Oh, Tiffany and core Kai, here we are.
Good morning, good afternoon.
Good afternoon. I've got a little bit of deja vu, deja vu, deja vu going on. I feel like there's something familiar about this little image I'm looking at with these three heads on the screen.
I wasn't here at the beginning of last time, though, so I've got.
No you were, but you did stumble in like a piss blow halfway through the party. The first time I've started a podcast and then you've come while the podcast is going, while the conversations believe you let me in. Well, yeah, well you're not. You're knocking on the virtual door. You're being noisy. Jamie Andrews deadman, Hi mate, how are you get?
Craig, Anthony and Tiffany and how are you? It's the three middle aies.
That's right, Anne, Andrew and Anthony. I think when there's a constantant first like Craig or Tiffany or Jamie, like first letter, there's invariably there's a vowel. Second name isn't there. It's not not always, but it's pretty common. It's pretty comic clear right now, and vice versa. I think about I think about some of my friends. Now anyway, let's not let's not do a show on that. Let's start with Tiff, has your morning been very good?
But now I'm going to have to go ask chat GPT you about the origins of consonants and vows for second names. I'm going to be quite obsessed with getting an answer on that.
Well, I just think it sounds better. But then there are some like my mum is Mary Margaret Harper, right, but that's very old. She's like, well, her mum was Irish, and I think that's her name. Was my mum's mom's name? I love this was Molly Malone? Is there a more Irish? That's my grandmother? Is there a more Irish name in the world than Molly Malone?
Definitely not.
I'm twelve and a halfcent Irish. Everyone there you go. And when I went to Ireland a couple of years ago, Jamie, you didn't come for this, but fuck it, get comfortable. When I went to fuck it, he's wearing a grand shirt. He looks Irish. I have you ever been anywhere that you've never been before? So you go for the first time and this is going to sound weird, but it was so familiar to me.
I've had friends speak of this. I think it's fascinating.
I'm not like, I'm not a weirdo, Like I'm a weirdo, but not in that like I don't that kind of I don't know vibe and all that. I'm like, care fuck it. When I went to Ireland, I went to this little place called Tullamore to present to speak, which is an hour and a half or two hours out
of Dublin. And I didn't feel like I've been to this town before because I knew I hadn't, and not like I've met these people before, but I felt part of me felt like, oh this this energy, this lang, not this language, but this accent, this culture, these people are very familiar. Like and I've been to maybe I don't know, twenty plus countries. I never had that experience. It feels like I'm in a foreign place and I'm not with in inverted commas my people right or I'm
not around people like me. But I felt like I belonged there. It was so interesting.
Do you reckon it changed you? Just the idea of.
That, I don't know, but I don't know why. But I fucking love Irish people. There's something that is and I'm generalizing. There's great people in every country and shit people in every country. I'm sure, but my experiences were like from the first day I got there and people were like I got into tullam or I don't know whatever day it was, and I was staying in this hotel and people like like asking me where I'm staying.
I'm like, I'm staying in the hotel. They're like, oh, you want to be standing there, You'll be stand with us, like and people are telling me, no, You've got to stay in our house, Like these are strangers that happened more than twenty times where people went, no, just come stay at our joint. I'm like, no, but thank you. Just bloody, that's never happened anywhere else like that. Doesn't you know you don't, Yeah, maybe it happens to some people.
But anyway, enough digressing. Jamie Andrews Dedman Welcome officially to the U Project for the second time in two days. What we can tell our listeners is we did what we started yesterday and we had a few interweb issues and so this is take two.
It is thanks thanks again for having me, and yeah, yesterday was I think a shitty optus issue on my end, not the first time, but hopeful the last.
Well, it's all good, mate. You know, you know when one of your biggest problems or your biggest problem for the day's Internet connection, that your life is fucking amazing, you know, australed me for at least three minutes. Yeah, that's good. Well, I'm glad you got over it, and I'm glad you didn't have to do therapy so I don't need to read out something off my screen and
sound like some kind of parrot. Why don't you tell our beautiful audience a little bit about the Jamie Stedman story, who you are, where you grew up, and then we'll do a deep dive because your life is interesting, your work is interesting, and there are particular components of your life that are very interesting. So you give us the as much or as little as you want. Thank you, Harps.
