Or else they’ll offend God if they leave.
Stories like these break my heart.
I worked at an abusive workplace once - I think this also is a hidden problem. What happened to me was that I had a boss (co-owner of the company, of course) who would yell at her employees, belittle them, insult them, and kick walls and throw things and act out like that. I don’t think she actually hit her employees, possibly because she knew most of them would throw her through a window if she did.
The first week I was there I was quietly working in my office, and she came in to see an office mate, and she ended up screaming at the top of her voice. I just sat there with big eyes, wondering what the hell had just happened here. I stayed with this company for two reasons; 1 - I had never experienced an abusive workplace before, and didn’t grasp what was going on, and 2 - I was flat broke, and the job market wasn’t really great at the time. I was finally fired from this job for standing up to her when she insulted me in front of customers. Which was fiiiiiiiine by me.
In some ways, workplace abuse can be worse than any other kind - you have to make money to live, and there doesn’t seem to be anything you can do when a boss is abusive (short of assault charges, but not all abusers hit).
The 50/50 figure of male to female injuries comes from the Richard Gelles and Murray Strause study. Its own authors have gone on recored criticizing the way it’s been misused, misinterpreted, and quoted selectively. Here’s a pretty good discussion about the way the study has been used to say things its writers don’t agree with. http://www.amptoons.com/blog/2002_11_10_archive.html
It’s the November 14th entry. Gelles has written several editorials about how ‘his’ study has been abused, but I guess those haven’t taken.
I knew he’d make my life absolutely miserable if I left. He might even come after me physically, or come after my family. He had certainly told me so. If I stayed, at the very least, I knew what was coming. It wasn’t a surprise attack, and being beat up yourself is preferrable to finding out your mother was murdered because of your poor choice in mates.
And the kids? Well, in this area of the world, anyway, spousal abuse is not factored in when going to family court. So, if I stayed, I could at least partially shield the children from his abuse. I could try to be the focal point of his rage. If I left and he got full custody, shared custody, or even just unsupervised visitation, I had no control over what happened to the children during that time. I could not shield them whatsoever. Not to mention his threats of kidnapping. I knew if he got it in his head to do so, I’d never see my children again. That alone is enough to paralyze a parent.
Another unmentioned point is this: when you live like that long enough, your sense of reality becomes quite distorted. Think of abused women as victims of a (personal) war. That’s what they are. When you spend your whole day worrying about pissing somebody off (for stupid things like, oh, being five minutes late coming home, or not magically knowing what abuser wants for dinner, or your inability to keep a normally energetic toddler quiet), you become hyper-sensitive and hyper-aware to the home dynamic and everything else becomes background noise. Your “public” time is taken up trying to hide everything that’s going on because you are so ashamed.
You don’t even think about leaving after a while because it seems so useless. You get to the point you just slump your shoulders and say, “this is the way it’s always been, and this is the way it will always be.” You see posters advising women to seek help and it doesn’t even make you think, “yeah, I should”. In fact, you just hope that abuser didn’t see you looking at that poster, and that’s it.
And the reason why you bail him out of jail? Because you know that he’s going to blame you for getting him there in the first place, even if it wasn’t you that called the cops, or even if you lied to the cops but they didn’t buy your falling-down-the-stairs story. In his eyes, it’s your fault. And if you twist yourself into nervous knots because you know he can’t stand dinner five minutes late, what do you think he’ll do when something this serious has happened? It’s going to be hell to pay if you don’t at least go through the motions of trying to “rectify” it.
And when you do leave, it’s no better. An abused woman is at greater risk when she finally leaves.
Restraining orders are worthless, the abuser dances on the edge of legality and laughs at you all the while. The police can’t help you unless he does something overt–like, he’s still there plunging that knife into your neck when they arrive. The family court system doesn’t give a crap about your children unless there is sustantiated proof he has physically harmed them. It takes a LOT to get the courts to take domestic violence seriously.
I did leave and it was a miserable hell for five years. He pulled something on me almost every fucking day for three of those five years and never once got busted on it. And I get to live the rest of my life wondering if he’ll strike again, but I think more in terms of “when”.
The partners know what the abuser is capable of, and how ineffective our justice system is dealing with these things, and that’s why it’s hard to leave. During those three years, I sometimes wished I had actually just stayed with him. That’s an awful thing.
