by avishai 37 Replies latest jw friends
"you drove me to it"
my ex-husband used to say this. I got a big mouth.
The article is pretty one-sided and wrong.
So i can get away with anything cause i'm hormonal - that's Bulls#*?t
You guys have done well and are very strong not to fight back. Especially when you are getting abused, I commend you.
Tan
Bringing this to the top, for CRR.
I know this is an old thread, but i found an article that i think doevetails nicely with it.
© 2004 George Rolph, London
Used with permission of the author
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| Chapter 3 — Domestic Violence |
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| Back — The Erin Pizzey Interview —Dads on the Air, Sydney, Australia |
The abusers — actors in disguise
The victim's relationship with the abuser
Let us look first at the desire to remain hidden
The desire not to be inferior stems from a different set of unconscious dynamics
"Treatment" for victims of abuse to avoid
Gender bias in the abuse industry and society
While this paper cannot be a definitive guide to the nature of an abuser, the victim's relationship with the abuser, and society's part in encouraging gender bias, I hope it will add to the pool of knowledge. It is my hope that, at least a small way, this paper will be an aid towards helping us all understand the nature of domestic abuse and those who perpetrate or encourage it.
First, and foremost, abusers are actors. It makes no difference what gender the abusive personality is, their primary skill is to emulate normal behaviour in order to disguise their own condition.
I have spoken to many victims of abuse who say that the person they met and fell in love with "gradually changed" into a monster. This is often one of the most confusing and distressing aspects of abuse from the victim's point of view. It is also a situation that the abuser will exploit with varying degrees of vicious skill. While it is impossible to be specific on these subjects in every case — as there are always exceptions to every rule — careful observation and research have uncovered certain general consistencies I want to discuss here. The question is; what is going on in the abusers mind that causes them to suddenly, or gradually, become abusive to their new partner?
It appears that the abusive personality has learned, by observation and by mimicry of those around them, how to give every appearance of normality and stability for often quite extended periods of time. This means that they are able to convince new partners that they are really charming, wonderful people who should be trusted and are worthy of love and care. This act is easy to maintain in certain social situations and where the abuser has minimal contact with others in an average day. For example, in a work situation where he/she will be in contact with others for a maximum of eight hours per day. Another social situation may be one of casual friendships made in pubs and clubs. Under these conditions the actor (abuser) need only be convincing as a normal person for a minimum amount of time. This is why many friends of the abuser find it hard to believe that the person they think they know could be capable of such barbarity within a long-term relationship. In the case of female abusers, this difficulty is compounded by social and political myths that see females only as victims and not as perpetrators.
For the abusive actor, maintaining the act of normality within a long term relationship is almost impossible. The intensity of the time spent in the company of the victim means the emotional strain placed on the pretender, by their need to hide their true selves, becomes too difficult to maintain. The act breaks down and the real personality disguised beneath it rushes to the surface. To the victim, the sudden outbursts of aggression from the previously "loving" and "charming"personality they fell in love with is both mystifying and deeply confusing. The victim, often still in love with the abuser, begins to make excuses for the abuser's behaviour, mentally sweeping it under the carpet and falsely believing that things will get better in time.
This is not difficult to understand. Anyone who has fallen in love knows the huge investment of trust, emotional/mental commitment and selflessness it takes make the relationship work. It is natural for the victim to assume that the other person has made the same efforts as they have and this primes them to accept the abuser's excuses and rationalizations of their behaviour.
An abusive personality is fundamentally one of self loathing and even self hate. However, this self disgust is too painful for them to accept. Desperate to "fit in" with everyone else they justify the abusive behaviour they cannot avoid and deny the rest. The denial can be very profound and will drive their negative feelings about themselves very deeply within their tortured psyche. Many abusers are deeply frightened and horrified by their violent outbursts but their denial prevents them from dealing with the feelings that cause them. Therefore, when they lose control and abuse another, there often follows what looks like deep and sincere repentance and begging for forgiveness, only to sink back into the same patterns again later on. Given enough time, even these feelings of regret and remorse will become buried and their emotional attitude to their abuse of others will harden into a cold uncaring outlook. For this reason, I believe it is vital that treatment be applied to the abuser while they still own feelings of remorse and regret. Treatment of the abuser will become progressively more difficult over time as the abuser will lack the necessary need and drive to want to reform.