I born and bred in regional New South I was in Orange, have lived all over the place, spent a few years overseas, funnily enough, in Ireland here and there. My grandmother's paternal grandmother's last nme was Green, so it's for shits and gigs. I have done so many jobs it's kind of hard to list, but have found myself now as the men's behavior change facilitator in the domestic
violence space, so basically perpetrated as a DV. Come across my desk and we chat about ways for them to shift their behavior.
You know, life hasn't always been simple made.
I grew up in a better say, a violent house, drug affected where drugs were the order of the day, in electricity and food not so much. Yeah, it wasn't always like that, I must say. That was after my dad had left when I was about six, My ability to remember the exact days and dates kind of goes away. And having since research, apparently that's a trauma thing. So I didn't know I was traumatized till someone said, hey, that is the thing, and I was like, oh.
You're right, So you know I was.
I went from burn, a happy, go lucky six year old to effectively burn in charge of raising my ever growing number of siblings half siblings to my very violent stepfather.
Yeah, that's it.
A few years ago I was I was a prison officer for quite some time and got quite ill, randomly ended up in a coma for three months and the first thing I thought of when they woke me was I think I missed my best mate's fortieth birthday cruise.
As you do, Let's let's lean into a few of those things. Okay, so we'll come back to the coma, but let's start with because now you work interestingly like you grew up in a violent household, with a violent person in your house who was, let's be honest, probably not a fucking great human. Correct me if I'm wrong, And and now you are working with people who were kind of like your stepdad, what's like, violent, abusive, intimidating, or people who at least have been that and are
trying to be better. How did that? How did that shape the way that you saw the world and the way that you navigated the world, having to go home from school or your friend's house aware and going into that very volatile, very dangerous and very I would imagine, terrifying environment.
It's funny as humans, how very quickly we can pick up and learn from just the way someone walks in the house, the way they talk, the way they carry themselves, how they dressed. Like I knew really quickly how to read this guy and how to just get the hell out of the house. And of course this was lash yeah late seven, his early eighties sort of thing. So leaving the house was nothing, you just off you go.
You'd go and find shit to do and stumble your way across something cool to look at for a little while until such time as you needed to go home and try and point.
How it shaped me as an adult. I guess is.
That empathy for those both dealing going through it and dealing with it. And as you know have watching principle for men's behavior changes to is we keeping women and children safe through the behavior change of men? This is a men's problem. Yeah, the space that I work in predominantly, and you know, at the end of the day, if we can just shift one thought, one time, one action, one moment where they just halt for a sect, we potentially a laugh.
So yes, yes, pretty big.
Watching your mum get I was in the car when I was I want to say eight, I reckon, yeah, and she got hit. She was sitting in the console center console on the front seat because he had a mate sitting on the other side, and this was before seatbelts were Yeah, that's stuff. She got hit so hard she ended up in the back suait wow, And as an eight year old, I grabbed master father by the hair and screamed at him to stop doing it, Like
what the hell was I thinking? This was exceriment, just that protective instinct and then.
What did he do to you?
Nothing to me in that moment, but you know later on it was pretty mandatory for him to hold us over a well and threaten to drop us in some gigs.
So so he would hold you what you would just lift you over the top, so you're actually hanging by the ankle yep and side down. This grown ass man would hold a child over an ankle over a well. Yeah, for for for anything we got, We got in trouble for years and too much to all the paper.
So and you know, you know he's not going to drop in, right, but you also don't because hugely, hugely volatile human.
Yeah. So, how many brothers, sisters, step brothers, sisters, how many kids were in the family at that stage. It was my brother and my sister.
And she had been born to him when my brother was with my dad, and you know, he doated on her hand and foot, so did I. That was she was, you know, she looked up to me because we were effectively in charge of raising her at that stage.
