|
Trudy W. Schuett is an Arizona-based online
veteran with 10 years in cyberspace; an author and
multiblogger. She has held workshops on blogging,
writing, and promo for writers at the New
Communications Forum and Arizona Western College,
and has participated in world blogging events such
as Global PR Blog Week. She is also an advocate for
unserved victims of domestic violence. She is is
the author of three novels, two how-to books and
eight blogs. Note: Books are currently out of
print, but two appear in blog form. She currently
publishes New Perspectives on Partner Abuse at
partnerabuse.com.
She has a video at her site that provides a look
into the circumstance of a few men. Entitled,
Husband
Beaters
It is in five parts and was part of the Secret
Lives of Women series on the WE network. She
publishes the AZ
Rural Times 
and New
Perspectives on Partner Abuse ,
she is on Twitter
and Facebook
She lives in Yuma AZ, with her husband, Paul.
desertlightjournal.blog-city.com/
or E-Mail..
Abusegate: a generation
deceived
I’ve followed the issue of Climategate with
great interest, as it has seemed that the issue has
mirrored events in the field of domestic violence
and partner abuse. Abusegate also occurred due to
money, political power, and careers at stake.
Where Abusegate is concerned, however, there is
one more element – the life or death of
feminism, and its determination to liberate women
from the so-called “oppression” of
marriage and family. The story of Abusegate is as
much about the attempt by feminists to obscure
their real intentions as it is about feminist
attempts to conceal the reality of partner abuse,
in order to claim the issue as their own, and
possibly the only issue available at the time to
keep this essentially destructive philosophy
alive.
As Joanne Nova, [1]
Australian science writer has said, “Science
has come full-circle, taking a page from the
medieval Church by using fear and persecution to
silence skeptics. The oppressed have become the
oppressors. Given that most professional scientific
bodies and peer-reviewed journals have been active
accomplices in this scandal, one wonders how many
other so called scientific consensuses have been
similarly engineered and waiting for their own
ClimateGates before truth is known.”
That quote is important because it addresses the
politicization of science and research. Dean Esmay,
the owner of Dean’s World, [2]
where I blog occasionally as part of a group,
has often commented that politics and science
don’t mix. While I haven’t been in the
field of research myself, it’s fairly
well-known that going after grants and funding has
become a difficult process, often fraught with
politics and cronyism.
What feminism is supposed to be about is the
definition provided by Merriam-Webster.
1 : the theory of the political, economic, and
social equality of the sexes
2 : organized activity on behalf of women's
rights and interests. This is a current popular
definition, however, and has little to do with the
goals of feminism, which has its roots not only in
Marxist ideals, but also in anti-male hatred and a
desire for power and control over society where it
is most beneficial to feminists themselves.
According to [3] Erin
Pizzey: “There never was a feminist movement.
A bunch of disenchanted women refused to support
their left wing men who were fighting capitalism.
They changed the goal posts and said capitalism was
no longer the battle ground it was now 'Patriarchy'
and declared war on all men and the
family.”
In the 1970s, and into the 1980s, feminism was
still an emerging movement. Except for the halls of
academia, which began to offer “women’s
studies” courses, and a few academicians
pushing “feminist law,” and
“feminist psychology,” the general public
had little interest in a movement that was so
clearly designed to create antipathy between not
only the sexes, but between career women and those
choosing more-traditional paths for themselves.
It was about the same time that the issue of
partner abuse began to emerge as an issue on the
public radar. In 1971, Erin Pizzey founded the
first shelter for abused women in the UK. There
were also a few shelters for women developing
independently in various places in the US.
This did not escape the attention of the zealots
of the feminist faith and other opportunistic
women. Surely there was profit and power to be
gained in promoting this cause.
According to the [4]
Herstory of domestic violence, “In the 1970s
‘We will not be beaten’ becomes the
mantra of women across the country organizing to
end domestic violence. A grassroots organizing
effort begins, transforming public consciousness
and women's lives. The common belief within the
movement is that women face brutality from their
husbands and indifference from social
institutions.”
A theory regarding abuse was formulated, relying
almost entirely on feminist supposition and the
input from self-identified abused women. There has
never been any kind of formal research or
investigation of the feminist theory of abuse; it
has simply been presented as a fait accompli and
seldom, if ever, questioned. A look through the
“Herstory,” (on the Minnesota Center
Against Violence and Abuse website, funded by your
tax dollars) reveals a stunning lack of mention of
research of any kind behind the feminist concept of
domestic violence.
Del Martin [5] a
lesbian activist, wrote one of the earliest works
on the issue in 1976. She says, “At the outset
I was told I had to produce extensive and
verifiable statistics on the incidence of violence
against women…I concluded that incidence and
incidents of violence in the home reached into the
millions. My editor deleted my estimate on the
grounds that I couldn’t prove it. Since then,
academia has confirmed my virtual estimate and
admitted that lacking uniformity in the way data
are accumulated makes it impossible to provide
actual statistics.”
Lenore Walker [6]
author of "The Battered Woman" “When I first
began my study of the psychological impact of
domestic violence on the battered woman, it was the
mid 1970s and the feminist movement had a negative
reaction to anything that came with a clinical
psychology label…”
Ellen Pence Duluth [7]
Domestic Abuse Intervention Project “Many
things that we did were new and groundbreaking. We
introduced the power and control wheel and its
accompanying theoretical framework, which tried to
shift away from seeing violence against women as
the problem of a few psychologically distorted men
and lots of bad marriages, by linking men’s
violence toward their partners to other forms of
domination—class, race, gender, and
colonization. We built on the work of previous
projects that held individual agencies responsible
to protect women and proposed a fairly bold notion
of linking agencies together and forming a
community-based advocacy program.”
This is probably the most astonishing fact of
Abusegate: While Climategate has at least some
basis in research and scientific theory, there is
none whatsoever behind the myriad programs and laws
established since the 1970s by the so-called,
“Battered Women’s Movement.” Even
the term itself was created for its impact by
feminists whose goals had very little to do with
providing aid for women.
As radical activist Susan Schecter [8]
said, "I believe it is most urgent for this
movement's future to declare that violence against
women is a political problem, a question of power
and domination, and not an individual,
pathological, or deviant one. Continuing to make
violence against women public is itself a crucial
continuing task. We also must become a movement led
by battered women, women of color, and working
class women. We must develop a progressive agenda,
a long range vision of what kind of society is
needed so that violence against women would not
exist, and to ally with groups sharing a vision of
a just society" This statement appears on the main
page of the website for the West Virginia Coalition
Against Domestic Violence, [9]
also funded by your tax dollars.
