killing of a woman because she is a woman," has been questioned on the ground that it implies unequal dignity of men and women victims of gender related death. This position called for an analysis of the terminology used to describe and define the various forms of killing of women and men. We conclude that the use of the term "femicide" retains as a central facet the objective of raising awareness of this crime and combating violence directed at women by men. We also analyzed the current use of the word "androcide" and concluded that its present use is limited to situations where the killing of men is systematic, such as illegal war crimes. In this regard, we address the occurrence of deaths that may be related to gender within or outside relationships. We addressed the under reported issue of intimate partner violence (IPV) and killing of men. The latter has not attracted as much attention and remains a complex problem to understand and study. The issue is further compounded because domestic violence has also been a factor in cases of suicide. Violent behavior directed against men may occur in heterosexual or gay relationships. Estimates of the prevalence of IPV against men in heterosexual relationships, vary from 3.4% to 20.3%. The victim's own behavior is often advanced in mitigation. Although reports on violent behavior among gay and bisexual men have been relatively rare, IPV is at least as prevalent in this group. Indeed, some studies report alarmingly high incidence. In conclusion, there must be a continued focus on gender related death of women, but this should not distract from the occurrences when the victim is a man. There needs to be a drive to improve data collection from all countries with special focus on those in Africa and Asia that do not fully contribute to the global effort. There is also a need to better define the underlying causes and triggers for death, including by suicide, to enable the development of informed prevention strategies.