So well, yeah, and how did your mum navigate all of that? Because your mom's just this victim for years at the hands of this.
Perpetrator. It's a hard thing, mate, because oh got me, Craig. Sorry, s all right, mate.
She was an amazing mom. Yeah, oh ship till the mate. This is why we have these chats. That's why it's real. She just.
It was her burden to carriage. Yeah, you know, she knew it wasn't ideal. She kept us alive as best she could, but women just didn't. How did they fucking get out, Craig. It was still legal to hit your wife at that stage. We hadn't changed the law yet, you know, So how do you how do you?
What a what? What the fuck message are we sending out to those people? Yeah? You know. So mum came from a big Italian family.
She moved around because she was embarrassed of where she'd ended up, and that was she just protected us the very best way she could, which was standing in front of you.
What an amazing brave mum. Dude, No wonder that. I don't think I would have come through that as well as you've come through that, because I couldn't if I had a dad who'd done that. I don't know what. I don't know. You know, you like to think you do this and that I'll probably do fucking nothing. I'd probably be in therapy for my whole life. But who knows. But I think that that's what I am doing, Craig.
I think that's exactly what I'm doing.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I was thinking like that you working with blokes that were basically that are basically a version of what you grew up in the middle of. Is that apart from trying to get them to change and change their behavior and to in turn protect our beautiful moms and sisters and wives and whatever. Yeah? Is that part of the recovery for you? The therapy for you? Hugely? Yeah? Massive, It's the opportunity is not lost on me to.
Impress on those guys the urgency of change and how easy it actually is to just try something a little bit different.
Where did they without giving away any info that you can't mate, how does it work?
Like?
How did people get court bloody ordered to come see you? Do they? Like? I want to know because to me, I'm and I'm sure I'm wrong, but I've I've like I've worked, you know, I've done stuff in prisons. I've spoken in quite a few prisons, and I've worked in rehab an addiction with people that are court ordered you know, treatment and and a lot of them are not too fucking voluntary. You know, they're there because they have to be. I don't see a whole lot of remorse, you know.
Interestingly, not to navigate that well, it's that discussion, isn't it.
It's that accountability.
There are there are some guys that are court mandated to be but lots few of them than you actually would think. Most of them are referred slash recommended, so their loyers will get them involved because it looks good at court, let's be honest.
But we also don't provide them any love in that space.
There is absolutely no guarantee that completing this course will mean anything. Yes, And that's kind of the most important part that we speak about when it comes to letters for court of support and all this sort of stuff, which.
We don't do a lot of. I don't. I mean I will, but it's very very black and white.
As like Joe Bloggs has been here three times, has engaged on.
Those dates at this time. Hmm.
Literally, it doesn't say because you know, just because it looks like he's doing well from my perspective, it doesn't mean shit once he leaves you.
I have a sense when I'm talking to people who you know, this is very different. Well, it's not totally different. It's in the same space in that like people come to me to talk or to be coached or mentored or whatever because they want to change, right. There's something about their habits or their behavior, or their thinking or
the way they do life. They want to change, right, And obviously it's not in the space you're in, but it's still it's people are turning up because they want to well they say they want to change, yes, But when I sit down with people sometimes I'm like some not not a huge percentage, and I'm like, you do you don't want to change. You like the idea of change, but you don't want to do the work of change, Like you want to sit with Craig Harper and talk. That's what you want, and you want to go I
went and spoke with this bloke or whatever. And sometimes I not not A few times, like a lot of times I'll see somebody and I go, there's zero I could be wrong, but to me, there's zero chance that this person is actually going to leave this chat, turn their life around, turn their behaviors around, and do the work like you must. You must deal with that on a regular.
Oh, the bullshit radar is pretty strong, and I make no bones about it.
And I.
Myself and my colleague where we operate very similar and her voice is even more important than mine in this space. But we get the guys group ready, is how we turn it. And eventually you know who's hanging around to tick a box and who isn't. And at the end of the day, mate, we can't kick them out just because they're ticking a box because what if that one next week is where they shift into change.