In order to avoid owning up to what they feel about themselves, the abuser will project their self hatred onto their victims. Where this occurs it sets up the classic abuser/victim relationship. I will expand upon this relationship later in this document, but for now I wish to return to the abusers view of themselves and its consequences in their lives.
We have seen how the abusive personality often feels about themselves, but why does this self hatred come about? There may be a myriad of reasons, but there are some common threads that I have noticed in my studies, my experience of abuse, and my observations of abusers. Many of those who become abusers report that they have grown up in abusive homes themselves or have experienced abuse later on in their lives. When probed about how these experiences have affected them, almost all report feelings of anger and even intense rage that they themselves are frightened by.
To a child growing up in an abusive home, even though the behaviour they are witnessing and experiencing from others deeply disturbs them, they consider it to be "normal." Its all they know, so for them, this is what normal family life is all about. However, the deep fears and anger raised in them by their abusers have little or no avenue of expression within the home. To become angry, or even show dissatisfaction with their treatment, may very well lead to an escalation of the abuse against them. This fear of retaliation drives the feelings they naturally have about their abusers deep within themselves. The only way to cope with the feelings of fear and anger is to deny and bury them, or take them outside of the home in antisocial behaviour. 1
When the abused child becomes an adult, if they have not dealt with these feelings of rage buried deep within themselves, they are almost certain to resurface within their adult relationships.
Adults have a tendency to recreate what they considered normal in their early life at home, within their own adult relationships. If they grew up in a chaotic and fear filled environment it is natural for them to feel at home within that kind of family dynamic. Subconsciously they may well be building relationships they feel are well known to them and no matter how painful those relationships are, they feel "normal."
Some abusers are simply psychopaths. They enjoy the feelings of power they have over the victim and may well go on to kill them if early intervention is not forthcoming.
Other abusers simply come to hate their partners over time and instead of leaving the relationship, set out to destroy the other person (and sometimes other people) within it.
All abusers enjoy the feelings of power they have over their victims at some level, but not all abusers are psychopaths. Abusers are often deeply selfish individuals who live in a "me me" world where only their own feelings, needs and desires are important. When the abuser expresses love for the victim it is often not because they feel that love, it is often because they want something from the victim that threats will not get them. My own abuser, for example, would become tender, gentle and kind whenever she wanted me to help her with something she could not manage alone. Afterwards, my efforts to help her would be ridiculed as inadequate.
Some abusers will abuse others by proxy and this seems to be a predominantly female trait. I have received calls to my help line from men who have been beaten up by other men when their abusive female partner has told another man that her victim had expressed a desire to sleep with the attackers infant child, for example. Other forms of this abuse include making false allegations to family members or the state authorities in order to have someone else attack or arrest the victim.
Another form of abuse by proxy is to withhold contact unreasonably from a parent with his/her child. In such a case, the abuser is using the state apparatus to continue abuse after the relationship has ended. This constitutes abuse of the child concerned and the adult denied contact. I also consider false rape allegations that can utterly destroy a persons life to be abusive behaviour that is all too often unpunished by the state.
For those who have experienced abuse in later life, but who had a relatively happy childhood, there may well be a subconscious element of revenge in their subsequent abusive behaviour. In the case of the female abuser this may be hugely reinforced by articles in women's magazines that portray men as nothing but bad, soap opera stories, dramas, movies, press stories about female abuse victims, and the constant and relentless pressures on women by radical feminist groups to see all men as dangerous, and who paint men as predatory violent animals and women as poor victims being preyed upon. Even advertising on the television that portrays men as useless and stupid may reinforce her hatred of males and feed her feelings of the need to take revenge against all men for what one man has done to her.
Such thoughts and feelings are covered by the umbrella term: misandry. A misandrist is a hater of men. There are many more of these women around than is popularly believed. Many of them are writing the things referred to above or are part of the organizations promoting hatred of men in our society.
