A new Netflix show about adolescence has sparked uncomfortable but necessary conversations about what it means to grow up in a world saturated with violence, misogyny, and digital harm. These are the forces shaping young people’s lives. Yet you wouldn’t know it by the current discourse from the 2025 federal election.
Major parties are promising more homes, better healthcare, and nation-building reforms. But currently, no one names the common thread: the cultural, structural, and increasingly digital violence that underpins so many of the crises these new initiatives claim to solve. Until we confront that truth, policy will remain reactive, not preventive.
Violence no longer stops at the front door. It follows children into their phones, browsers, and gaming consoles. The recent release of the video game No Mercy, developed by Zerat Games, reveals the depths of online content profiting from the glorification of sexual violence. In the game, players control a male character who uses extortion and coercion to sexually exploit female family members. With over a thousand paying subscribers on Patreon, No Mercy is a business model built on the commodification of abuse.
And it’s not alone. From free access to violent pornography and algorithm-driven videos that push misogyny and coercion, children are absorbing narratives that normalise harm. We’re not just failing to protect them, we are handing them over to systems that profit from their exposure.
As Professor Michael Salter warns: “We have to stop treating online harms as peripheral. These platforms are not just reflecting culture they are shaping it, reinforcing harmful norms, and making violence go viral.”
Of course, confronting these issues means confronting cultural and political power. We are seeing real fear in the community about the conversation on gender-based violence. Backlash is growing, not just online but in schools, workplaces, and even policymaking circles. But the answer can’t be retreat. Leaders who talk about building a stronger, safer Australia need to show the courage to name this resistance and push through it rather than pander to it. Because safety, equality, and dignity shouldn’t be up for debate.
How prosperous can a society be when dehumanising behaviours are being normalised for children before they even reach high school? What kind of opportunity are we offering if we don’t confront the industries that are grooming youth into perpetrators and victim survivors into silence?
The 2025 platforms of both Labor and the Coalition outline visions for infrastructure, the economy, and education. But neither party has made a clear, additional commitments to ending gender-based violence with a focus on children even though that violence underpins considerations in every other policy area.
The Australian Child Maltreatment Study laid it bare: over 60 per cent of Australians experienced a form of child maltreatment. For girls, the rates of sexual abuse and exposure to domestic violence are particularly alarming. These are not abstract statistics. These are real children right now many of them still living in homes where violence is ongoing.
So, what exactly are we planning for, if not for them?
Building more childcare centres? Excellent. But we must go the extra mile to ensure they’re safe, trauma-informed, and accessible to children fleeing violence. Funding more GPs or mental health services is important, but not enough if they’re not equipped to respond to complex trauma. A tax cut or wage rise means little to a parent who can’t leave a violent home because there’s no crisis accommodation in their town.
Children living in violence is not just a social issue. It’s a health issue. An education issue. An economic issue. It undercuts every goal our political leaders claim to champion. If we don’t address it, we’re building the nation’s future on fractured foundations.
We need a vision for Australia that directly responds to the crisis we’re living in, one that includes structured investment and long-term commitments to prevention, early intervention, specialist services, and systems reform. From schools and health services to police and courts, every part of the system must evolve. This is the time for bold innovation and fearless leadership, our future relies on this.
Safety must be a bipartisan priority not a footnote, not a side note, but a central pillar of any credible future for this country.
We have committed to end violence in one generation—it requires urgency, and our clock is ticking.
If you need help and advice call 1800Respect on 1800 737 732, Men’s Referral Service on 1300 766 491 or Lifeline on 13 11 14.
If you or someone you know is in immediate danger, call 000.
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