The War At Home Revisited:
Domestic Violence
Kathi Bresnehan
In 1972, The American Medical Association reported that as many as one in
three women will be assaulted by a domestic partner in her lifetime (4 million
in a given year). In 1991, six out ten women murdered were killed by someone
they knew. The US Surgeon General ranked abuse by husbands and partners
as the leading cause of injuries to women aged 15 to 44. Health and Social
Services Secretary Donna Shalala has warned, "Domestic violence is
an unacknowledged epidemic in our society." Abuse cuts across all racial,
ethnic, religious, and socio-economic lines. Robert Geffner, president of
the Family Violence and Sexual Assault Institute in Tyler Texas says, "I'm
treating physicians, attorneys, a judge and professors who are, or were,
battered women. Intelligent people let this happen, too. What goes on in
the home does not relate to what's outside."
Howard Erlanger of the University of Wisconsin found that 25% of his sample
of American adults actually approved of husband-wife battles. What is more
surprising was that the greater the educational level, the greater was the
acceptance of marital violence. The study also showed that contrary to popular
belief, low-income respondents were no more prone to, nor more readily accepting
of violence in the home than were middle or upper income respondents. Jacquline
Campbell, a researcher in domestic violence at Johns Hopkins University,
concludes that a woman's risk of being battered "has little to do with
her and everything to do with who she marries or dates."
A recent study in Milwaukee found that 95% of assaultive men arrested were
not prosecuted, and only 1% were convicted. Faced with real violence and
years of terror and battering, psychiatrists often mislabel patients, mistaking
the after effects of prolonged trauma for a personality disorder, labeling
the woman as "self-defeating" or masochistic when they should
be diagnosed as suffering from post-traumatic stress.
Risk-markers of men who batter, a 1994 analysis by Richard J. Gelles, Regina
Lackner and Glenn D. Wolfner indicates: Previous domestic violence is the
highest factor for future abuse. Homes with two of the following show twice
as much violence as those with none. In those with seven or more factors,
the violence rate is 40 times higher:
- Male unemployed
- Male uses illicit drugs at least once each year
- Both partners have different religious backgrounds
- Male saw father hit mother
- Both partners cohabitate
- Male has blue-collar occupation
- Male didn't graduate from High School
- Male is between 18 and 30
- Both use severe violence toward children in the home
- Total family income is below the poverty line.
Primary characteristics of the most brutal batterers: The most brutal batters
make up the smallest group of batteres: rather than becoming more agitated
during an attack, their heart rate drops, they are calculated and focused.
The second most dangerous types are "loose cannons," men with
poor impulse control. Men who batter share an important similarity; they
deny what they've done, minimize attacks and always blame the victim.
Domestic violence finally came out in the open and gained a voice following
the O.J. Simpson trial, the Karen Straw acquittal for murder, and Hedda
Nussbaum's testimony concerning systematic beatings by Joel Steinberg and
the death of her adopted daughter. We tend to dismiss these cases as anomalies
and yet, the statistics say otherwise. Figure that one in every four women
you know will be a victim of violence. Is your mother, sister, best friend
or neighbor in a violent relationship now? Are quietly putting up an occasional
slap, kick, punch, or constant verbal abuse? Does your spouse completely
control the finances in your family? Does he switch from charm to anger
without warning? Call Advocates for Battered Women at 251-1237
for more information or help.
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