The 2025 UK Femicide Census: Why We Need Feminism | Molly Hamill

A woman is killed every 3 days in the UK. Almost 90% of them are killed by men. These killings are usually hot blooded, fueled by 'male anger', and are often painful or long.

When we speak about feminism, we almost end up speaking about what are known as 'first world feminism problems'. Men (and many women) around the Western world look at affirmative action policies in the UK and think that feminism is just misandry, or that women are complaining about nothing. In this article, I'm hoping to show you that our perspectives are skewed. Tiny numbers of women receiving boosts to get onto the boards of huge multinational banking corporations do not mean that we've achieved equality, when women don't feel safe to leave their home in the dark. Most men are not violent. Most men aren't 'the problem', but practically all women experience it, and something needs to be done.

Almost 20% of men think sexism doesn't exist. Only 49% of women identify as feminists. 4 in 10 UK adults and 51% of men believe that "feminism has gone too far".

These statistics might inspire a reaction – but they're not inspiring change.

The UK's Femicide Census for 2025 has been released. The enumeration takes the first 2000 women and girls aged 14 or above who have been killed since 2009, and at least one man has been identified as responsible for the death. It focused on 'solved' cases, where the state has run processes to hold the perpetrator to account, but includes some 'incomplete' cases, where the murder was a murder/suicide or where the perpetrator was deemed 'unfit to stand trial'.

In 16% of cases, a man used his own body to murder the victim (kicking, stamping, hitting, etc). In almost a quarter of cases, more than one form of violence was used to kill. In fifty nine percent of cases, evidence of overkill was found.

For those fortunately unfamiliar with the concept of overkilling, it refers to the use of more violence than is necessary to kill somebody. When femicide occurs, it is more often than not a torturous death. There tends to be a defensive response when this is mentioned: more or less 'blah blah blah testosterone. While yes, men are biologically more aggressive than women, 76% of women are killed by their own family, partner, or ex-partner. Men who are supposed to love them are killing them, and we're sat here debating whether it's natural? The male violence epidemic isn't going away, and women are dying as we argue about whether these crimes are motivated by nature or nurture.

I will repeat: a woman is killed every 3 days in the UK. 73% of them are between 20 and 60. 22% of them are elderly.

Lives are being brutally cut short, and futures are being stolen, but we reduce them to discussion points around a dinner table – this is not a question of "Has DEI gone too far?" or "Why do women think it's all men?" This is a crisis, and it's hard to find people making change. Those of us who remember Rachel Blake MP's visit to HWSF might remember her response when she was asked what the government would do to combat the male violence epidemic. Then again, you might not – she didn't really say much. While Blake herself shouldn't be held responsible for the systematic and repetitive failures of successive governments, it is telling that all she really had to say by way of government strategy is "Yes, it's awful, I hate it too."

Of the sample, 128 (or more) children witnessed the killings of their mothers. Only about 60% of killers were found guilty of murder (including of double or multiple murder). 71% of women are killed in their own homes.

Yes. It is understandable that men commit more violent crimes than women. Yes. Not every one of these crimes will have been motivated by pure misogyny. Even yes, some of these men may have been victims themselves. But we have a responsibility, our governments have a responsibility, to do something.

When 44% of domestic violence cases go unreported, and those that do are often sidelined or outright dismissed by the police, and over the last 16 years there has been almost no progress in making women feel safe walking home alone, it is its own separate tragedy that we've allowed ourselves to believe that feminism has "gone far enough". We desperately need protection for the women who are being torn away from their futures to endure senseless and horrible suffering, and we need more than empty promises for those doing everything they can to bring change so that we stop treating women as the cold statistics which these levels of violence create. It is not all men, but it is almost always a man.

Cover image: The NIA Project