I did not watch the PBS documentary "Breaking the Silence: Children’s Stories" that aired last night. I can say that my inbox has been filled with mail from MRAs and father’s rights groups, all of whom lobbied PBS (unsuccessfully) to get the documentary pulled off the air. Lots of posts about the film can be found at Trish Wilson’s place, and she links to this newspaper review of the documentary.
My friend and polite adversary, Glenn Sacks, sent out this email alert earlier this week; Glenn calls the film an "assault on fatherhood."
Though I haven’t seen the film, I’m troubled that Glenn — and his fellow MRAs — use the verb "assault" in this context. It may be a film whose ideological commitments are at odds with MRA doctrine; it may not parrot the father’s rights activist line — but it is not, under any circumstances, an "assault." All of us who work on issues of gender justice, domestic violence, and sexual harassment are obligated to speak out against the pervasive habit of using words like "assault" and "bashing" to describe the work of our movement.
One of the most unpleasant tactics of the Men’s Rights Movement has been to appropriate "victim language". MRAs talk incessantly about being "assaulted", either literally by women or figuratively by a court system that they see as hopelessly biased in favor of mothers. They call women’s studies courses exercises in "man-bashing", even though they cannot name a single incident where a man has been physically assaulted in such a class! It’s a smart tactic on their part, as it allows the primary perpetrators of violence against women to claim to be the real victims.
Outside of a few spectacular cases, it’s difficult for MRAs to document what they claim to be the widespread practice of women’s physical abuse of men in American society. As a result, they use words like "assault" to describe PBS documentaries. In doing so, they unwittingly (or perhaps quite intentionally) minimize the suffering of the real — and overwhelmingly female — victims of very real physical and sexual assaults.
Language matters! As a women’s studies professor, I’ve made the effort to purge certain catch phrases like "patriarchal oppression" and "male privilege" from my public vocabulary. These phrases describe important realities, of course — but they also are easily misinterpreted as the tired rhetoric of a movement well past its heyday. I find it helpful to make the language of pro-feminism as jargon-free as possible; I still have work to do in that regard. That said, I wish my friendly adversaries on the MRA front would leave loaded and precise words like "assault" out of a discussion of documentaries, and save it for real incidents of real violence.
UPDATE: Glenn writes me an email to stress that the goal of his campaign was not to get PBS to pull the show, but to provide father’s rights groups the opportunity to respond on air with their version of the issue.
Although I understand the concerns of the MRAs when it comes to documentaries such as this one, I believe that the public has had their heads buried in the sand for far too long when it comes to abuse. While most fathers are good men, one of the tragedies of our legal system is that some of the abusive fathers are suave enough to fool the courts, resulting in children having to live with further abuse.
There are only two reasons I’ve ever seen for a child to cry parental abuse - 1) the child is *extremely* angry with the parent whom s/he is accusing, or 2) the abuse is actually happening. It is a difficult job, but it is the responsibility of the legal system to determine which of the 2 cases it is.
When my parents seperated, I was lucky enough that my mother was awarded sole custody. I was unlucky enough that my father had monthly visitation. My mother’s POV was that no matter what, he was my father and I should love him. My father, on the other hand, “dug his own grave” with his words and actions.
Because I have seen that end of things, it is difficult for me to understand why the MRAs don’t lobby for some sort of guidelines to be put into place to protect children from abusive parents, whether the abuser is the father or the mother. They state that they are concerned for the children. If they’re so concerned for the children, then they should be acting for the *children*, not for themselves.
bg
Hugo - I hear you, and I agree that hyperbole is a huge barrier to communication and understanding. Both sides could take a step back and look at themselves in that regard. I consciously try to avoid it myself, but I know I blow it at times.
Not having seen the program in question, I have to ask whether or not the use of expressions such as “assault” is the only criticism you have for Glenn. Had he used less inflammatory language, would his concerns have seemed valid to you? What was he complaining about? My impression, just from what you wrote, is that it made the abusers out to be virtually 100% male. True? Does this reflect the reality of the situation?
Caitriona: I don’t know any MRAs who wish to protect child abusers. As far as I know, we would all be fine with locking them up until their kids are grown, and when they are released, give their kids permanent immunity from prosecution for any future offense they may commit against the jerk. This is for proven abuse, of course, following due process. Not for just any new accusations that suddenly arise in the heat of a divorce battle. Do you know MRAs who wish to protect abusers?
Stanton, I chose to focus on Glenn’s words because I haven’t seen the documentary. But unless the video itself was slapping and beating men, I’m nonetheless confident that the term “assault” was inappropriate rhetorical overkill. More than that, it’s symptomatic of what I see as an unsavory (and thankfully not universal) MRA tactic — appropriating victim language despite very little evidence that men, as a class, are systematically victimized.
I understand your concern, though “assault” is commonly used metaphorically in English. There are assaults on many things these days: the senses, the first amendment, the environment, the constitution, Precinct 13, Social Security, and much more. A secondary definition of the verb “assault” is actually “to attack in speech or writing”. I doubt that the word was chosen to preempt female victims of literal assaults, coming from Glenn. But hey - as long as you chastise feminists for their hyperbole as well as MRAs, then I have no quarrel with your stand.
Did anyone out there see the program?
Stanton, I don’t think most MRAs wish to protect abusers, but it does seem to me that many of the more vocal MRAs are so obsessed with “fathers’ rights” that they neglect to insure that “children’s rights,” the right to a safe home, are safeguarded. Some sort of training needs to be given to the judges, some safety net put into place, to deal with those few cases where one of the parents is abusive. Something needs to be in place to protect the children.
Many PBS stations are NOT showing this documentary.
It was not even shown in New York City last night. It won’t be shown in NYC until November 20 at noon, not exactly primetime. The MRAs have been fairly successful in their latest “assault” against women and children, many of whom have already been assaulted many times before by the “men” in their lives. Thank you for at least posting this controversary. So much for breaking the silence. You think the MRAs would at least allow the other point of view to be heard. Women who have been financially broken by estranged, abusive men do not have the resources to flood PBS affiliates with calls, letters or finance press releases. No wonder more and more women are afraid to leave their abusers or certainly dare not file for child support. All the pretty lectures about feminism mean nothing when you live in fear for life and the lives of you children.
Hugo, when people refer to “man-bashing” in a class they are not referring to physical violence. It is in reference to constant put downs towards males that have little merit and do nothing to advance any issues. Your argument in this section of your blog was a weak one.
Does anyone have any idea WHY there were protests about this program? No one has addressed this yet. Rainbow - in your experience, is the feminist perspective not being heard in America today? I believe they are better financed than MRAs by orders of magnitude.
Hugo - do you see any hyperbole here that may warrant some words of admonishment?
Why are the MRAs supporting a court system that allows an abusive father to control and abuse innocent children? Do they really believe all of the children in the documentary are lying? including Joe Torre, manager of the Yankees? Good fathers should be in the forefront of releasing abused children and letting them get away from abusers.
To Stanton — Mothers are not being heard. Women who devote themselves primarily to motherhood and homemaking are not respected.
Geez, Rainbow! You have not been paying attention. Fixing up the lousy family court system is one of the top MRA priorities. Believe it or not, abusive mothers get custody too sometimes. Abusive mothers kidnap children after losing custody. Abusive mothers drill their kids to lie to the courts about their fathers. It is not a gender thing, other than when it comes to sexist turf wars. Fixing the family courts does not mean that one gender suddenly gets it all. It means that gender is no longer a factor in decisions - the children are the priority. It means that visitation is enforced - not just the support payments. It means that a parent does not get to move the child far away from the non-custodial parent for their own convenience. And yes - it means that abusers do not get custody, nor do they get unsupervised visitation. Listen up! We wanted this fixed long before the feminists tried to make it their issue. But we welcome your participation to the battle, late as you are. That is - if you can remember that it’s about the kids - it’s not a nice new platform for making men the bad guys.
“You think the MRAs would at least allow the other point of view to be heard.”
You’re kidding, right?
The “other point of view” (”men beat up their women and children”) is the ONLY view being heard. And I use the word “view” loosely, because most or all of what they’re saying is true. The problem is that, again, female-on-male and mother-on-child abuse, also rampant, are being ignored. It’s a sin of omission.
Calling light to abusive fathers/husbands, in and of itself, is a good thing, but you’re dropping the ball as a society if you never mention the other scenarios. And our point is that society, indeed, is dropping the ball.
boy genteel
http://www.vawa4all.org
“Women who devote themselves primarily to motherhood and homemaking are not respected.”