Such a scenario is also possible in the case of a male abuser who resents being typecast in these ways by "evil women" and sets out to justify his violent behaviour by seeing himself as some kind of avenging angel. His thoughts and feelings of hatred and resentment towards women are embraced by the term misogynist. It is well known there are many of these men around, however, criticizing female behaviour is not the same as hating females. An important distinction needs to be made between the two for any rational debate on these issues to succeed. 2
1. It is interesting to note that over 90% of males in prison come from broken homes. Yet societies in the western world actively promote single motherhood as a virtue while discouraging marriage. That this is creating a huge problem for the future and is singularly lacking in any kind of wisdom should be obvious to all.
2. A common defensive ploy of radical feminists is to paint any and all criticism of females as hatred of them and, by so doing, pressure people (chiefly men) into regarding a counter argument as misogynistic in origin and therefore worthy of being ignored.
The victim and the abuser have a complicated relationship that is often difficult to define in simple terms. I will do my best here to look at the most common traits of these relationships as I have understood them.
Initially, as stated above, the victim will often have no idea their partner is abusive. Those who do, and remain in the relationship, may well be attempting to "help" the abuser. This is a very dangerous thing for those with little or no knowledge of abusive personalities to attempt. It is difficult enough for a professional to help an abuser, it is certainly not something an amateur should attempt. As the ability to maintain the act of normality under the constant scrutiny of an intimate partner breaks down, so the real and disturbed person beneath the act will emerge. The first signs that all is not well may be anything from a slow escalation of irritable behaviour to a sudden explosion of violence.
It is important here to make another careful distinction. Not every act of irritable behaviour or sudden aggression means a person is automatically an abuser. All of us get out of bed on the wrong side sometimes. The key indicator is the frequency with which the behaviour occurs.
The most common indicator that one is living with an abuser will be that individuals need to control everything about the victim. This need to control will become all consuming over time and is common to both male and female abusers. 3 This need to control others seems to stem from two strong desires within the abusive personality. The first, is a desire to remain hidden and the second, is a desire not to feel inferior. In order to understand these two desires it is important to realize that abusers are deeply fearful people who are terrified of the strong and overwhelmingly powerful feelings raging within them. It is this fear that drives their need to bury those feeling as deeply within as possible and then to deny them when they rush to the surface.
Within a close personal relationship it is perfectly natural for both parties to closely examine each others personalities and to explore each others feelings. This examination is what the abuser fears most. To the abuser, such a close look at who they are becomes deeply threatening. They spend their wholes lives hiding their true selves both from themselves and from society. They typically loathe themselves and often fear their capability for violence. They cannot bear coming under scrutiny. Thus, this innocent searching by their partner can often be the trigger for their abusive reactions as they try to halt the exploration of their deeper and hidden selves by using intimidation and violence. Yet their need to appear normal drives them to seek out a partner and have a "normal" relationship. 4
We all remember the bright kid in school who was always picked on for being "the teachers pet." That child stood out in the crowd, and by virtue of the fact the they were smarter than the rest, made the rest feel inferior. By picking on the bright kid the others were trying to pull that child down to their level in order for them to lose their sense of inferiority. Unmerciful and constant teasing or bullying can force the bright child to conform to the wishes of the rest, and those bright kids who join the pack quickly find the persecution stops. In a similar way, the abuser tries to drag their partner down to their level. This can be achieved by constant bullying and by a technique I have dubbed "verbal machine gunning."
To machine gun verbally means to fire a constant and rapid stream of accusations and insults without ever giving the victim time to answer any of the points made. These insults will often be projections of how the abuser really feels about themselves. For example; if the abuser has strong feelings of jealousy towards the victims friends and associates, then the abuser accuses the victim of being jealous of him or her. Again, the abuser may feel inadequate in the kitchen, or driving, and so accuses the victim of being a crap cook or a lousy driver. Whatever the accusations are, they will often be delivered at high volume and in such rapid succession that the victim will be both terrified, confused, outraged and hurt, and, with so much going on at once within them, feel totally unable to respond. A sort of mental and emotional paralysis ensues that may eventually lead to the complete collapse of the victim. At this stage the abuser is almost drunk on the feelings of power over the victim and if violence is to occur it may happen at that moment of evil euphoria. Victims have told me that they have seen the abuser "smiling down" at them with sick delight as they have folded beneath such onslaughts.
