Child abuse, intimate partner violence, and reciprocity.

[lumberjack_jeff]

Intimate partner violence has been studied extensively, and one of the most repeatable conclusions of that research is that most IPV is reciprocal, and that women (especially adolescents) are at least as likely to use violence in their relationships as men are. The difference is that as that cycle of violence escalates, the women involved are more likely to suffer significant injury, and especially if the violent relationship is reciprocal.

Another well established result of IPV studies is that kids in violent relationships are more likely to themselves perpetrate violence against their partners when they grow up.

Domestic violence isn't a women's issue, it is a social issue. So long as kids continue to live in households in which violence exists, they will repeat that behavior when they grow up.

There's an argument to be made that the kind of chronic low level violence that never erupts into injury and incarceration is MORE damaging to kids psychological wellbeing because it sets the expectation that violence in your relationship is without consequence.

At Christmas, my son and his live-in girlfriend (they live about an hour from us) were bantering and joking in the kitchen about something silly. I saw her make a quick motion out of the corner of my eye when he dropped to the floor in pain. She had apparently punched him in the balls. I walked over to see what was going on, and they were both laughing, but he was in actual pain. I haven't had an opportunity to talk to him alone about this but I will as soon as possible. A violent relationship only requires one of the parties involved to be acculturated to the idea that hitting your partner is okay.

The entire spectrum of violence must be addressed to prevent it from being normalized in the next generation.

[Demo_Chris]

1. EXCELLENT THREAD and POST! REC

[lumberjack_jeff]

3. Thanks.

I think we need to think about this problem in a new way.

[2naSalit]

2. very

important points there. I grew up with violence in the home but I have been very reclusive and unaccepting of even the hint of malevolence in intimate relationships and even work/casual relationship and a mild case of PTSD to manage. Guess I made it, now that I'm old and don't have much interest in intimate relationships... I have my sanity and most of the wounds are healed or manageable and I have learned how to be peaceful and enjoy life. It took a long time though, first, I had to stop being angry about what my parents put me through... which I found to be the key element.

Good post, thanks for putting it out there.

[Drew Richards]

4. Great post!

[Whisp]

5. I'll have to read the links later, but

one thing I notice and I absolutely detest is that women can hit or slap men in movies, tv and sometimes in real life and it's supposed to be funny. Not funny at all.

[tammywammy]

6. Interesting post.

Stopping the cycle of violence is important. As far as the girlfriend, I just don't even see how that's considered funny. Plus, hitting a man there can cause real issues.

[tammywammy]

7. Kick.

[1000words]

8. Good post, rationally stated.

So far, so good ...

[kcr]

9. One of those studies

I'm sure you were going to mention this:

There are several limitations of this work. The first set centers around the measures of partner violence. All measures were assessed using only participant reports about their own perpetration of violence and that of their partners. The data are thus subject to all the biases and limitations inherent to this form of data collection, such as recall bias, social desirability bias, and reporting bias.

[lumberjack_jeff]

11. Yes. Those would be limitations on all questionnaire-based studies. n/t

[Gormy Cuss]

14. No, those are limitations specific to a subset of studies.

Last edited Thu Jan 2, 2014, 11:57 AM - Edit history (1)

Limitations are cautions on interpretation of the results. That's what careful researchers include in their findings.

[lumberjack_jeff]

15. Was my agreement with the poster phrased wrong?

"The data are thus subject to all the biases and limitations inherent to this form of data collection, such as recall bias, social desirability bias, and reporting bias."

[Gormy Cuss]

22. Yes. n/t

[westerebus]

10. What's the saying?

It's all fun and games until...

hope he's ok

[kdmorris]

12. I think we need to think of this in a different way, as well.

My ex-husband was the batterer, but he would never have ended up that way had he not spent his entire life watching his mother and father beat each other up. (not to mention the emotional abuse). His sister and both of his brothers also ended up as abusers - of both their partners and their children. I got my daughters out when they were 6 years, 3 years and 11 months old, but the environment had lasting effects on my 6 year old daughter. She finally got the help she needed several years ago and is doing really well, but she had so much emotional damage that she used to hit me when she was a teenager. She would fly into rages.

It's a family issue. It's a social issue. It's not just a women's issue.

