Usual Suspect, I was thinking of the supporters of the status quo of DV campaigns. Those who think that by addressing all family violence we are somehow trying to hide violence against women. Those who think the needs of men with violent spouses are so unimportant that the risk of any genuine acknowledgement of female initiated violence will distract from the needs of female victims and should be surpressed.

R0bert

JamesH

‘…so basically what the feminists are saying is that DV by men is more serious than DV by women.’

I don't know about 'more serious' - certainly more dangerous. Feminists are simply citing what statisticians, police, social workers, the medical profession and anyone working in the DV field freely and openly state in their records and research data.

Richard J. Gelles – Mr Conflicts Tactics Scale himself – says the same thing regarding the many misinterpretations of his own (deeply flawed) research. I quote:

‘The statement that men and women hit one another in roughly equal numbers is true [sic], however, it cannot be made in a vacuum without the qualifiers that a) women are seriously injured at seven times the rate of men and b) that women are killed by partners at more than two times the rate of men.’ http://thesafetyzone.org/everyone/gelles.html

Oh … and the essay title containing the above quote is: ‘Not a Level Playing Field’.

R0bert

If by ‘supporters of the status quo of DV campaigns’, you are referring to campaigns like Australia Says No, then they are not worth the money spent on them. The Howard government used this campaign merely to distract from its appalling record of cuts to women’s DV protection funding (in fact, ALL women’s advocacy funding).

Conservative governments the world over are basically uninterested in DV/GV, except as a criminal issue. They rely on the traditional belief that men can be blamed and shamed into ‘respecting’ women. This maintains the paradigm that it’s men who call the shots on DV/GV. The empowering of women is not a part of any conservative political agenda.

The progressive viewpoint – the one advocated by feminists – is that only by addressing the two main underlying causes of GV/DV – the glamorisation of (particularly male) violence and women’s financial dependence on men – can any long-term solutions be found.

Because women are by far the greater victims of GV/DV, they are much more visible and vocal on the issue. If you wish to interpret this as ‘suppression’, then you are entirely missing the point.

<Feminists are simply citing what statisticians, police, social workers, the medical profession and anyone working in the DV field freely and openly state in their records and research data. >

Are they really?

Yet feminists have threatened Gelles, Straus, Erin Pizzey, Steinmentz and according to other reports I have read, for many DV researchers if they want money for their research it must be male on female violence, there is no money for researching female on male violence.

Is not feminist research deeply flawed when it only asks questions from the position of female=victim and male=perpetrator.

Firstly as I said the definition of DV is expanded from just physical violence, to include behaviours such as emotional manipulation etc, and as you have just shown SJF once the definition has been expanded, you then fall back onto the position of physical violence.

So if the strict definition of physical violence and a pattern of violence (not just one off incidinces) then the percentage of women esperiencing Dv falls rather dramatically.

Also drug and alcohol use and abuse are very big contributitors to violence whether it is on the street or in the home.

SJF:"women are by far the greater victims of GV/DV"

More "telling lies for women" from the sideline-runner. You go grrrl.

SJF:"‘The statement that men and women hit one another in roughly equal numbers is true [sic], however, it cannot be made in a vacuum without the qualifiers that a) women are seriously injured at seven times the rate of men and b) that women are killed by partners at more than two times the rate of men.’ http://thesafetyzone.org/everyone/gelles.html"

No one disputes that women are injured more frequently when they fight with men, just as children are injured more frequently when they fight with their mothers. What the sensible posters here grasped a long time ago is that the violence of women is often directly contributory to the violence of men. Claiming pure victime status for women, while maintaining full culpability for men is, therefore, not merely dishonest, but insulting to both genders and counterproductive if your aim is to reduce injuries to women. Of course, reducing injuries usually comes a poor second to ensuring on-going funding, doesn't it? After all, where would all those embittered, entitled "victims" get their wages if "telling lies for women" wasn't Government funded?

Sometimes we all have to modify our expectations of what we're entitled to do and that includes the 1/3 of girls who regard it as reasonable to be able to hit boys.

"Telling lies for women" the way you do doesn't add to the discussion or assist in arriving at an equitable and workable solution.

JamesH

'Is not feminist research deeply flawed when it only asks questions from the position of female=victim and male=perpetrator.'

This deceitful remark inadvertantly reveals the sense of male supremacy underlying all anti-feminist rhetoric.

So ... research on heterosexual violence against homsexuals is 'deeply flawed' because it doesn't give more priority to homosexual violence against heterosexuals. Ditto - research on White Australia's shabby treatment of Aboriginal people is deeply flawed because it doesn't give more priority to Aboriginal people's shabby treatment of white Australians. And research on adult violence against children is deeply flawed because it doesn't give more priority to children's violence against adults.

I suggest that the only feminist research that you would NOT consider 'deeply flawed' is the kind that puts men at the centre of every woman's universe.

Antiseptic

'"Telling lies for women" the way you do doesn't add to the discussion or assist in arriving at an equitable and workable solution.'

This says far more about you than it does about me or about the topic.

Antiseptic/JamesH

It's impossible to adequately respond to your posts to me. Not only are they too belligerent to rationally engage with, they contain far too much second-guessing and projected deceit - i.e. using deceitful arguments to illustrate the supposed deceit of an argument I never made in the first place.

I don't expect you to even remotely understand what I am talking about. I write this more for the sake of others reading it.

SJF - thank you for your posts and especially the last one.

I have been wondering whether responding is worth my time and effort.

I read MRA sites at length as well as all the credible information available to anyone who has an interest in this topic and in social justice. The fellows here are too lazy or too content in their prejudices and hatreds to do as much. I really don't think it's just a lack of intelligence.

They just again state the same malicious lies they started with that are intended to maintain and justify abuse supportive attitudes and beliefs.

I suggest that for now they address any further 'questions' (that they obviously don't want answered) to the WRC Blog:

http://whiteribbonday.wordpress.com/