The reasons why the abuser does not want to give the victim time to answer are twofold. First, the abuser has absolutely no interest in the thoughts, concerns, or feelings of the victim. Second, the abuser is not interested in dialogue, but only in control over the victim. In the abusers world view, life is all about the great "ME" and not the little "you."
The extent of control over the victim can sometimes be very far reaching indeed. I have spoken to many male and female victims whose abusive partners have chosen:
• What food they eat and when.
• What clothes they wear and when.
• What times they are allowed out of the house and when to come home.
• Who they are allowed to be friends with and who they must never see.
• What time they are allowed to sleep and when they must wake up.
• When they can see their children and when they cannot.
• What relatives they can visit and those they cannot.
• What music they can enjoy.
• What purchases they can make.
• How much of their own money they can spend.
And on and on.
Abusers who fear a partner may be about to leave them will often run up huge debts for their partner. Some will:
• Slander their partner in the local community in the hope of stopping anyone else being interested in them.
• Try to ruin his/her reputation by spreading lies about him/her to his/her family, friends, co-workers, and employers.
• Poison the victim.
• Send abusive text messages to their phones.
• Stalk the victim or damage the car to prevent them leaving.
• Keep the victim from his/her children.
• Threaten suicide.
• Accuse the victim of rape or sexually molesting children.
• Make threatening or silent calls late at night.
• Destroy his/her property.
• Keep him/her at home against his/her will.
• Increase the level of violence.
• Threaten to kill the kids if she/he leaves.
• Turn the children against the victim.
• Find and attack him/her in her new home etc.
All of this behaviour is about control and dominance over the victim. All of it is negative and destructive behaviour. It is unlimited in its creative evil and the two lists above are by no means exhaustive and neither are they mutually exclusive. Each gender is as capable of these things as the other.
3. Indeed, so prevalent is this trait that careful and informed questioning by police officers called to a domestic abuse incident may well quickly elicit who is the real abuser and who the real victim. Something that many police officers need to understand if they are to ever stop making the wild assumption that all abusers are male and all females are victims.
4. This may be why many abuse victims are kind, gentle, loyal and deeply loving people. Most abusers will not seek confrontation with people who may fight back. They want easy targets that they can dominate. For the male and female abuser that will often mean a passive personality type is sought as the next victim either consciously or subconsciously.
The co-dependency (co-alcoholic) idea was first developed to explain other family members reactions to living with an addict and the harmful effects of those reactions. It is an entirely reasonable idea based on sound research. However, during the 1980`s the definition of codependency was expanded beyond all reasonable bounds. People looking to make quick money by selling cheap books defined co-dependency to include virtually any form of caring for another. Simply put, this means that any and all caring behaviour is a form of psychological illness unless the person being cared for is the self. It could almost have been written by today's radical feminist element who advocate blaming others for the way we feel while accepting no responsibility for our own actions.
The pushers of the modern codependency therapy system of mock psychology will tell you that as a victim of abuse your feelings of caring for the abuser are wrong. In fact, they will tell you that almost everything you feel about other people is wrong. But caring for others is not a pathological condition. My advice is to avoid these peddlers of doom like the plague. Being a caring person is not wrong but, excessive selfishness is, and in fact, is one of the symptoms of an abuser.
Robert Westermeyer, Ph.D. Has the following to say about the current codependency "fix all" sweeping book shops and chat shows on both sides of the Atlantic.
"Why would a psychologist wish to criticize the codependency idea? Many people claim to have been helped by codependency books and codependency self-help groups. I don't wish to take away anyone's belief that they are better for having integrated the codependency idea into their lifestyles. But it definitely isn't for everyone. Codependency is a nebulous idea, born not of science but of the gut feelings of counsellors and frustrated lay people. It's black and white requirements for recovery, though seeming reasonable on the surface, are not in line with empirical research and have dangerous implications with regard to the most human of attributes, caring. My two primary concerns with the codependency idea are:
The Codependency Idea Pathologizes the Natural Tendency to Care for Others.
