Domestic Violence - Term Paper Example

Domestic Violence i. Introduction Whenever someone imposes power and control over somebody through physical, sexual, emotional, and economic abuse, threats, and isolation within a relationship is domestic violence. It is domination by one partner over another that normally happens inside marital or live-in relationship where victims or survivors often face many obstacles in trying to end the abuse in their lives. Although willing and able to fight the lingering cruelty, entanglement with the psychological and economic consequences of such action makes them frantically helpless. Moreover, physical isolation and lack of support from the community intensified by religious and cultural values further increases the uncertainties of getting away. What is more horrific is the various excruciating social judgment and intimidating character of custody or separation processes. There are other practical reasons shaping the victim’s decision but the lack of viable alternatives is the predominant one. These and other significant issues surrounding domestic violence including its effects on children’s well-being will be the central discussion of this paper. ii. Domestic Violence The American Psychiatric Association (2005) suggested that increasing public, legal and healthcare awareness, and enhancing community resources could rebuild domestic violence survivor’s lives. However, these assumptions are not enough and since domestic violence probably involves more than just social issues, further research is required. The first logical move is to explore the nature of domestic violence based on available literature and real-life cases, and see for ourselves what is really going on inside behind the door. There is a common belief that domestic violence is occurring in every culture regardless of age, gender, and socioeconomic status (Baker et. al. 2002). It involves people from all occupations no matter what religion and education a person might have (Summers and Hoffman 2002). It can happen to same sex but women are the frequent victims particularly those living below the poverty line and experiencing physical or mental disabilities. Although there are claims that women are equally violent in a relationship, a more common view is that women are the main victims of domestic violence (Black 1999). Domestic violence is almost never a one-time event and it normally escalates in quantity and severity overtime combining psychological, economic, sexual, and physical forms of abuse (Summers and Hoffman 2002). Regrettably, this does not spare children directly or indirectly exposed to such violent acts and may suffer traumatic experiences early in life. iii. Extent of Domestic Violence Domestic Violence is a “pervasive problem that transcends all ethic, racial, gender, and socioeconomic boundaries”. It “destroys individual, destroy families, and weakens the communities” (DTFDV 2001). According to the survey of National Violence Against Women, here are at least 22% of women physically assaulted by their partner or date during their lifetime and 5.3 million American women at age 18 and older suffers this kind of violence each year. These assaults according to the Black (1999) include pushing, shoving, grabbing, kicking slapping, and hitting. Consequently, 2 million of these women suffered severe injuries and 2.5% died. Aside from physical injuries incurred, nearly 25% of these women have been raped by intimate partner in the span of their lives. Surprisingly, the survey reveals that domestic violence does not confine to women alone as 15.4% of gay men, 11.4% of lesbians, and 7.7% of heterosexual men are also assaulted in similar fashion (American Psychiatric Association 2005). In addition and more depressing, almost one quarter of the women killed by their male partners were separated and divorced from the men who killed them according to one study in Philadelphia and Chicago (Dugan and Hock 2000). For a better comprehension, the following explains abuses committed using power and control. iv. Power and Control Coercion and Threats is a type of domestic abuse involving making or carrying out threats to do something to hurt his partner. This includes threatening to leaver her, to commit suicide, to report her to welfare, making her to drop charges, and making her do illegal activities. In relation to this, intimidation is another abuse using looks, actions, gestures, and displaying weapons to make her frightened. Intimidation often results to smashing and destroying her possession including pets she loves. An emotional abuse includes putting her down or making her feel bad about herself, calling her names, making her think she’s crazy, playing mind games, humiliating and making her feel guilty. Controlling what she does is an abuse using isolation where she is being force to limit her social interaction such as talking to friends and relatives. She is even restricted to what she read and where she goes to thus limiting her social involvement. Jealousy is often times his the excuse for justifying these actions. Another is using economic abuse where he is preventing her to get or keep a job and not letting her know about or have access to family income. A more often and probably the most likely abuse are using the male privilege where she is being treated like a servant while he is making all the big decisions