The man behind the She is Not Your Rehab anti-violence movement, wants to change the conversation around domestic violence in order to better understand the root of the problem.
She is Not Your Rehab author Matt Brown told Breakfast’s John Campbell that many New Zealand men struggle to know how to express their emotions, after years of being told to “harden up”.
The renowned Christchurch barber penned the book with the help of his wife Sarah, launched off the back of a powerful TEDx talk he gave in 2019.
Taking the message from beyond the barbershop, She is Not Your Rehab offers a rethink of how Kiwi men deal with their past traumas.
“A lot of the time people are grieving or they feel inadequate. It’s trying to understand that and help our men - our people - and help navigate and understand those emotions.
Brown is himself a survivor of childhood abuse and hosts a men’s support group from his shop, My Fathers Barber s.
“We need to humanise people, people that are the perpetrators of violence. They’re not just angry, a lot of them are grieving, a lot of them never understood their emotions.
“When you’re told to shut up, harden up, man up, you suppress that emotion - you suppress your humanity.”
Jordon Rangitoheriri says the Browns' movement had helped him overcome a violent upbringing, including the murder of his son at the hand of others. (Source: Other)
Channelling his own childhood experiences with an abusive father, Brown said it took a long time to realise his dad wasn’t “just angry”.
“Coming from Samoa to New Zealand and not being able to speak the language, he must have felt so scared,” he said.
“He felt inadequate for not being able to provide for his family like he wished he could, so he turned to the booze… and we were on the receiving end.”
As a child, Brown had hoped his father would come home a “better man” after spending time in prison, but “sadly that wasn’t our case".
That’s what inspired him to raise funds for every inmate in the country’s prison system so that other families would have a better outcome.
“My hope was for all the other children who are waiting for their fathers and mothers to get out, that they’re present and able to when they get out.”
He said a large element of the path to recovery is taking ownership of past actions, and “owning your story.”
“Once we own our story, we can transform our pain and redeem ourselves so that we don’t transmit that on to our most vulnerable. “
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