On This Day in History: March 5

Patrick Stewart speaks out against domestic violence

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Captain Picard is the best captain, played by the amazing human Patrick Stewart. Amnesty International’s campaign to end violence against women prompted Stewart to action due to his childhood experiences of domestic violence.

--On This Day in History Shit Went Down: March 5, 2004--

Violence against women is a form of hate crime; these egregious acts are usually committed against women and girls specifically because of their gender. The manners in which it manifests are legion, and on March 5, 2004, Amnesty launched its Stop Violence Against Women campaign. Stewart had been unable to speak about what happened in his childhood, but because of Amnesty, “all that changed.”

He consulted his brothers. They agreed it was time to use his voice to tell of how their father abused their mother. A sergeant major in World War II, Patrick’s father was one of the last men evacuated from Dunkirk, then later parachuted into Crete and Italy under fire. But back home “He was an angry, unhappy and frustrated man who was not able to control his emotions or his hands,” Stewart later wrote. Of witnessing the repeated beatings of his mother, the actor said, “the terror and misery he caused was such that, if I felt I could have succeeded, I would have killed him.” The authorities often said that Patrick’s mother “must have provoked” her husband and that “it takes two.”

Acting became his refuge; it allowed Stewart to be someone else.

In 2006 Stewart made a video for Amnesty detailing the shocking prevalence of domestic violence, admonishing how it is “hushed up” and “allowed to continue.” He called on the UK government to take serious action. Stewart is a patron of Refuge, a UK charity for abused women, and launched a post-graduate scholarship for the study of domestic violence. He’s continued to use his voice and profile to speak out against domestic violence and call for more to be done to stop it.

In 2013 Stewart was speaking at Comicpalooza in Texas when a woman in the audience thanked him for his activism; she then asked what it was he was most proud of that wasn’t related to acting. He said that it was getting more men to realize the role they have to play in ending domestic violence. “The people who could do most to improve the situation of so many women and children are in fact, men,” he said. “It’s in our hands.” Then holding back tears, he continued, “I do what I do in my mother's name because I couldn't help her then. Now I can.”

Stewart learned his father suffered from post-traumatic stress due to his wartime experiences, which he emphatically stated was not an excuse for his violent behavior, as “violence is never ever a choice that a man should make!” Since then, he has also become involved in a charity to support veterans suffering from PTSD.

The guy also fosters shelter dogs and helps them find their forever homes. If there is a more wonderful being in the galaxy than Patrick Stewart, I don’t know who it is.

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