Women aren´t always the victims...

Gato_Solo

Out-freaking-standing OTC member
Women aren't always the victims...

October is domestic violence awareness month, and nothing cries out for awareness so much as the misconceptions that have been constructed around this issue by politically correct feminists. [/siz]

I was once beaten so badly by a boyfriend that I am legally blind in my right eye. In our culture, being a "victim" makes me an expert on domestic violence. The truth is quite different. Being on the wrong end of a hurled fist doesn't make me an expert on anything. The only insight I have on domestic violence comes from endlessly turning one question over and over again in my mind: Why did I stay?

Feminist explanations have been worse than useless. I was not oppressed by patriarchy — I was battered by one specific man. I didn't suffer from the Stockholm Syndrome — I simply refused to give up on a commitment.

The latter explanation I find particularly galling. To suggest an emotional interdependence between captor and captive is insulting. What I did was assume personal responsibility. I simply worked harder at the relationship and hoped for the best.

Clearly, I made a mistake.

Battered women are not generally portrayed as responsible adults with free will who strike a bad bargain or misjudge a situation. But that scenario is probably as common as any of the ones sketched by mainstream feminism. For example, a growing trend among Latinas, for whom family and children are often paramount, is for couples to work out their relationships, often with the aid of a priest or counselor. These women are choosing to put trust in their relationships and stay.

Another popular misconception about domestic violence is that men are always perpetrators and never victims. Yet the frequency with which women batter men is less and less disputed in political circles. There is just too much statistical evidence. According to the Justice Department's 1998 National Violence Against Women Survey, some 1.5 million women and more than 800,000 men are abused by an intimate every year.

Another report, Behind Closed Doors: Violence in American Families by researchers Murray A. Straus, Richard Gelles and Suzanne Steinmetz, caused a sensation in 1980 by reporting that men and women initiate physical abuse at about the same rate but the abuse of men is virtually ignored.

It was a sensation because it was, and still is, politically incorrect to view men as anything other than perpetrators. Steinmetz's earlier research, The Battered Husband Syndrome Victimology (1977-1978), found that wives initiated attacks as often as husbands do but caused less injury. The politically correct backlash against her was furious. Steinmetz eventually left her field, alleging, among other charges, that radical feminists had threatened to harm her children.

Erin Pizzey, who founded the first battered women's shelter in England, had much the same experience with her book Prone to Violence (1982) which provided anecdotal support for Steinmetz's findings. Pizzey was met "with a solid wall of feminist demonstrators. 'ALL MEN ARE RAPISTS,' 'ALL MEN ARE BATTERERS,' read the placards. The police insisted that I have an escort all round England for my book tour."

Pizzey argues that domestic violence, as an issue, has been highjacked by advocates who have a political and financial interest in denying that men are battered.

In Los Angeles County, Marc Angelucci is running up against those political and financial interests. Representing the activist group Stop Abuse For Everyone (SAFE), he is lobbying to establish the county's first battered shelter for "men-only."

In an interview, Angelucci described to me how the county maintains over twenty shelters for "women-only" at taxpayers' expense. Only one is willing to admit men as well, and it had to fight to do so. That shelter, in the remote desert community of Lancaster, is 80 miles from downtown L.A., a 3-hour drive. This makes it virtually inaccessible to men who must work or live in the city.

"What L.A. County is doing is discriminatory and illegal, and ... it is leaving itself vulnerable to a class-action lawsuit," the shelter's former director, Patricia Overberg, told the Los Angeles Daily News last month.

Angelucci determined to fight against the battering of men after witnessing the abuse of a close friend whose wife became violent when drunk. Despite frequent abuse, the friend didn't leave because he would have almost certainly lost custody of the three children. He did not fight back because he had been taught since infancy that men do not hit women. He did not call the police for fear of being arrested himself.

Or being laughed at. The stigma attached to battered men is so enormous that many researchers believe the best statistics we have badly understate the situation. Like women who were raped in the '50s, men who report spousal abuse should expect to be further humiliated by the authorities, family, "friends," and co-workers. The silencing shame these men feel is one of the reasons that feminism has been able to ignore them while claiming to care about "victims."

