This four-minute SBS video and article describes coercive control as:
- A repeated pattern of control and domination in a domestic relationship. It can include verbal, economic and psychological abuse, as well as sexual and physical violence.
- This behaviour is used to maintain dominance over a partner, to restrict their freedom and autonomy. It can even continue or escalate after a couple separate, as the abuser desperately seeks to maintain control.
- It is most often perpetrated by men against women and children.
- Coercive control has also been linked to intimate partner homicide; most women who are killed by their partners or ex-partners have previously been victims of coercive control by these men.
Watch the video, read the article – and share them. You could save a life.