The worst form of inequality is to try to make unequal things equal.

-Aristotle

Scientific research and empirical surveys are not always quite as objective and factual as they sometimes pretend to be. Statistical evidence is not always synonymous with the truth. What is “domestic violence” and what is “battering” has become an academic exercise. Not recognizing the difference can be dangerous for some victims.  

What is “domestic violence” has become an academic exercise because fundamental feminists [people who think women’s rights are more important than victims or civil rights] insist that domestic violence is directly related to the oppression of women. This academic exercise continues despite the fact that there is not a single scientific empirical study that documents that relationship. Not one!  

In the Full Report of the Prevalence, Incidence, and Consequences of Violence Against Women http://www.ncjrs.org/pdffiles1/nij/183781.pdf on page 31 the authors, Patricia Tjaden and Nancy Thoennes write, “In summary, it is possible that the manner in which screening questions are introduced and framed has more of an effect on intimate partner violence disclosure rates than does the overall context in which the survey is administered.” Oddly, Tjaden and Thoeenes continue, often with money from the Violence Against Women Office, to ignore their own observation.

A report from the National Research Council (NRC), Advancing the Federal Research Agenda on Violence Against Women http://books.nap.edu/catalog/10849.html notes that there are at least 29 different measurement instruments used in research on violence against women. The NRC warns that, “Rigorous inquiry into violence against women is precluded when scholars fail to distinguish among what constitutes an act of violence, abuse, or battering.” The majority of the national domestic violence organizations continue to ignore this reality.

Our public policy makers, the criminal justice system and many domestic violence organizations, quite obviously, do not recognize or distinguish between what constitutes an act of violence, abuse, or battering. This ignorance of the issue is at the heart and core of how and why domestic violence intervention and prevention has been turned into a bizarre gender war.

Many national organizations claim that female incidents of domestic violence against males are “rare events.” At the same time these organizations and advocates do not define just what a “domestic violence” act is, unless of course, it suits their specific agenda.

Thus we see on domestic violence websites or in publications that every (you fill in the blank) seconds somewhere in America a woman is battered. Thus the act of “battering” a woman can be, as you will see below, when a woman reports she has been insulted or talked down to. This is far beyond apples and oranges. It approaches the cartoon character “Zippy the Pinhead” state of mind.

And worse still, this “gender war” often leaves the real “battered” victims, particularly those at the lower end of the socioeconomic educational ladder with little resources or family support, wondering how their plight has turned into an academic exercise.

Some of The Tools

One measuring tool for “abused women” is called the WAST (Woman Abuse Screening Tool.) It is used in the medical field to measure women who report being abused emotionally or physically by a partner http://comms.uwo.ca/media/archives/releases/2001/jan_apr/jan15.htm . The authors of this tool, for reasons a prudent person can not fathom, choose to ignore the fact that it would be useful and beneficial for the health and well being of both women and men if these same screening questions are asked of both females and males.

Another “abused woman” tool is HITS, which is an acronym for hurt, insulted, threatened, screamed http://www.iafp.com/domestic%20violence/literature%20summaries/HITS.htm. This is used in some emergency rooms to screen for women who are abused. Wording of this tool is: In the last year how often did your partner hurt you physically, insult or talk down to you, threaten you with physical harm, scream or curse at you? Are we to assume they do not ask men because women do not scream or curse them? 

It seems to me that it is difficult for anyone to claim that, regardless of gender, their partner or other family member or in fact themselves have never been guilty of displaying some of the HITS behavior. And again, is there any logic in using this tool for women and not men?

The vast majority of studies used to measure the number of “battered or abused victim” use some form of the Conflict Tactics Scale (CTS) http://www.fasttrackproject.org/techrept/c/cft/  developed by University of New Hampshire in 1971. Without shame fundamental feminists use this tool when it serves their purpose (to measure the number of women who they claim are abused) and rail against it when it does not (when it can be used to document the number of men who claim to be abused.) People seem not to understand or refuse to comprehend that by twisting this data to suit their specific agenda they have abandoned all ethical and moral behavior.

CTS is the most common measure of non-sexual family violence. It measures three styles of intimate partner conflict in familial styled relationships. It measures, most often through telephone interview, the use of rational verbal agreement and disagreement, the use of verbal and nonverbal aggressive behavior, and the use of physical force or violent behavior. It is not designed to measure in any context the reason or motivation for the behavior of either offender or victim.

Almost all versions of the CTS ask questions such as:

The question begged here is, how many people regardless of gender can claim they have not been guilty of or a victim of, some form of the behavior described by the CTS scale? How does a single answer in the affirmative to any one of the above questions document that a victim, of what may be a once in a life time isolated event, is a “battered victim” or that the actor is a “batterer?” 

CTS includes questions concerning a varied range of behaviors from those considered non-abusive to those considered extremely abusive. Fundamental feminists will, when it suits their purpose, include men who engage in non-abusive conflict tactics as being abusive. And just as important is the fact that the motivational dynamic is rarely asked and hence rarely answered when using the CTS scale.

No one, not the most ardent fundamental feminist or male chauvinist, can argue with any degree of reason or certainty that some of this self reported behavior may have been motivated by an isolated argument, anger, jealousy or revenge for some perceived prior behavior and/or fueled by an excessive use of alcohol or drugs.

Information Concerning the Documentation of Numbers.

Hugh Barlow and David Kauzlarich note in, Introduction to Criminology, that studies document women are three times more likely than men to feel unsafe in their own neighborhood at night. They note that while elderly women are the most fearful they are the least victimized. Young men are least afraid yet they are victimized most. While men suffer from crime more than women, women report crime more than men http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/abstract/rcp00.htm. Violent crimes are more likely to be reported if they involve female victims, weapons, or if they result in injury.

The findings from the National Violence Against Women Survey document that women are significantly more likely than men to report being victimized by an intimate partner. The findings also document that the police are significantly more likely to take a report or make an arrest if the victim was female.

Conclusion

The National Violence Against Women Survey clearly and unequivocally documents that victimization occurs and has serious consequences for both men and women. Any survey that documents only the victimization of women and excludes men is only going to provide half an answer. Most of our public policy makers seem oblivious, I’m not sure how, to the fact that the Violence Against Women Act has created “biased” intervention or prevention efforts.

It is important to ask not only if violent victimization have occurred but it’s just as important to ask who initiated the violence by striking the first blow. Whoever was responsible for the survey methods in the National Violence Against Women Survey clearly and purposefully avoided asking this fundamental and vitally important question. What could be the reason they purposely excluded this question?   

Each and every intimate partner regardless of age, gender, or sexual orientation has engaged, at least once in their life time, in verbal arguments, screamed at each other, cursed, engaged in some type of put down, insult, etc. Documenting all of the above events as “domestic violence” is a travesty of epic proportions. Not distinguishing between violence, abuse, or battering, and ignoring who strikes the first physical blow, is to engage in the theatre of the absurd and is insulting and can be dangerous to the many real victims of domestic violence.