Since the early days of the Battered
Women’s Movement, nearly everything that has
come after has been based on feminist principles
devised out of thin air. Even today, in the US
there is no standard definition of what domestic
violence is or is not. Yet thousands of men are
incarcerated, families destroyed, and women and
children thrown into a permanent condition of life
in turmoil because of nothing but the aberrant
personal beliefs of a few women a generation
ago.
While the feminists of the 20th Century are
dying off or retiring, their ugly legacy of
opportunism remains. Legions of divorce lawyers,
shelter advocates, and organizations providing
feminist education all benefit from the
multi-billion dollar industry that now forms the
basis of society’s approach to partner
abuse.
The real tragedy of Abusegate is that victims of
genuine partner abuse are still left without hope
and support. They have been doubly victimized by a
society that has been too willing to accept answers
without first considering the problem.
Reference Links
1. Joanne Nova joannenova.com.au/global-warming/climategate-30-year-timeline
2. Dean's World deanesmay.com/2009/12/03/climategate-hitting-more-than-just-one-area-of-science
3. Erin Pizzey www.erinpizzey.com
4. Herstory of domestic violence
www.mincava.umn.edu/documents/herstory/herstory.html
5. Del Martin www.mincava.umn.edu/classics/chapters/Chapter%2011%20Martin%20reflection%20by%20Martin.pdf
6. Lenore Walker www.mincava.umn.edu/classics/chapters/Chapter%2015%20Walker%20reflection%20by%20Walker.pdf
7. Ellen Pence www.mincava.umn.edu/classics/chapters/Chapter%2023%20Pence%20reflection%20by%20Pence.pdf
8. Susan Schecter www.mincava.umn.edu/classics/chapters/Chapter%2014%20Schechter%20reflection%20by%20Schechter.pdf
9. West Virginia Coalition Against
Domestic Violence www.wvcadv.org
The Domestic Violence
Industry’s War on Men
Barbara Kay, an outspoken Canadian voice of reason,
illustrates how a single event in Montreal —
the incident at École Polytechnique in 1989
when 14 female engineering students were gunned
down by a sociopath — was hijacked by radical
feminists as an example of all men’s violence
toward all women.
Writing at Pajamas Media, she says:
Feminists everywhere in the West appropriated
its emotive themes to lend greater credence to an
already widespread pernicious tripartite myth:
namely, that all men — the
“patriarchy” — are inherently prone
to violence against women, that all women are
potential victims of male aggression, and that
female violence against men is never unprovoked,
but always an act of self-defense against overt or
covert male aggression.
The unspoken corollary to these falsehoods is
that violence perpetrated against males, whether by
other males or by females, is deemed unworthy of
official recognition or more than minimal legal
redress, and that while female suffering must be
acknowledged as socially intolerable, male
suffering may not make a parallel moral claim.
In fact, as any number of peer-reviewed research
and government statistics make clear, although
women are far more likely to report domestic abuse,
equal numbers of men and women experience some form
of DV during their lifetimes; men and women
initiate abuse in equal measure; and far from any
inherent “patriarchal” instinct to
control women, DV — in Judeo-Christian culture
at any rate — is almost always attributable to
individual psychological dysfunction (see Abusegate
RADAR report).
For the overwhelming majority of boys and men
who harbor no ill feelings toward women and no wish
to control them — indeed, whose impulses are
largely chivalric; feminists have never explained
why all those “patriarchal” and
“controlling” men on the Titanic died
after voluntarily ceding the lifeboats to women and
children — the social and cultural fallout
from feminist misdirection about DV beggars any
honest observer’s descriptive powers to
summarize. The unjust loss of children in biased
family courts under judges trained by feminist DV
“experts,” lives ruined by unchallenged
false allegations of abuse, men’s
ineligibility for psychological and logistical
services lavishly provided for women — these
are just a few of the human rights abuses men
routinely endure because of DV industry myths.
At the heart of the myth-propagation problem is
the 1991-initiated White Ribbon Campaign ,
impulsively organized by leftist male Canadian
politicians eager to ingratiate themselves with
politically influential feminists in the hysterical
wake of the tragedy. The “educational”
and commemorative campaign, which rapidly spread to
57 countries, is based on scaremongering falsehoods
perpetrated by feminists pulling the communications
levers of the DV industry, such as the canard that
one in three (in some accounts, four) women will be
a victim of male aggression in her lifetime, or
that spousal homicide is the leading cause of death
for women (in fact, it is not even on the list of
leading causes).
Credible information on DV is easily accessed,
but the largely liberal media compliantly channel
the disingenuous “findings” and
“reports” churned out by hopelessly
biased advocacy groups, whose methodology does not,
to put it kindly, meet the gold standard of
community-based, peer-reviewed research, or who use
definitional ruses, or who collect only
male-on-female violence information, or who
withhold data on female violence — and I could
go on.
The controversial and irrefragably anti-male
Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) is coming up for
renewal in Congress this year. VAWA partakes of
exactly the same philosophy as the White Ribbon
Campaign and doubtless owes its provenance in large
part to the Montreal Massacre juggernaut.
Is there hope for a breakthrough in correcting
the public’s perception on DV, the necessary
precursor to a gender-neutral approach to support
for DV victims by policymakers? One encouraging
indicator has surfaced this month in the form of a
high-profile Abusegate campaign, organized by a
coalition of groups and individuals working to
reform domestic violence laws. The campaign will
include a concentrated lobbying effort on Capitol
Hill explaining how flawed information leads to
flawed public policy. It will also feature a series
of radio interviews with internationally respected
domestic violence expert Dr. Donald Dutton of the
University of British Columbia, author of
Rethinking Domestic Violence. * But
Abusegate’s most tangible contribution to
public exposure of the DV industry’s willful
deception of policymakers and the public is
encapsulated in a scrupulously referenced special
report drawn up by a reliable research group, RADAR
(Respecting Accuracy in Domestic Abuse Reporting):
Fifty Domestic Violence Myths .
The report deserves widespread distribution in
the media, as well as in political, educational,
and legal circles. It completely debunks the
received wisdom on many aspects of DV. For example,
it tells us that: women are as likely as men to be
controlling; fewer than 1% of hospital visits by
women — not 22% as often touted — are
attributable to DV; the actual annual number of
rapes reported by the FBI is 90,427, a tenth the
number claimed by feminists; 71% of children killed
by one parent were killed by their mothers; and 46
other little-known facts the DV industry would
prefer you didn’t know.
This report will not have relevance for
everyone: it is only for men and for those women
who have, or have had, or may have in the future
kind thoughts for a father or male partner or
brother or son or son-in-law or male friend or,
indeed, any man who has, or may someday, contribute
something positive to their lives or to the lives
of those they love. So as I say, this report may
not be relevant to you, in which case you should
not feel obligated to pass it along to anyone else.
