Not all intimate partner violence is the same. Many people think of coercive controlling batterers when they think of domestic violence. This is almost exclusively perpetrated by men. But "battering" is not the most common form of IPV. Situational couples (aka conflict instigated) IPV is the most common type in the USA. These are couples who get violent when they get in arguments. Situational couples IPV is instigated more or less equally by males or females. There is a spike with teenage girls as instigators.
Cultural specific IPV has many dimensions around the world. This makes it much harder to apply our Western lens to any specific situation. Chris From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Dr. Ernie Prabhakar Sent: Tuesday, March 27, 2012 2:18 PM To: [email protected] Cc: [email protected] Subject: Re: [RC] NYTimes: When Home Is No Refuge for Women Hi Billy, I don't have any data. But I do know that in many subcultures, a husband slapping a wife is considered as normal as a parent spanking a child (and of course, vice versa in Northern Europe). So, I could easily believe that 40% of Indian Households engage in behavior that would qualify in the West as spousal abuse; whether it has the same destructive connotations as it would in the West is a much more difficult question. If you include various forms of emotional abuse -- especially from in-laws -- the number might even be higher... -- Ernie P. On Mar 27, 2012, at 1:12 PM, [email protected] wrote: Chris : Maybe Ernie can shed some light on this. However, I am suspicious about the data. 40 % seems to be exaggerated, especially since the article admits that many hospitals --obviously relevant to the question of effects of domestic violence-- have poor records and don't systematically collect such information. Where, then, are the figures coming from ? IF the answer is "women's empowerment groups" then you can count on inflated numbers. This is not to say that there isn't a serious problem. But it would be plenty serious if the rate was "only" 10 % or 15 %. But 40 % really seems to me to be off the charts. Reason for my skepticism is the way that American feminist groups habitually exaggerate similar numbers here, like the false claim that one out of three US women are rape victims --or victims of attempted rape-- at some point in their lives. Christina Hoff Summers exploded that claim back in the 90s as seriously flawed. When a writer exaggerates for effect that is one thing ; when a policy influencing organization does it, things may be very serious and rise to the level of fraud. Where a higher than normal domestic violence rate is verified from anecdotal evidence, but a lot of it, is among Muslim families. Yet the article only mentions Hindu names. Uhhhh, someone is trying to mess with readers' heads. Still, to use the example of acid attacks on women, which I once looked into, there definitely is a problem in India outside of the Muslim community. Clearly the problem is much worse among Muslims but it definitely exists among some Hindus. Anyway, Ernie ought to have access to evidence on the subject. Billy =========================================== 3/27/2012 9:25:18 A.M. Pacific Daylight Time, [email protected] writes: Since India gets mentioned here from time to time, I thought you might be interested in this from another discussion group of mine that deals with family and divorce issues. The attorney who sent this helped a female friend of ours from India work out a difficult situation with her ex-husband who had mental health problems. -------------- A significant number of my international family law cases involve DV. Globalization requires that family law professionals understand what happens in other cultures in order to understand the experience and expectations of the families we work with. >From The New York Times: THE FEMALE FACTOR: When Home Is No Refuge for Women As more Indian women share their experiences, it is clear how widespread domestic violence is, cutting across community, caste and economic lines. But India has begun to acknowledge the problem. http://nyti.ms/GUKMGz -- Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community <[email protected]> Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/RadicalCentrism Radical Centrism website and blog: http://RadicalCentrism.org <http://radicalcentrism.org/> -- Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community <[email protected]> Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/RadicalCentrism Radical Centrism website and blog: http://RadicalCentrism.org <http://RadicalCentrism.org/> -- Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community <[email protected]> Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/RadicalCentrism Radical Centrism website and blog: http://RadicalCentrism.org -- Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community <[email protected]> Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/RadicalCentrism Radical Centrism website and blog: http://RadicalCentrism.org