Not respected by whom? I have heard some pretty shrill feminist vitriol aimed at them (but not lately, I admit), but I have not heard any men giving them a hard time, MRA or otherwise. Just where do you see this disrespect?
If you respect free speech; if you respect the rights of children, then allow the PBS stations to air this program. Write to PBS and thank them for airing the point of view of abused children and the mothers who have tried to protect them, who have been silenced in this country for way too long. If your PBS station did not air this program last night when it was scheduled for showing, call and write them asking to please allow children to tell their stories. NO MORE ABUSED CHILDREN; no more children watching their mothers taking constant abuse, Please G-d.
Rainbow, it sounds to me as if this is a program that shows fathers as the bad guy every time. How would you feel about a followup program that was exclusively about mothers abusing their chidren? Will you write a letter to PBS and demand that they produce such a program? Will you give voice to the children and fathers in this category that have been so profoundly silenced that some even claim that they don’t exist? NO MORE MOTHER ABUSE OF CHILDREN; no more children watching their fathers take constant abuse, Please G-d. Will you write that letter?
I read a post from the producer of the documentary that he originally planned to include abused fathers and children but since the court cases and the children he met overwhelming had abused mothers he did not feel it would be statistically accurate to include abused fathers.
One of the most unpleasant tactics of the Men’s Rights Movement has been to appropriate “victim language”. MRAs talk incessantly about being “assaulted”, either literally by women or figuratively by a court system that they see as hopelessly biased in favor of mothers.
Unfortunately everyone in this country seems to cry victim sometime or another. It’s certainly not limited to MRA’s. As a society we glorify being a victim. The term grabs headlines and loosens taxpayer pocketbooks. How many threads here have devolved into who’s the biggest victim?
What I can’t stand is when groups that claim victim status conveniently ignore issues that might weaken their status as victim.
The PBS show is just an example. Family violence is not limited exclusively to men. All here know it. But to some, saying that is heresy. The family court system is another similar issue. Women know the inequities of the family court system but conveniently ignore the fairness of it because in the majority of cases it benefits women. To admit it weakens their “victim status”. To hell with fairness and equality if it benefits me.
Someone made a comment the other day that, sometimes the oppressed take on the mannerisms of their oppressor. Still doesn’t make it right.
I might also add, that fixing the family courts wouldn’t be nearly as difficult if judges would weed out and prosecute false claims of familial abuse. It’s a well known and much abused tool in Texas Family Courts. Unscroupulous women (and men) make real abuse issues harder to recognize and deal with appropriately in the court arena. That would truly help children.
Well stated Uzzah.
Hugo: “One of the most unpleasant tactics of the Men’s Rights Movement has been to appropriate “victim language”. ”
Uhm, so you don’t like that your enemies have co-opted your weapons and used them against you? Seems like fair play to me..
Thanks for the link and the post, Hugo. The documentary is an important one that needs to be aired.
It’s specifically about how mothers who are victims of abuse themselves who are trying to protect their children from abuse are punished by the legal system. Abusers continue their abuse by using the court system as a weapon against their ex’s and the children. Yes, abusive fathers are winning custody of their children because of a widespread belief that mothers often “alienate” their children from their fathers, despite Parental Alienation Syndrome being junk science that is not recognized as valid by the American Psychological Association. Fathers’ rights activists often spread the lie that mothers mostly lie about domestic violence and child abuse in order to get back at their ex’s. Bona fide false allegations of abuse are rare - only 2 - 8% of all cases are false.
Friendly parent theory that has made it into the court system also punishes protective mothers. Friendly parent theory awards custody of the child to the parent who supposedly is most likely to support the relationship between the child and the other parent. Abusive mothers are seen as being “unfriendly”, and therefore they lose custody.
I know two of the women whose cases were covered in the documentary. The entire situation is horrendous, and this documentary provides much needed education towards airing the problem.
Regarding the lobbying fathers’ rights activists have been doing to get PBS to give their concerns equal time, their point of view is already out there. Their point of view already gets media coverage. The point of view of the abused mothers who are trying to protect their children, yet are losing custody despite that, has not been heard and it needs to be heard. Besides, there is nothing that requires that PBS give fathers’ rights views of the issue equal airing. That would be like requiring PBS to provide “equal time” for Holocaust deniers after airing a documenary about the Holocaust. Fathers’ rights claims that men and women are equally abusive and that women frequently lie about abuse to get an upper hand in court are false. The research out there already has proven that. There is no need to provide “equal time” for views that have no basis in fact.
From The American Judges Association: “Studies show that batterers have been able to convince authorities that the victim is unfit or undeserving of sole custody in approximately 70% of challenged cases.”
Another fact: “Abusive fathers are far more likely than nonabusive parents to fight for child custody, not pay child support, and kidnap children.” [White, Ann C., The Florida Bar Journal, Vol LXVIII, No. 9, citing Hansen, Marsali, and Michele Harway, Battering and Family Therapy 175 (1993); Grieg, Geoffrey L. and Rebecca Hegar, “Parents Whose Children Are Abducted by the Other Parent: Implications for Treatment,” 19 American Journal of Family Therapy 215, 221 (1991); Zorza Joan, “Protection for Battered Women and Children,” 27 Clearing House Rev. 1437 (1994).]
Countess: ” Besides, there is nothing that requires that PBS give fathers’ rights views of the issue equal airing. That would be like requiring PBS to provide ‘equal time’ for Holocaust deniers after airing a documenary about the Holocaust.”
Shame on you.
“Fathers’ rights claims that men and women are equally abusive and that women frequently lie about abuse to get an upper hand in court are false. The research out there already has proven that.”
Only self-serving, fatally flawed “research” proves that.
The truth is like a pot of boiling water. Try to keep it shut and the pressure will only increase until it explodes. The truth about domestic abuse is finally beginning to find its way through the cracks, whether you like it or not.
bg
Stop violence against women AND men.
http://www.safe4all.org
Fathers’ rights claims that men and women are equally abusive and that women frequently lie about abuse to get an upper hand in court are false. The research out there already has proven that. There is no need to provide “equal time” for views that have no basis in fact.
Which is the biggest lie? Claiming that men and women are equally abusive, or that women are never abusive. Denying that women pull the abuse card in court (as do men) is naive at best, dishonest at worst. Anyone that has ever spent time with a divorce lawyer knows this.
From The American Judges Association: “Studies show that batterers have been able to convince authorities that the victim is unfit or undeserving of sole custody in approximately 70% of challenged cases.”
Does this indicate that Judges and Police authorities are completely clueless in 70% of cases? Or does it actually point to the fact that many accusations of “battering” are false (spell that perjury).
Trish, one of the reasons I avoid blogs like yours is that your statements, and those of many of your posters seem to follow a pattern. Men are the root of both women’s problems and men’s own problems. Women never contribute to their own problems or create problems for others. Women are never vindictive, or abusive. And if they are, the men in their lives somehow deserve it. And if these men did nothing to deserve it, then they are guilty by association. And of course, my favorite; women are just innocent victims in all this. An oppressed class. Any facts or statistics disproving to the latter are lies. And of course there is no reason to provide “equal time” since they are lies and have “no basis in fact”. So you are wrong for even examining the issue.
If you are so sure of your position, let in the light of day. Even if 8% of abuse allegations are false, that is a staggering number. Don’t you think that deserves some recognition? Even your statement about Parental Alienation Syndrome being junk denies the problem that some mothers (and fathers) do actually brainwash their children into hating the other parent for hateful and vindictive reasons.
I can’t say how pervasive it is. But these things do happen. Undeniably.
At the risk of someone yelling “Godwin’s Law” ;) - bmmg, for fathers’ rights activists to demand that PBS air their side of the story would be like demanding PBS air a documentary created by Holocaust deniers in response to a documentary aired by PBS about the Holocaust. Fathers’ rights views about domestic violence and child abuse are not supported by valid research. PBS is not obligated to present their side of the story, in part because it isn’t obligated to do any such thing, and also in part because fathers’ rights views are not supported by valid research.
