The Ministry of the Interior and the Ministry of Family Affairs and the Federal Criminal Police Office (Bundeskriminalamt) presented a situational picture on domestic violence in Berlin this week, according to which the number of cases of domestic violence rose by a full 8.5 percent in 2022 compared to the previous year

240,057 victims and 197,348 criminal suspects were registered, and it is clear that this is only the tip of the iceberg. With all the efforts made in recent years to propagate that the state is against violence against women, such an increase is a revelation of the hypocrisy of bourgeois politicians. But in a country where women in underwear are displayed as decoration on large advertising hoardings on every second street corner, prostitution is practised on a huge scale and serves as a source of income for the state, and the most successful music band that has long been courted in many bourgeois media is a gang of rapists, who should be surprised there if a few "kind-hearted" campaigns against patriarchal violence come to nothing. The rise in domestic violence (i.e. primarily violence against women; for that is what is important here, although the type of statistics blurs this) in 2022 is also particularly humiliating for the traffic light government, which took office the year before in December and has also taken this issue on board:

"We will secure the right to protection from violence for every woman and her children and ensure a nationwide legal framework for reliable funding of women's shelters. We will expand the support system in line with demand. The federal government will contribute to the regular financing. ... We will expand preventive work with perpetrators. We want a strong alliance against sexism. We will implement the confidential preservation of evidence, which can be used in court, throughout the country and close to where people live.“ (Coalition agreement 2021; p. 91)

Now, none of the promises to women have been fulfilled, the more women's shelters and counselling centres that, for example, Family Minister Lisa Paus (Greens) assures, fall behind the interests of the German imperialists in the state budget, i.e. especially military spending, and will not be created.

Whereas during Corona the main blame for the increase in numbers was placed on the isolation of people in their homes, it is now again more difficult to disguise the fact that the bourgeoisie will always uphold the patriarchy and condone or support violence against women in large parts accordingly. Even (still?) Minister of the Interior Nancy Faeser has to admit this and then calls for better "training and sensitisation of police forces" who all too often ignore the call for help in cases of patriarchal violence. And the other measures put into play also play into these cards: In response to the increase in patriarchal violence, the expansion of the powers of the executive as part of the reactionarisation of the state and the militarisation of society are to be pushed forward. According to Faeser, there should be consistent controls to ensure that perpetrators disappear from the home after the first violent assault so that they do not quickly return, and this may require a change in the law. The authorities should be able to make faster and more direct decisions without having to pay attention to so many paragraphs. And already reactionaries who claim to stand up for women's rights, such as the national director of the women's rights organisation Terre Des Femmes, Christa Stolle, are joining in the clamour for militarisation. "The measures that really protect women and prevent the worst acts of violence must finally be taken. This includes enforcing a nationwide uniform removal of the perpetrator from the place of residence - and also with electronic surveillance, as exists in Spain." With the pretext of protecting women, these people are campaigning for the introduction of electronic ankle bracelets in Germany. The Hessian Minister of Justice, Roman Poseck (CDU), said: "The development of the number of cases shows the urgency of the Hessian initiative to allow the use of the electronic ankle bracelet in escalation cases to monitor measures under the Protection against Violence Act." In any case, this does not hold out the prospect of an improvement in the situation of women with regard to patriarchal violence.