‘Men have to step up’ in fight against domestic violence, LePage says

Article here. Excerpt:

'To win the battle against domestic violence, Gov. Paul LePage says men need to stop seeing the problem as a women’s issue and take action to stop abuse.

“We can have all the strict laws in the world, but we have to make [domestic violence] socially unacceptable,” LePage said during a ceremony Wednesday morning in his Cabinet Room at the State House.

“We, the men, have to help to eliminate abuse,” Lepage continued. “We are 80 percent of the perpetrators, and we have to find a way to stop people from doing this, and we can’t expect women to fight this battle alone.”

The morning ceremony marked the proclamation of October as Domestic Violence Awareness Month, during which the Blaine House, Maine’s governor’s residence, will be illuminated in purple — the color associated with the cause.

The governor also announced that he will provide $10,000 from his contingency fund to help pay for the completion of the Maine Murder Victims’ Memorial in Augusta. Ground was broken Sunday on the memorial, a project by Maine’s chapter of Parents of Murdered Children.'