It's supposed to be the world's "most gender-equal" country. But behind that title a devastating problem remains.
For 14 years, the small Nordic nation of Iceland has topped the World Economic Forum gender-gap rankings, considered to have closed 91.2 per cent of the male-female divide.
The survey considers the gender gap on four metrics: health, education and political empowerment and economic participation.
But statistics on violence in the country, paint a vastly different portrait of the nation's treatment of women.
About 40 per cent of Icelandic women experience gender-based and sexual violence in their lifetime, according to a landmark 2018 study by the University of Iceland.
"It doesn't matter even here in the one of safest countries in the world, your life is threatened for only being a woman," gender-based violence survivor Ólöf Tara Harðardóttir said.
"If 40 per cent of all women in Iceland are survivors of physical and or sexual abuse, that's no feminist paradise."
A national conversation about gender-based violence — an issue Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has described as a "crisis" — is continuing in Australia.
The search for solutions has, sometimes, put a spotlight on equality.
But if the experience in Iceland is anything to go by, experts believe it's far more complicated.
Breaking down the Nordic paradox
Women in Iceland experience more equitable economic, social and political status than those elsewhere, but many warn it has not necessarily translated into higher rates of safety.
This phenomenon has been labelled the "Nordic paradox", where equality-focused Scandinavian countries experience higher-than-expected rates of violence.
Experts struggle to explain it.
Possible theories range from female advancement leading to male backlash to problematic alcohol consumption patterns and a lack of public discussion around family violence.
Many in the field accept there are challenges with comparing and collecting data, but repeated studies have shown rates of violence are higher than other European countries.
Ms Harðardóttir now co-leads a not-for-profit organisation, Ofgar, which campaigns for legal and social reform for women in Iceland.
"I decided that I needed to speak up … because I felt for too long our country silences victims," she said.
Last year, tens of thousands of Icelandic women — including the country's female prime minister — took part in a 24-hour stop-work demonstration using the slogan "you call this equality".
The strike intended to highlight the persistent gaps in women's pay, domestic workload and rates of gender-based violence.
Some media commentary dubbed the protesters as "ungrateful middle-class feminists".
"People say we are an equal country, but I say equal for who?" Ms Harðardóttir said.
Tanja Mjöll Ísfjörð Magnúsdóttir, another survivor who also co-leads Ofgar, said she felt let down by Iceland's legal system.
"I did everything by the book, I pressed charges, I went to the police and everything," she said.
"[But] my case got dismissed and my family, my home town they turned their back on me and and I had to look elsewhere to find help.
"I realise this happens to many survivors of abuse in Iceland."
Along with many others involved with Ofgar, she is campaigning for changes to Iceland's age of sexual consent, sentencing laws and treatment of survivors of sexual assault.
"Despite the female politicians, I still do not feel we get the answers we want," Ms Magnúsdóttir said.
'The good guys are very silent'
The Scandinavian countries of Iceland, Norway, Sweden and Finland all rank in the top five of the World Economic Forum's gender-equality rankings, with scores of 81-91 per cent.
The gender gap is not closed in any of these countries but, based on these statistics, these nations have come closer to levelling the disparities than many others.
Yet, Nordic countries with strong legal and social empowerment frameworks for women appear to have rates of gendered violence above the European Union (EU) average.
"The work with gender equality doesn't fix the problem with violence," said Anneli Häyrén, a researcher at Uppsala University in Sweden.
"The Nordic paradox is hard to explain … but I would say that we do not have gender equality, and we clearly still have a problem with the balance of power between men and women.
"We have a problem with violence, men's violence against women and children and men's violence against other men as well."
The World Health Organisation estimates about one in three women worldwide have experienced intimate-partner violence or non-partner violence in their lifetime.
In Australia, about 39 per cent of women over the age of 15 have experienced violence, according to the not-for-profit Our Watch.
In Sweden, 46 per cent of women have experienced violence, which is 13 per cent higher than in the EU overall, according to a major 2014 study by the European Centre of Gender Equality.
These figures are 10 years old, but a 2019 European Agency for Fundamental Rights survey also showed the prevalence of physical and sexual-partner violence against women in the EU was substantially higher in the Nordic countries than the continent's average.
It was about 30 per cent in Finland and 29 per cent in Sweden.
Dr Häyrén said the problem had for too long been framed as a "women's issue".
"The good guys are very silent in Sweden and I would say, and we would need them to be a lot more active," she said.
The EU's main data collection agency says more work is needed to accurately capture information on violence against women, and that it is difficult compare data from different countries.
The EU does track a series of "gender equality" indexes — including statistics on work, money, knowledge, time, power and health — and has identified violence as a future metric.
"People really think that, men and women are equal and we don't need this kind of discussion," said Dr Juha Holma, from the University of Jyväskylä in Finland.
"We don't think that men or other professionals need to help women because they are strong …
"It's a cultural image about how Finnish women manage by themselves."
Despite women experiencing levels of empowerment and advancement in the workplace and society, many Finnish households may operate with different attitudes, Dr Holma suggests.
"We have been looking also at how people who have been violent in their close relationship, with their intimate partner, and it seems that there still are quite traditional gender roles in those families," he said.
"Women and men are still playing very old-fashioned roles sometimes at home."
A lack of public discussion around violence has led to a poor understanding of the issue, which is preventing a pursuit of solutions, Dr Holma said.
"In Finland, [violence against women] it's not topic, a theme in public, in media and so on.
"Our research showed that actually students in Spain, had much better understanding and language around domestic violence."
The push to create a better culture for women
The women of Ofgar are on a mission to change the culture in Iceland.
Hulda Hrund Guðrúnar Sigmundsdóttir, another co-lead of the organisation, said she was assaulted by a close family member as a child.
She said growing up felt she could not disclose it as this would bring "shame to her family".
"We are trying to pave the way for our future so that our daughters and our sisters, can be safer than we were because when we were growing up," she said.
"We understand that many countries have it worse than us, but that does not mean that we have to settle."
