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An American football hero racing on the freeway in a white Ford Bronco, finally stopping in front of his luxurious home. Six years or more ago this scenario would have sounded like a clever advertisement campaign. Replay the same scenario from 1994 forward and almost all Americans will vividly recall the death of Nicole Simpson and her ex-husband (0. J.
Simpson) fleeing the police with a gun to his head. This single event thrust the serious and deadly topic of domestic violence awareness into the spotlight of the world. There are numerous dynamics that make up the deviant nature of domestic violence. I will summarize five articles that discuss some of the aspects of domestic violence and some of the ways society in the United States combats it. Although domestic violence touches all walks of life, government and academic studies consistently demonstrate that the majority of victims in heterosexual relationships are female and that batterers in heterosexual relationships are overwhelmingly male. (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 1997) Battering also occurs in lesbian and gay relationships, and the use of gender specific language should not be construed to mean that domestic violence exists only in heterosexual relationships. &# 61472; Victims may be doctors, business professionals, scientists or judges, among others. Perpetrators may be police officers, sports heroes, CEOs or college professors.
Unlike victims, perpetrators do have at least two common traits -- the majority of perpetrators (1) witnessed domestic violence in their family and (2) are male. (Healing & Sugarman, 1986; Stratus, 1980) &# 61472; There are many other staggering statistics pertaining to domestic violence, too many to list them all. a woman is beaten every nine seconds in the United States. Domestic violence is the most under reported crime in the country, with the actual incidence 10 times higher than is reported. By the most conservative estimate, each year 1 million women suffer nonfatal violence by an intimate partner. &# 61472; Nearly one in three adult women experiences at least one physical assault by a partner during adulthood. &# 61472; Forty-seven percent of men who beat their wives do so at least three times per year. Domestic violence also has immediate and long-term detrimental effects on children. Each year, an estimated 3. 3 million children are exposed to violence by family members against their mothers or female caretakers.
In homes were partner abuse occurs, children are 1, 500 times more likely to be abused. Forty to sixty percent of men who abuse women also abuse children. A study in 1997 showed 27 percent of domestic homicide victims were children and when children are killed during a domestic dispute, 90 percent are under age 10; 56 percent are under age 2. An article found on the American Bar Association Web page addresses the myths and facts about domestic violence. The first myth is that victims of domestic violence have psychological disorders.
People who are not abused think the victims of domestic violence must be sick or they would not take the abuse. When, in reality, most victims are not mentally ill, although people with mental disabilities are not immune from being abused. Some victims of domestic violence suffer psychological effects, such as post-traumatic stress disorder or depression, as a result of being abused. (Dutton, The Dynamics of Domestic Violence, 1994) Another myth is batterers abuse their partners or spouses because of alcohol or drug abuse. Alcohol and drug abuse does not cause a perpetrator to abuse the victim although it is frequently used as an excuse. Substance abuse may increase frequency or severity of the abuse. (Jillson & Scott, 1996) another myth is that law enforcement and the court system, for instance arresting batterers or issuing civil protection orders, are useless. Conclusions drawn from research studies in this area have brought two conflicting results. (See Buzawa & Buzawa, 1996; Sherman & Berk, 1984; Zorza, 1994) Police officers must make arrests, prosecutors must prosecute domestic violence cases, and courts must enforce orders and handout stiff sentences for criminal convictions.
In the mid- 1970 s battered women's shelters were just beginning and the main focus was developing services for the victims. Providing services and looking out of the needs of the perpetrator was not a priority. It was thought that focusing on the perpetrator was just another way men took priority over women in our society. In 1977 Dr. Daniel Jay Sonkin started calling the local battered women's shelters. Six months later he finally got to a return call from a director of one of the shelters.
After meeting with a director they realized there was a mutual need each could provide for the other. In order for Dr. Sonkin to get experience with counseling batterers the director allowed to him to attend hotline training. The shelter needed something to do with all the male perpetrators calling their hotline looking for their partners who may have been residents of the shelter. After attending hotline training the shelter would refer all phone calls from the men to him. The phone calls started flooding in to Dr.