For those to whom it is relevant, you owe it to the
men in your life to share it with others.
Be sure to read the whole thing!
* Dr. Dutton’s radio appearances will occur
this month — should have already started.
When a man is a victim
of partner abuse
The US Dept. of Justice says there about 840,00
male victims of domestic violence each year.
These are just the men we know about. If
there’s anything I’ve learned in 10 years
of advocacy for unserved victims of partner abuse,
it’s that men don’t tell. Some men even
think that being abused is the price they have to
pay for living with a beautiful/wonderful/sexy
women.
Nobody really knows how many men are being
abused by their wives or girlfriends. The numbers
of victims don’t actually matter; what matters
is that men are being abused every day, and
it’s no joke. Despite the popular presumption
that men should somehow be able to
“control” the woman in their lives, and
if they can’t, then they deserve what they
get, the fact is that today a man who tries to
defend himself is more likely than not to end up in
jail.
Several decades of awareness campaigns devoted
to shedding light on the issue of battered women
have resulted in laws that have tipped the scales
so far that not only do male victims have little or
no legal recourse, abusive women have learned to
take advantage of these women-friendly laws and
public policies as an aspect of their abusive
behaviors.
So what can a man do, when the behavior of his
significant other is either violent, abusive, or
both?
Because the few objective researchers into the
matter have recognized partner abuse as a
multi-faceted problem, with a number of causes and
origins, there are no easy answers. There are,
however, a few things you can do on your own to
help not only yourself, but your partner as
well.
Probably the most important thing to recognize
is that not all situations are alike. Not only is
there no single cause for partner abuse, abusive
people – male or female – do not all
follow the same pattern. There is no supportable
evidence for the idea that domestic violence is
always a deliberate choice; neither does it always
progress in severity.
First, try to look to the cause. It’s
possible that some women just don’t realize
what they’re doing.
Maybe they’ve been brought up in the kind
of an environment where this kind of behavior is
considered usual. Some people live their entire
lives in an atmosphere of mutual combat on a
regular basis – we’re talking about
long-term marriages of many years. If that’s
the kind of family she had growing up, perhaps
she’d be willing to get some counseling, if
she knows she’s causing harm to her husband or
children.
Is there a medical problem? If a woman who has
been congenial and serene suddenly becomes angry or
violent, there’s a possibility that a visit to
a doctor could be helpful. There are a number of
conditions and diseases that can cause behavioral
changes, and early recognition and treatment for
these problems is important. Fortunately, women are
more likely to seek medical treatment if they know
that it’s necessary.
What about drugs or alcohol? Is the abusive
behavior something that seems to occur when
she’s under the influence? Would she be
willing to get help for this problem if she knows
it’s causing harm to her family?
If those kinds of solutions have not been
helpful, perhaps then it is a case of a
psychological problem such as borderline
personality disorder.
At the extreme end of the scale is the woman who
knows what she is doing, and doesn’t care. In
that kind of a situation, then it’s up to you
to decide whether you can live under these
conditions, or you need to get out for your own
safety, or the safety of your children.
There are a few things you can do to be
proactive in dealing with a situation that is
violent or has the potential to turn violent:
- Move the argument: if you are in the bedroom
or kitchen, try to move. The bedroom has
understandable reminders of issues that could be
important, and the kitchen can be a dangerous
source of weapons. The living room or even the
front yard is a better place for you to be.
- If you have collections of guns or knives
get them out of the house, and store them
elsewhere. Women tend to go to weapons as
equalizers more quickly than men. While even
simple items as CD cases and wine glasses can be
turned into weapons by a violent woman, it makes
sense to remove the obvious dangers.
- Get witnesses. Tell family or friends about
your situation, difficult as that may be. Even
one person with first-hand knowledge of your
problem can make the difference between your
wife or girlfriend getting help or using the
issue against you. That’s why I suggested
the front yard in the earlier point. A nosy
neighbor can be your best friend in some
cases.
- Do not phone police unless you are in
immediate danger, and your life is at risk.
Law enforcement professionals nationwide have
been trained to presume the man is always the
perpetrator. There have been many cases where a
man has been arrested, even while his wife is in
the process of assaulting him and/or a police
officer. Don’t add this extra risk unless
you absolutely cannot avoid it.
- Have a safety plan. Put together a bag with
a change of clothes, cash, spare keys and
toiletries, and keep it somewhere away from your
residence. If you have children, make provisions
for them as well, and also include such things
as birth certificates and social security cards.
You may want to start storing your important
papers in a bank safety deposit box. Be sure to
arrange for a place to go if you need to spend a
night or more away from home.
It’s important for male victims to be aware
than you cannot rely on help from traditional
domestic violence programs. You are not welcome at
most shelters, and some domestic violence hotlines
train their employees to attempt to convince male
callers they are actually at fault.
This article is only an overview of the main
points of the issue. For more information here are
some resources for men:
Domestic Abuse
Helpline for Men and Women
Men's
eNews
Menstuff
The
San Diego Men’s Centers
Stop
Abuse For Everyone
I also have video at my own site that provides a
look into the circumstance of a few men. Entitled,
Husband
Beaters ,
it is in five parts and was part of the Secret
Lives of Women series on the WE network.
When a man is a victim of
partner abuse
The US Dept. of Justice says there about 840,00
male victims of domestic violence each year.
These are just the men we know about. If
there’s anything I’ve learned in 10 years
of advocacy for unserved victims of partner abuse,
it’s that men don’t tell. Some men even
think that being abused is the price they have to
pay for living with a beautiful/wonderful/sexy
women.
Nobody really knows how many men are being
abused by their wives or girlfriends. The numbers
of victims don’t actually matter; what matters
is that men are being abused every day, and
it’s no joke. Despite the popular presumption
that men should somehow be able to
“control” the woman in their lives, and
if they can’t, then they deserve what they
get, the fact is that today a man who tries to
defend himself is more likely than not to end up in
jail.
Several decades of awareness campaigns devoted
to shedding light on the issue of battered women
have resulted in laws that have tipped the scales
so far that not only do male victims have little or
no legal recourse, abusive women have learned to
take advantage of these women-friendly laws and
public policies as an aspect of their abusive
behaviors.
So what can a man do, when the behavior of his
significant other is either violent, abusive, or
both?
Because the few objective researchers into the
matter have recognized partner abuse as a
multi-faceted problem, with a number of causes and
origins, there are no easy answers. There are,
however, a few things you can do on your own to
help not only yourself, but your partner as
well.
Probably the most important thing to recognize
is that not all situations are alike. Not only is
there no single cause for partner abuse, abusive
people – male or female – do not all
follow the same pattern. There is no supportable
evidence for the idea that domestic violence is
always a deliberate choice; neither does it always
progress in severity.