So like the term that you use or that I guess, like the almost like the job description is Men's behavior
change facilitator or whatever. Right to me, it's almost like I think before the behavior change needs to come thinking change because they're thinking that it's you know, it's like, well, the behaviors are just a consequence of how that person thinks and chooses, right, And I know that it's all, it's just semantics here, But like, if somebody thinks a certain way, how do you I know, you can't make them think differently or make them be different, but how
do you influence them in a way where you're as much as is possible, Jamie influencing their behavior?
Moving forwards spoke I listened to quite a bit Harps, and he has said a few things that have really resonated with me over the years. And the first one is always be curious. And so someone will mention to me a thought process or where and I just say, help me understand where that comes from? What were you thinking prior to that? Where were you emotionally? What does
that look like? What you been doing leading up to it? Like, you know, we're talking a lot about the potential for drug taking and drinking and drinking huge in this space, and so in those lead ups we then start talking about what was she saying to you? What were you hearing? Kause often the two are very different, and it just leads us down a pathway of an opportunity to think differently. How do you think you might do this next time? What might that look like? And you do this next time?
Because you know arguments are part and parcel of relationships, so so differences of opinion and thought and.
All this sort of stuff.
So it's it's making sure that people are just being prepared to respond rather than react. Remember that there's that space, that opportunity.
I would imagine. I would imagine that like with any change process. You know, it's like, how do you get in shape? While well, we don't all eat the same food and we don't all do the same workout. How do we change your body? How do we medicate a particular medical condition? You know, it's like, well, there's no like it depends like there are a lot of variables.
And while the while the common theme is domestic violence, I'm sure you could have ten different conversations about the same issue with ten different people trying to get the best outcome.
So so much mate, the differences in backgrounds, in biases, and cultural differences in belief systems, prejudices. It's a tricky space to navigate. But we simply focus on the behavior, not the human as much as humanly possible. Obviously, you know where we've made these guys look at.
It's empowerment too.
Perhaps we want those guys to understand that they're allowed to be different, that the fucking man box isn't always the best place to operate from, that you can step outside of it quite comfortably and just do something different to what you were taught, what you believe, what you think.
And also I guess the man box doesn't have to look like what they think, like I think I'm a man, but it never dawns on meta fucking hit a woman, you know what I'm saying. And you know we go so far beyond just that physical stuff, mate.
One of my most heartbreaking things if I hear from women, there's two sentences that I that just break me in half. And the first one is I wish you'd hit me because it'll be easy to deal with, so that coercive control.
Wow, So they'd rather get hit because it's tangible.
Yes, And then the next one is I wish i'd stayed with him, My life would be easier. What are we fucking doing to people where we can't support women enough now that they're comfortable enough to leave? And I would say to those blokes often, I want you to love people so hard that they feel free to to get fucked and walk out the door safely.
Yeah, yeah, I mean yeah, it's like love is a oh fuck, don't start me on the love conversation. Love is fucking complicated, like love is actually to me anyway. This is my very probably naive take, but this is how I feel like. And I'm a selfish fuck sometimes and I don't walk my own talk. Put up my hand. But like, love is wanting the best thing for somebody else, even if it's maybe momentarily the worst thing for you.
You know, that's that's the perfect answer, I reckon harps.
Love is for itom yeah yeah, and that edom to love, to be loved, and to leave if you need to tell me about I don't know if you have data or stats on this, but what is the what are the numbers around, or what is the evidence around the relationship between domestic violence and booze? Is most domestic violence? Does most of it involve booze? Half of it?
Some of it numbers? There are some numbers, nothing that I can think of off the top of my head. All I can tell you is I've got a list of currently sixty plus blokes, fifty five of which would be our coal related incidences.
Right, So we're looking at like over ninety percent have got to do with booze. And what about I mean, I know I'm asking. By the way, everyone, everything we're saying today, none of it is a recommendation or a prescription.