Sonkin. Most of the calls were crisis intervention counseling in nature. The phone counseling led to one-on-one counseling which, because of popularity led to group counseling and support groups. At the same time other similar groups performing across the country. One innovative therapist was developing a court mandated counseling program in Santa Barbara.
Dr. Sonkin acknowledges during this period of time that he and other therapist were flying the seat of their pants. Most of their knowledge came from alcohol and drug treatment and they utilized whatever behavioral and cognitive interventions seemed to fit the situation. He went on to point out that there was an important social perspective to their work that was heavily imposed by the feminist movement.
It was believed the violence was not just an individual or family problem, but a social problem rooted in the devaluation of women in general. Also during the ' 70 s the battered women's movement began to focus attention on the criminal justice system as being one solution to the problem. Until this time, mediation, counseling and non-criminalization was the typical way these cases were handled. Law enforcement viewed domestic violence as a family problem not a criminal problem. Advocates turned her attention to reforming the police and the courts. California as well as other states passed pretrial diversion laws to begin addressing domestic violence as a criminal problem.
The courts mandated batterers into counseling or education programs and if they successfully completed the programs their record would be expunged. Dr. Sonkin felt diversion was good for its time, primarily because battered women had almost no protection from the criminal justice system prior to this. The diversion was good in that defendants were only offered it once every seven years and was only offered in misdemeanor cases. The downside to diversion was that it was only offered to misdemeanor defendants, and many felony charges were reduced to misdemeanors to give the batterer the option of diversion rather than jail. In the 1980 s more funding was becoming available for counseling programs aimed at the male batterers.
The number of research studies focusing on the male batterer dramatically increased during this decade. During this highest point of popularity to date, providers started to fight amongst themselves on which was the "right" way to treat the male batterer. During the ' 80 s there was more pressure on the criminal justice system to punish the male batterer rather than offer diversion. With guilty verdicts hanging over the defendants head it was thought that they would take counseling more seriously. Towards the end of the 1980 s the gap began to widen between the feminist groups and the mental health professionals and the feminists went to work at what was successful in the past -- changing laws.
During the 1990 s politics became more apparent than in the past. Victims rights groups put pressure on politicians to pass laws that counteracted the trend of defendants rights of the previous two decades. Many of these laws were reactionary to sensationalized crimes, which were highly publicized. The three strikes legislation in California was a good example of this. Dozens of laws were drafted as a result of the kidnapping and murder of a teenage girl and one was enacted.
Domestic violence laws have also been reactionary in the past. Several years ago a law was passed saying that all mental health professionals must report a client who is being treated for domestic violence. The intention of this law was good however many women did not seek help of counselors for fear of their batterer being turned in. This law was amended within one year to only include positions treating physical injuries. Dr. Sonkin says he wouldn't be surprised if a group of battered women advocates get a law passed to expand the special circumstances that qualify a defendant to be executed to include spousal murder.
In 1995 the California Legislature passed Assembly Bill 168. This new law requires the defendant to plead guilty immediately so his conviction comes before participation a treatment program. This way if the defendant fails to complete the treatment program the judge enters a guilty verdict and the defendant is remanded to custody. If the treatment program is completed the guilty plea is not entered into the court record.
In addition to this probation departments are also given the responsibility to certify local treatment providers for batterers. Dr. Sonkin does not like this aspect of the law because the wording of the law does not specifically define providers as licensed counselors or therapists. Although many of the providers are licensed mental health professionals, many other people such as former probation officers, retired police officers and others offer their version of the treatment program. He believes this opens the door for commercialization and believes people developing batterer intervention programs may be doing it for a lucrative venture rather than the goal of helping people. His opinion goes on to say that this law is based on the feminist analysis of the problem of domestic violence and, in particular, the Duluth Model of treating male batterers.
This perspective sees the causes of domestic violence being social rather than psychological. His view is the Duluth Model is narrow minded and the person who drafted this law presumed that the model is the most effective method of treating male batterers even though...
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