Its interesting how a matter of violence gets politicised for the purpose of pushing gender inspired political agenda. In my view, that is a very anti-human basis on which to proceed.

Why do women have such a hard time challenging their own gender stereotyping of men as potential victims of female aggression and of women as aggressors? It happens, we know it does, we can see it. We can quibble over degree for the sake of avoiding unpalatable truths, but that just perpetuates it and drives it deeper.

l can tell you of one of those pesky anectodes that the political stasticians despise. A male friend was living with his partner and she was very unbalanced. He was usually quite paranoid around her whilst at home, knowing that she could lash out at any time. He routinely experienced physical violence at her hand, often involving a weapon. It all came to a head when he was watching tv and she snuk on him from behind and hit him over the back of the head with a large pot and stabbed him in the shoulder blade with a steak knife. He experienced the debilitation of dealing with the remanants of concusion for many months. When it happened he called the police, who intervened to his benefit. They emplored him to press charges but he refused because he didn't want the hassle nor the embarassment of owning up, publicly, to being beaten up 'by a chick' (in his words). The police were not impressed with his stance, but they couldn't do anything about it.

l doubt that this is a rare occurence. He told me very casually, over a beer at the local, and he was very dismissive about it. Basically, he laughed it off.

That, to my mind, is the essence of this thing... challenging our own prejudice regarding gender stereotypes and the attendant consequences for how people are treated.

I don't know about you others,
but I am really happy that this forum has finally began to share real experiences and support of men who are battling with DV and the implications of societal discrimination.

We had to push through a mine field of male-bashing just to have our voices heard - and that pretty well sums up what the research says.

Some are beginning to ask ... Why?

The following research paper gives a good account of the history of DV research and its gender blinded policy. It is American but similar applies to Oz.

"Disabusing the Definition of Domestic Abuse: How women batter men and the role of the feminist state"
Linda Kelly (I love the female researchers)

download
http://www.law.fsu.edu/journals/lawreview/downloads/304/kelly.pdf

For some Australian research on it, try to find

"he silence of the screams:
female violence in intimate relationships"

Some objectivity please.
Violence rarely occurs in a vacuum. None of us live in one.
Violent or abusive behaviour which is non-physical can be as damaging as physical violence and also as powerful....viz Gandhi. That's why they had the ducking stool and the bridle in the Middle Ages. Women drink too. In vino veritas.
Insensitive, immature expectations on an exhausted, vulnerable spouse can be soul destroying.
Women raise most boys and spend most time with them, including teachers (male teachers are an endangered species).
Most boys become men.
Young men have a much higher suicide rate than young girls.
Boys have more learning problems at school.
It is not acceptable for men to cry...viz our politicians.
Most poets and chefs are male.
Men die younger than womeen and far more die violent deaths including accidents in the work place.
The family court system and Child Support arrangements still disadvantage men.
65% of men have no contact with their children 5 years after separation from their spouses.
Men like children.
Not all men are pedophiles. My Scout Master was not.
Role models come from watching adults.
Sexual abuse in childhood begets borderline the personality disorder in women especially and mental disturbance in men.
Sexual abuse occurs in about 1 in 4 girls before they are women...how many men?
He who is without sin, cast the first stone.
Let us all be a bit more honest and objective.
In circula circulorum.

I hasten to add, some of the common undiagnosed causes of domestic violence which are especially in males:
depression, sleep deprivation from shift work, sleep apnoea and a wide range of other sleep disorders, socially encouraged alcohol abuse as well as anxiety disorders to name but a few. To overlook the underlying pathology is to take an indifferent look at this problem. Add to this financial and other societal expectations and there is a recipe for a social disaster which will worsen as the conventional family disintegrates.
What proportion of men under 50 visit a family doctor regularly? What proportion of females under this age group do? The ratio is abut ten to one. Ask the HIC.

Odysseus,
I would agree that DV is often a symptom of something else, but it is normally studied and researched very superficially because so many of the people who research it are feminists who will research DV according to feminist dogma and notions of patriarchy, or men trying to oppress women etc

For men, DV can be related to sleep disorders or general levels of stress as you have pointed out, although this can occur in women also, together with known increases in DV that are associated with Pre Menstrual Tension, Post Natal Depression, Menopause, Hysterectomy, depression, side effects of depression medication etc.

The types of relationships are also important, with the lowest rates of DV and child abuse occurring in dual-parent married families.

In case nobody has noticed there has still been no attempt to provide details of research which
- supports the view that men are responsible for the overwhelming majority of DV and or child abuse (as some posters claim)
- has clear indications that it has attempted to address gender bias in the data collection methods (interviewing equal numbers of males and females. Not doing the collection in conjunction with a TV campaign showing all male perpetrators/female victim's etc.)
- shows in it's analysis that there has been a genuine attempt to avoid gender bias. The same kinds of questions/explanations are asked/given for issues impacting on each gender. That is probably not well phrased but some of the previous posts discuss the kind of issues involved.

My summary of research which I have seen which appears to try and be independant is
- DV is not significantly genderised. When collection bias is removed then physical DV of similar intensities is reported by both men and women in about the same numbers.
- There appears to have been little serious work on non physical DV. We don't know much about the impacts of nagging, putdowns, financial pressure, deprivation etc. We also don't know much about how frequent it is or how severe.
- Some evidence exists to suggest that the extreme end of physical DV may involve an over-representation of women. The bit where the additional strength may become a significant factor.
- Women commit more substantiated abuse and neglect of children than men however this may be largely accounted for by the difference in time spent with children.

My own observations suggest that many women still believe that it is OK to hit a man for what they regard as inappropriate behaviour (lewd comments, inappropriate touching, coming home late from the pub etc).

R0bert