Guin, that link you provided was just awful and heartbreaking. I can’t believe those women actually encourage the others to stay in abusive relationships because “It’s God’s will” and “God will deal with them later”. God should be dealing with them right now. It’s hard to believe that there’s people out there like that. Even worse is the fact that the men know that they can get away with it because the women are too shamed to disobey God.
{{{{HUGS}}}} to plain_jane. That’s heartbreaking and horrific that you had to deal with all that. And it’s even more horrific to find out that the system won’t do anything. Something needs to change.
carimwc, thank you. In a way, I was very nervous writing all that but in a way it also felt good to just say it!
There are no easy answers, but I believe we need to address the problem on two levels: prevention (like programs in the school system, better social services) and the court system. Although a stint in jail won’t change an abuser, we need to make it safer and easier for abused people and their children. I also believe a “witness protection” type program should exist for battered people in certain circumstances.
I meant to put in my original response that ultimately I am very glad I left. I may always fear him, but not moment to moment like I did when we were together.
Exactly, carimwc-there’s a huge difference between Christian forgiveness and allowing someone to hold you hostage like that.
I mean, if this guy murdered someone, should we just forgive him, even if he goes on to do it again? No, I think NOT!
I wasn’t able to get to Guin’s link, but from what carimwc says…doesn’t God help those who help themselves?
I bailed my husband out after he knocked the living crap out of me. No one understood why. Including me. But it’s actually worked out for us. It’s not always a bad thing.
I couldn’t get to ** Guin **'s link either. But I worked with a religious woman who was married to an abuser. When he beat her bad enough to put her in the hospital, some church members came to the hosital to tell her it was her fault and to forgive him and be a better wife. I advised her to get rid of the husband and the church.
Fortuantely, she took my advice.
plain_jane -no one should have to live in fear in a civilized society.
Your story breaks my heart and I wish I could do something to help-I honestly do.
Read the following Statistics Canada reports, with particular attention to pages 5, 11 and following of the 2000 report: http://www.statcan.ca/english/freepub/85-224-XIE/free.htm
The bottom line is that women are slightly more frequently victims of domestic violence than men, but not by much. Most importantly, however, women are about three times more likely than men to be victims of serious domestic violence or death.
In other words, rate of violence is similar, but degree of violence is hugely different.
You have to be registered with ezboard. That’s all.
Amen, featherlou! And it certainly victimizes them again when they, the wronged party, are the ones who are forced to pack up and leave behind their homes, their belongings, their communities and whatever nominal support systems they may have behind to run to a shelter or some other safe space. That’s more than a lot of women are able and willing to do, and really, why the hell should they?
Why are we talking about A-Team commando squads going in to get the women out? Get A-Team commando squads to go flush out these asshole abusers and make it clear to them that they’re no longer welcome! Get A-Team commando squads to protect women who do stand up to their abusers and keep them safe until the assholes are behind bars!
As a society, our approach to the whole domestic violence issue is a massive joke. We blame the victim, we make things worse for the victims in the guise of “helping” them, and we wonder why – beyond the obvious relationship issues – women stay instead of trying to get help. We need a major wake up call.
Obtaining ex parte restraining orders, orders for exclusive possession, and having abusers initially tossed in the can is easy enough (at least it is where I live, ymmv).
Shelters provide things that go beyond these, such as physical security (in as much as an abuser will usually get out on bail), a immediate community of support, and on-site professional family services.
Often abused persons tend to have been isolated from their family, friends, and the community at large by the abuser. From that position, recognizing options and making decisions can be exremely difficult.
I believe it is extremely important to educate kids, early on, about domestic violence. My mother, for all intents and purposes, was not a good mother; but, she did indoctrinate in me one thing that may well have saved me from being a battered wife: she always told me “any man who will hit you once will hit you again”. At age 19, I was engaged to a man whom I loved. He was sweet and charming, and a great lover! Yeah, he was a little possessive, and kinda jealous. And he could be pretty mean when he was drunk (and as time went on, he was drunk more and more). But, overall, the relationship was good. I liked his family, my family liked him. He had bought me a beautiful engagement ring. All was pretty much okey-dokey. But I was in college, and we were living together, and he got pretty demanding. One night, he came home drunk, spoiling for a fight. I had a ton of studying to do, so I said, “Hey, if you wanna fight, you’re going to have to find someone else to fight with, because I’m busy”. And he slapped me in the face. “You need to leave” I told him. “Don’t bother coming back”. Well, he was back the next day. He was so apologetic “Oh, God, I’m so sorry. It’ll never happen again” I said “You’re right. It won’t happen again, because I’m done with you”, and I gave him his ring back.