First, try to look to the cause. It’s
possible that some women just don’t realize
what they’re doing.
Maybe they’ve been brought up in the kind
of an environment where this kind of behavior is
considered usual. Some people live their entire
lives in an atmosphere of mutual combat on a
regular basis – we’re talking about
long-term marriages of many years. If that’s
the kind of family she had growing up, perhaps
she’d be willing to get some counseling, if
she knows she’s causing harm to her husband or
children.
Is there a medical problem? If a woman who has
been congenial and serene suddenly becomes angry or
violent, there’s a possibility that a visit to
a doctor could be helpful. There are a number of
conditions and diseases that can cause behavioral
changes, and early recognition and treatment for
these problems is important. Fortunately, women are
more likely to seek medical treatment if they know
that it’s necessary.
What about drugs or alcohol? Is the abusive
behavior something that seems to occur when
she’s under the influence? Would she be
willing to get help for this problem if she knows
it’s causing harm to her family?
If those kinds of solutions have not been
helpful, perhaps then it is a case of a
psychological problem such as borderline
personality disorder.
At the extreme end of the scale is the woman who
knows what she is doing, and doesn’t care. In
that kind of a situation, then it’s up to you
to decide whether you can live under these
conditions, or you need to get out for your own
safety, or the safety of your children.
There are a few things you can do to be
proactive in dealing with a situation that is
violent or has the potential to turn violent:
- Move the argument: if you are in the bedroom
or kitchen, try to move. The bedroom has
understandable reminders of issues that could be
important, and the kitchen can be a dangerous
source of weapons. The living room or even the
front yard is a better place for you to be.
- If you have collections of guns or knives
get them out of the house, and store them
elsewhere. Women tend to go to weapons as
equalizers more quickly than men. While even
simple items as CD cases and wine glasses can be
turned into weapons by a violent woman, it makes
sense to remove the obvious dangers.
- Get witnesses. Tell family or friends about
your situation, difficult as that may be. Even
one person with first-hand knowledge of your
problem can make the difference between your
wife or girlfriend getting help or using the
issue against you. That’s why I suggested
the front yard in the earlier point. A nosy
neighbor can be your best friend in some
cases.
- Do not phone police unless you are in
immediate danger, and your life is at risk.
Law enforcement professionals nationwide have
been trained to presume the man is always the
perpetrator. There have been many cases where a
man has been arrested, even while his wife is in
the process of assaulting him and/or a police
officer. Don’t add this extra risk unless
you absolutely cannot avoid it.
- Have a safety plan. Put together a bag with
a change of clothes, cash, spare keys and
toiletries, and keep it somewhere away from your
residence. If you have children, make provisions
for them as well, and also include such things
as birth certificates and social security cards.
You may want to start storing your important
papers in a bank safety deposit box. Be sure to
arrange for a place to go if you need to spend a
night or more away from home.
It’s important for male victims to be aware
than you cannot rely on help from traditional
domestic violence programs. You are not welcome at
most shelters, and some domestic violence hotlines
train their employees to attempt to convince male
callers they are actually at fault.
This article is only an overview of the main
points of the issue. For more information here are
some resources for men:
Domestic Abuse
Helpline for Men and Women
Men's
eNews
Menstuff
The
San Diego Men’s Centers
Stop
Abuse For Everyone
I also have video at my own site that provides a
look into the circumstance of a few men. Entitled,
Husband
Beaters ,
it is in five parts and was part of the Secret
Lives of Women series on the WE network.
Everybody Deserves
Better
On International Women’s Day, it is time to
consider the roots of the women’s movement of
the 1960s. Back then, the issues were focused on
equal rights for women. In 2005, most if not all,
the issues have been successfully resolved, in
terms of literal equality in western industrialized
nations. The movement has evolved over time into
something more about female supremacy rather than
equality. While there are those women who will
never be content with their lot in life and always
imagine their perceived lack of prestige, or
success, or whatever to be entirely the fault of
men in general, that simply does not apply to women
today.
Most women accept the challenges presented to
them in their lives, work through them, and move on
to enjoy the benefits provided women which may or
may not have existed before. They wish to live full
and balanced lives, and are free to organize the
varied parts of their lives – marriage,
children, and career in whatever way they
choose.
Generally speaking, the radical elements who
haven’t yet realized their work is done are
easily dismissed, and most often ignored.
Malcontents in society will always be with us. It
is only when we allow these malcontents to dictate
public policy, and our government to fund programs
to further their extremist philosophies that
society puts itself in harm’s way.
Such is the case with the issue of intimate
partner abuse, most popularly recognized as
domestic violence. Today’s programs are still
operated by the same radical feminists, in the same
ways as they were in the 1970s. The only difference
in these programs is that they are now being given
public funding; to the detriment of any community
which supports these programs. They have ceased to
be helpful, if in fact they ever were.
At the root of the problem is the fact that
domestic violence is neither a political issue, nor
a gender issue. To address this social issue in
this fashion, from this standpoint, is a mistake
which sends victims down a dangerously wrong path.
All it does it set the immediate problem on hold
temporarily while creating a new set of problems
for the victim to confront. Offered no other
choice, victims follow the direction of shelter
programs, unaware the actions suggested will have
ramifications that may never be resolved for years,
possibly even causing permanent, irreparable,
damage to themselves, and their children and
families.
The only victims willingly served by existing
programs are women – preferably those with no
male children over the age of 12. Male abusers are
eagerly placed in re-training or incarceration
programs by institutions created to do just that.
There are no effective screening measures in place
in either case to demonstrate evidence of need;
only a verbal request or accusation is ever
required.
The nationwide network of women’s shelter
programs actively and constantly remind the public
that men are to blame for the problem, and
naturally enough, refuse to aid male victims or
female abusers. (While many programs claim to serve
all, in an awkward attempt to address the public
perception they provide assistance without regard
to gender, in practice there are few
equally-accessible services available for anyone
other than female victims and male abusers.) This
same network maintains a stranglehold on public
funding for domestic violence services, and goes to
great lengths to prevent agencies intending to
serve those other populations from doing so.
It is time this project in the cause of feminist
ideology came to an end.
Everything You Thought You Knew about Domestic
Violence is Probably Wrong
There is a morass of confusing dogma surrounding
the subject. It is often lumped together with other
issues of stalking, sexual assault and divorce
which are in fact, entirely separate issues and
should not be considered in the same way, and at
the same time.
However, the establishment in charge of these
programs has found it expedient and profitable to
allow the confusion. In fact, it could be said that
misconstruction and partial truth is the hallmark
of feminist marketing and activism. This has worked
well for them for decades, but in these days of
transparency and accountability, the abilities they
may have had in the past to revise everything from
history to the laws of physics are no longer so
dependable.
