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Since October is
"Domestic Violence Awareness Month", I'll mark the occasion by
examining four of the most prevalent feminist myths about
violence in families.
Myth #1: In violent
heterosexual relationships, the aggressor is almost always the
man, and the victim is almost always the woman.
Serious research on
domestic violence overwhelmingly asserts that domestic assault
is committed by both men and women and that, by using weapons
and the element of surprise, women are abusing their male
partners as often as vice versa. Only about 1/4 of violent
heterosexual relationships fit the feminist "man/aggressor,
woman/victim" model--about the same percentage as fit the
"woman/aggressor, man/victim" model. Roughly half of all violent
heterosexual relationships are mutually abusive, and domestic
violence rates between men and women are comparable from small
violence to serious violence, including murder.
The mutual nature of
domestic violence has been attested to in voluminous research.
For example, veteran domestic violence researchers Richard
Gelles, Murray Straus, and Susan Steinmetz, who were once hailed
by the women's movement for their pioneering work on violence
against women, were initially surprised to find equal levels of
male and female violence. Since then their studies have
confirmed it repeatedly.
Cal State Long Beach
professor Martin Fiebert compiled and summarized 117 different
studies with over 72,000 respondents which found that women
initiated domestic violence as often as or more often than men.
Studies conducted by the Family Research Laboratory at the
University of New Hampshire in 1975, 1985, and 1992 found that
abuse rates were equal between husbands and wives and that abuse
of wives by husbands is decreasing, while abuse of husbands by
wives is increasing.
Studies by researchers
R.I. McNeeley and Coramae Richey Mann show that
women are much more likely than men to use weapons and the
element of
surprise. These weapons often include guns, knives, boiling
water, bricks,
fireplace pokers and baseball bats.
Myth # 2: When women
are violent, it is usually in self-defense.
As a general rule,
neither men's nor women's violence is usually committed in
self-defense. According to Straus, for example, roughly 10
percent of women and 15 percent of men perpetuate partner abuse
in self-defense. Dr. David Fontes, author of Violent Touch:
Breaking Through the Stereotype, and the director of Stop Abuse
for Everyone (SAFE), has also found that only a small percentage
of female abusers are acting in self-defense.
Myth #3: Domestic
violence is committed almost entirely by men, and lesbian
relationships are gentler and provide women a refuge from male
patriarchal dominance and violence.
Actually, the evidence
is virtually undisputed that domestic violence is at least as
common in lesbian relationships as it is in heterosexual ones.
For example, a 1997 survey of 1,099 lesbians found that 52% of
the respondents had been abused by a female lover or partner and
that 30% admitted having abused a female lover or partner. Of
those who had been victims of abuse, more than half (51.5%)
reported that they also had been abusive toward their partners.
In a survey of
lesbians who had had previous relationships with men, 45%
reported that they had experienced physical aggression from
their most recent
female partner alone, while only 32% had ever experienced any
aggression from any male partner.
According to St.
Joseph's University sociology professor Claire Renzetti, lesbian
batterers "display a terrifying ingenuity in their selection of
abuse tactics, frequently tailoring the abuse to the specific
vulnerabilities of their partners" (Violent Betrayal: Partner
Abuse in Lesbian Relationships).
To their credit, even
the UCLA Clothesline Project, whose website and public materials
contain scores of discredited lies about men and domestic
violence, cites Renzetti's research findings that "Violence in
gay/lesbian relationships occur at about the same frequency as
violence in heterosexual relationships."
Over the past 30 years
feminists have often played an admirable role in pushing for
societal acceptance for gays and lesbians. However, feminists
have shamefully turned their backs on battered lesbians, and
have stifled the attempts of activists to address lesbian
domestic violence.
Myth #4: Mothers are
children's "first line of defense" against child abuse.
In reality it is
mothers, not fathers, who commit the overwhelming majority of
child abuse, neglect, and parental murder. According to the US
Department of Justice, 70% of confirmed cases of child abuse and
65% of parental murders of children are committed by mothers,
not fathers.
According to the US
Department of Health and Human Services, adjusting for the
greater number of single mothers, a custodial mother is five
times as likely to murder her own children as a custodial father
is. A study of confirmed child abuse cases published in the
Journal of Child Abuse and Neglect found that mothers abuse
their children two and a half times as often as fathers. The
Third National Incidence Study of Child Abuse and Neglect (1996)
found that children are 88% more likely to be seriously injured
from abuse or neglect by their mothers than by their fathers.
Twenty-five years ago
feminists played a heroic role in advocating for abused women
and publicizing the despicable crime of wife-beating. Today,
unfortunately, their refusal to acknowledge violence by women
stands in the way of eliminating domestic violence for
everyone--not only women, but men and children as well.
Glenn
Sacks' columns on men's and fathers' issues have appeared in dozens of America's
largest newspapers. Glenn can be reached via his website at
www.GlennSacks.com or
via email at Glenn@GlennSacks.com.
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