I watched this video:
which prompted me to look it up on Google where I found an article called "What's Wrong with the Violence Against Women Act?"
I just want to quote a section from the Time's article:
When Congress passed the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) in 1994, it was a landmark in federally recognizing the scourge of domestic violence. It also brought about a very practical change, meant to address the problem of cops treating such cases as private family matters instead of serious crimes.My emphasis; this just hits a nerve. I would guess that a majority of domestic violence cases are men abusing women. If it's not true, I apologize. However, a number of them have been constructed as such. The idea that cops would look at a domestic violence case and not look into it further because it's a "private family matter" is so fucked.
It just strikes me as a view that a man, head of household, husband, earner, has a right outside the law to abuse his family because... they're his property? Children and women have been and still are purchasable and trade-able, and for a long time men were the only people who could actually own anything. Unfortunate that these things still pervade our culture.
The vast majority are still men abusing women. Lest we forget, however, there are cases of women abusing men, and mutual abuse. They aren't as common, but I've been in that scenario before. Too many people ignore all the angles, and this will cost us. It should NOT be ok for anyone to abuse anyone, despite sex, gender, age, etc.
ReplyDeleteThe way I figure it is that if the police are called out, if a person files a complaint for assault, or if a cop can clearly see that a person is beaten, then they are obligated to at least try to assist the victim, male or female or whatever. It seems like a lot less common sense (common decency) is floating around than there should be.
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