Some misconceptions have become part of
conventional wisdom. But, just because
“everybody says so” doesn’t mean
everybody is right. Here are some of the most
widely-repeated tales:
95% of victims of domestic violence are women.
This came to be due to either a misunderstanding or
an outright manipulation of Dept of Justice
figures. While it seems logical to shelter
personnel, that is because shelters are in practice
open to women only. Female victims are the only
victims they see.
There is an epidemic of domestic violence. Since
the actual meaning of the term is something to the
effect of “a greater than usual amount of
cases,” it can’t possibly apply. Nobody
knows what is usual in the first place. From a
marketing perspective, the word sounds good for
emotional effect, but that’s all.
Domestic violence is unknown and unrecognized.
We maintain a running search for articles in media
and online, and even on a slow day there will be
about 50 articles relating to the issue.
Ironically, many of those articles contain a quote
from somebody saying nobody ever talks about
domestic violence. A recent Google search for the
term yielded 5,810,000 results.
Battering always escalates, and the eventual
conclusion is death. This untrue, unsupportable
statement gives some important insight into the
mindset of those running shelter programs. They do
not recognize their clients as individuals, and
there is no provision in shelter programs for
meeting the needs of individuals. Therefore, it is
easy to make blanket statements regarding this
situation, despite a lack of actual evidence.
Domestic violence is a deliberate pattern of
power and control. While this is true in some
cases, it cannot possibly be true all the time.
Again, this relates to the inability of current
programs to treat victims as individuals. It also
reflects on the viewpoint of feminist-run shelters
that domestic violence is political in nature. In
this ideology, men are the cause, and women are the
hapless victims, unable to deal with their problems
without outside intervention.
We can have an end to domestic violence, if only
_________. This purely human problem has been with
us long before it was given a name, and will be
with us as long as we continue to be human.
Certainly, we can have an end to the parts of it
engineered by the feminists as soon as control of
these programs is given to apolitical professionals
with an understanding of family problems. It is
unreasonable to even consider there will be a day
when there is no domestic violence whatsoever, just
as it is unreasonable to consider there will ever
be an end to crime, greed, or any other human
failing.
How Did Things Get This Way?
People in general, and Americans in particular,
have a deep well of compassion and concern for
other individuals. Yet, in the 20th Century there
was a new reliance on the word of
“experts” in dealing with personal
issues, as the population became increasingly
mobile and separated from the extended family
situations of earlier times. The 20th Century was
also a time when socialist ideals became attractive
to a people faced with issues such as unemployment
and alcoholism. Welfare programs, such as those
established in the Great Depression of the 1930s
appeared to succeed, even though Prohibition on
alcohol did not.
Still, there was an acceptance of the idea that
politicizing and criminalizing dysfunctional human
behaviors was an appropriate means of dealing with
those kinds of issues. By the 1960s, socialist
activists and various groups seeking improved
levels of social acceptance for specific groups of
people appeared all over the country.
Among these groups were the feminists, who
claimed to want “equal rights” for women.
This term was, and still is defined differently,
depending on who is using it. What the most radical
and militant feminists considered equal rights
included dominance over men, and the dissolution of
marriage and traditional family structure. This
would be replaced with government control,
including placement of children in public childcare
facilities from birth to adulthood.
By the 1970s, most of the more-realistic goals
of equality for women were achieved, leaving the
radical elements with few issues to confront. Here
and there, shelters and services were beginning to
be established to help battered women, which were
prime targets for the radical feminists. These were
usually small grassroots efforts run by people with
little or no experience in political activism. The
only thing the early shelter volunteers had in
common with the radical feminists was sometimes a
shared hatred of men and everything they did. This
happened often enough that the feminists were given
free rein in their activism. What had once been
agencies providing simple aid on a volunteer basis
became massive concerns, with infrastructure,
staffing, and funding to match.
The well-publicized goal of these programs was
“an end to domestic violence.” Advocates
for these programs were constantly lobbying
legislatures at all levels for favorable laws
fostering divorce, and criminalization of perceived
abusive behaviors by men, as well as
ever-increasing levels of funding. No law, no
amount of funding, was ever enough.
Any legislator, researcher or public figure of
any kind who attempted to object to this level of
government control of private lives, who suggested
seeking solutions other than divorce or that men
and women were equally responsible for the problem
was labeled a misogynist, an abuser, or worse. Many
careers have been ruined by shelter advocates
resisting change or accountability for their
programs. Some questioning these programs have even
suffered threats of physical harm or specious
lawsuits. This kind of behavior on the part of
anti-male, anti-family factions of the radical
feminist movement continues today.
In 1994, the initial Violence Against Women Act
was passed, and a new social problem was recognized
by Congress. “Gender violence” was
claimed by advocates to be the #1 issue facing
women everywhere. Despite the fact the term has no
meaning on its own, the law passed, and $3.5
billion dollars in public funding was earmarked for
these women-only shelter programs.
Meanwhile the general public, believing the
problem was under the control of well-meaning
experts, not only supported this act, but
encouraged the programs to expand and the laws to
become more restrictive and inequitable.
Legislation suggested by shelter advocates moved
farther and farther away from the core issue as
time went on. Today it is almost impossible to have
a discussion of either divorce or domestic violence
without mentioning the other, or bringing in the
blame issue.
We are no closer to finding practical solutions
to the problem, for either victim or abuser, than
we were when the first shelter was established in
1971 by Erin Pizzey. Her early attempts at
providing equitable services were promptly
eradicated by the feminist takeover of shelter
services everywhere.
What Can We Do to Change Things?
First, the public needs to recognize the
difference between the fictions promoted by those
implementing an ideology, and the reality of the
situation. Those who have been able to avoid
intervention by the established domestic violence
industry, and study the problem using accepted
scientific methodology and objectivity have found a
quite different problem than is generally claimed.
Intimate partner abuse is something that can often
be addressed in other ways than the overly
simplistic intervention/divorce/relocation scenario
provided by existing programs.
There are also different people involved. While
the male abuser/female victim is part of the
picture, there are also female abusers, male
victims, mutual victim/abuser situations, serial
victims, and a small group of those who appear to
have an addiction to violence.
There is a nascent, but emerging pattern of
individuals and groups seeking alternatives to the
ideological approach, which could be encouraged to
come forward. In some locales, human services
programs have deliberately removed themselves from
the national network of services in order to serve
their communities without interference. Some
agencies, that depend on the funding and networking
opportunities provided by the national network,
have an unspoken, but functioning “open door
policy” that provides those limited services
allowed by the network to a greater population than
only the female victims mentioned earlier. Others,
such as the Domestic Abuse Helpline for Men,
function independently of the network, as it has
repeatedly been refused admission.
