A short scroll through social media and some of Pakistan's leading newspapers has made me realise, once again, that perhaps we are becoming a little more "mature" as a society.

The quotation marks matter. For years, some of the most visible disclosures of childhood sexual abuse by well-known women, particularly from showbusiness, involved chowkidaars, maalis and other men who entered the household through work. Those disclosures were important and should never be belittled. But have we quietly created a mental map in which abuse belongs to that constituency? A perpetrator has no particular occupation, beard or bank balance. He can be a driver or a doctor, a cook or a civil servant. Respectability is not a risk assessment.

Recently, senior civil servant Maliha Sehr, Additional Deputy Commissioner (Headquarters), Rawalpindi, filed a police complaint alleging prolonged domestic violence by her husband. He is on judicial remand. The allegations remain to be tested in court. In her complaint, she said she had remained silent for a long time in the hope of saving her marriage and family. Her photograph travelled. In the coverage that reached my own feeds, I saw her face and not his. I was relieved she was heard, and uneasy about what comes next. Because what happens after we call a woman brave?

"Brave" can be praise. It can be solidarity. In British usage, depending on the tone, it can........

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