(And this issue with your son... that's kind of scary. Was he just laughing because he didn't want to make a scene or did he actually find it funny? I know there were times when my ex-husband would do something that would embarrass me that I tried to make it look like it was a joke so that no one would know just how ashamed I was.)

[lumberjack_jeff]

13. The answer to your last paragraph is, I don't know.

They were joking around and she didn't do it in anger.

But doing it at all - in front of your future in-laws?...

I'm still trying to sort it out in my head.

[kdmorris]

19. It is pretty weird, at best

In either case, I hope it all works out with him.

[NaturalHigh]

16. Dang...I hope your son is okay.

I can't imagine what was supposed to be funny about that.

[lumberjack_jeff]

17. I'm confident that he's uninjured.

But to be sure, I have concern about his relationship.

[NaturalHigh]

20. I'm glad he's okay...

but I think his fiancé needs a serious lesson in boundaries.

[H2O Man]

18. Recommended.

I did social work for many years -- in the community, in clinics, and in the county jails. My primary focus was domestic violence. That includes every type of violence within a family.

For years, at the county mental health clinic where I last worked, I was frustrated in my attempts to include females in our "batterers groups." Eventually, a progressive psychologist and I expanded our services to include women who battered their husbands and SOs.

In the previous county I had worked in, I knew that child abuse cases most frequently involved single mothers. I've noted this numerous times on DU discussions on domestic violence. A sub-group with an agenda first denied that child abuse is actually domestic violence. Of course it is. Next, they sought to excuse it by noting that single mothers face pressures that other parents do not. This, of course, is not only a weak attempt to short-cut addressing the problems -- one rarely sees the excusing of violence by men as being understandable, because they are stressed -- but it is terribly flawed.

My approach to dealing with family violence is consistent, but not rigid: physical violence is always wrong, but many people can learn better ways to deal with the pressures of daily life. Be it a single mother, a young man, or anyone else, attempt to teach them a better way. Weed out those who are not willing to try to become better people, with improved skills in relating to family members.

The last thing I worked on at the clinic before retiring was a parenting course for those who were at risk of losing their children. It involved coordinating efforts with family court and several county agencies. It was a 20-week course, in which the parents had to be invested in, in order to keep the option of custody open.

It's not an appropriate battle of the sexes. Not if we seek to reduce family violence, anyway.

[NaturalHigh]

21. You're a better man than me.

I saw more than I ever wanted to in the four years that I was a teacher. There's no way I could have survived a career like yours.

[CoffeeCat]

23. Do you mean that you saw evidence of child abuse...

...when you were a teacher? Your students would show signs of abuse?

I feel for you, if this is what you were experiencing.

I thought about being a teacher. However, I was abused as a child and I have PTSD as a result. I am managing fine--but knowing that children were abused, would be a huge trigger for me.

I can't imagine what that was like and how helpless you would feel. Because really, as a teacher, you only have so much power. And I imagine that much abuse is so covert. Especially emotional abuse. You can sense when something is wrong, but there is no proof.

Because of all of this, I avoided the teaching profession. Kudos to you for giving it your best shot.

[NaturalHigh]

24. I'm glad you're doing well.

Yes, I saw evidence of abuse and neglect and had to report it. I can't imagine having to work with abuse victims for an entire career like H2O Man.

[H2O Man]

25. I'm on the

local school board, and have the utmost respect for public school teachers. (I did a bit of substitute teaching years ago, and loved it.)

I appreciate your compliments. But I don't think that I did anything special. Different people have different talents, and my career allowed me to work at something I was very interested in. It provided me the opportunity to learn a heck of a lot more, both formally and informally, about an important issue. And it gave me the chance to make a difference in a lot of people's lives.

A couple years back, a "kid" (now adult man, with teenagers of his own) re-connected with me on Facebook. His childhood was something that no human being should ever experience. But he came through it, and is a functioning, contributing member of society. It makes me feel really good when, on that forum, he tells his family and friends about how I assisted him in finding his way in life. And I tell them that I was honored to have that opportunity.

It's not a job for everyone, though. I saw a lot of good people burn out. For whatever reason, I didn't have that problem. There were times when things I saw made me sick, and kept me from sleeping. But I loved my job.