and acting like the master of the castle with the power to define men and women’s role. Finally, using children as an excuse making her feel guilty about it and threatening to take the children away (Baker et. al 2002). If this viciousness is extremely prevalent, then how can we possibly identify potential perpetrator of these acts? v. Identifying Perpetrators Although such cases are hard to identify as the perpetrators are actually ordinary people concealing their destructive behavior in public, such strange individual who have tendencies to control their partners often appear to be an attentive, generous, and an angelic human being that would turn in a while into a terrifying creature. Early in the relationship, abuse appears to be just an isolated incident, as the offender seems to repent and justify his behavior as an effect of stress at work or pressures from somebody else. Furthermore, he seems too sincere and promises not to do it again out of love or whatever reason he can think of to gain his partner’s confidence. These early signs of abuse includes the propensity to accompany his partner all the time or tracking her whereabouts and company. Jealousy at any perceived attention to or from others and will repeatedly attempt to isolate his partner from meeting friends, going to work, etc. and insisting that his partner’s friends and family do not love her. He is the type of person who will pressure his partner to do something she hates and aside from hypersensitivity to even diminutive issues; he easily blames others for the abuse (American Psychiatric Association 2005). vi. The Batterer To expand our understanding of the behavior of these violent persons, Bancroft and Silverman (2002) identified them as the “batterer”. They are people whose archetypal behavior as both partners and parents could have extensive effects on all facet of family functioning. In fact, there is no distinction between their behaviors as being parents and their other behavior as their full pattern of conduct has significant implications for family dynamics. Furthermore, in the presence of domestic violence, family dynamics are shaped by a complex wave of factors involving the bond between the parents, each parents to each child, and the connection of the family of the outside world. In a result of clinical study, some batterers are dependable in showing kindness to his children however; no batterer is dependable in this respect toward his partner. On the other hand, although there are signs that batterers practice good parenting behavior, this is not a guarantee that they are entirely responsible parents. The fact that batterers abuse the children’s mother is a clear indication of bad parenting and other weaknesses that may be present. They tend to be authoritarian parents, often expect members of the family to obey his will and have limited capability to hear or accept feedback or criticism. In another study, they were reported to be more frequently angry and often response with “power-assertiveness” whenever resolving conflict involving their children than normal parents. However, they too have the capability to swing unpredictably between authoritarian and permissive parenting. Moreover, these people are in some cases showing authoritarian parenting but showing no interest in their children at all. vii. Domestic Violence and Children “Watching, hearing or later learning of a parent being harmed by a partner threatens children’s sense of stability and security typically provided by their family” (Baker et. al. 2002). Domestic violence is clearly not just a matter of partner-to-partner violence but also entirely a matter of children’s welfare and safety. Children exposed to domestic violence are normally at emotional risk because of the traumatic effects of the violence itself. According to a study, children are likely to suffer from emotional problems whenever their fathers has high rate of irritability. They also found evidence that a father’s authoritarian treatment of children has more pronounced negative effects if he also abuses the children’s mother (Bancroft and Silverman 2002). They may even use children, as a control tactic against an adult victim claiming the children’s bad behaviors is the cause for the assaults or he may threaten violence against the children and their pets in front of the non-offending parent. Much worse, in an effort to punish an adult, he may hold the children as hostage or abduct them to satisfy his bad intention and gain compliance (Baker et. al. 2002). In addition, such act communicates to the children that their mother’s physical integrity deserves no respect. They may view and feel their mother’s fear and powerlessness while witnessing an assault and may take the notion that depending oneself is useless since the more you defend yourself, the more you seriously get hurt. More importantly, aside from the children’s subjugated impression of their mother, the aftermath of this violence are likely to be evident in children such as their mother’s shock, depression, and withdrawal (Bancroft and Silverman 2002). As a further consequence, children will have strong ambivalence to their violent parent, as affection will co-exist with feeling of resentment and disappointment. Moreover, they will probably emulate and discover the attitudes and behaviors formed when intimate partner abuse occurs and almost