Uzzah, I never said that women are never abusive. There are men who are abused by women, but those abused men are greatly outnumbered by the men who abuse women. No one said that women are never abusive. Fathers’ rights activists often proclaim that women and men are equally abusive. Even one of the researchers of the Conflict Tactic Scales, which is the research cited by those who claim that men and women are equally abusive, has criticized fathers’ and men’s rights activists who have misrepresented the CTS. Researcher Richard Gelles, who one one of the researchers who created the CTS, said that [W]hen we look at injuries resulting from violence involving male and female partners, it is categorically false to imply that there are the same number of “battered” men as there are battered women. Research shows that nearly 90 percent of battering victims are women and only about ten percent are men.”
From The American Judges Association: “Studies show that batterers have been able to convince authorities that the victim is unfit or undeserving of sole custody in approximately 70% of challenged cases.”
Uzzah: “Does this indicate that Judges and Police authorities are completely clueless in 70% of cases? Or does it actually point to the fact that many accusations of “battering” are false (spell that perjury).”
It’s clear what that indicates. It indicates that batterers have been able to convince authorities that the victim is unfit or undeserving of sole custody. They use “alienation” and friendly parent theory, plus harassing their victims through repeated malicious litigation to get their way. The documentary “Breaking The Silence: Children’s Stories” highlights cases in which exactly that has happened.
It is not a fact that many accusations of battering are false. The Association of Family and Conciliation Courts, “The Sexual Abuse Allegation Project: Final Report” has found that “false charges are infrequent, and every allegation must be taken seriously.”
According to the two best and largest studies on the subject, false allegations of sexual abuse are rare — in the range of 2 to 8 percent [1,2]. That means the other 92%-98% are meritorious, and this 92%-98% comprised the 152,400 *substantiated* cases on record for 1993 alone [3] (and, bearing in mind that child sexual abuse is a highly *underreported* crime, these are just the cases we know about).
1. Thoennes N, Tjaden PG: The extent, nature, and validity of sexual abuse allegations in custody/visitation disputes. Child Abuse & Neglect 14: 151-163, 1990.
2. Everson MD, Boat BW: False allegations of sexual abuse by children and adolescents. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry 28: 230-235, 1989.
3. McCurdy K, Daro D: Current trends in child abuse reporting and fatalities: The results of the 1993 annual fifty state survey. Chicago: NCPCA, 1994.
The extensive study of 1,249 allegations by Everson and Boat found a false allegation rate of 1.6% for children under 3 years of age, 1.7% for children aged 3 to 6, 4.3% for children aged 6 to 12, and 8% for adolescents (for an age-averaged rate of 4.7%).
“Why Attorneys Should Routinely Screen Clients for Domestic Violence”, By Pauline Quirion, Esq., has shown that “the high frequency with which RO’s [sic] are issued might lead some skeptics to assume that these orders are granted too easily for minor offenses and almost any man is at risk of being a defendant. The data from the new RO database in Massachusetts reflect otherwise. Men against whom RO’s have been used are clearly not a random draw from the population. They are likely to have a criminal history, often reflective of violent behavior toward others. Research suggests that false reports of family violence occur infrequently. Although many believe that women especially will lodge false charges of child abuse or battering against their spouses in an effort to manipulate or retaliate, the rate of false reports in these circumstances is no greater than for other crimes. Most batterers minimize and deny the frequency and severity of their abusive conduct. Similarly, victims often underreport and may minimize the abuse.”
So, the research shows that your claim that “many” allegations of battery (and child abuse, for that matter) are false.
Uzzah: Saying that I believe that “[m]en are the root of both women’s problems and men’s own problems. Women never contribute to their own problems or create problems for others. Women are never vindictive, or abusive. And if they are, the men in their lives somehow deserve it. And if these men did nothing to deserve it, then they are guilty by association. And of course, my favorite; women are just innocent victims in all this. An oppressed class.”
I have never said anything like that, nor do I believe it. You are projecting your own prejudices onto me. For some reason, people like yourself view domestic violence, child abuse, custody cases, and the court system as a zero-sum game. People like me must believe that only men are abusers and never victims. That’s nonsense. I recognize that the majority of abusers are male, but that does not mean that I believe all men are abusers. I suggest you actually read what I write on my blog, and not project your own biases onto what I write.
To get back to the topic, it was important that PBS air “Breaking The Silence: Children’s Stories”. It was important that PBS not bow down to pressure from fathers’ rights groups. The documentary is airing and it has aired. Stories about abused children who have been awarded by the courts to their abusive fathers need public attention, and PBS provided it, much to the rage of fathers’ rights activists. Those protective mothers do not get much media attention, and it’s about time they did. PBS provided it for them. I have also learned that the documentary is going to be aired in a special showing in Michigan for key legislators. It’s important that legislators get educated about how the court system treats abused mothers and abused children. This documentary is one way to do that.
Trish: “Researcher Richard Gelles, who one one of the researchers who created the CTS…”
I am beginning to think that this one Gelles essay is in the handbook for those of you who deny the equality among domestic abuse cases. I’ve addressed this argument by Gelles before. THIS WEEK, in fact. So, as I am pleased with my response that day, I think it will work equally well here. Allow me to refer you to a quotation from that Gelles essay:
“A battered man is one who is physically injured by a wife or partner and has not physically struck or psychologically provoked her.”
That’s a rather tight definition, wouldn’t you say? Imagine if I argued that a woman isn’t really battered if she “psychologically provoked” her husband first. That would be the “she brought it on herself” argument that was popular, oh, forty to fifty years ago with regard to battered women … but battered men still hear with regard to themselves.
The article refers to serious injury. Not even to mention the men who go to the emergency room with “carpentry accidents” that were really attacks from their wives, I had thought that one doesn’t need to send another person to the E/R in order to have committed abuse.
It’s also interesting that you take this one example from Gelles, when plenty of other works he has written call attention to the same things that I do. Here’s one really good one. You may not like the website it’s on, but you will find that it was originally submitted to THE WOMEN’S QUARTERLY:
“The Hidden Side of Domestic Violence: Male Victims”
http://www.ncfmla.org/gelles.html
Here is a notable excerpt from THAT Gelles article:
“My colleague Murray Straus has found that every study among more than 30 describing some type of sample that is not self-selective (an example of self-selected samples are samples of women in battered woman shelters or women responding to advertisements recruiting research subjects; non-select selective samples are community samples, samples of college students, or representative samples) has found a rate of assault by women on male partners that is about the same as the rate by men on female partners.”
Here is another that reiterates my criticism of VAWA:
“The real horror is the continued status of battered men as the ‘missing persons’ of the problem. Male victims do not count and are not counted. The Federal Violence against Women Act identified as a gender crime. None of the nearly billion dollars of funding from this act is directed towards male victims. Some ‘Requests for Proposals’ from the U.S. Justice Department specifically state that research on male victims or programs for male victims will not even be reviewed, let alone funded. Federal funds typically pass to a state coalition against or to a branch of a state agency designated to deal with violence against women.”
And here is his conclusion:
“Given the body of research on that finds continued unexpectedly high rates of violence toward men in intimate relations, it is necessary to reframe as something other than a ‘gender crime’ or example of ‘patriarchal coercive control.’ Protecting only the female victim and punishing only the male offender will not resolve the tragedy and costs of domestic violence. While this is certainly not a politically correct position, and is a position that will almost certainly ignite more personal attacks against me and my colleagues, it remains clear to me that the problem is violence between intimates not violence against women. Policy and practice must address the needs of male victims if we are to reduce the extent and toll of violence in the home.”
Also, I point out that Gelles is one of those who have endorsed our bid to make the Violence Against Women Act completely gender-neutral:
http://www.vawa4all.org/endorsements.asp
And, Trish, I’m POSITIVE that one or many of us have referred you to these 174 (the number has increased over time) studies, reviews, and analyses that demonstrate that women initiate DV against men approximately as often as the reverse occurs:
http://www.csulb.edu/~mfiebert/assault.htm
I don’t see Gelles’ name on all 174, either. Not even close.
Trish: “I recognize that the majority of abusers are male, but that does not mean that I believe all men are abusers.”