This is just Harps and Jamie and periodically tiff Ti if I know you're passionate about this, so feel free to jump in ask a question or add what about people that are just sociopaths, mate psychopaths, charismatic charming psychopaths who just know how to be, They know how to play, they know how to play people they know how to because some people who do this are also charismatic, charming, and depending on the setting, quite likable and often good looking, like fucking terrible humans.
I get, I earn an ex prison officer, I can sense the manipulation quite quickly. But these most men in this space are master manipulators. They have been doing it for so so long that it's outrageous that finally been caught, so to speak, or whatever the case may be. And when they come in here, there's a level of that that that jumps out at your pretty quick. The you know, the charm, and I actually get on with most of
these guys quite easily. They're not not inviting them around for a barbecue, but you know that they're just blokes at the end of the day. Who who I get an opportunity to talk to, pull them apart, challenge them and hopefully get them to just use one of the tools, just take one for a test run and see if it works.
Do you ever do you ever have a moment with somebody where it's like there's a there's a real genuine breakthrough, not just some kind of not lip service. You know, there's not there's tears, there's fucking there's a breakdown, and you know, well as much as you can know, you're like, no, this is this is there's something going on here which is good. You can you can almost it's almost a vibe.
You know when you've you know, when you've broken through the wall. I've got a cool little story. And this is not going to mean a lot to a lot of people from a change perspective, But I've got a young Aboriginal fellaw in our group, and he's quiet. He's not had any male role models whatsoever. He's only a young fella. He's seemingly quite desperate to shift Every now and again, he speaks up and it's the most amazing thing that drops out of you that you can get.
A couple of weeks ago, it's bucketing rains. It was still kind of you know, winter ishan orange and orange is a cold place.
This guy had been.
Arguing raowing was his term with his girl all day, going at it all day, low socio economic chat, good, good, good. Young fellow just doesn't know any better. And he walked all the way down here in the rain. So when he come in literally to Tommy, he couldn't do group because he wasn't feeling very good. We had to have a suicide discussion and all this sort of stuff as well.
This is all while I'm trying to run group or get group started.
Literally, so he could come down and Tommy couldn't do group, so he could walk home again. And that was him leaving to keep her safe. Wow, And it's not an option he'd ever considered using previously. Right, it's a that is a massive, massive breakthrough, and not a lot of people are going to understand how big a deal that is, but for him it's so far removed from his normal. I was so impressed, so proud, so just wrapped in in that because change looks different to everyone.
How many people Jamie who perpetrayed domestic violence grew up in it? Is it the greater percentage? Like we don't generally get that stat, Craig. We it comes out.
As part of the discussion more or less than the one on one stuff for a lot of them.
But you're both surprised how few really?
That actually concerns me, to be honest, because now to behavior you've chosen instead of one you actually grew up with, which.
Is is there more of it? Less of it? The same have we got? Is there just more a awareness and attention which there should be.
I think all of the above made I think that with women in particular, are finally starting to understand what a dovair relationship is from an empowerment perspective, which is great, and of course as they start to speak up, then we start to act hopefully, and of course unfortunately, if you look what's the numbers today, ninety three women ninety three made it went up one overnight, So we're at one point nine per week, nearly two women a week
being killed while someone they know, someone they love, someone they're supposed.
To be in love with. Them.
Now, this is a horrific stat and it keeps going up, and unfortunately, I think, and I don't know, people will push back and get cranky. But the more the women speak up, the more the douchebags are going to fucking do their because now they're being challenged, Now they're being embarrassed, now they're being shamed.
So I mean again, remember everyone, this is I'm genuinely It's not an area I know a lot about. I'm curious and so if my questions are not the best questions, it's because I'm kind of finding my way. I feel like it's a catch twenty two for ladies because if they speak up, they get in trouble. If they don't speak up, their life, shit do they do they? I feel like you've almost got to create your own escape plan and then just push the button like wolf. Some women anyway, maybe not all, But.
