Sarah’s murder is a seminal moment

WHEN I started out as a journalist almost 30 years ago, there was a pernicious culture of misogyny in police forces across Britain just as there was in society. Rape victims were “asking for it” and if a woman was beaten in her home it was “just a domestic”. Policing, like every other male dominated organisation, including the media, was a bear pit of machismo. Such a culture neither serves women nor progressive men well and it hinders the diversity, key to a police force duty bound to a diverse society.

It is exhausting, demoralising and disempowering to neither want to play nor have any chance of winning an interminable game of who can pee the highest. For those outside “the boys’ club”, including progressive men, there is inevitably a culture of put up and shut up, of turning a blind eye to racism, homophobia and sexism for fear of retribution and ostracisation.

Over the years, as the dinosaurs have been retired, there has been progress in policing both in the treatment of female officers and the investigation of crimes against women.

But the progress is too slow, misogyny and sexual misconduct are still prevalent and there are still not enough women in positions of power.

The murder of Sarah Everard must be a seminal moment for the police and the call for action her death has provoked must be realised.

As Deputy Chief Constable Malcolm Graham has said, it shouldn’t have taken such a ghastly crime to force this long overdue conversation but it is beneficial we have it.

We need progressive leaders like Graham to keep their word and encourage that conversation and as he says, turn the frustration and anger of decent police officers into an energetic force for change.

The That Guy campaign launched yesterday is all about conversation, about men calling out demeaning, sexualised “banter”, harassment and sexual assault.

There is a collective responsibility for men to tackle male violence, to question their peers, to educate their fathers, brothers and sons.

And there is a moral imperative for our police to bear that responsibility heaviest of all.