Speaking for myself, I have read your blog and understand that. I know you’re not implying that all abusers are men or vice versa; I am disagreeing with your selective use of literature to imply that the vast MAJORITY of abusers are men. Even Gelles, whom you cite, points out that male victims ARE NOT COUNTED.
boy genteel
http://www.vawa4all.org
Boy Genteel is kicking Trish ‘The psycho bitch’ Wilson’s ass! hah
bmmg, the CTS isolates individual physical “hits” out of the context of the abusive incident and the abusive relationship. Abuse is about much more than a hit and a punch. There is an entire cycle of abuse that the CTS conveniently ignores. This is a portion of
Measuring The Extent of Woman Abuse in Intimate Heterosexual Relationships: A Critique of the Conflict Tactics Scales”, by Walter Dekeseredy and Martin Schwartz:
Many social scientists consider CTS data “probably the best available when it comes to estimating the incidence and prevalence of woman abuse in the population at large” (Smith, 1987, p. 177). Yet, quite a large number of researchers have criticized the CTS for the following reasons:
* The CTS rank orders behaviors in a linear fashion, from least serious to most serious. In doing so, it incorrectly assumes that psychological abuse and the first three violence items (e.g., slaps) are automatically less injurious than the items in the severe violence index. Many strongly object to creating what Liz Kelly (1987) calls a “hierarchy of abuse based on seriousness” because emotional abuse is often experienced as more harmful than physical violence (Chang, 1996; Kirkwood, 1993), and a slap can often draw blood or break teeth.
* The CTS works from an ideological base that presumes that violence is family-based, rather seeing the issue as one of male violence directed toward women.
* The CTS only asks about several specific types of abuse, but does not ask about many others. Many researchers fear that respondents will not report abuse that is not asked about, such as scratches, burns, and sexual assault.
* The methodology of the CTS is simply to count the raw number of violent acts committed. What it cannot tell us is why people use violence. Thus, CTS data almost always report men and women as equally violent, and thereby miss the fact they use violence for different reasons. Women use violence for a variety of reasons, but a common one is to defend themselves. Men typically use violence to control their female partners (DeKeseredy, Saunders, Schwartz, & Alvi, 1997; Ellis & Stuckless, 1996).
* The CTS only situates violence and verbal aggression/psychological abuse in the context of settling conflicts or disputes (note again the preamble above). In doing this, it ignores a large number of control-instigated assaults that do not have their root in conflicts or disputes. Even worse, it may miss attacks that “come out of the blue” with no external reason or dispute to mediate. These attacks, whether physical or verbal violence, may be as or more highly injurious as those that stem from conflicts or disputes. The CTS, although it may accurately count numbers of blows struck, overlooks the broader social psychological and social forces (e.g., patriarchy) that motivate men to abuse their female partners.
—
More from the same paper:
As suggested above, the CTS does not provide adequate answers to this question. Much worse is that many people think that the answers the CTS provides do in fact deal with this question. The data that arise from the use of the CTS are commonly, and problematically, used to show that violence in relationships is “sexually symmetrical” (Dobash, Dobash, Wilson, & Daly, 1992). In other words, by simply counting the number of blows struck, the data appear to show that women are just as, if not more, violent than men. Unfortunately, this crude methodology can hide as much or more than it can illuminate (Schwartz & DeKeseredy, 1993).
These problems can be avoided by including questions about motives, meanings, and contexts in different sections of the CTS or CTS2. For example, DeKeseredy and Kelly (1993) placed the following three questions after both the first three and the last six violence items in the CTS, as part of a national study to measure the prevalence of violence in Canadian university and college dating:
On (the following) items, what percentage of these times overall do you estimate that in doing these actions you were primarily motivated by acting in self-defense, that is protecting yourself from immediate physical harm?
On (the following) items, what percentage of these times overall do you estimate that in doing these actions you were trying to fight back in a situation where you were not the first to use these or similar tactics?
On (the following) items, what percentage of these times overall do you estimate that you used these actions on your dating partners before they actually attacked you or threatened to attack you?
In analyzing the data generated by these questions, DeKeseredy et al. (1997) did not find support for the sexual symmetry thesis. Rather, a substantial number of women reported that their violence was in self-defense or “fighting back.” These findings are consistent with Saunders’ (1986) study of battered women. Thus far, the sexual symmetry thesis has only been supported by those using crude measures, such as the CTS with no further questioning.
The most important point of this paper is that the bulk of the research in this field has simply counted blows (who hit whom, and how often). The CTS2 speaks to one context issue (but only one) by asking about injury. A light slap may be different than one that jars loose several teeth. A push out of the way is different than a push down a flight of stairs. However, the survey still does not easily differentiate between a victim fighting back for her life, a survivor retaliating, and an instigator of violence without cause. All are considered violent. Even the more recent strategy of asking who struck the first blow (purportedly to tell who is the aggressor and who is fighting in self-defense) can be hard to place in context. When a woman has been beaten 30 times in the past and knows from her husband’s behavior that a beating is coming within minutes, and further knows that if she strikes first she will end up being hurt less, does that mean that the violence is the woman’s fault?
Thus, both versions of the CTS have serious limitations. However, this does not mean that researchers should not use them, only that their studies will be flawed if they use the CTS or CTS2 as the sole measure of abuse. What are required, then, are multiple measures of abuse.
—
By the way, bmmg, Fiebert’s list has already been discredited. All of the studies he cites rely almost solely on the CTS. The CTS, as I have shown, has serious problems in the way it tabulates abuse. While it has its uses, it should not be misused to “prove” that women and men are equally abusive.
Folks, no one in the medical establishment with any credibility, nor anyone in the domestic violence community, believes that women and men are equally abusive. It’s long been established that most victims of domestic violence are women. This does not mean that there are no abused men. There are. The vast majority, however, are women. That fact does not negate what happens to abused men. You only denigrate abused women with your constant, misguided claims that women are as abusive as men. Not only that, no one is listening to you.
Folks, no one in the medical establishment with any credibility, nor anyone in the domestic violence community, believes that women and men are equally abusive.
can you back this statement up, preferrably with a non-feminist example?
and one done within the last 5 years when social scientists began to study DV in more detail.
Folks, no one in the medical establishment with any credibility, nor anyone in the domestic violence community, believes that women and men are equally abusive. It’s long been established that most victims of domestic violence are women. This does not mean that there are no abused men. There are. The vast majority, however, are women. That fact does not negate what happens to abused men. You only denigrate abused women with your constant, misguided claims that women are as abusive as men. Not only that, no one is listening to you.
Hugo,
Are you going to allow Trish Wilson (aka the ‘Countess’–yeah, right, some countess!) to keep spamming your blog with her hate propaganda? Be a man, Hugoboy! Stand up to her! Believe me, dude, Trish Wilson is not your friend. Despite her pathetic whimpering (e.g., “oh, Hugo…oh Hugo! Thanks so much for linking to my [shitty, pathetic] blog! Oh, Hugo! You’re my hero, Hugo!”), she’ll stab you in the back just as soon as she no longer has any use for you. Wake up, dammit!
On just a quick search, since we’ve family things to do today - http://www.aidv-usa.com/Statistics.htm
OK, there’s a little more data on this site, but the stats are only for FL:
http://www.fdle.state.fl.us/FSAC/Crime_Trends/domestic_violence/
In their domestic violence counts, they include murder, manslaughter, forcible rape, forcible sodomy, forcible fondling, aggravated assault, aggravated stalking, simple assault, threat/intimidation, arson, simple stalking.
Trish Wilson Exposed
Hugo, you ought to be aware of what Trish “The Countess” Wilson is all about. Do some Internet searches on her and see what you find. I used Google, but other search engines should give you plenty of material to consider.
For many years, Trish Wilson has been posting her hateful rants against men and fathers and has been particularly abusive toward individuals who get on her bad side. She is also a pornographer, as she gloats on her blog.
Here are some search queries to get you started, so that you can discover what your pal Trish Wilson is really all about. To give you advance warning, by allying yourself with Trish Wilson, you’re allying yourself with a member of the lunatic fringe, and an internet kook who spends her days (she doesn’t have a job, aside from writing pornography) posting her incoherent and hateful gibberish all over the web.
“Trish Wilson” + “Cindy Ross”
“Trish Wilson” + “Wendy McElroy”
“Trish Wilson” + “Warren Farrell”
“Trish Wilson” + “Glenn Sacks”
“Trish Wilson” + “Marc Angelucci”
“Trish Wilson” + “Liz Kates”
“Trish Wilson” + “LaMusga”
“Trish Wilson” + “Status of Women Canada”
“Trish Wilson” + “school success by gender”
“Trish Wilson” + “erotica”
“Trish Wilson” + “canow”
You’ll see her extreme misandry; it’s so obvious, you can’t miss it.
