Domestic Violence Awareness Month 2008 — California Leads the Way
The saying “As goes California, so goes the Nation,†never has been more true than for Domestic Violence Awareness Month 2008. On October 14, the California courts led the nation in bringing public awareness to a previously hidden Domestic Violence issue — that of battered men — and subsequently ruled that battered men deserve equal protection under the law.
Facing squarely the reality of Domestic Violence against men, the California Court of Appeals ruled that: “We find the gender-based classifications in the challenged statutes that provide programs for victims of domestic violence violate equal protection. We find male victims of domestic violence are similarly situated to female victims for purposes of the statutory programs and no compelling state interest justifies the gender classification. We reform the affected statutes by invalidating the exemption of males and extending the statutory benefits to men, whom the Legislature improperly excluded.†(page 2).
The California court ruling was based, in part, on empirical research undertaken by hundreds of social scientists who have helped to provide “the rest of the story.†This research has demonstrated that both men and women initiate Domestic Violence at roughly equal rates with some recent studies suggesting that the initiation rates for girls and women may be increasing. Furthermore, approximately 40% of the physically harmed victims of Domestic Violence are men.
The implications of the California Appellate Court ruling are clear, compelling, and require a fundamental revision of all State and Federal Domestic Violence legislation to fully recognize the need for equal treatment of battered men under the law. It is particularly important to revise the federal Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) and replace it with a Domestic Violence Act that stands in compliance with the California court ruling. By its name alone, the Violence Against Women Act now is both Unconstitutional and scientifically misleading.
Hopefully, the long-term impact of the California ruling will be to raise public and political awareness to the reality that Domestic Violence truly is an equal opportunity affliction. Since the Democratic Vice Presidential nominee Sen. Joe Biden both is the father of VAWA and a self-defined Constitutional scholar, let us hope that he will take advantage of the closing days of the campaign to propose a revision to VAWA along the lines of the California Appellate Court ruling. Voters should be listening for such a proposed revision.
Such an action also would be in the spirit of the words of Presidential candidate Sen. Obama* that: “…we must fight to bring domestic violence out of the darkness of isolation and back into the light of justice…†On October 14, 2008 the California courts ruled that justice must serve and protect both men and women.
May it continue to hold that: “As goes California, so goes the Nation.â€
Gordon E. Finley, Ph.D. is Professor of Psychology at Florida International University in Miami.
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* Circulated in a press release by NOW (National Organization For Women) PACs on 10/16/08.
| More from Gordon E. Finley, Ph.D.
Stumble It!
October 17th, 2008 at 12:34 pm
Gordon Finley wrote:
Unfortunately, the ruling did not acknowledge the similar rates of domestic violence victimization between male and female victims. Per page 12 of the ruling:
Rather than recognizing similar victimization rates between men and women, the court’s ruling recognized that the lower trial court had erred when it declared that no particular man was eligible for domestic violence victim services, because he was a member of a group (men) that was victimized less often than women as a group. The ruling did not recognize the significant level of victimization that male victims face.
According to the ruling (page 18):
The court asserted, on page 18, that there are fewer male victims. Not an equal, greater, or even similar number — but rather a lower number of male victims.
We have a long way to go before the extent of male victimization by domestic violence is acknowledged. I have created a Web site called DVStats.org for this purpose, making searchable the Fiebert compilation of research on domestic violence against males. Rather than pointing to a vast library of studies as one monolithic body of data, we need to be reading the individual studies and telling the world about them. If we don’t take the time to examine any particular study, then we can’t expect judges (or the culture at large) to do that either. Each study has specific findings, and we should be able to recognize how one study differs from another. We will be more credible and our arguments made more persuasive if we do.
DVStats.org recently instituted an RSS feed and e-mail subscription feature, so that the moment that any new study is added to the compendium of research, all subscribers instantly become notified (via e-mail, RSS, or even instant message). This way, we each have the means — as advocates for male victims — to stay on top of the most recent and cutting edge research. No longer to we need to pore over the entire Fiebert bibliography, eyes glazing over, trying to discern whether a new study has been added or not (in fact, the Fiebert bibliography lists studies in alphabetical order by author, making it exceedingly difficult to know what are the most recent additions to the list). The instant notification feature at DVStats.org changes all that, making each one of us capable of being lay-experts on the issue.
When we can show that we’ve read some of the research, and provide our hearers with the link to the actual online research article (which the Fiebert bibliography omits), our claim that males suffer at similar rates to female victims will become that much more believable and credible. Until then, we are at the mercy of appellate judges’ nebulous sense of fairness, parsing out the meaning of arcane terms such as “similarly situated.”
Let’s start doing our homework! And while we’re at it, in the ongoing legal battles that lay ahead, let’s donate money to organizations that carry the torch forward.
October 17th, 2008 at 6:01 pm
What would have happened if a Southern judge had ruled, during the civil rights era of the 60’s, that blacks are discriminated against (treated unequally), because they are not allowed to use the same restrooms and drinking fountains as whites, but then said “They don’t need equal access to white restrooms and drinking fountains, because statistically they don’t use white restrooms and drinking fountains at the same rate as whites?”
How corrupt and/or stupid are these California appeals court judges? The reason men are not reflected in the domestic violence shelter statistics, and the crime statistics, is that the entire gender feminist dominated, domestic violence industry is corrupt to the core, and has been denying men access to shelter and services. Duh! Gender feminists have been training police, prosecutors and judges, etc. to discriminate against men (treat them unequally).
http://tinyurl.com/6z3fko
The statistics used by the appeals court “injustices” reflect that corruption and are thereby grossly unreliable.