certainly, exposure to violence will make children immune to aggressive behavior, as it is already developed into a norm (Baker et. al. 2002). viii. Ethical Issues In view of the details and in the reality, that domestic violence is a social predicament that often times involve helpless women and children, then why such incidents still prevails. One of the problems concerning this is the traditional ethical issues concerning men’s domination over women. DiQuinzio and Young (1997) elucidate the gender blindness and biases in most traditional ethical theory. For instance, traditional ethics has tended to assume the private and public dichotomy according to which the primary characteristics considered part of the “moral point of view” where universality and impartiality correspond to the institutions and activities dominated by men. Feminist scholars emphasized the relationship between gender and violence and male sexuality and force particularly violence against women such as rape, battery, and sexual harassment (DiQuinzio and Young 1997). It is a mistaken belief that men are superior to women and entitled to control them in all situations (McCormick and Connors 2002). The veracity that our society will normally lean on the myth that men dominate women intensifies the plight of abused women as they will normally feel alone and unsupported. The dilemma of domestic violence is beyond committing the crime, as ethical issues regarding women victims are equally problematic. Some significant ethical issues oftentimes hinder domestic Violence prevention and execution of perpetrators. For instance, victims who have experienced or those who are currently experiencing violence are afraid of the stigma brought about by victimization status. This behavior is in tune with the documented gender bias of the criminal justice system and the stigmatization that society may inflict on them (Laing 2003). Moreover, since emotional traumas such as depression, anxiety, panic attacks, substance abuse, posttraumatic stress disorder, and mental health disorder in general are often the result of domestic violence, victims are oftentimes reluctant to cooperate and afraid of discrimination from the rest of the society (American Psychiatric Society 2005). According to Black (1999), many victims of domestic assault appears to have difficulty in accepting that their partner’s behavior is a crime thus reluctant to pursue a case against her partner. Furthermore, some people who see themselves as victims of domestic violence do not believe that the justice system has anything to do with their sad experience. They will not tell others about it believing that it is too embarrassing to divulge. In a real-life study conducted by Berns (2004) using her student’s personal experiences in “gender and violence” class, holding the victim responsible for preventing abuse is a common way that people talk about domestic violence. In one instance, a student said the her mother told her that “if a man hit you once he’ll hit you again and if he hits you once, it is his fault but if a man hits you twice then it is your fault” . However, a 20-year-old student also confessed that her mother advises her; “always be careful about the boys you date. If a man was to ever hit you once, get out because he would never going to change”. In sum, according to the result of the study, people do not have many references why people abusers abuse and do not understand what social and cultural factors tolerate and foster violence. More importantly, it describes the narrow frame that the public uses to make sense of domestic violence and the fact that women cannot just leave a relationship, as they are dependent and has stumpy sense of worth. This is exactly why intervention and evaluation of services for abused women becomes a methodological and ethical issue for social workers. Culturally competent ethical research is essential to domestic violence intervention as implementation and dissemination results can promote or develop negative stereotypes. Furthermore, ethical practice concerning the contextualization of findings should be within an understanding of the dynamics of domestic violence and the realities that women face in dealing with it, as there is a possibility that it will result in “victim blaming”. (Laing 2003). To ensure safety and confidentiality of abused women, participation must be voluntary and not on a condition of access to services and keeping in mind that participating in the service may re-traumatize women. More importantly, dealing with the victim should be at utmost secrecy as the knowledge of the victim or women’s participation may result in harassment, abuse, or heightened danger from a partner. Finally, research should consider the ethical issues and the risk of tracing participants needed for longitudinal research as it could replicate the harassment and stalking behaviors women experienced during abuse (Laing 2003). Notwithstanding ethical issues, social and medical workers are aware of the medical needs of victims and they are sentient on their legal obligation to inform the police whenever they feel that the patient under treatment has been abused. In addition, they are aware that they too can help the patient win her case in court by carefully documenting her injuries, as this constitutes third party factual evidence supporting or proving that the abuse has