Trish: Folks, no one in the medical establishment with any credibility, nor anyone in the domestic violence community, believes that women and men are equally abusive.
jaketk: can you back this statement up, preferrably with a non-feminist example? and one done within the last 5 years when social scientists began to study DV in more detail.
The American Institute On Domestic Violence (2001)
The Human Factor
85-95% of all domestic violence victims are female.
Over 500,00 women are stalked by an intimate partner each year.
5.3 million women are abused each year.
1,232 women are killed each year by an intimate partner.
Domestic violence is the leading cause of injury to women.
Women are more likely to be attacked by someone they know rather than by a stranger.
From the American Bar Association. This link shows that despite some social scientists claiming that women and men are equally abusive, the legal establishment doesn’t buy it. These stats, though ten years old, have not changed since 2000. The ABA rejects the myth that women and men are equally abusive.
GENDER
An overwhelming majority of domestic violence victims in heterosexual relationships are women.
* 90 - 95% of domestic violence victims are women.
Bureau of Justice Statistics Selected Findings: Violence Between Intimates (NCJ-149259), November 1994.
* as many as 95% of domestic violence perpetrators are male.
A Report of the Violence against Women Research Strategic Planning Workshop sponsored by the National Institute of Justice in cooperation with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 1995.
* much of female violence is committed in self-defense, and inflicts less injury than male violence.
Chalk & King, eds., Violence in Families: Assessing Prevention & Treatment Programs, National Resource Council and Institute of Medicine, p. 42 (1998).
* during 1992-1993, women were 6 times more likely to experience violence by an intimate partner than men.
Bureau of Justice Statistics Special Report: Violence Against Women: Estimates from the Redesigned Survey (NCJ-154348), August 1995, p. 1.
* the chance of being victimized by an intimate is 10 times greater for a woman than a man.
Bureau of Justice Statistics Special Report: National Crime Victimization Survey, Violence Against Women, 1994.
* 70% of intimate homicide victims are female.
Bureau of Justice Statistics Selected Findings: Violence Between Intimates (NCJ-149259), November 1994.
* male perpetrators are 4 times more likely to use lethal violence than females.
Florida Governor’s Task Force on Domestic and Sexual Violence, Florida Mortality Review Project, 1997, p.44, table 7.
From PBS, just to tick you off. ;)
Can men be the victims of domestic violence?
According to the U.S. Department of Justice, 95 percent of the victims of domestic violence are women. The National Crime Victimization Survey consistently finds that no matter who initiates the violence, women are 7 to 10 times more likely to be injured than are men. It’s important to realize the climate of intimidation and control that occurs in abusive families. Most men will say they are not afraid of the woman with whom they live, even if they had also been hit, scratched, or punched by her. However, you’ll often hear that women are terrorized and live in constant fear of being battered by the man with whom they live. The difference in strength and physical size puts a woman at more risk than a man
More from the Department of Justice. The DOJ accepts that most victims of domestic violence are women.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
WEDNESDAY, JULY 21, 2004
http://WWW.USDOJ.GOV
OVW
(202) 514-2008
TDD (202) 514-1888
ATTORNEY GENERAL ASHCROFT ANNOUNCES $20 MILLION FOR COMMUNITIES THROUGH PRESIDENT BUSH’S FAMILY JUSTICE CENTER INITIATIVE
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Attorney General John Ashcroft announced today that the Department of Justice is awarding more than $20 million to 15 communities chosen under President Bush’s Family Justice Center Initiative to prevent and respond to violence against women, and to five communities that will receive technical assistance grants to provide specialized expertise and consultation to them. The President’s Family Justice Center Initiative, unveiled by President Bush in October 2003, is an unprecedented pilot program that will make a victim’s search for help and justice more efficient and effective by bringing professionals who provide an array of necessary services together under one roof. The Justice Department’s Office on Violence Against Women (OVW) has taken the lead on this pilot program to develop comprehensive domestic violence victim service and support centers in these 15 communities across the country.
—
There is also “The Problem With Proxy Measures: The Inaccuracy of the Conflict Tactic Scales and Other Crime Surveys in Measuring Intimate Partner Violence by Joan Zorza, Esq.”, which was published in Domestic Violence Report in 2001. It’s not available online. It reiterates many of the same concerns as the DeKeseredy article I have already linked to and quoted. Domestic Violence Report is very well respected in the legal community. It has a wide circulation, and it’s articles have great impact on how the courts operate.
Other figures [note: PDF file] have shown that “in 2001, about 85 percent of victimizations by intimate partners were against women and 15 percent of victimizations were against men”. By no means does this show that women are as abusive as men. The vast majority of victims are still women.
Are you going to allow Trish Wilson (aka the ‘Countess’–yeah, right, some countess!) to keep spamming your blog with her hate propaganda?
Uhm, hate propaganda? She has typed responses that are clear and nonaggressive. She has written in a way that looks at both the men and women who are victims of abuse, while asking that the female victims of abuse not be negated.
Would that you could say the same.
Thanks for the kind words, Caitriona. The point I’m trying to make is that while women may be most of the victims of domestic violence, there are male victims. I wish that rather than having spent so much time protesting against a much-needed documentary about what abused women and children go through in court, I wish that fathers’ rights activists would have done some of the hard work necessary to help abused men. Instead, they expended a lot of energy attacking the documentary. That’s very telling, in my opinion.
I agree. The truth about abused men needs to be known, but that’s not going to happen by attacking the truth about abused women and children. A documentary on the subject would be welcomed.
I’m much more interested in finding solutions to problems, as opposed to throwing stones at others in an attempt to draw attention to the problems. It would be nice if others would quit throwing their stones and begin using them instead to build something of use.
What the protest against the documentary had shown me, Caitriona, is that fathers’ rights activists have the ability and the energy to organize when it suits them. I just wish they would use that ability and energy to do something constructive for - in this context - abused men. Instead, they attacked a documentary about abused women and children. They have shown that they can organize. If only they would use that energy for more constructive purposes.
“It also does not allow the researcher to separate out aggressive abuse, whether physical or psychological, from those assaults used in self-defense.”
Since you’re still convinced of this point, that of the “lack of differentiation” between women initiating violence and women acting out of self-defense:
Claxton-Oldfield, S. & Arsenault, J. (1999). The initiation of physically aggressive behaviour by female university students toward their male partners: Prevalence and the reasons offered for such behaviors. Unpublished manuscript. (In a sample of 168 actively dating female undergraduates at a Canadian university, 26% indicated that they initiated physical aggression toward their male partners. Most common reason for such behavior was because partner was not listening to them.)
DeMaris, A. (1992). Male versus female initiation of aggression: The case of courtship violence. In E. C. Viano (Ed.), Intimate violence: interdisciplinary perspectives. (pp. 111-120). Bristol, PA: Taylor & Francis. (Examined a sample of 865 white and black college students with regard to the initiation of violence in their dating experience. Found that 218 subjects, 80 men and 138 women, had experienced or expressed violence in current or recent dating relationships. Results indicate that “when one partner could be said to be the usual initiator of violence, that partner was most often the women. This finding was the same for both black and white respondents.”)
Fiebert, M. S., & Gonzalez, D. M. (1997). Women who initiate assaults: The reasons offered for such behavior. Psychological Reports, 80, 583-590. (A sample of 968 women, drawn primarily from college courses in the Southern California area, were surveyed regarding their initiation of physical assaults on their male partners. 29% of the women, n=285, revealed that they initiated assaults during the past five years. Women in their 20’s were more likely to aggress than women aged 30 and above. In terms of reasons, women appear to aggress because they did not believe that their male victims would be injured or would retaliate. Women also claimed that they assaulted their male partners because they wished to engage their attention, particularly emotionally.)
Follingstad, D. R., Wright, S., & Sebastian, J. A. (1991). Sex differences in motivations and effects in dating violence. Family Relations, 40, 51-57. (A sample of 495 college students completed the CTS and other instruments including a “justification of relationship violence measure.” The study found that women were twice as likely to report perpetrating dating violence as men. Female victims attributed male violence to a desire to gain control over them or to retaliate for being hit first, while men believed that female aggression was a based on their female partner’s wish to “show how angry they were and to retaliate for feeling emotionally hurt or mistreated.”)
Gonzalez, D. M. (1997). Why females initiate violence: A study examining the reasons behind assaults on men. Unpublished master’s thesis, California State University, Long Beach. (225 college women participated in a survey which examined their past history and their rationales for initiating aggression with male partners. Subjects also responded to 8 conflict scenarios which provided information regarding possible reasons for the initiation of aggression. Results indicate that 55% of the subjects admitted to initiating physical aggression toward their male partners at some point in their lives. The most common reason was that aggression was a spontaneous reaction to frustration).