The Cure for Codependency Mandates Action which is Not Necessarily in Line With Pro social Values." (Emphasis mine)
He goes on:
"A case from several years ago comes to mind involving a caring mother whose 27-year-old daughter had been abusing prescription opioids and benzodiazapines for ten years. The daughter finally made the decision to attempt a methadone detox, following two months of methadone maintenance. The MD at the methadone clinic recommended that she taper the benzodiazapine, which was Valium (methadone doesn't cover non-opiate drugs). The mother was very invested in her daughter's change efforts and subsequently flew in from out of state to live with her while she detoxed. She agreed to dole out the Valium because the daughter felt that she could not do it on her own without relapsing. The mother hid them in her car and stood watch over her daughter during the first three weeks of her transition. The patient voiced that her mother's presence was imperative for relapse prevention at this time. The mother voiced that it made her feel as though she was finally doing something to help her daughter, which was panning out. She felt so good about her efforts that she went to an Al-Anon meeting. She was literally attacked by three attendees who deemed her behavior enabling and, in addition to deeming her responsible for her daughter's enduring problems with substances, instructed her to go back to her home immediately and let her daughter grapple with her troubles on her own. One said, 'She's an adult, and a time comes when you have to let them leave the nest or you' re just perpetuating the illness.' "
Thankfully, this woman had enough conviction and confidence in her values to blow off the advice. Many people don't have this much tenacity to their standards. Many are given such guidance and are left in a complete quandary. The mother's contention was that her daughter was completely responsible for her choice to use or not use. She recognized that her daughter had crippling problems with anxiety and panic and had used the drugs to medicate these states. Though her daughter made the choices, she felt that there was a way she could help her daughter follow through with her motivation to better her life. She knew that if she went back home her daughter would relapse and that relapse, at this point, would be devastating to her daughter, who had tried just about every method of quitting imaginable. She fathomed that her daughter might discount the whole methadone choice and revert to prescription drug abuse again."
With attacks like those above on a mother's need to be involved in her daughter's recovery from drug addition, it makes one wonder at times if the psychopaths are running the asylum!
It is a pervasive and disturbing view that relies more on "feelings" than serious research and it is to the medical and political establishments shame that these views have found any credence at all within today's society because they have kept silent in the face of such populist, false and dangerous ideas.
Instead of buying into these "instant happiness" so-called solutions to modern living, learn about assertiveness and ways in which you can better manage the situation you find yourself in. The best advice that can be given to a victim of abuse is still:
Get out of the relationship as fast as you can!
Nobody in their right mind likes to see themselves as a victim but the truth is that until you have broken free from the relationship, and overcome the effects of the abuse, a victim is what you are. Once you have overcome the effects of the abuse — and with the right help that is almost always possible — you become a survivor. The ease of transition from victim to survivor will depend entirely upon yourself, the quality of the help you receive if any is needed, and the extent to which you were abused. If you wish to cut down on the time needed to recover and be your old self again, leave the abuser as soon as you possibly can.
The domestic abuse industry is saturated in gender bias, as any examination of the literature it produces will show any reasonable person. From the thousands of so-called "studies" carried out by special interest groups, to the leaflets and advertising surrounding the abuse phenomenon, it is obvious that society has blinkers on when it comes to thinking about who perpetrates the abuse. The questions are, one, why has this bias come about and, second, who are the victims of it?
Answering the second question first the answer is simple: Men!
Answering the first question is very complex and beyond the scope of this paper to examine in detail. However, I would like to touch upon the more obvious examples. At the risk of being accused of misogyny (woman hating) for daring to criticize anything the "fairer sex" does or says, I am nevertheless going to do so.