While the issue is nowhere near as cut and dried
as is publicized today, an opening up of inquiry,
allowing honesty and objectivity to prevail will go
a long way itself to provide otherwise-unknown
solutions for some cases. Here and there, in
isolated shelters and counseling programs, are the
seeds of these new, and unidentified
approaches.
Federal, state, and municipal government needs
to stop funding organizations that are using public
monies for ideological purposes and divert those
funds to those who are operating on equitable
terms, and providing practical assistance to
members of their communities without regard to
gender.
A serious investigation of organizations such as
the Violence Against Women Office, National
Coalition Against Domestic Violence, the National
Domestic Violence Hotline, and the individual state
DV coalitions needs to be undertaken, and criminal
charges filed where necessary, if misappropriation
of government funds or other wrongdoing is found.
Civil litigation needs to be pursued in those cases
where these agencies and coalitions have caused
economic or other actionable damage to communities
and individuals.
Legislators and public officials at all levels
of government who have opposed the feminist-based
programs and been hesitant to speak out due to fear
of political repercussion should be encouraged to
make their positions clear, by taking the lead in
restoring their communities to the sanity of equal
treatment for all.
In addition, they can withdraw and/or oppose any
legislation that is related to increasing criminal
penalties for domestic violence. Past laws have
been proven to be of little value, and only serve
to add to the burden of already overcrowded prison
populations. They are only reflections of the
politicization of human relationships, which is
part of the feminist ideology, and has no place in
addressing domestic violence from a humanitarian
point of view.
Screening procedures must be developed to ensure
that applicants can demonstrate a need for services
of any kind. There is no screening procedure in
place today, and many cases of abuse of the system
itself go unrecognized. Current services have
resisted any suggestion that they either screen
applicants or network with other agencies to avoid
duplicating efforts.
Finally, since there is no procedure in place to
determine whether shelters actually aid women in
becoming free of abuse in their lives, there should
be some way to establish independently whether
these shelters provide the community with any
service at all.
Some have said to me that this idea of scrapping
VAWA entirely is the wrong approach, that we should
simply correct the problems and give this system
credit for the good it has done. If I knew of any
actual good to anyone, I would give credit where
credit is due. I’ve been writing about this
issue since 1999 and not once have I ever had a
single positive e-mail about women’s shelter
services from a recipient of same. I don’t
believe they come away from these programs any
better off than before.
Allowing these prejudicial, deeply biased and
regressive programs to continue unchecked will only
serve to add to the numbers on the welfare rolls,
in the jails and under the care of
government-sponsored child protective agencies.
In the United States of America, in the 21st
Century, our families deserve better.
America’s War on
Families
You’ve heard about the war on drugs, the war
on poverty, and other wars on various problems, but
are you aware of the War on Families?
Our federal, state, and local governments spend
an amount equal to the entire Canadian military
budget on this operation every year.
Where there used to be a family made up of a
mom, a dad, and kids; there is now a single mom,
working full time to support herself and her kids
whether she ever wanted to or not, a dad deleted
from his children’s lives like some sort of
typographical error, and children who will spend
the rest of their lives wondering what horrible,
bad thing they did to deserve all this.
While people have been led to believe that
divorce is a solution; an end to the fighting, for
most divorcing families today it is only the
beginning. The system we have in place today has
seen to that. The tragedy here is that so much of
this anguish and pain could have been avoided if
only people knew the truth.
That truth is that there are people in this
country who do not want families to exist.
That’s because a strong family unit can face
almost any difficulty, any problem and come through
it. Some even come out of it stronger and more
resilient than before. These strong families have
no need of government programs. They won’t put
up with a government official, a stranger to them
and their kids, making their major life decisions
for them. Families want to make their own choices
of where to live, with whom, and how they will
support themselves.
Call them progressives, Marxists, feminists,
whatever you like, but they all have one goal: get
rid of those families so they can take control.
The War on Families is far more successful than
any of the other wars I mentioned earlier.
That’s because the American people have been
led to believe this war is about something entirely
different.
This is one of those issues most people think
they know about, but unfortunately what they know
is a product of several decades’ worth of
political maneuvering without much substance.
Since 1984, the United States government has
quietly conducted an operation with only one
outcome in mind: the destruction of the American
family unit. Under the guise of
“protecting” women from partner abuse
– now called domestic violence by such laws as
the federal Violence Against Women Act of 1994, and
the Family Violence Prevention and Services Act
– many thousands, if not millions of families
have been eliminated.
With the current divorce rate at about 50%,
about half of all marriages seem destined for
failure. This is a very good thing for the
anti-family warriors, as it means a never-ending
flow of money and personnel to carry out their
strategy.
Alumnae of women’s shelters emerge with no
skills beyond the gamesmanship of divorce and
“working the system,” so all those
newly-single moms and fatherless children need
endless support from government programs, from
infant nutrition all the way to burial at public
expense. Many go on to new abusive relationships,
having had no instruction in ways to avoid future
problems.
You have to go back to the early days of the
Communist Party in the Soviet Union to see how this
all plays out. If you Google “abolition of the
family” you will find a wealth of information,
from both pro-communist and anti-communist sources.
Some of the material is quite recent, so you can
see it is an idea that has endured over a hundred
years.
The durability of the concept does not bestow it
with any sense of humanity, however. It is as cold
and dehumanizing as ever, ignoring the demonstrable
fact that human beings have emotions and needs that
can never be addressed by any economic system.
Americans in particular have resisted much of
the socialist and communist ideology in the past,
but this has begun to change. Over the years the
anti-family warriors have become adept at cloaking
their ugly intentions in a soft fabric of lies that
have fooled many otherwise-intelligent people. They
use words like “protection and
“equality,” while all the time what they
are really looking for is submission.
This is the reason why there have never been any
changes to women’s shelter programs in 50
years; it is why the lion’s share of that
funding we provide through our tax dollars goes not
to helping women in distress but to anti-family
“education” efforts, to ensure millions
of law enforcement and court personnel see partner
abuse as a political and gender issue.
It is why the only solution ever provided by
these federally-mandated programs is now and has
always been divorce, and why they will never give
more than lip service to suggestions of reform or
improvement.
These programs have nothing whatsoever to do
with partner abuse. They are about eradicating the
very concept of the family from the public
consciousness. It is but a single skirmish in the
larger current crusade for our hearts and minds by
the progressive/socialist/communist movement, but
we can win this one.
How?
That’s the easy part. Just tell the
truth.
Both VAWA and FVSPA are up for reauthorization
this year, and we can end the War on Families by
pointing out the reality of those laws to our
legislators, as well as our state and local
officials. There is not a state, city, or county in
this country that is not directly affected by these
laws.
