Shhh! It’s supposed to be a secret

Posted on November 18, 2007
Filed Under Domestic Violence | Leave a Comment

While it is suposedly part of the wisdom of our society that all men are abusers and rapists and dead beat dads etc… Even the good men out there just havn’t been caught yet. Right?

More and more evidence is emerging that the so called gentler sex is more prone to commiting domestic violence and abuse against their partners and their children. While a very small percentage of men do commit domestic violence against their families those involved in the men’s rights movement have long been aware of study after study that show that women are fare more likely to abuse not only the men in there lives but also their children. In fact children have much more to fear from their mothers than their fathers.

Women More Abusive Than Men, Study Shows

By Daniel Johnson Staff Writer

According to recent study by Professor Murray A. Straus of the University of New Hampshire, men are less physically abusive than previously thought. In fact, the examination showed that women were found to be more abusive in mutually abusive relationships.

The study, which observed 13,601 university students over a 12-month period, showed that nearly a third of both male and female students physically assaulted their partners over time. The study also shows that young men and women are particularly prone to aggression.

According to Marc E. Angelucci, Esq., president of the Los Angeles chapter of the National Coalition of Free Men, a non-profit group that examines sex discrimination affecting men and boys, the reason that these findings did not surface previously is that men often fail to report domestic abuse, making crime statistics unreliable. “Domestic violence is a human problem, not a gender problem. The only two big differences by gender are that men are less likely to report it, which makes crime data unreliably low, and that men inflict more physical injury on average,”

Angelucci said. However, while men may generally cause more injury to their partners, they can still be the recipients of abuse. “Men account for about one-third of injured victims, and children are damaged by witnessing it regardless of injury levels, so the injury argument is just another way of downplaying male victims and female violence,” Angelucci said.

According to Angelucci, laws based on gender are often disproportionately levied against men. “Men are systematically and institutionally discriminated against in fathers’ custody rights, domestic violence policies, military conscription, criminal sentencing, forced labor laws, reproductive and parenting rights, dating expectations and more,” Angelucci said.

However, others believe that these laws are in place to balance out persisting gender inequality. Hohyon Kim, a history major at UC Irvine, reacted to these findings, saying, “Overall, I’d say that women are still being discriminated against more overall than men. I think such laws exist to balance out [gender inequality].”

While the statistics on who is inflicting abuse in a relationship may have changed, the effects in maintaining such an abusive relationship can also affect an individual’s psychological state and biochemistry. According to Professor Zuzana Bic, an affiliated faculty member of the School of Ecology, being in an abusive relationship adds considerably to an individual’s stress level, regardless of gender. “The person … is blaming herself or himself for the problem, trying to prevent the situation that may cause the anger of the other person. So it’s like [a] constant, constant level of … feeling stress, so eventually this [person] is [in] the stage of … chronic stress,” Bic said.

According to Bic, whenever individuals are found to have chronic stress, they also have high levels of cortisol. Leaving the abusive relationship is healthier for the individual, and there is a biological reason behind it. Cortisol is the stress hormone found in the human body. At elevated levels, this hormone can have an adverse effect on a person’s biochemistry. Among the effects of increased cortisol levels are high blood pressure, insomnia, fatigue and headaches. High cortisol also increases the chance of developing diabetes, hypertension and obesity.

While it is evident that women suffer more physical abuse at the hands of men, women play a role in domestic violence and are involved in aggression as well. By realizing this, attention can be given to manage conflict for both men and women.

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