First of all the domestic abuse industry is run almost entirely by women. Many of these women are themselves victims of abuse or have worked closely with female victims of abuse. This, I submit, tends to give these women a skewed and deeply prejudicial view of men. At their most harmless these views will be shaped by the experiences these women have suffered and make them tend to be suspicious of anything men may do or say about abuse. At the worst, these views may lead to a pathological hatred of men and a deep desire for revenge. I suggest that both of these views are common within the abuse industry today. What is more, I suggest that these are the reasons why the female dominated abuse industry is almost totally unable to even countenance that women can be abusive also, irrespective of the evidence we might show them to prove otherwise. Their minds have become set into two broadly entrenched positions:
1. Men abuse women and women do not abuse men.
2. If women abuse men then men deserve it.
That these prejudices have been taken up by western political thinkers is beyond dispute. It is also increasingly evident that police forces, the medical establishment, and the media as a whole in the western world have also adopted these bigoted and dangerous attitudes towards male victims and female perpetrators. The message sent out by these attitudes to female abusers is, "do what you like."
This "woman as victim and men as perpetrator" mind set is not only deeply offensive to all the male victims out there, it is also dangerous for society as a whole. Like all prejudice it has implications for the future that are horrifying to contemplate but the implications for today are also deeply worrying. For example; when we allow one gender carte blanche to abuse another we are failing to consider the other innocent victims of that abuse, e.g., the children, grandparents, brothers and sisters, who witness the destruction of a loved one or, in the case of kids, learn to become abusers themselves. We have seen how a woman, subjected to non stop terror and violence in the home, can snap and kill her abuser. Yet, we do not afford the same damaging effects on a male victim's emotional life. In fact, if he snaps and kills his abuser we victimize him all over again by vilifying him in the press and locking him up in jail. Personal abuse is not enough, it also becomes political and legal abuse if you are a man.
Is it just the abuse industry that generates this prejudice? The answer to that question is, no. The abuse industry perpetuates these myths of man = bad, woman = good but there are other roots in society that also need to be cut out once and for all.
As an example of the extreme prejudice aimed at men throughout society lets look at a T-shirt currently on sale here in Britain. The T-shirt has a cartoon of a young boy emblazoned on the front. A rock is seen heading for the young boys head. This picture is set beneath the words, BOYS ARE STUPID....THROW ROCKS AT THEM. Anyone viewing this T-shirt would probably smile and say, "Its just a bit of harmless fun." However, if we reverse the gender and make it a little girl cartoon and change the words to read, GIRLS ARE STUPID....THROW ROCKS AT THEM. Suddenly it becomes an incitement to hatred.
Further examples of this selective, politically-correct thinking can be found in almost any of the modern women's magazines. Articles describing men in general as anything from stupid, unthinking animals, to downright dangerous, predatory monsters can be found in almost any of the thousands of periodicals on sale in British newsagents. Hundreds of books have been written that do nothing but portray men and boys as complete idiots or dangerous sexual beasts. However, were men to begin writing about women in the same terms, the outrage and protest would be massive. Prejudice, it seems, is fine if you are a female, but offensive if you are a male.
Perhaps the most surprising thing about all of this is that many men buy into it. Not only do they buy into it but they become advocates of it. Its almost like black men joining the Ku Klux Klan and helping to rid the planet of those "stupid niggers." It astounds me that some men have done this and lived up to the "men are stupid" stereotype many radical feminists have portrayed them as for 40 years. It also demonstrates the incredible power of media led brainwashing!
Many women, who know very well what other members of their sex get up to in terms of violence and the emotional abuse of others, are probably the most guilty of all people in society. By their cowardly silence they give a nod and a wink to their "sisters" to continue the abuse of children and men.
The politician, the police officer, the general practitioner, the journalist, and the lawyer are all guilty of the most astounding double standards and extreme prejudice when it comes to even looking at the evidence for the existence of male victims. Even our social scientists balk at the idea of a man being a victim of female abuse, yet the reasons they give for their prejudice are — like all reasons for prejudice — laughable in their demonstration of inept thinking.
