Batter UpFrom Menletter February 2012 By Tim Baehr You might be experiencing domestic violence
if your partner: ●
Calls
you names, insults you, or puts you down
●
Prevents
you from going to work or school ●
Stops
you from seeing family members or friends ●
Tries
to control how you spend money, where you go, or
what you wear ●
Acts
jealous or possessive or constantly accuses you of
being unfaithful ●
Gets
angry when drinking alcohol or using drugs
●
Threatens
you with violence or a weapon ●
Hits,
kicks, shoves, slaps, chokes, or otherwise hurts
you, your children, or your pets ●
Assaults
you while you're sleeping, you've been drinking, or
you're not paying attention... ●
Forces
you to have sex or engage in sexual acts against
your will ●
Blames
you for his or her violent behavior or tells you
that you deserve it ●
Portrays
the violence as mutual and consensual Seems like a list of warnings for women, huh?
Well, no. It's from a list of warnings for men, as
published by the Mayo Clinic: http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/domestic-violence-against-men/MY00557.
I would add to the list a couple of things: ●
Berates
you in front of the children and your friends and
tries to recruit them in thinking you're bad ●
Breaks
or ruins your possessions I
prefer not to get into a contest about who is more
abused. Common wisdom is that it's women, by a wide
margin. I'll go with that, even if some of the
"statistics" (on both sides!) seem cooked. But we might consider that domestic partner
violence against men is likely to be greatly
underreported; that men, in our society are expected
to "take it"; and that men's services and shelters
are often not available. The Mayo Clinic site has
this to say: Because
men are traditionally thought to be physically
stronger than women, you might be less likely to
talk about or report incidents of domestic violence
in your heterosexual relationship due to
embarrassment or fear of ridicule. You might also
worry that the significance of the abuse will be
minimized because you're a man. Similarly, a man
being abused by another man might be reluctant to
talk about the problem because of how it reflects on
his masculinity or because it exposes his sexual
orientation. Additionally, if you seek help, you
might confront a shortage of resources for male
victims of domestic violence. Health care providers
and other contacts might not think to ask if your
injuries were caused by domestic violence, making it
harder to open up about abuse. You might also fear
that if you talk to someone about the abuse, you'll
be accused of wrongdoing yourself. I hate to raise awareness and alarms without
providing a path to action. If you need help with
your own situation, The Mayo Clinic article has some
solid advice for dealing with abuse, ranging from
calling a hotline, to having a safe place to go, to
protecting your computer and e-mail access, to using
your phone carefully, to obtaining a restraining
order. We may think "Hey, those steps are for women
being abused," or "Abuse that severe will never
happen to me," or "That all seems paranoid." Read
the article anyway. Think of it as a kind of basic
disaster preparedness. And even if nothing ever
happens to you, you may be able to advise a friend
who is undergoing abuse. If you want to join in the efforts of
anti-domestic violence organizations focusing on
men, you'll find a lot of information on the
Internet. Here are a few more websites, gleaned from
the Web in one of my essays in 2007. There are many
more, but, as with anything on the Internet, please
read critically. Battered
Men, a reprint of an article in Pacific Sun: http://www.menstuff.org/issues/byissue/batteredmen.html Battered
Men (many articles, links, and resources): Equal
Justice Foundation: http://www.ejfi.org/DV/dv-6.htm Male
Victims of Domestic Abuse: http://www.pitt.edu/~frieze/maleabuse.htm S.A.F.E
(Stop Abuse for Everyone): Male
Abuse, a site by Women Against Domestic Violence: http://www.wadv.org/maleabuse.htm We
also need to recognize that violence is a general
problem, not a gender problem. As individual men, we
can examine our lives and consider taking the
following pledge: ●
I
will commit no violence against another person. The
only exception is if my life or another person's
life is in danger. ●
I
will tolerate no violence against myself or the
people I love. ●
I
will teach my children or other young people I'm in
charge of that negotiating or walking away from a
fight is a sign of strength. ●
I
will increase my awareness of how violence is used
to entertain or to sell products. I will use that
awareness in deciding how to spend my time and
money. ●
I
will not support those leaders for whom war is the
only or primary means of influencing other nations. And as I said in 2007: "This may feel like we're beating our tiny little fists against the hardened steel of our Big Bad Society. But are we able to take even these first steps? Are we willing?" M ©Copyright
2012 by Tim Baehr
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