Tell them they are taking our tax dollars to use
against us and our families, and you can’t
continue to support their other efforts if they let
our families be destroyed. These programs do not
just affect victims of domestic violence, they
affect everybody, because that’s what they are
intended to do. These programs have been so
effective in their actual purpose that right now
almost everyone knows somebody who has been through
a bad divorce, accused of domestic violence, or a
victim of domestic violence, real or imagined.
Nearly all that trouble for their constituency
could have been avoided if they’d only known
what the proponents of these programs were up to
from the beginning. After all, if you call the fire
department when your house is on fire, they
don’t come with a backhoe and tear down the
house, then walk away while the remains are still
in flames, do they? Of course not.
But that’s exactly what these programs do.
And that’s all they do.
In these difficult economic times, we do not
have the luxury of spending scarce funding on
programs that do not function to the immediate
benefit of the taxpayer. Allowing damaging programs
to exist is foolhardy.
The evidence is clear, on every website and
every handout provided by these programs. It is all
talk and very little action, and there is still no
proof that anyone has actually been helped with the
specific issue of partner abuse. After all this
time, the successes should be obvious, but there
are none.
Can we really continue to fund programs that
only provide negative outcomes?
For more detail, including analysis, facts, and
figures, visit the Stop Abusive and Violent
Environments website and read the most recent
report:
“Assaulting our Rights: How Domestic
Violence Laws Curtail our Fundamental
Freedoms.”
You can be part of an historic Congressional
hearing
It’s time to STOP dehumanizing, ineffective
VAWA programs!
Since 1994, programs and policies created by the
Violence Against Women Act have destroyed countless
families and left victims of domestic violence with
no practical help, and no possibility of future
advances in the field.
VAWA programs are unique among all helping
programs as they have not changed in any way in 50
years, yet society continues to evolve.
Because of VAWA, victims of domestic violence
and partner abuse literally have nowhere to turn in
an emergency, and allowing these programs to
continue will ensure they never will.
The VAWA concept of partner abuse is only about
advancing a political agenda and not at all about
seeking real-world solutions for the families and
people affected.
All of this has come at a cost of billions of
dollars per year, with no demonstrable return on
this investment. It is time to STOP funding a
Marxist political agenda and START helping
taxpayers get the help they are paying for.
The next VAWA is currently being drafted by the
National Task Force to End Sexual and Domestic
Violence in preparation for introduction and
passage in 2011.
For the first time since its inception, Congress
is allowing opposing viewpoints on this issue to be
aired at the first hearing.
“The Increased Importance of the Violence
Against Women Act in a Time of Economic
Crisis”
The hearing was Wednesday, May 5, 2010 at 10:00
a.m. in Room 226 of the Dirksen Senate Office
Building.
Scheduled to speak is Richard Gelles, PhD. who
is a Dean at the School of Social Policy &
Practice at the University of Pennsylvania. He is a
leading researcher in the filed of partner abuse
from a non-political perspective. His
take on the most popular and enduring myths
surrounding the issue is here.
You can be part of this landmark event!
Even though you can’t be there in person,
you CAN submit testimony to the Committee.
It’s simple…just write a concise, polite
letter about your experiences with VAWA, and email
to Senators Leahy (Democrat of Vermont) and
Sessions (Republican of Alabama). It is preferable
that your letter not be longer than one page.
Just fill in the missing places in the draft
letter below, and email it to:
Anya McMurray (Leahy’s staffer): Anya_McMurray-at-judiciary-dem.senate.gov
Bradley Hayes (Sessions’ staffer):
Bradley_Hayes-at-judiciary-rep.senate.gov
Send a copy of the letter to: news-at-saveservices.org
. The deadline to receive your letter is this
coming Tuesday, May 11!
DRAFT LETTER
RE: Violence Against Women Act
Honorable Patrick Leahy
Honorable Jeff Sessions
Senate Judiciary Committee
Dear Senators Leahy and Sessions:
I am writing regarding the May 5, 2010 Judiciary
Committee hearing on the Violence Against Women
Act.
[POLITELY, FACTUALLY, AND CONCISELY DESCRIBE
YOUR EXPERIENCES AND RECOMMENDATIONS HOW TO REFORM
VAWA.]
Sincerely,
[YOUR NAME, ADDRESS, AND TELEPHONE
NUMBER]
Abuse arrest policies
push gender bias: report
Biased domestic violence arrest policies are
violating the civil rights of innocent Americans
and allowing abusers to go free, according to a
report released today. The report,
“Predominant Aggressor Policies: Leaving the
Abuser Unaccountable?” charges such policies
violate 14th Amendment equal protection guarantees
and worsen the cycle of violence.
The analysis is published by SAVE – Stop
Abusive and Violent Environments, and is available
online: www.saveservices.org/downloads/Predominant-Aggressor-Policies
The report analyzes domestic violence policies
in 23 states designed to guide law enforcement
personnel in arrest decisions. The document calls
on states with predominant aggressor laws to repeal
such policies.
The predominant aggressor report follows
SAVE’s recent release of “Assaulting
our Rights: How Domestic Violence Laws Curtail Our
Fundamental Freedoms,” which concludes
abuse laws result in the curtailment of civil
liberties of over 2 million Americans each
year.
Research shows men and women are equally likely
to instigate acts of partner aggression: www.csulb.edu/~mfiebert/assault.htm
. But in Roanoke, Va., police officers are
instructed to assess the “Height/weight of
parties,” a criterion that openly biases the
officer to arrest the male.
In Maine, law enforcement personnel are expected
to assess the “Power and control
dynamics.” Law enforcement expert Richard
Davis of Plymouth College, Mass. charges these
criteria represent “more a polemic ideological
rant than a domestic violence intervention
program.”
In several states, police are told to evaluate
“Risk or potential of future injury.” But
experts question the scientific basis of such
recommendations.
“Predominant aggressor laws pressure police
officers to arrest the man regardless of who called
the police or what person instigated the
abuse,” according to SAVE spokesman Carl
Starling. “Females that provoke violent acts
are not held accountable for their abusive
behavior, while innocent men end up with an arrest
record for life.”
Last September, San Diego Chargers linebacker
Shawne Merriman was arrested on charges of domestic
violence, following an accusation by an inebriated
woman. Lacking any evidence of harm, the D.A.
dropped the charges. Columnist Dean Tong later
wrote, “Shawne Merriman was falsely accused of
domestic abuse charges, but may always carry a
scarlet letter emblazoned upon his name.”
Bleeding out alone due
to political correctness
Barbara Kay: First, kill the husband. Second, claim
sympathy as a widow from the June 14, 2010
Canada’s National Post
Most of you have probably already read the
article, but I was actually present in the
courtroom in a similar case, here in Yuma a few
years ago.