I don't want to speak to how difficult, how crazy it must be toleleief under that fucking number. I'll be walking around on eggshells to finally speak out until the bloke this isn't how you treat people or whatever, and then for them to for their actions to then increase rather than decrease what. You know, how how horrifically difficult that must be for women. You know, they're trying to keep their kids safe, they're trying to put food on
the table. The blokes withholding money or he spent it all on his fucking flash motorbike or just so much genuine douchebaggery out there that it's it's mind blowing, and I you know, it may be a matter of time. There's all those blugs forgetting that women give birth to us, keep treating the mark us, and that's going to stop.
I should have asked you this before. But who do you work for? Like, who pays for all this? It's an n g O.
I don't want to because it's a bit too opinionated, so I don't want them to getting all sad. The toughest part about all this made is the regulation and the stuff we have to do to just tick boxes to keep getting paid. The government says, oh, we're going to give you heaps of money, but we don't fucking see any of it, and it's stupid. I've got there's literally three of us in my team. I've got six. There's sixty five blokes. We are trying to put through
groups that happen every ten weeks. I could run a group every night, and that's unfortunates that in.
And of itself, right, M.
But the two girls in the team, you know, my coacilitator, her voice is huge in this space. It's when she speaks, there's a there's a lot of modeling that has to go on, Like I have to make sure I give her the room and I give.
Her the respect, and I give her the space. And because the.
Blokes think like some think less of women, and that's just how I am. So if I can be, I need to model the behavior I believe in make sure I'm practicing all that. And my other colleague, in my mind, she's got the hardest job. She is what we call the family safety worker. So it's her job to be ringing the ex partners current partners and offer them support and you know whatever that looks like even an escape
plane if if the risk is severe enough. So what she does is phenomenal, mate, And you know, all on a shoestring, as pretty much everyone does.
Yeah, I don't think any of you are in it for the doughmate, No, No, I would do it for free. Harps. Just don't tell him I said that.
Yeah, yeah, and what about what about you, like you're dealing with I know that your intentions are good and you're doing good work, but it's a it's an almost overwhelming challenge, right because, like you said, you could be doing way more stuff, but you don't have the manpower.
The resources. How do you because I feel there's probably a bit of PTSD just you know, into your back as you navigate this, how do you? And then when I talk to your mum, clearly that's all very close to the surface and raw. How do you manage you? How do you? How do you? You know, we all have our peaks and trust, but how do you? How do you protect you while still doing what you need to do.
It's not always easy, mate. Sometimes I'm not a great dad. Sometimes I'm not a great friend or a great partner. But what I've done is empower those closest to me to call me out because sometimes I don't see it. So yeah, given permission to say, hey, this is different to your normal.
The other stuff is paying attention to what I call burnon circle.
I hate when people say I'm on path because path has like a starting point and the finish point.
So I like it. Yeah, yeah, anyway.
I so the gym coffee connection my big three if any of those slipped for too long.
So so what about I'm thinking about the ability some men have to have like bullshitty man conversations that are not very uplifting for women. What if you find yourself you know where some guys are And by the way, I think that goes both ways. I've had a lot of conversations with wives who run their husbands down in the gym, but we're not talking about that. That's a different thing.
So that is a different thing I want to I want to touch on that hYP So someone having a conversation with you and running their partner down, that's a connection thing. That's freedom, that is. But me and you're sitting at the pub bonding by.
Othering women, Yeah, is kind of disgusting. Shit.
Yes, have I done it, absolutely because I'm old and it was a normal thing to do.
Once upon a time.
But for whatever reason, I grew up and I can actually remember the exact moment a bloke simply didn't indulge in the bullshit that was going on at the table, and I noticed, and I asked him any.
Yes.
And so that's my big challenge for all blokes right now is I don't expect you to call out the bullshit if you're not comfortable enough to do it right, because it might be you a punch in the mouth.
Not everyone wants one.
Yeah, but your other obligation is very simple. You simply have to do nothing. Just don't indulge. If you're comfortable enough, turn you back, get up and walk away, because what you're doing in that moment is saying to the other guys at the table, I'm not doing this shit. And someone in there is watching you, somebody's going to come and.
Question you, and there's an opportunity for growth and empowerment. Yeah.