Policemen who have had to call for help while struggling to load a drunken and violent female into the back of a police van on a Friday night will still say, "Well, it stands to reason that a woman who is half the size of a man cannot do much damage to him." The politician who has to ensure the safety of their citizens from the threat of a female terrorist with explosives strapped to her body from wiping out dozens of people will still say, "It goes against the instincts of nurturing in women to kill others." The journalist filing a story about females who kill, injure or maim others, including children, will still say, "Women are incapable of inflicting much damage on people." Likewise judges, who sit daily and listen to horrifying stories of females abusing kids, or making false rape or sexual molestation charges against men, will still say, "I do not believe that women are naturally capable of violence or deceit." Such stupidity in the face of huge evidence to the contrary is mind blowing to me, yet it is so common it appears everywhere. The mind that is soaked in prejudice truly is a swamp of contradictions and blind, brutal dishonesty.
How does all of this affect the male abuse victim? The answer is as simple as it is direct... No one believes him!
From the family doctor who refuses to "get involved" when the man says he is being abused by his wife; to the nurse at the hospital all to willing to probe the cause of suspicious injuries on a female patient but whose mind is as closed as a steel trap when the patient is male. From the police officer swayed by the "victim act" of the sobbing female abuser and who then arrests the real victim; to the lawyer who talks the man out of applying for the restraining order because "the judge will not believe you." From the male victim's "friends" who ridicule him when he asks for help; to the men's movement leaders too stupid to realize the implications of this policy of denigrating males. All are equally as guilty as each other of ignoring deep and real concerns and the evidence of their own eyes. All, by their complicit silence, are as guilty of abusing that man as if they wielded the pan of boiling water she threw over him themselves.
• In great Britain, at the last count, women had 423 refuges. Men have 3.
• Women's groups receive over 30 million pound sterling per year from government and police sources. Heterosexual male support groups get nothing.
Scientific studies from all over the western world have shown again and again that domestic violence against men occurs equally as commonly as domestic violence against women, yet western governments have actively suppressed these facts, preferring to use instead, the wildly inaccurate "reported crime statistics" method of determining the prevalence of domestic abuse against the two genders. At the same time, the British government, for example, publicly acknowledges that "most men do not report domestic abuse against themselves." Therefore, if the government acknowledges that most men do not report the abuse they suffer, why do they insist on using reported crime statistics, which they acknowledge are inaccurate, to influence funding decisions? At the same time they ignore the evidence from their own scientific studies. 5
Men and boys are subjected to massive amounts of prejudice in everything from education provision; medical cancer research (breast versus testicular for example); housing provision; divorce; the right to bring up their children alone; hugely insulting articles; newspaper stories and books; job security issues as a result of so-called "positive" discrimination; discriminatory advertising on the television; hate speech; political discrimination; legal rights and censorship of the male point of view in the media. If men complain about this they are ridiculed and called whiners sometimes by other so-called men in the media but, most often, by radical feminist media spokesmen. This prejudice has led to an explosion of single mothers and the most confused and damaged generation of children our country has ever known.
Will someone please tell me the benefits of this utopian radical feminist, left wing view of modern society?
5. For a great cautionary tale of statistics and their manipulation see Wendy McElroy's article Reading Between The Numbers.
George Rolph. April 2004
Founder of No More Silence.
Sure I have a problem with it it's a load of cow dung... Basically what it says is men are at fault most of the time, even when the clear evidence is that women are more likely to be physically abusive it's STILL mens fault somehow. Classic blame the victim type crap. It's the foundation of most women's lib horsehocky. While it's true that women are abusers more often the difference is most men aren't really damaged or hurt. That said a woman being weaker (as the POS article stated) is MUCH more likely to go for a weapon of some sort. Also the statement that most women aren't being violent they are just defending themselves from an already violent situation precipitated by a man. That's about some bullshit right there too!
You want to know how to get a woman violent mad? Right in the middle of the fight just start laughing at her, nothing and I mean NOTHING gets crap flying through the air like laughing at a mad woman. I'm serious, a friend of mine, well an acquaintance anyway laughed at his wife during a fight and then went to bed. He woke up about an hour later when the door opened and she came sailing through the air with a butcher knife! He pulled his leg up and blocked it and ended up with a ton of stitches in his leg but women are MUCH crazier than most men.
