From time immemorial, it seems the human race has been acquainted with incidences of violence. Although violence has long been part of human experience, it has never been accepted as a norm in any sane society.
It has always been viewed as an anti-social behavior and as such every civil society has always put in place mechanism to contain the incidences of violence.
While the satellite technology has done a lot to make acts of violence across the world visible to television audiences on a daily basis, many cases of violence remained invisible to the public eyes because victims of violence keep silence about their experiences out of fear, pressure, conformity to social convention or because they are too young or weak to protect themselves.
So, every day, at home, workplace, at school, prison, hotels, religious centers and many other places including institutions set up to cater for people's health needs, untold millions suffer silently from various acts of violence.
The word "violence" can conjure up different images and pictures in the mind of different people. Therefore, to ensure we are on the same page on this, I need to properly define the terminology I use in this article.
Proper Perception of Violence
For us to have proper perception of violence as used in this article let me briefly discuss the following viz:
The Meaning of Violence
There are many ways violence can be defined. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), violence can be defined as:
The intentional use of physical force or power, threatened or actual, against oneself, another person or a against a group or community that results in or has a high likelihood of resulting in injury, death or psychological harm, maldevelopment or deprivation.
The WHO definition of violence is comprehensive and elucidating. It corrects some misconceptions about the word "violence"
Misconception about Violence
Intentionality is central to act of violence as can be seen in the WHO definition. Whether an act result in harm or not is inconsequential, once there is an intention to harm. In the same vein, intentionality exclude from the definition of violence, incidence such as injury from road or domestic accidents.
Again, the word "power" in the WHO definition above, include such act as neglect in a power relationship as act of violence.
For example, if a father neglect to provide food for his child or children, it is an act of violence. Another example is if the government of a nation, deliberately neglect to act to protect her citizens from brutality, terrorism, kidnaping or look away deliberately from the plight of her people, it is seen as an act of violence against the people.
Thus, it is evident that violence goes beyond the traditional concept of the acts of commission and encompasses the acts of omission.
My concerns actually stems from this understanding. A close observation of happenings in Nigeria will show that little is being done to protect the citizens from the harassments of non-state actors rather there have been allegations against government institutions such as the military for both abating and perpetrating acts of violence against her own citizens through extrajudicial killings. This was undoubtedly the genesis of the "EndSar" protest that took place last year in Lagos and some other cities of Nigeria.
I will return to this same train of thought later in this article. For now, let's consider the many ways that violence is demonstrated.
The Manifestations of Violence
Violence can be manifested in different ways at different times. It could be:
Physical: This occur in the form of kidnapping, banditry, murder, acts of terrorism, war etc.
Psychological:This occur in the form of harassments, defamation, humiliation etc.
Sexual: In the form rape and other forms of sexual assaults
silence and neglect: This is the passive form of violence. It only require perpetrators to look away or deprive people of their rights.
Violence could be directed toward oneself in the form of suicide or suicidal attempt(s), a group of people or the state.
Surely, there are possibly multiple motives for violence acts. Violence could be motivated by social, political, economical gains etc.
Whatever may be the motives of perpetrators of violence acts, it is evident that unless something is done to prevent violence in the society, it will soon become a way of life.
Violence becomes a way of life when people become so inundated with daily occurrence of violent acts without observing corresponding corrective measures being taken against such acts, to such an extent that the shock and disapproval that is often associated with such acts in a sane society is lost.
Preventing the Problem of Violence
The job of preventing violence in any society is enormous and requires many hands. I will however like to look briefly at the public health approach to it.
Public health is a scientific field of study that is concerned with the health and well-being of the generality of people. It is interdisciplinary in nature and encompasses such field as medicine, psychology, epidemiology, sociology, criminology, economics and education.
Public health practitioners are convinced that violence can be prevented in any society.
The public health approach to violence prevention can be summarized as follows:
Intelligence gathering: This entails the collection of data regarding the occurrence, causes, consequences and control of violence.
Identification of risk factors: The factors that predisposes people to acts of violence, reduces or increases incidence of violence is identified from collected data.
Intervention based on knowledge: This is done by designing, implementing, monitoring, evaluating and modifying of program to prevent violence in a given locality based on identified risk factors.
Information dissemination: This involves sharing information based on findings to receive feedbacks upon which better future designs can be based.
In conclusion
Violence may be as old as the human race, but it has never been accepted as a norm in any sane society. It only become a norm in any society when nothing it done to prevent it. Public health approach is a scientific method of violence prevention.
Any government can build upon this approach to prevent violence in the society.