Goodyear-Smith, F. A. & Laidlaw, T. M. (1999). Aggressive acts and assaults in intimate relationships: Towards an understanding of the literature. Behavioral Sciences and the Law, 17,285-304. (An up to date scholarly analysis of couple violence. Authors report that, “…studies clearly demonstrate that within the general population, women initiate and use violent behaviors against their partners at least as often as men.”
“…overlooks the broader social psychological and social forces (e.g., patriarchy)…”
Ah, the P-word. Reminds me of when some tried to explain away female violence with the word “context.” In other words, when men hurt women, they are enforcing the patriarchy, and therefore it is far more serious than when women hurt men, because then they’re only lashing out against the patriarchy.
“The National Crime Victimization Survey consistently finds that no matter who initiates the violence, women are 7 to 10 times more likely to be injured than are men.”
So here we have an example that some outright don’t CARE who initiates the abuse; if a woman initiates and a man retaliates, they’re STILL more concerned about what he does to her. You just illustrated my point.
“The difference in strength and physical size puts a woman at more risk than a man”
The difference in size and strength benefits the smaller, weaker person if, because of that difference, no one takes it seriously when the smaller person assaults the larger person, and only becomes involved when the larger person uses self-defense. (Why do your critics only consider the likelihood of self-defense by women and not by men, by the way?) Further, you cannot ignore that the use of weapons equalize the size “disadvantage.”
bg
bmmg, stop copy/pasting what you find on men’s rights web sites that denigrate violence against women. What you posted is nearly verbatim what is available at MenWeb. It’s also nearly verbatim from Fiebert’s list, and I already addressed that. Those “studies” relied almost exclusively on the Conflict Tactic Scales, and I have already shown that the CTS has some serious problems.
Men and women are not equally abusive. Nobody reputable believes it, and posting stuff you find on men’s rights web sites will not change that.
How droll. 6 posts after a cut and paste by Trish, she bemoans it.
I just noticed something as I was reading through those snippets from the studies bmmg cited - all the ones that indicated where their samples were taken stated that they were taken from college students. For the studies to be indicative of the general population, wouldn’t they need to be a bit broader in the population from which they are sampling? Using only college students will definitely skew the results.
“bmmg, stop copy/pasting what you find on men’s rights web sites that denigrate violence against women. What you posted is nearly verbatim what is available at MenWeb.”
Trish, I’m not “denigrating” violence against women. If it’s verbatim with MenWeb, that means they’ve found the same sources as I have.
“It’s also nearly verbatim from Fiebert’s list, and I already addressed that. Those ’studies’ relied almost exclusively on the Conflict Tactic Scales, and I have already shown that the CTS has some serious problems.”
I am addressing what you addressed. You seem to think you spoke The Last Word, but I am rebutting your argument that the CTS only looks at instances of hitting and not “context” (i.e. self-defense vs. initiation). Mind you, I only made it up to the G’s; I could show additional studies from the list that take self-defense vs. initiation into account, but I thought I had made my point and I’m not trying to choke the thread or monopolize the conversation, and so I stopped there.
bg
Seriously, why are you so threatened by this? How in heaven’s name does it “denigrate” abused women by pointing out that there are many OTHER women who are abusive? I WANT abused women to receive all of the support and protection they need.
bmmg, I’m not threatened by anything. I’m merely enjoying the debate. You’ve been posting men’s rights pablum that claims that women are as abusive as men. That simply is not true. Of course some women are abusive, but that has not been what you’ve been posting about. You’ve been posting discredited men’s rights pages that claim that women and men are equally abusive. They aren’t. If you want abused women to receieve all the support and protection they need, stop spreading propaganda claiming that women and men are equally abusive. That is of no service to abused women. It undermines their situations.
Are you aware that two of the studies you quoted are unpublished manuscripts, including one unpublished master’s thesis? Those were student’s papers. Not exactly the best source.
Please remember that what you had posted are synopses from men’s rights web sites. They are not abstracts of the actual studies. They do not quote the actual studies. The men’s rights versions take those studies seriously out of context and misrepresent them.
Here is one example, from your list, that admits outright that men perpetrate the majority of serious partner attacks, and that male violence is more problematic. This is the abstract of the paper. It is quite different from what was on the men’s rights version.
Aggressive acts and assaults in intimate relationships: towards an understanding of the literature
Felicity A. Goodyear-Smith *, Tannis M. Laidlaw
Far more people in relationships are subjected to violent acts than those who receive injuries. The degree of damage sustained may not reflect the perpetrator’s intent to deliberately harm a partner. Data documenting aggressive acts determines the population at risk and their prevention and early treatment requirements; whereas data focusing on harm and injury helps determine emergency medical and refuge services. Data from national crime surveys, police records, or clinical populations should not be generalized to the population at large. Even if men perpetrate the majority of serious partner attacks, addressing the issue of female violence will significantly reduce the overall level of domestic violence. Judicial, medical, and social services should take note that while male violence may be more problematic, violence is a relationship issue, not a male issue. Copyright 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Fiebert’s list has no credibility. No one with any credibility at all believes that women and men are equally abusive.
Caitriona: “I just noticed something as I was reading through those snippets from the studies bmmg cited - all the ones that indicated where their samples were taken stated that they were taken from college students. For the studies to be indicative of the general population, wouldn’t they need to be a bit broader in the population from which they are sampling? Using only college students will definitely skew the results.”
Good point. You made it before I did. I noticed that myself.
Fiebert’s list has no credibility. No one with any credibility at all believes that women and men are equally abusive.
Prove it.
The Gonzman: How droll. 6 posts after a cut and paste by Trish, she bemoans it.
Hey Gonzman, that’s classic Trish Wilson style. Notice, of course, that feminists, including many of the regulars at Hugo’s site, merely accept her hateful, poorly documented and cited progaganda as dogma. MRAs challenge her sloppy attempts at cut and paste.
Again, anyone who wants to know what Trish Wilson and her misandrist agenda are about need only do the internet searches I posted in a previous comment. Despite Trish’s attempts to present herself as some sort of unbiased ‘researcher’, she’s clearly on a mission to disparage fathers and men, and even more so, MRAs. In that regard, she’s in the same camp as the notorious Cindy Ross and Liz Kates, among other Internet kooks. If you notice the people who take Trish seriously, they are merely other internet kooks and hardcore feminists who swallow dogmas whole with nary a critical thought about what they are ingesting.
Trish claims that Dr. Fiebert’s research has been ‘discredited’. She does that to try to distract us from observing that she herself is the one who is discredited. She’s merely a Massachusetts housewife who spends her time online posting falsehoods, harassing those who disagree with her propaganda, and submitting pornography stories by e-mail to ‘erotica’ sites. Is that someone to be believed, particularly when she can’t compose a logical argument? I don’t think so.
Hi Hugo, I’m the Gonzman’s daughter; I just got back from my honeymoon the other day and came over to have coffee with my dad and pick up me and my husband’s wedding presents.
A while back you asked non-feminist women to weigh in on why they aren’t feminists. My pop pointed me to it, and said if I wanted, to go ahead and respond to it, but with my wedding coming up I was too frazzled, and I thought it might not be timely until I read this thread.
I actually was a feminist while I lived with my mother, who is a big feminist, but the inconsistancy got to be too much for me. This whole thread you have here is a good example of the inconsistancy. Over and over I have heard all kinds of new-age feminist claim they are not the Robin Morgan, Hate your father, divorce your husband, get a girlfriend, dump your son feminist; that they really just want to be individuals and have everyone judged as individuals.
Well, Doctor, here is your inconsistancy and hypocrisy in spades. Nether you nor any other of the feminists here has stood up to the hateful bullying by Trish Wilson, and you’ve given her a free pass to spread her bile. And I can only consclude that it is because she is being hateful and bigoted towards an accepted group to hate. Men. I can’t begin to ask the questions this begs. All the high and mighty words are queefs in the wind to me, and it is why all the things you say mean nothing to me when I can sit here and witness what you do when your principles are put to the test. I’d be ashemed and insulted to be, or be called, a feminist with things like this.
