GBV prevention starts with the conversations we avoid

THERE are certain stories we should never become accustomed to reading. Another woman assaulted. Another mother grieving. Another family trying to understand how someone they loved became the subject of a crime report. And yet that terrible word, “another”, has become disturbingly familiar. A recent report in the POST brought this uncomfortably close to home.

KwaZulu-Natal-based NPO, the DSK Group, said that from January to August 2026, it had dealt with 196 domestic-violence cases, 26 cases of partner violence, 82 cases of sexual assault and 13 cases of harassment in the Phoenix, Tongaat, Verulam and Ballito areas. It also reported three GBV-related murders.

We can read those numbers and shake our heads, or we can allow them to disturb us. What I’m mindful of is that these are not simply statistics because they represent homes, relationships and communities in which something has gone terribly wrong. For those of us who work with young people, they also raise a question I find increasingly difficult to ignore: What are we teaching the next generation about how human beings should treat one another?

Education cannot end with employment

In education, we understandably speak about qualifications, careers and employability. These things matter enormously. Education can change the economic trajectory of a young person and, sometimes, an entire family.

We know, though, that education must do more than help a person earn a living. It should help them understand how to live. At GIFS, we encounter young adults preparing themselves for careers and independence. Our responsibility towards students cannot simply be about skills and qualifications. Education should also encourage confidence, personal agency, dignity and the ability to recognise their own worth and that of others.

That matters particularly when we talk about GBV. We must empower young women to build independent futures and know that their ambitions, voices and safety matter.

We must, however, be careful about where we place responsibility. Women cannot be educated into becoming sufficiently careful not to be harmed. We have spent years telling women to watch where they walk, who they trust and when they travel. Those conversations may be intended to protect, but they leave the most important question unanswered. And that question remains: what are we teaching boys and men?

Perhaps the conversation begins at home

For many of us, family is extraordinarily important. I remember listening to my grandmother share how fundamental our education was to the entire clan. That generational care is precisely why we continue to worry about our children’s marks.

We invest deeply in our children’s education. We ask what they are studying, whether they have found work, what career they intend to pursue and, quite often, when they intend to settle down.

But it’s time for another conversation around our dinner tables.

How do you respond when someone tells you no? What does respect look like when you are angry? What does a healthy relationship look like? What do you do when a friend humiliates or controls his partner? When did walking away from conflict become less admirable than winning it?

And, yes, these are not comfortable conversations. That may be precisely why we need them.

We cannot expect schools, universities, police, government or NGOs to repair attitudes that families and communities are unwilling to confront. One aspect of the DSK Group Pink Towel campaign particularly struck me. A simple household object is being used as a symbol of comfort, dignity, protection and hope for women and children affected by GBV. There is something profoundly human about that.

It also made me think about what happens before someone needs that comfort. Maybe there were warning signs, or degrading language that was dismissed as a joke, or perhaps it was controlling behaviour mistaken for love. From those of us looking on, did we say that it wasn’t our business?

Changing GBV culture is not only about what happens after violence occurs. It is also about challenging the attitudes that we normalise before it does. That responsibility belongs to all of us.

Perhaps this is where our national conversation needs to become braver.

Empowering women remains essential. Education, economic opportunity and confidence can dramatically expand the choices available to young women.

However, women’s empowerment alone cannot solve violence against women.

We must raise and educate men differently too. And this is not because every boy is a future perpetrator. I know that would be both unfair and destructive. We need every young man to become part of the solution.

Imagine if strength were associated as readily with restraint as with dominance? If young men challenged degrading conversations among friends? If respect became something demonstrated privately rather than merely professed publicly?

That is social change, and education has a role in creating it.

Let us refuse to become numb

Campaigns matter. Awareness matters. Support services matter. Law enforcement matters, but perhaps the most dangerous moment comes when another GBV headline no longer shocks us.

Indifference comes quietly when we turn the page, scroll past, or shake our heads to say, “What is happening to this country?” Then we continue with our day.

We cannot continue having the same conversation only after another woman has been harmed. Let us have it in our classrooms, in our workplaces and among friends.

That lunchtime conversation matters because it’s an education that can potentially help a young person in trouble. The bottom line is that if we are serious about building a better society, we must also help young men, in particular, become people who value the lives of others.

That may be one of the most important lessons we ever teach.

**Dr Kershen Pillay is the CEO of the Graduate Institute of Financial Sciences (GIFS)

** The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of IOL or post.co.za