Had my mother not drilled me the way she had, I might have thought, well, he only slapped me once; and he was drunk; and he does seem truly sorry. I should give him another chance. But I knew better. If I had stayed with him, we would have been married, and maybe had kids, and the violence probably would have gotten worse. The whole time, circumstances would have made it harder and harder for me to leave.
In short (ha!), if more people were taught, while young, the signs of violence, and got out early, when their self-esteem is still intact, and they don’t have kids to complicate matters, the incidence of domestic violence would drop considerably.
When I was in college, I volunteered at the women’s shelter for a short while as a class requirement.
My job was primarily teaching art to the children.
It was not something I could do for a long period of time, and I greatly admire those that do.
During my short time there, I saw how affected the children were. Here we had 5 year old boys that were physically abusive towards others and we had girls that ‘took’ it, because, sadly, it was all they knew. I recall once a boy threw a basketball at another boy pointblank in the face, for no reason what so ever. I also recall children drawing images of their fathers that made the fathers look worse than the devil. One kid threw a punch at me because I didn’t give him the right crayon. 
My point is, I suppose, that while these particular children were getting help… many do not receive this help. This is how, I believe, we get adults getting into their respective abusive relationships later in life. If it is all you know, chances are, that is what you will become.
My former landlord (well call him Bob) has done this a few times as well. The first time was really scary because it involved a drug dealer who was beating on Bob’s friend’s sister. The drug dealer guy was violent enough that Bob had to shove him head first through a wall to get him to back off and leave the girl alone while she packed up her stuff. (The dealer wasn’t hurt, he’d just gone through drywall, but it scared him plenty).
The more recent time was when a male friend of mine was getting the shit slapped out of him on a regular basis by his girlfriend. My friend decided toleave and wanted back-up because he ran his own business and several computers were in the apartment. He wanted to be sure that someone would be able to tackle the woman and sit on her if she started smashing the computers. (She’d been in the Navy, and though she wasn’t really big, she could pack a wallop!)
She was in the apartment when they arrived to get his stuff. And she seemed calm enough, then POW! sucker-smacked my friend and knocked him right off his feet (he’s a pretty big guy too, 6’1" and well-built.)
So Bob had to bluff her and said “you know, he might not hit back, but I have no problems hitting a woman.” In reality, Bob would never, ever have hit her (or any other woman), no way, now how! But he always sounds very sincere. So she believed him and stayed out of the way (but glared at them, as if she was trying to make them burst into flame with her mind) as they cleared out my friend’s stuff.
The police in my city (and the city in which I previously lived) are extremely good at responding immediately to domestic violence calls, make themselves available as escorts for property pickups, and even oversee child access exchanges at the station despite there being specialized community services for this. Their emphasis on arresting spouse abusers makes our violent crime rate appear higher than other communities, but the fact is that the numbers reflect our police making a serious effort at reducing spousal violence. I wish all places would put such resources into providing these services, for it really helps prevent a lot of violence.
I worked at a job for six years where I was verbally abused by my boss, sometimes in front of clients. All the usual “You couldn’t find someone else who’d hire you” crap that I took because I had lousy self-esteem, it was a lousy economy, and I had a small family to support. I finally found the courage to get another job–and it paid half again as much!–and he gave me shit for only giving a week’s notice. Well, boo-hoo-hoo! If he had been NICE to me I might not have gone looking.
So, it’s fifteen years later and I’m getting paid three and a half times what he paid me at a job where they like and respect me and the last I heard the plant had closed he had been demoted by corporate. Life is good!
However, I can really see the reluctance many battered women feel to leave the relationship. They have to see all of the possible outcomes and some are even heroic in the way they divert the abuser’s attentions from weaker people than they.