FREE ESSAY ON WOMEN - VICTIMS OF DOMESTIC VIOLENCE

WOMEN - VICTIMS OF DOMESTIC VIOLENCE

Throughout history many women have been victims of domestic violence.Society considered
men to be superior to women because men were always inpower economically, legally, and
religiously. This gave men the attitude thatwomen were inferior to them. Men harm their
wives by beating them physicallyand abusing them emotionally. Many of these women did not
report the abusethat they got from their spouses and families because they thought that
no onewould believe them. By becoming informed with the causes, effects, andtreatments of
domestic violence towards women in the United States, we canthen contain the damages that
are done to women or at least get the messageacross to other women that there is help to
overcome this tragic display of"affection"."Domestic violence is defined broadly as
violent acts carried out bypersons in a marital, sexual, parental, or care-giving role
toward others inreciprocal roles. 'Spousal abuse' may apply to couples engaged in a
sexualrelationship outside of marriage. And 'child abuse' may be penetrated byparents,
siblings, step-parents, or live-in boyfriends or girlfriends of the abusedchild's parent
(Rosen 3). Battered women are defined as women that have beenVictora 2physically or
emotionally abused by their husbands or families. These womensuffer from many different
types of domestic violence but the cause is just one-abuse.Abuse happens to many women
but most of the time it is not reported tothe police. "Abuse is an underreported crime,
it is underreported for tworeasons: a) it occurs in the privacy of one's home where there
are typically nowitnesses aside from family member's to detect and report it and b)
thoughviolence is by no means restricted to the lower classes, middle- and upper
classviolence is likely to go unreported to the police" (Stets 3).Why it is not reported
to the police could be the result of the emotions thatare building up inside the victim's
head. These women feel apprehensive inreporting the abuse because they are scared of what
the abuser will do to them.They were afraid because if he found out that they called the
police he mighthurt them or their children even more than he already did. The lower
classviolence is usually reported because they deal with social services more oftenthan
the middle and upper classes do. They are more educated in knowing thatpublic social
control agencies can help them get through the abuse. The middleand upper classes do not
usually report these acts of violence because theyprobably can afford a psychiatrists or
a marriage counselor.Abusive behavior begins in cycles and not everyday occurrences.
Thisabusive cycle is called the battering cycle and it contains three phases. The
firstphase is the tension-building phase, the second phase is the explosion or
acute3battering incident phase, and the third phase is the calm, loving phase. The
firstphase is when the woman notices the man building tension and becoming veryedgy which
causes minor violent episodes. Then the second phase beginswhen that tension builds up
higher and the man explodes in anger or in a blindrage that revolves into a severe
violent incident. And the third and final phase iswhen the man apologizes and tries to
win the woman back by showering herwith gifts. The abuse that women obtain towards them
can be experienced withvarious types of violence. Those types of violence can be anything
from a minorpush or shove to something major such as threatening with a weapon. "In
thepast, spousal abuse has been treated as a fairly simple set of violent behaviors".The
five most common types of domestic or spousal violence are: 1) when awoman is thrown
against an object, 2) when she is hit with the man's open handor fist, 3) when she is
pushed or shaken roughly, 4) when she is hit with anobject and the 5) and most deadly of
all is when a woman is threatened with aweapon (Rhodes 32). The causes of domestic
violence towards women in the United States aremany but the best known and lucid are the
male gender attitudes of beingnumber one. Men have the idea that women are worthless and
inferior to them.This concept degenerates women to a lower class or form of life that can
notallow men to see women as their equals. According to Violence Hits Home,"Karen Rosen
reported that men who abuse their spouses tend to have more4traditional gender-role
orientation than do non-batterers. She also suggeststhose abusive men tend to be more
controlling, dominating, and aggressive inorder to get their needs met" (85). These men
also believe that their abuse willhelp them to maintain power in their families. Rosen
also found out that"witnessing marital violence as a child was consistently related to
abuse in adultrelationships" in other words "Being a member of a violent family is how
eachgeneration learns to be violent" ( 85 ). When a child is exposed to everyday actsof
domestic violence then that child is brought up to believe that domesticviolence is
acceptable and can be done to their own spouses. Some men alsoabuse their wives in an act
of jealousy, anger, and aggression or poor impulsecontrol.Men usually tend to abuse women
more often when the women involvedare not their wives. Batterers are more likely to be
violent in non-familysituations than men that are married and do not batter their wives.
According toSandra Stith, a researcher of the causes for domestic violence, "Abusers
weremore likely than non-abusers to believe that wife-beating is not only justified
butacceptable" ( 86 ). This belief that violence is justified to maintain power
mayexplain why men may choose not to control their anger and frustrations. In anabusive
man's eyes violence is not only justified but also acceptable.