Yeah, that's how we have these cool conversations. I just get in this space. Harp's. One of the most frustrating thing I see is when I go to rallies or gatherings, it's always women, but men and ones telling me that they support this stuff, that they love their women.
I'm like, okay, well, where the fuck are you?
Yes, you don't have to do anything, just go to the thing out.
Yeah, sorry, a little bit so foxy, No, No, I fucking love it. Mate, Well, clearly, it's like this is your passion and your purpose, and so if you weren't this emotional, I would be disappointed or I would be surprised, right because this is but now anyway, maybe forever, but
this is why you're here, it seems. Is there are there any like programs that are research based, evidence based, like programs designed and implemented to deal with, you know, domestic violence, Like here's here's a program that's been designed to take men through this or is that not available.
I'm not saying that's necessarily any better than what you do, but I'm just saying it's like with every other fucking thing, we've got some evidence based kind of protocol or operating system or treatment option or strategy to deal with these things. What about this?
Yes, in the short term, but once again, the problem with challenging humans to change is lip service.
Right. The evidence based stuff is that if you adopt this, we know it will work.
Yes, right, same as push ups. If you stop watching others do them, you'll get better at it if you.
Do If you start doing them, Yeah, it's amazing.
So, like all things, unless you're actually willing to implement and lean into the hard stuff.
Yeah, change just won't happen. Yeah. So you've got lots of people listening. Now, you've got lots of men, You've got lots of wo And what do people? I don't know. I didn't prep you for this, and it doesn't need to be particularly elegant or eloquent. What do you? Yeah, come on, get your eloquent on. If you could see him, everybody's about as eloquence as me. So what do you
what would you love to share with people? Because there are going to be people listening to this who are like this is maybe hopefully there's a few a few men who maybe need to hear this and recognize a little bit of themselves in what you're saying and need to go fuck, I need to pull my head in and watch myself or maybe own up and step up. Or there might be women that need support or help, Like, what do you want to say to both of those groups?
The biggest thing is to get yourself educated in what abuse constitutes, what constitutes abuse?
So there are there's a list halps.
I can promise you if I spoke one on one with every man in my town, most of them would look at this list. At some days and go shit. I am guilty of some of these right now. The other side of that coin, of course, is the women not knowing that, fluck me, I'm actually in this relationship. So it would be simply educating yourself and be willing
to have those discussions with each other. Of the issues we face as couples is through poor communication, through difficult conversations had well and just scheduling that in how's to day? What's going on for you? What's happening in your world? You know, asking the kids what went well today? What can we do better next time? What do you need from me as a dad? Like actually fucking empower them to put you in their lives now. I hate the
fact that I work in the harm minimization space. I want to work in harm prevention, and I would imagine that most people in this environment want to. We need to be having really tough conversations with ten eleven to twelve year old kids. Yeah, we need to show them. Hey girls, here's a list of ship for you never to put up with. Hey boys, here's a list of stuff you need to never do. Yes, guess what those lists look exactly.
I wonder that that I've never thought of that, Like, I've never thought of opening that door on young young women or young girls and young boys. And because it seems like, oh, this is not something that children need to learn about. Absolutely, maybe they do. Maybe the language halts. All of this stuff is in the language, mate.
The more we allow our little boys to talk shit about girls, yeah, the more we don't say.
Hey, that's not how you do this. Yeah, the more we don't pull them up.
You know, there's a there's a few pretty powerful little programs that are run in schools, but they kind of bounce around the subject.
Right, kids are tougher and.
More able to deal with this ship than ever before at any other time on this planet. Right, they know some stuff. Most of them are probably doing things that I'd be afraid to try. Yeah, But if we don't, if we don't empower them now to have those hard conversations to recognize right and wrong, then my job is just.