However Av this is some bullshit too;
"Plus, an enraged woman coming after you is way scary. You KNOW you can't hit back. You can't defend yourself"
If a woman comes after me I will probably not ball up my fist and punch her but I will slap a woman into the middle of next fucking week if she comes after me. Plus at 250 fairly solid pounds she better be coming at me in her car!
The only time, and I mean the ONLY time I've ever punched G was about 2 years after we were married and we were arguing about something and she picked up a board flipped it over saw that the other side was COVERED with drywall screws and then hit me in the leg with it screws first... I don't care if she punches me, I honestly don't she can ball up her teenie tiny fist and punch me all day long all she's going to do is hurt her hand but a board studded with drywall screws? You have to draw the line SOMEWHERE! lol actually looking back on it it's hilarious we still laugh about it all the time.
Geez, mkr32208 , you're a real charmer there, aren't you? If this original article is inaccurate and insulting to men, then why do you and others take what it says about women and call it accurate. I'll agree that women can have violent tendencies, but to say they outnumber men in this regard is just idiodic. I don't recall seeing hardly any girls fighting at school, except in SE Lousiana. But throughout my school career, I saw boys get in fights constantly. I went to five schools and at only one did I ever see girls fight. Who do you see out playing army, war, etc? Little boys. Girls are busy playing dolls and dress up. Notice there are no girl wrestling teams at schools and almost no girl boxers? Girls aren't into playing American football, usually, or hockey. Boys are more aggressive than girls for the most part. Do you see millions of women fighting for the right to go into combat? No, you don't. Yes, women do have tempers just like men do. But to say they out do men on domestic violence is ridiculous. If you throw Avi's original article out because it is inaccurate and insulting to men, then don't believe the crap it says about women either.
And if you taunt a person, laughing at them when they are upset, man or woman, the person is liable to knock the crap out of you just to get you to shut up. Not saying it's right. But I had a first husband who used to pound on me. I never laughed at him during an argument. It would have been equal to committing suicide.
Avi, I think it would be prudent to do more research and not just post this George Rolph's point of view. It sounds very skewed and biased against women. The writer sounds biased. There are probably some neutral sources and articles to be found. Ones that do not carry bias against either gender. When Mr. Rolph gets to this point, he sounds unbalanced:
I correct myself on one thing I said. At another school there was a black boy named Robert who constantly taunted a black girl named Juanita. No one did anything to stop him. One day Robert taunted her and then he humiliated her by yanking off her wig in front of the entire class. She was a sturdy girl, built like Tina Turner. She walked over to him and grabbed him by his shirt and yanked him across several desks. The teachers finally decided to do something. They made sure the two did not share classes and that Robert did not taunt the girl anymore. Now, if it had been a boy who was taunted by Robert and the boy finally got sick of it and yanked Robert across several desks, you'd say Robert had that coming, wouldn't you?
The article is a radical one that's for sure. Some would argue that it helps balance things out for all the 'down on women' crap that out there but domestic violence is a very real issue and of course, shouldn't be tolerated no matter who the perpetrator or victim is.
To say (like mkr3208 did) that this sort of attitude is the "the foundation of most women's lib horsehocky" is probably just as bad as the article itself though. It's the nutcases who always generate the most publicity in the media (face it, who wants to read/hear about normal people?) might pay to actually find out about the different forms of feminism that are out there and what their principles are before making a blanket statement like that.
I knew of quite a few women who were being bashed by their husbands in my congregation... and I'm sure I don't need to tell anyone here the crap the elders told them about their situations.
I also had my grandmother, who both physically and emotionally abused me as a child. Both social services and the elders swept my case under the carpet. Social services simply didn't know what else to to (that's my take anyway)... she was in hospital for a week at one stage on 'respite' and the nurses (and I'm not kidding here) were threatening to strike. They just couldn't handle her so it was easier for them to just leave her where she was... with us.
Problems on both sides here and rather than taking the 'blame it all on the one team' route how about looking at each person individually and not tolerating any disrespect... period.
