I've been looking for the Straus article I mentioned earlier (not found yet) but did find (or revisit) other materials.

One item was a summary page. I don't know the agenda or credibity of the author but the items which I was familiar with appeared to be fairly represented so my impression is that the summary is worth considering.

http://johnhamel.net/family_v/fam_v_research/fam_v_res_pdf/briefsumgeninclresearch.pdf

I found an interesting paper at http://www.law.ku.edu/journal/articles/v12n2/detschelt.pdf - I didn't always like the authors phrasing but on balance a helpful coverage of the issue.

A paper discussing criticism of CTS (Conflict Tactics Scales) http://pubpages.unh.edu/~mas2/CTS4.pdf I've not read much of this yet but it may be useful to understand the strength and weaknesses of CTS.

An article by Erin Pizzey which touches on abuse from extremist gender feminists. Not a neutral site unfortunately so take it as you find it. http://www.fathersforlife.org/pizzey/failfamt.htm

The site will annoy some but there are interesting resources at http://www.mediaradar.org/index.php .
"R.A.D.A.R. – Respecting Accuracy in Domestic Abuse Reporting – is a non-profit, non-partisan organization of men and women working to improve the effectiveness of our nation's approach to solving domestic violence. "

R0ber

R0bert

Hope it’s not too late to respond here. Thanks for the links and I'll certainly try to read them. If you don't mind, however, I'll pass on Erin Pizzey, though. I can't bear the woman!

Having said that, here is one of several links that I found, which criticises Murray Straus’ CTS research in particular, and CTS in general:

‘The Myth of Sexual Symmetry in Marital Violence’, R. Dobash, R. E. Dobash, M. Wilson and M. Daly
http://72.14.205.104/search?q=cache:H-8Qjl6SsSkJ:psych.mcmaster.ca/dalywilson/sexual_symmetry_myth.pdf+The+myth+of+Sexual+Symmetry+in+Marital+Violence+Dobash+Wilson+Daly&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&gl=au

There is a section on p. 9 of the above article, which describes the findings of a research team who has worked with Straus at other times (Gelles and Harrop, 1991). They used CTS to do a survey on step-parent versus birth parent child abuse. In most countries statistics indicate that step-parents are much more likely to commit fatal or sub-lethal violence on children than are birth parents, by up to as much as 100:1. However, using the CTS method, Gelles and Harrop were unable to detect any difference in self-reports of violence by step-parents or birth parents.

If CTS is able to create a false symmetry between step-parent and birth-parent child abuse, then how accurate can it be in determining domestic violence by gender? I know I go on a bit about anti-feminism, but I suspect that CTS research has been allowed to continue on well after it's been largely discredited because the anti-feminism lobby has been so powerful over the last two decades.

MLK

"In most countries statistics indicate that step-parents are much more likely to commit fatal or sub-lethal violence on children than are birth parents, by up to as much as 100:1."

That does not gell with what I've seen of the Substantiated abuse and neglect stats (although they tend to dodge the issue of who did the abuse by talking in terms of family type) nor with the child death studies I've seen.

From the Abused Child Trust website http://www.abusedchildtrust.com.au/facts.htm
- ** -
Who perpetrates child abuse?
- 94% of abused children in Queensland are harmed by someone they know and trust.
- 85% of abused children in Queensland are harmed by their natural parent.

Family types involved in substantiated abuse and neglect
27% two parent (natural families)
23% two parent (other families)
37% single female parent families
5% single male parent families
- ** -
Single parent families are a significantly proportionally higher risk than either the two parent (natural or step). Note I'm a single male parent, the rate for my type of household is second worst on the list.

From one of the NSW Child Death Review Team reports http://www.health.nsw.gov.au/public-health/health-promotion/injury-prevention/at-risk-groups/cdrt-report.pdf (page 78)
- ** -
The seven fatal abuse deaths were caused by assault involving beating, burning, suffocation, shaking and battering of the children while being cared for by their mother and father (n=3) or their mother and her boyfriend (n=3). One child was being cared for by a paternal cousin and his partner. One of the fatal incidents involved the death of two brothers and their mother were murdered by their father.

Eleven deaths were suspicious of abuse and neglect but not clearly the result of abuse or neglect.
These deaths included:
- sleep incidents (n=7)
- drowning (n=1)
- strangulation (n=1)
- choking (n=1)
- suffocation (n=1).
In all of these 11 suspicious deaths, the carers at the time of death were the child’s parent(s)(n=10) or a step-parent (n=1, a step-father)
- ** -
I'll provide additional comment in a follow up post.

R0bert

It is important when you look at the figures that you also have the socio-economic backgrounds of figures and facts.

This would then relate it back to non-genderisation but deal with importance of dealing with backgrounds, family history, traditions/beliefs and other important factors that also cause physical/emotional abuse, sexual molestation, rage abuse and neglect of all basics of normal human growth.

Another paper now removed from the site had an interesting table. I’ve posted stats from it previously. Sorry about the formatting, I don't know how to get OLO to let me lay a table out. There are also entries for non family suspects but they have limited relevance to this discussion.

http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=3268#5666
Table 4.3 (page 63) Suspect’s relationship to child by fatal assault group.

Suspects | Non-Accidental injury | Mental illness | Family breakdown |Teenagers | Total
Biological mother only | 3 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 7
Biological father only | 6 | 0 | 5 | 0 | 11
Mother and father | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3
Mother and male de facto | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2
Male de facto only | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 4
Foster mother | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1
Male relative | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1

My impression is that step fathers are overepresented in child sexual abuse but in other aspects of child abuse the difference is not overly significant.

CTS is being refined, it has weaknesses but it would appear to be a far more reliable instrument than the "make the rules to suit the outcome you want" approach used by those doing advocacy for the myth that males are responsible for the overwhelming majority of DV and child abuse. I've yet to see one of those detailing the flaws of CTS making any effort to point out the flaws in the alternatives.

I take your point about Erin, you may not like Radar much either. I'm not much of a fan of the style but they do reference some good material.

R0bert

MLK,
It is very difficult to understand how there is so much gender violence, when the greatest problem that couples are reporting, is not having enough time to spend with each other, and the least likely problem is violence.

I think most of the gender violence and mistreatment of a gender is occurring in feminist literature.