Going to keep getting harder and harder. And I want that. I've got a tricky I've got a tricky question for you again. So another one. So I've got a hypothetical. By the way, everyone, this is a hypothetical. I'm not talking about someone that don't try and figure it out. Okay. So I know a couple and from the outside looking and it's kind of, you know, works like there's this public version of the relationship which is okay, but behind
closed doors that's not the case at all. And the dude is very controlling and very strong and very you know whatever fill in the blank, and the female is the opposite of that. And I'm an outside observer and I know that if I try to do anything that won't work well, if I try to talk to him, he'll deny it, potentially get aggressive. And I know there's no simple answer to this, but I think all of us probably know someone or someone's where there's a version
of that going on. What like you don't want to do nothing, but you don't want to throw a match on it.
This is a really, really tough situation and I can't speak for everyone. What I would do is get educated, go speak to there's DVO specialists at the place, there's relationship advice you can get online through Relationships Australia. Know what you can do, what you can't do, what you can and can't get away with.
There are you know for those two that might be how they do life.
Yeah, but it does not mean that you can't raise a question and hey, you have to be prepared to lose a friend to save a life.
Yeah yeah, yeah, wow. If people want to get if people want to support this kind of work or even do this kind of work, which is it's tough work, or people want to support you, or how do people how do people get involved? If somebody's got an interest in whatever this, they've got a psych background or a counseling back ground, or they want to do some kind of certification where they can get involved and work in their space and help. I mean, this is a multifaceted issue.
This is not a three step solution, and this is you know, there are so many parts to this, so there's no quick fix. But what do we need? Who do we need? Apart from funding which is the obvious one, but can people get involved to do what you do? I still don't know how I landed here, HAPs, so that's a tough question. I think.
There's an organization called MTV Note of Violence and they are our overarching body, and that would be the first step I would expect. And there are unfortunately a lot of opportunities to work in the domestic violence space variously currently in this country, where going through what we call sixteen days of activism, and of course, as I said previously, just fucking show up, yeah, talking about it, start doing it.
Waste no more time talking about what a good man is. We won. I was sharing this. I think I was sharing with Tiff and some I don't know. I do a lot of podcasts, mine and others, so some weeks I do like ten or eleven podcasts, including seven of my own. But I think I was talking to you yesterday, Tiff, or the day before. A couple of months ago, I ran a workshop in Hampton, Mate, just down the road, and it was a small group. And I apologize to
my listeners who heard this story. But one of the ladies in the group it was five hours, but one of the ladies in the group, you know, we're all kind of interacting, and she goes, my ex husband hates you, like hates me, right, And I'm like, that's not the smallest group. There's a few husbands and ex husbands and boyfriends who hate me. Right. I'm like, I'm okay with that. And I said, well, when did like when did he and I intersect? Where did I meet him? And she goes, oh,
he's never met you. I went what she goes, He doesn't know you, he's never met you, he's never listened to a conversation of podcasts, nothing, but he thinks that you're the reason that we broke up, right, So the reason his marriage was destroyed was because of me.
I'm like, Wow, how fucking delusion was that bloke? How much how arrogant and self righteous are you when you think that somebody that you've never met or had a conversation with you is that the reason that your marriage your marriage didn't work.
I'm like, it's amazing how many guys don't he what the women are asking of them or telling them or explaining to them. And eventually, you know, they either get sick of saying it, whether they say it a different way by leaving or by yelling, and just so many different ways. And what we do know is the girls are telling us. The women are speaking right to us. They tell us exactly what they want. We just don't listen. And in this most case, really was not listening until he decided that it.
Was all you. Yeah, fucking Craig Harper effect, Hey, mate, you're a gun. We didn't even talk about your coma. We'll do that next time, if there's the next time. But how do people connect with you or learn more or what do you want to and where do you want to direct people towards? If anything.
I do have a website Jamie Stebben dot net. It is it needs updating. It's probably the easiest way. Or just email me on Jamie Steado at gmail dot com.
I don't know Jamie. Jamie Steado at gmail dot comedy's home address, everyone is number seven. All right, it's been We got through it. No internet problems today, so that was nice.
Thank you, and it went a different way again, which was really cool.
So buddy, we'll say we'll say goodbye off here. But for the moment, mate, we appreciate you being on the new project Tiff for you.
Okay, yeah, thank you, Thanks Jamie cool, Thanks everyone.
Thanks course