I’d volunteered to show up in place of the
family of the late Bill Kirkham, who was beaten
with a lamp and left to bleed out as his live-in,
Margo, walked her dogs and chatted with friends on
the phone.
He was found by his AA sponsor the next
morning.
By the time the Yuma court got around to
sentencing his murderer, Bill’s family was
fatigued in their very souls and like so many
others, battered by the system. They’d been
treated by local LEOs as family of an abuser from
the get-go, which is where I came in.
My job was just to observe and report, while
giving these good people a bit of peace, because
they had no idea what that day would bring.
So I went, and was truly astonished to hear this
violent, remorseless woman attempt some kind of
throwing herself on the mercy of the court thing
— because she was a widow!!!
Even the judge did a double take.
She got three years, and our local paper located
her kids in Florida, who was glad that judge put
their mother away. The article of the time
didn’t elaborate, but can you even imagine how
abusive she must’ve been to her own
children?
It’s really not forward-looking or helpful
in any way to continue to pretend that only men
abuse, only woman are victims.
It only enriches the hatemongers who claim they
have the ultimate solution for domestic violence
— to the tune of multiple billions of dollars
each year.
Meanwhile, men like Bill Kirkham are left alone
to bleed out, and no one will help them.
Would you click 4X to help
victims of domestic violence?
We need your help! Our agency has been entered into
the Chase Community Giving challenge…Just 4
clicks from you and Domestic Abuse Helpline for Men
and Women (DAHMW) has a chance at 20K for
victim’s services. Time is of the essence as
there are only have 11 days left to this challenge.
It takes just 4 clicks for you to participate. The
top 200 organizations that bring in the most votes
win so why can’t Domestic Abuse Helpline for
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DAHMW needs each one of you to vote and then ask
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Your 4 clicks start here:
Hines and Douglas publish
on men’s experiences with partner abuse
Denise Hines and Emily Douglas have published the
first article from their project on male victims of
partner abuse.
Entitled, A Closer Look at Men Who Sustain
Intimate Terrorism by Women it appears in Partner
Abuse, Volume 1, Number 3 and can also be
accessed thru the Men’s Experiences with
Partner Aggression Project website
Abstract:
Over thirty years of research has established
that both men and women are capable of
sustaining intimate partner violence (IPV) by
their opposite-sex partners, yet little research
has examined men’s experiences in such
relationships. Some experts in the field have
forwarded assumptions about men who sustain IPV
– for example, that the abuse they
experience is trivial or humorous and of no
consequence, and that if their abuse was severe
enough they have the financial and psychological
resources to easily leave the relationship
– but these assumptions are not based on
any empirical studies. The present study is an
in depth, descriptive examination of 302 men who
sustained severe IPV from their female partners
within the previous year and sought help. We
present information on their demographics,
overall mental health, and the types and
frequency of various forms of physical and
psychological IPV they sustained. We also
provide both quantitative and qualitative
information about their last physical argument
and their reasons for staying in the
relationship. It is concluded that, contrary to
many assumptions about these men, the
IPV they sustain is quite severe and both
mentally and physically damaging; their most
frequent response to their partner’s IPV is
to get away from her; and they are often blocked
in their efforts to leave, sometimes physically,
but more often because of strong psychological
and emotional ties to their partners and
especially their children. These results are
discussed in terms of their implications for
policy and practice.
Also of interest in the same issue of Partner
Abuse
are
Explaining Gender Differences in Police
Arresting and Charging Behavior in Cases of Spousal
Violence by Paul Millar and Grant Brown
and
Thirty Years of Denying the Evidence on
Gender Symmetry in Partner Violence: Implications
for Prevention and Treatment by Murray A.
Straus
You can give underserved
victims of domestic violence a lifeline
Getting people to vote for a
community effort is every bit as hard as getting
people to contribute cash. Maybe even harder,
because so many figure the internet is so big,
there are so many people – surely plenty of
other people will take the time, and my single vote
won’t mean much.
That’s really not
true, because in this case especially, we have a
small group to begin with. People just don’t
realize the extent of the need for this project.
Neither do they realize how much one person can do
to help it along.
Without going into a
complex explanation of how things like blogs,
Twitter and Facebook work, what I will say is this:
each person voting has the potential to influence
hundreds, or even thousands of others. That’s
because the Pepsi Challenge has provided several
ways for each voter to also engage their
blog’s readers, their FB friends, their
Twitter followers, who in turn have their own
networks of different people.
In other words, you
don’t have to know a lot of people online,
because you have friends who do.
So, you already know the
importance of your help in this, but what is this
project, anyway?
Jan Brown says it better
than I ever could:
“Studies
show that men who
are in relationships with abusive partners do
not see themselves as victims of domestic
violence .
Domestic violence has been so narrowly defined
in our society that most people, including
abused men, believe that it begins and ends with
men beating their intimate female
partners.
Many men who suffer
physical, emotional, psychological, financial,
and/or sexual abuse at the hands of their
intimate partners do not realize that this, too
is domestic violence . They will usually write
it off as their partner having a bad day or feel
that they must have done something to deserve
the abuse.
Further, agencies that
offer a myriad of supportive services and
shelter to victims of domestic violence do
little to encourage abused men to come forward
and seek help. Few offer outreach to male
victims.
The Domestic Abuse
Helpline for Men and Women is hoping to change
that with the first national public awareness
campaign on male victims of domestic violence.
We have entered the Pepsi Refresh Project. We
are seeking a $250,000 award from Pepsi for our
project idea to bring public awareness to male
victims of domestic violence. This funding will
enable us to send outreach materials (brochures,
posters, booklets and placards) about male
victims to 7,500 agencies that work with victims
of domestic violence across the
country.
In order to obtain this
$250,000 award we need your help. The public
determines, through voting on their favorite
project ideas at the Pepsi site, who wins.
Please click
on this link
to vote for our project idea!
Voting goes from
Aug.1st to Aug. 31st. Remember to vote DAILY and
ask your friends and family members to do the
same. Thank you for helping us to bring
awareness and services to victims and their
families.
Because abused men need
awareness and services too.
We already know that this
information is wanted and needed. A good percentage
of calls to the Helpline come from those very
agencies Jan mentions, whose main experience has
been working with women. They want to know what
they can do for men.
Because of the antiquated
laws and policies in place, DAHMW does not get any
of the billions of dollars that flow to domestic
violence programs each year. They must rely on
private donations and campaigns such as
Pepsi
Challenge
in hopes of keeping services for men
available.
If this effort succeeds,
it has the potential to cause a sea change in the
way the public at large sees domestic violence, and
thousands of families nationwide could begin to
heal.
©2010, Trudy W.
Schuett
* * *
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