Is Domestic violence always domestic violence?

Methodological flaws

The Conflict Tactics Scale (CTS) has three key flaws as a way of measuring violence. Firstly, it leaves out important forms of violence, such as sexual assault, choking, suffocating, scratching, stalking, and marital murder. Most importantly, CTS studies exclude incidents of violence that occur after separation and divorce. Yet Australian data, e.g. from the Women's Safety Survey shows that women are as likely to experience violence by previous partners as by current partners [Australian Bureau of Statistics, 1996: 8]. And that it is the time around and after separation which is most dangerous for women. International data shows similar patterns. For example, the U.S. Department of Justice reports that 75.9 percent of spouse-on-spouse assaults occurred after separation or divorce, with a male perpetrator 93.3 percent of the time [U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, Family Violence April 1984, p. 4].

Conflicting evidence

To make the fifty/fifty claim about husband battering, men's rights and fathers' rights advocates must also ignore or dismiss a mountain of conflicting evidence, from crime victimisation surveys of the population, numerous studies using methodologies other than the Conflict Tactics Scale, calls made to domestic violence centres and services, hospital statistics on how people were injured, and applications for intervention orders.

This massive body of evidence continues to show that men are more often the perpetrators of domestic violence than are women, that women are more often the victims of domestic violence than are men, and that when boys and men are the victims of violence this is usually violence by other boys and men.

Anne Ferrante et.al's exploration of all sources of data on domestic violence in Australian finds the consistent result that females are 88-92 percent of victims in most sources [Ferrante et.al, 1996: 104].

Of all the forms of violence to which adult men are subject, only a very small proportion of this is represented by domestic violence. From police records, domestic violence accounted for 13.6 percent of all forms of violence against women, but only 1.3 percent of violence against men. While from victimisation surveys, one-third of violence against women was domestic, versus less than 1 percent of violence against men. (The reason for the lower percentage of domestic incidents among the police statistics is that women are less likely to report a domestic than a non-domestic incident [Ferrante et.al, 1996: 104]. Ferrante et.al define 'domestic violence' as referring only to criminal violence inflicted by one partner by another, which occurs between partners and ex-partners including those in boy/girlfriend relationships [ibid: 3].)

Crime victimisation surveys in Australia reveal further aspects of the violence experienced by men, and how it differs from violence experienced by women. If we compare men's and women's experiences of personal attack, threats, and sexual assault, we find that incidents against men are far less likely than incidents against women to occur in the home (10 percent versus 43 percent), they are far more likely to involve strangers (75 percent versus 31 percent), and they are far less likely to involve partners or ex-partners (1 percent, versus one-third of female incidents) [Ferrante et.al, 1996: 56-61]

Some people claim that men are less likely than women to report domestic violence, out of shame or chivalry or the fear that they won't be believed. However, the available evidence finds instead that men are more likely to call the police, more likely to press charges and less likely to drop them [Schwartz, 1987; Rouse et.al; 1988; Kincaid; 1982].

A further reason why studies using the CTS and similar methods are unlikely to capture the true character of domestic violence is to do with the samples of such studies. Headey et.al acknowledge that their chosen method, a survey, may under-report extreme violence, and that some victims of extreme violence are in refuges and so not available to surveys [Headey et.al, 1999: 57, 61]. And that perpetrators and victims of severe violence may be less willing to admit what is going on that people in milder situations [ibid: 61]

Male victims of domestic violence deserve the same recognition, sympathy, support and services as do female victims. And they do not need to be 50 percent of the victims to deserve these [Orman, 1998].

There are facts and scientific results that contradict parts of the prevailing narrative. What do you do about that?

How much evidence do you need to change your mind, EhBeth?

Of course he is criticizing the CTS. The CTS didn't give him the results he wanted.

Did you read the latest article I posted that showed very good symmetry between self-reporting and partner-reporting?

The results show that 15 per cent of women (or about one in seven) and six per cent of men (or one in 16)
have experienced severely abusive behaviour of a physical, sexual or emotional nature from a partner at
some time in their lives.

Approximately 1.3 million women and 835,000 men are physically assaulted by an intimate partner annually in the United States.

Let's ask the question directly.

A person feels their intimate partner isn't listening. They get frustrated and they slap their partner in the face.

Is this always domestic violence?

It's an assault, and rude/violent. If a man, woman or grown clild slaps me, they better hope I don't get back up, or if I do, there are no baseball bats, golf club or cast iron skillet within my reach.

how many times 18 years old on have you thrown a drink, or anything else, at a guy in anger? I am pretty sure women are as rude and as violent as men are.

Child abuse was the single biggest determining factor for men and women becoming perpetrators or victims of either dating violence or stalking, Gover said. Even if one never personally experienced abuse, witnessing violence between one’s parents as a child increased the likelihood of stalking or being stalked as a young adult and it made girls more susceptible to becoming victims of dating violence when they grew up, she said.

The survey found that men and women who were abused as children were 43 percent more likely than their peers who were not mistreated to perpetrate physical violence and 51 percent more likely to be victims of physical violence in a dating relationship. Violent acts included kicking or slapping, pushing or shoving, punching or hitting with a hand or object, slamming someone against a wall and using force to make a partner have sex, she said.
http://news.ufl.edu/archive/2006/07/women-more-likely-to-be-perpetrators-of-abuse-as-well-as-victims.html

There is a narrative that pervades modern American society. It says that men are perpetrators of violence and that woman are victims of violence. This is almost a sacred belief. People who dare question it are attacked (as several of us on Able2Know know too well).

Any rational, scientific person has to make a choice. You either accept the prevailing narrative without questioning it, or you ask the questions honestly and choose to accept what the facts say.

Men in fathers' rights groups and men's rights groups have been claiming very loudly for a while now that domestic violence is a gender-equal or gender-neutral phenomenon - that men and women assault each other at equal rates and with equal effects. They claim that an epidemic of husband-battering is being ignored if not silenced...

To make the fifty/fifty claim about husband battering, men's rights and fathers' rights advocates must also ignore or dismiss a mountain of conflicting evidence, from crime victimisation surveys of the population, numerous studies using methodologies other than the Conflict Tactics Scale, calls made to domestic violence centres and services, hospital statistics on how people were injured, and applications for intervention orders.

This massive body of evidence continues to show that men are more often the perpetrators of domestic violence than are women, that women are more often the victims of domestic violence than are men, and that when boys and men are the victims of violence this is usually violence by other boys and men...

Some victims of domestic violence certainly are men. Some of these male victims have been subject to violence by other men - by brothers, fathers and step-fathers, male friends and acquaintances, and gay male partners. And some have been assaulted by women.

Male victims of domestic violence deserve the same recognition, sympathy, support and services as do female victims. And they do not need to be 50 percent of the victims to deserve these [Orman, 1998].

There are also some important differences between men's and women's experiences of domestic violence. When men are subject to domestic violence by women, the violence is not as prolonged and nor is it as extreme, they are far less likely to be injured, they are less likely to fear for their own safety, they are less likely to be subject to violence by their ex-partners, and they are likely to have more financial and social independence...

http://www.xyonline.net/content/claims-about-husband-battering