My Dad likes to quote a Mister Clemens when he says there are three kinds of lies. Lies. Damnable lies. And statistics. I could probably write a very long response that included statistics that would be found objectionable. The proportion of blacks in prisons. Women who haven’t done or achieved this that or the other. Illegal aliens as offenders. Homosexual men, or those who have had homosexual experiences as sex offenders towards children.
In each of them, it would be said that statistics lie because they don’t factor in everything, that they are dangerous as they promote hate towards a group, that despite all these bogus racist/sexist/homophobic I needed to remember that all of these things were committed by a tiny minority of that group, and that most of those members of that group were fine people, and I should play the odds in dealing with that group by focusing on that huge majority that were good people.
You’d be right in your objections. You’d be disgusted, annoyed, and angry with me for trying to justify hatred and fostering legal discrimination by citing these bogus statistics. You would probably want to ask me to at least moderate my own posting, or maybe ban me outright.
But you put up with it when these same tactics are used by man-haters and man-bashers. And that is why, after listening to the same tired litany in my “Womyn’s Studies” classes for a couple years, and contrasting it with the men my dad worked with, I tured my back on feminism as a hate movement.
I eventually saw the tactics my mother used in alienating me from my dad for so many years, and I am here to tell you that I am a victim, as much as I hate that word, of what is called P.A.S. It is not a new thing, it is the same old repeating of a lie until it is believed as the truth, sending people on a guilt trip, cult-like brainwashing that has gone on from time immemorial. Cults use the same tactics, totalitarian dictators use it, and it is old as the hills.
I eventually saw through the lies and deceptions when I confronted my dad about him ignoring me, and he took me to his garage and let me go through the packages, letters, cards, and such that were returned to him as refused by my mother. I always wondered why I didn’t have my dad’s last name, until I saw the folders of papers where he tried to be declared my father, but was fought by my mother. She belittled me the whole time I was growing up. She turned a blind eye when her lesbian friends made passes at me. She tried to get me, at 14, to date the landlord for free rent, and the whole time filled my head with the idea that I was so worthless even my own father didn’t want me, and I should be grateful to her for raising me without any support from him. And she didn’t even come to my wedding, even though my dad made his paying for it conditional on me inviting her.
The feminists and man haters I share this with are quick, however, to tell me I’m on crack and that my MRA father has just brainwashed me.
Pop has warned me that even though you may be a genuinely nice guy, your chief failing is that you won’t confront the hard questions directly when it comes to standing up for what you profess feminism to be if it means taking a firm stand against the radical establishment of your pet cause here. Even after I let him read what I responded to in the paragraphs before this, he said, “T, give him till Monday, he usually takes the weekends off.” Since my Pop is a wise man and has this aggravating habit of being right, I’ll take his advice and withhold final judgement on this. But I will say that I am waiting to see more of what you do rather than what you say. It’s not the words, Doctor Schwyzer, of feminism that have made me anti-feminist. It’s what feminism has done, and failed to do. To quote my Dad again, “What you do speaks so loudly to me that I can’t hear what you have to say.”
Uzzah: Saying that I believe that “[m]en are the root of both women’s problems and men’s own problems. Women never contribute to their own problems or create problems for others. Women are never vindictive, or abusive. And if they are, the men in their lives somehow deserve it. And if these men did nothing to deserve it, then they are guilty by association. And of course, my favorite; women are just innocent victims in all this. An oppressed class.”
I have never said anything like that, nor do I believe it. You are projecting your own prejudices onto me.
Do tell.. I was feeling a little guilty. I thought I was being unfair because I was projecting some of your poster’s comments onto you. Until I read this that is.. Let me see if a mere layman can decipher these links you base your comments on..
Many social scientists consider CTS data “probably the best available when it comes to estimating the incidence and prevalence of woman abuse in the population at large” (Smith, 1987, p. 177). Yet, quite a large number of researchers have criticized the CTS for the following reasons:
* The CTS rank orders behaviors in a linear fashion, from least serious to most serious. In doing so, it incorrectly assumes that psychological abuse and the first three violence items (e.g., slaps) are automatically less injurious than the items in the severe violence index. Many strongly object to creating what Liz Kelly (1987) calls a “hierarchy of abuse based on seriousness” because emotional abuse is often experienced as more harmful than physical violence (Chang, 1996; Kirkwood, 1993), and a slap can often draw blood or break teeth.
Men abuse more, because they are bigger and stronger and there are more ways to abuse women than men. Sticks and stones may brake a mans bones, but words are worse when directed at women. Women can’t really hurt those big strong men anyway..
* The CTS works from an ideological base that presumes that violence is family-based, rather seeing the issue as one of male violence directed toward women.
Those bastards.. they included violence towards men in this study.
* The CTS only asks about several specific types of abuse, but does not ask about many others. Many researchers fear that respondents will not report abuse that is not asked about, such as scratches, burns, and sexual assault.
Women are assaulted more dammit. We need to broaden the definition of domestic assault for women to boost the numbers.
* The methodology of the CTS is simply to count the raw number of violent acts committed. What it cannot tell us is why people use violence. Thus, CTS data almost always report men and women as equally violent, and thereby miss the fact they use violence for different reasons. Women use violence for a variety of reasons, but a common one is to defend themselves. Men typically use violence to control their female partners (DeKeseredy, Saunders, Schwartz, & Alvi, 1997; Ellis & Stuckless, 1996).
When women are violent, its the mans fault. Men don’t use violence to defend themselves, when they do they are wrong. Men are just control freaks.
* The CTS only situates violence and verbal aggression/psychological abuse in the context of settling conflicts or disputes (note again the preamble above). In doing this, it ignores a large number of control-instigated assaults that do not have their root in conflicts or disputes. Even worse, it may miss attacks that “come out of the blue” with no external reason or dispute to mediate. These attacks, whether physical or verbal violence, may be as or more highly injurious as those that stem from conflicts or disputes. The CTS, although it may accurately count numbers of blows struck, overlooks the broader social psychological and social forces (e.g., patriarchy) that motivate men to abuse their female partners.
Sometimes men snap. Being a part of the patriarchy is stressful. We need to place more imphasis on this. Women are just sitting there doing nothing and men just go crazy on us. TPHMT
More from the same paper:
As suggested above, the CTS does not provide adequate answers to this question. Much worse is that many people think that the answers the CTS provides do in fact deal with this question. The data that arise from the use of the CTS are commonly, and problematically, used to show that violence in relationships is “sexually symmetrical” (Dobash, Dobash, Wilson, & Daly, 1992). In other words, by simply counting the number of blows struck, the data appear to show that women are just as, if not more, violent than men. Unfortunately, this crude methodology can hide as much or more than it can illuminate (Schwartz & DeKeseredy, 1993).
Women have justifiable reasons to initiate violence. Counting the blows is unfair. Men make us do it.
These problems can be avoided by including questions about motives, meanings, and contexts in different sections of the CTS or CTS2. For example, DeKeseredy and Kelly (1993) placed the following three questions after both the first three and the last six violence items in the CTS, as part of a national study to measure the prevalence of violence in Canadian university and college dating:
Men sometimes deserve what they get. We don’t want to count these violent acts either.
In analyzing the data generated by these questions, DeKeseredy et al. (1997) did not find support for the sexual symmetry thesis. Rather, a substantial number of women reported that their violence was in self-defense or “fighting back.” These findings are consistent with Saunders’ (1986) study of battered women. Thus far, the sexual symmetry thesis has only been supported by those using crude measures, such as the CTS with no further questioning.
Did I mention it? Men deserve what they get.
The most important point of this paper is that the bulk of the research in this field has simply counted blows (who hit whom, and how often). The CTS2 speaks to one context issue (but only one) by asking about injury. A light slap may be different than one that jars loose several teeth. A push out of the way is different than a push down a flight of stairs. However, the survey still does not easily differentiate between a victim fighting back for her life, a survivor retaliating, and an instigator of violence without cause. All are considered violent. Even the more recent strategy of asking who struck the first blow (purportedly to tell who is the aggressor and who is fighting in self-defense) can be hard to place in context. When a woman has been beaten 30 times in the past and knows from her husband’s behavior that a beating is coming within minutes, and further knows that if she strikes first she will end up being hurt less, does that mean that the violence is the woman’s fault?
Even when women initiate violence, its still men’s fault.
Thus, both versions of the CTS have serious limitations. However, this does not mean that researchers should not use them, only that their studies will be flawed if they use the CTS or CTS2 as the sole measure of abuse. What are required, then, are multiple measures of abuse.