actually occurred. However, confidentiality and liability in recording or releasing the information can unconsciously harm the victim thus they are confuse to how and why to record information about domestic violence. Consequently, they are afraid to come out and testify in court as the risk outweighs the benefits of documenting abuse (Isaac and Enos 2001). The complexity of dealing with cases of domestic violence is more often the factor preventing social services from effectively solving the problem. Furthermore, ethical and moral issues’ surrounding gender and society overcomes the victim’s desire to come out and seek help. Since nobody can actually persuade a victim, only she can stop her sufferings by voluntary action. According to the American Psychiatric Association (2005), the best thing to do is to find help and support by talking to someone that the victim trust, a friend, a relative, neighbor, a co-worker, or a religious advisor. The victim may approach her physician and other medical professional about the abuse or she may call the National Domestic Violence Hotline in her state. She may also call the police directly if she is in real danger, keep an open mind, and do not let anyone influence her into doing something unfavorable to herself. ix. Conclusion Domestic violence in general is a social and cultural issue that knows no boundaries and never a one-time event in a relationship. Moreover, the severity of its emotional consequences upsets innocent children’s physical and mental well-being, destroys families, and weakens the community. The depressing results of the national survey where millions of women suffers abuse of all sorts every year, is an indication of its prevalence and should cease at all cost. However, the problem is beyond identifying and quantifying the extent of the violence as its prevention and control entails problematic traditional ethical issues hampering social and legal services. The stigma of victimization status further complicates the situation because victims of domestic violence are reluctant to cooperate and traumatize by the sheer thought of public harassment. Furthermore, many victims of domestic assaults are not convinced that their partner’s behavior is a crime and the justice systems as the appropriate solution to their traumatic experience. Conversely, prevention offered by social and medical services is more concern on the consequences of their actions in terms of ethical practice than making a dauntless act of saving lives. Finally, since voluntary action on the part of the victim seems to be the only logical recourse left to prevent the crime, a national domestic violence hotline is available for anyone in distress and seeking support. Victims are also encouraged to divulge their anguish to close and trusted friends, relatives, and religious advisors. In life threatening situation, they should directly contact the police and disclose her situation and whereabouts. Overall, domestic violence is preventable if victims particularly women are willing and courageous enough to face the reality that no one has the right to harm them. x. References American Psychiatric Association, 2005, “Let’s Talk Facts About Domestic Violence”, Copyright 2005 American Psychiatric Association Bancroft Lundy and Silverman Jay, 2002, “The Batterer as Parent: Addressing the Impact of Domestic Violence on Family”, Published 2002 Sage Publications, ISBN 0761922776 Baker Linda, Jaffe Peter, and Ashbourne Lynda, 2002, “Children Exposed to Domestic Violence An Early Childhood Educator’s Handbook to Increase Understanding and Improve Community Responses”, Centre for Children & Families in the Justice System, ISBN # 1-895953-13-8 Black Catriona Mirrlees, 1999, “Domestic Violence: Findings from a new British Crime Survey Self-completion Questionnaire”, Home Office Research Study 191, Information and Publications Group, Room 201, Home Office, 50 Queen Anne’s Gate, London SW1H 9AT, ISBN 184082 1930 Berns Nancy, 2004, “Framing the Victim: Domestic Violence, Media, and Social Problems”, Published 2004 Aldine Transaction, ISBN 0202307417 DiQuinzio Patrice and Young Iris Marion, 1997, “Feminist Ethics and Social Policy”, Published 1997 Indiana University Press, ISBN 0253211255 DTFDV, 2001, “Domestic Violence”, Defense Task Force on Domestic Violence, An Initial Report to the U.S. Secretary of Defense, DIANE Publishing, ISBN 1428995714 Dugan Meg Kennedy and Hock Roger, 2000, It's My Life Now: Starting Over After an Abusive Relationship or Domestic Violence, Published 2000 Routledge, ISBN 0415923581 Isaac Nancy and Enos Pualani, 2001, “Documenting Domestic Violence: How Health Care Providers Can Help Victims”, National Institute of Justice, U.S. Department of Justice Office of Justice Programs Laing Lesley, 2003, “Research and Evaluation of Interventions with Women Affected by Domestic Violence”, Copyright © Australian Domestic and Family Violence Clearinghouse 2003, online, date of access: 09/19/2007, http://www.austdvclearinghouse.unsw.edu.au /topics/topics_pdf_files /evaluation_of_interventions_with_women.pdf McCormick Patrick and Connors Russell, 2002, “Facing Ethical Issues: Dimensions of Character, Choices & Community”, Published 2002 Paulist Press, ISBN 0809140772 Summers Randal, Hoffman Allan Michael, 2002, “Domestic Violence: A Global View”, Published 2002 Greenwood Press, ISBN 0313311641 Read More