As pointed out in a just released NCFM press release:
“Men are less likely than women to report domestic violence, which makes crime-based statistics unreliable. Randomized sociological surveys worldwide, however, consistently show women initiate domestic violence at least as often as men, and men suffer about a third of physical injuries. California State Long Beach Professor Martin Fiebert summarizes over 200 of these studies in an online bibliography. The 50/50 result remains even when self-defense is accounted for.”
What will it take for California’s black robed fools to stop behaving like Stalinist tyrants promoting gender Jim Crow laws?
October 17th, 2008 at 7:13 pm
“Must arrest” laws throw off the statistics. Many locations have “must arrest” and “no drop” laws. There is strong reason to believe that in many of these locations, it is the man that must be arrested since law enforcement agencies get funding from the Violence Against Women Act if a man is arrested for domestic violence. This means the man is arrested even if he is the only victim. Often the D.A. counters that they had a conviction or that he admitted guilt but lets look at this a little closer.
When a man is arrested for domestic violence for the first offense, he is often given the chance to go to an “anti-violence” or a “batter’s class and upon “successful completion” completion of this class, the charges will be dropped. (this is sort of like going to traffic safety class to get a speeding ticket dismissed) however as part of the treatment program for this class the man has to sign a treatment plan. In this plan is an admission of guilt. Without thinking, the plan is signed since not doing so will result in not completing the course and thus he would be tried for domestic violence. However in doing so, he now as a record of domestic violence and the next time police are called, this will come back to haunt him.
There are other ways the “must arrest” laws distort the statistics If we take 100 men and 100 women and out of this, 50 men AND 50 women are abusive to their spouse, and if each were arrested, the statistics would show that the rate if 50%. Now suppose that with “must arrest” laws that out of the 50 women that battered their husband or boyfriend, “he” was arrested in 40 of these cases. Now we have 50 abusive men being arrested, but we have 40 male “victims” being arrested as well as 10 of the women that were abusive being arrested. But now when we look at the statistics we now find that 90% of the abusers were MEN…and only 10% were women although in reality the rate was still 50%.
http://www.shatterdmen.com/pagetwo.htm
October 18th, 2008 at 3:08 pm
The whole “domestic violence fraud” needs to be gotten rid of. We just need to go back to the days when the state understood its lawful role, ie keep order, not do micro managing of society. In those days, if you attacked, ie physically struck someone, that person could file assault and battery charges, there was no need and no desire for the state to interfer and yes that is what the state now does, interfer.
There are two very good reasons for keeping the state out of these matters. First, when the state interfers, it takes a side and while this might “feel good” it totally screws up the due process requirements of the common law system we have. When one side has all the resources, women have all these programs to help them and men have virtually nothing, it becomes easy to have miscarriages of justice, which leads to the second reason the state should stay out of such cases.
The state only wants to be involved for one reason, it gets money, power and control. Which adds to and exacerbates the number of miscarriages of justice. In many so called domestic violence cases, it is simply an argument that escalated to a physical altercation. It is NOT the atempt by the man to lord over the woman. In those cases , the state needs to stay the hell out of the way.
The only reason the “feminazi’s want this state involvement is to get an advantage. They hate men and are in rebellion against men and they don’t give a damn if noone else wants to be part of their twisted little plan. They and the “power mad” state don’t give a rats ass whose rights they violate, particularly the rights of fathers and men. The state, by and large needs to stay out. Don’t try to give men, what women already have, take away what the women should have never had in the first place, ie superior status. Common sense and good judgment say don’t involve the state in families if you want to keep them together and you want peace.
November 13th, 2008 at 10:24 pm
All young men should seriously consider getting their college degree at Florida International University. There is no other university where men won’t be beaten up by feminists. Lets fill this university up, and let other universities go begging for students.
April 29th, 2009 at 10:24 pm
Men do not really have any idea what domestic violence is because they perpetrate it. So if a few of them get beat up by thier homosexual lovers along the way, why should anyone care? Its never right to be abused and women have been putting up with it forever. Now they want to jump on the band wagon? I'm not buying it. Willing to bet that most of the victims in here are actually perpetrators who have found a way to voice thier frustration at finally being stopped.
September 15th, 2009 at 1:03 am
woman Says: “Men do not really have any idea what domestic violence is because they perpetrate it. So if a few of them get beat up by thier homosexual lovers along the way, why should anyone care? Its never right to be abused and women have been putting up with it forever. Now they want to jump on the band wagon? I’m not buying it. Willing to bet that most of the victims in here are actually perpetrators who have found a way to voice thier frustration at finally being stopped.”
And there you have it folks. This is WHY abused men are ignored.
TMOTS
October 18th, 2009 at 9:00 am
No TMOT’s that not why battered men are ignored, once again it goes back to the “master plan” of the criminals who run this country.
Create discord, create envy and make one side or the other feel like they are special and somehow entitled to “special rights”and that everyone else is entitled to nothing, not even basic human rights, which is what they are doing to men.
This “woman” character is atypical, man bad woman good, attack a women get life in the “electric chair” if it a man doing it and get petted on the head if a woman attacks a man. The mans rights are disreguarded, because the idiots who run this country know, men are not as readily manipulated and controlable as women are. Women are flighty and emotional and can be easily controlled. But men are a lot more logical and stable, so we have to be knocked down and disenfranchised, so we can’t stop them. But the good news is , we will stop them and soon!
October 27th, 2009 at 6:09 am
Cowardly Anonymous Woman,
You make attacks on all men and yet hide….You are a bully and a hypocrite.