By the way, bmmg, Fiebert’s list has already been discredited. All of the studies he cites rely almost solely on the CTS. The CTS, as I have shown, has serious problems in the way it tabulates abuse. While it has its uses, it should not be misused to “prove” that women and men are equally abusive.
Feminists can use this data as long as we ignore any data that doesn’t support our thesis. When it doesn’t, jiggle the numbers.
By the way, I did enjoy reading your site. I used to be a fairly regular reader (under a different pseudonym). You write well, even if I don’t buy some of the commentary.
MRAGuy101> Boy Genteel is kicking Trish ‘The psycho bitch’ Wilson’s ass! hah
This is uncalled for. And unhelpful. I may disagree with some of her posts. But I still respect her for debating her ideas in good faith. How about sticking with the issues and leaving out the charactor attacks, including the ones aimed at Hugo. They make you look like an ass.
Gonzette, what are you talking about? Trish Wilson has consistently been one of the most reasonable and rational posters on this thread. It would take a lot of projection to see her arguments as hatred of men or of anyone else. She’s not saying that all men are abusers, or all abusers are men, just that a large majority of abusers are male, and she has already debunked the MRAs’ rebuttals with well-researched information. I’m sorry about your personal experience, but the things your mother did represent one person with problems, not feminism as a whole.
MRAGuy101> Boy Genteel is kicking Trish ‘The psycho bitch’ Wilson’s ass! hah
This is uncalled for. And unhelpful. I may disagree with some of her posts. But I still respect her for debating her ideas in good faith.
Your sticking your nose in to help out Trish Wilson is uncalled for and unhelpful. If you think Trish Wilson is ‘debating her ideas in good faith,’ you’re wrong. She’s here to try to demonize men. That’s mostly what she does online, when she’s not writing porn and gloating about it.
How about sticking with the issues and leaving out the charactor attacks, including the ones aimed at Hugo. They make you look like an ass.
How about minding your own business? Your defense of Trish and Hugo make you look like an ass.
trish, i did not ask you to show me a bunch of statistics showing that women are victims. i asked you to backup your statement that no credible professional believes that women can be and are potentionally as violent as men. what you offered does not address that. can you back that statement up with non-feminist facts? can you show me any evidence that professionals who believe that women can be and are as violent as men have no credibility? if not, i will understand.
What the protest against the documentary had shown me, Caitriona, is that fathers’ rights activists have the ability and the energy to organize when it suits them. I just wish they would use that ability and energy to do something constructive for - in this context - abused men. Instead, they attacked a documentary about abused women and children. They have shown that they can organize. If only they would use that energy for more constructive purposes.
actually, we do. here’s a whole list of services provided for male victims. if you do a search for sexual abuse, there are even more services, but fairly spread out.
the reason you continuously hear from supporters of male victims is because of the comments you make. they re-enforce misguided, misinformed stereotypes. the message comments like yours send to service providers is that male victims are so rare that there is no reason to reach out to them. the message you send to victims is even worse. comments like yours ensure that victims will not only remain silent, and probably remain in those situations, but that they somehow brought it upon themselves. but perhaps the worst message is that women cannot be abusers. this falsehood not only allows women to get away with abusing adult men, but it’s often used as a shield to defend child abuse, the majority of which is commited by women.
so understandably you are going to be challenged, and you should. those of us who actually work with or are male survivors do not need the hindrance of feminists while we are trying to help victims. acknowledging male victims does not hurt abused women. all it does is hurt the stereotype that women cannot be abusers, and it should. ignoring the violence done against males because of the gender of the abuser is utterly immoral, as is downplaying it, or making the victims out to either be whiners or liars.
i honestly do not believe that you think male abuse is a serious issue. your only real problem with people who want to help male victims is not that men are abused but simply that they say the abusers are women. outside of that, i do not think you would even consider the abuse wrong or immoral, let alone a problem worth preventing and stopping.
I can say that, sparklegirl, because Trish Wilson was one of the feminists trying to help my mother several years ago. Just because she was a woman, and my Dad was a man. As I said, what is said can’t be heard because what is done is making too much noise. The few short years I lived with my Dad before I turned 18 were the best of my life. He was more of a mother to me, and a father, than the woman who gave birth to me. And he’s a man, and an MRA. And Trish Wilson’s claims about MRAs and men who want their children are overwhelmingly false. I know a great many of these men, and they love their children, and just want to be fathers to them. It’s a tiny minority of men who are monsters, and when Trish Wilson tries to use them to hurt the vast majority of men who are good, kind, and decent people, that is hate, and it is wrong, and she is wrong and in the wrong. And if she had her way, I would have continued to stay in a house where I was belittled, abused, molested, subjected to drug use, bizarre religions, and all kinds of things no child should be subject to. All in the name of sisterhood. That’s why I have no use for feminism, and I feel it is so danerous that I should not only back away from it, but be anti-feminist. And as much as one might want to claim that such behavior is an ezxception, it has been my experience that it is the rule.
Fathers and Men are regarding you(Feminists) as the enemy because you(Feminists) long ago declared war on them. And I’m on their side.
Why are you big brave men so afraid of one or two women voicing an opinion. Let abused and non-abused women speak; let children speak. Enough already or are you too afraid to recognize yourself.
Why are you big brave men so afraid of one or two women voicing an opinion. Let abused and non-abused women speak; let children speak. Enough already or are you too afraid to recognize yourself.
Why are you so afraid of men who show feminist dogma to be lies? Let men speak.
What’s the matter, ‘Rainbow’? Are you too afraid to recognize yourself? Are you really so threatened by strong men? Men will speak and men will discredit liars and hatemongers like Trish Wilson, whether you like it or not.
If Hugo wants to attack MRAs, MRAs will respond.
Listening to MRA rants, hearing about number of recent court cases where mother’s have lost joint custody just for disagreeing with how dear old dad is raising the tykes, seeing the huge censorship of one little documentary that probably no one would have watched — is why I stay and take constant verbal, emotional and finacial abuse with a death threat over my head rather than change the locks on my abuser or flee. Better the constant putdowns, the poverty, feeding and cleaning after my lord and master, and living in constant fear than to lose my child. Are you happy with what the father’s rights movement has accomplished for mothers like me? Of course, dear Daddy now is beginning to shed his kindness on our daughter, yelling at her, telling her she is stupid, not taking her to the one party she was invited to all year. Are you glad she has to live with and obey this father? Is it safe for her to tell him to go away or will some PAS spouting shrink put her into a mental institution until she recants her “lies” about her father? I know teenagers who have been forced to go that route. How much spirit and hope do you think will be left by the time she reaches 18? To Gonzette, there is no stack of unopened presents. My daugher’s father sees her whenever he does not have a date with the 100 plus women with whom he has committed adultery or his mistress who installed in the family apartment after he kicked his daughter and me out, but he has never given her a present since she was born.
He loves father’s rights, he reads all the articles, can recite all the statistics on fatherlessness, knows all the lawyers and all the cases, plus has a lawyer on retainer. He has followed all the suggestions like going to the PTA meetings and meeting with the teachers, showing up to every public event, while never provide a penny towards her expense or lifting a finger to do anything related to her physical care.
Good fathers should want to see an end to abusers winning custody of their children.. They should not want to help make it easier by silencing the victims who are still alive and willing to face public shame.
So be happy everyone in father’s rights crowd, you have condemned at least one woman and child to 18 years of wondering whether either one of them will live to see another day and knowing that any day when they do wake up will be spent catering to a monster’s every whim. Congratulations
This is uncalled for. And unhelpful. I may disagree with some of her posts. But I still respect her for debating her ideas in good faith.
Your sticking your nose in to help out Trish Wilson is uncalled for and unhelpful. If you think Trish Wilson is ‘debating her ideas in good faith,’ you’re wrong. She’s here to try to demonize men. That’s mostly what she does online, when she’s not writing porn and gloating about it.
How about sticking with the issues and leaving out the charactor attacks, including the ones aimed at Hugo. They make you look like an ass.
How about minding your own business? Your defense of Trish and Hugo make you look like an ass.
It is my business when you make MRA’s look bad. Personal attacks have no place here. The very thing I hate most about a lot of feminist sites, doesn’t look any better coming from you.
Grow up dude..
Trish just put a point of view out there in calm language. She answered in calm, non inflammatory language. I don’t see a hatemonger anywhere in her posts.
All she suggested was to set up a organization or