By focusing upon victimized men and by suggesting that women who stay may be making a choice rather than exhibiting a syndrome, I will be accused of trivializing domestic violence. But when such critics wake up tomorrow, they will view the world through two eyes. Because of domestic violence, I will never see the world completely again.

It is because I take domestic violence so seriously that I want October to bring "awareness" and not just politics as usual.

Source...

Also read this...
 
You bring this subject up alot--that women are looked at as victims more than men or that we don't get punished as much as men for the same wrongdoings. I'm starting to wonder if it's because you feel injustice has been served or because you're getting obsessed with it. I know there are a few things you feel strongly about but I'm starting to see a pattern.

Don't be a woman-hater. ;)
 
There is no doubt that men are abused along with women, but there is doubt that those women can cause great physical harm to 'their' men, as much as these men can cause damage to 'their' women. As much as I hate to draw this oh-so-old card, most men are stronger than most women. That being said, women have a very good grasp of the emotional realm, and can inflict great harm on the average man in this way. It is too bad that it is insisted that 'we all are equal' when, in fact, we are very different.
 
Yeah, I believe we are very different. Not only physically but emotionally as well. We weren't created equally and we will never be equal. We can try and act like we are, but you'll never convince me as such.
 
The day women can pee standing up and not get their shoes wet is the day we are equal. Why is different so bad? I believe in equal work for equal pay. If I have to lift a 75lb box, alone, over my head then so does she. I belive that a woman is capable of running a country or a company. We are not the same. We have different emotional needs. We have different physical needs. We have incredibly different physiological needs. We can never be equal, though we can be as qualified.


Interesting stat that failed to make the liberal media. Taking away the women who take time off for raising their kids & similar pursuits, woman make more money & climb the socio-economic ladder faster than men. It just so happens they were blessed (or cursed) with the ability to bring forth life & have a natural tendency to want to partake in that life. Don't blame the men for your ovaries.
 
It was much easier for men to go to work and women to raise the kids. Now we both have to work and we try to raise our kids. I'm about to have to go through that next year!
 
Originally posted by MitchSchaft
It was much easier for men to go to work and women to raise the kids. Now we both have to work and we try to raise our kids. I'm about to have to go through that next year!

Give up 2 new cars & the overpriced house & all the latest toys & that is not true. Make a decision that one of you stays home to raise your child & the other works to support the family. That's what we're doing. That's also why I soend so much time on the computer. I can't afford to do much else. If you have kids kids, why allow strangers to raise them?


ask whoever is most boisterous about both parents working-would you want your spouse to spend 8,10,12 hours a day-5 6 or 7 days a week with another person who tends to their every need? I certainly wouldn't.
 
Hey, I hear you man. My (soon to be next friday:)) wife said that when our kid is born (Nov. 11), if I lose my job she will let me stay home to take care of the kid. I am very tempted to quit my job because I feel that's how it should be. But I know we would need the money, but I want to raise my kid "proper", but hey we gotta pay the bills, but I don't want my kid to be a.... it goes back and forth and I hate it! Damn you women and your equal rights! lol
 
Mitch, since I don't know your specifics, I am talking to you in a philosophical point only...understood? good:D




BULLSHIT!!!!!!!
But I know we would need the money, but I want to raise my kid "proper", but hey we gotta pay the bills, but I don't want my kid to be a.... it goes back and forth and I hate it!

and more BULLSHIT!!!! Move to a shittier house, buy 2 1971 Gremlins. Eat a lot of Top Ramen. Turn off the extra cell phone. When you leave a room, turn off the lights. Don't run 6 computers 24/7. Wait for it on video. fuck, wait for it on ABC. sell the 6.2 million dollar wedding set. WHATEVER IT TAKES, somebody, strike that, A PARENT has to be with their child. If you don't want them, don't have them. What's more important, a Ferrari or a YOUR kid (that's a toughie). Struggle, eat like shit, live in "that" neighborhood, ride bikes.

NOTHING IS MORE IMPORTANT IN THIS WORLD THAN YOU SPENDING TIME WITH YOUR CHILD...NOTHING[/siz]

kids all over the world live in rags & eat yesterdays dinner for breakfast & lunch & you know what? they still love their parents more than money. more than your status. more than a new bike. lower your standard of living will raise your child better than any day care.
 
Gonz, that is the philosophy we live by as far as our kids go, I am staying home with our three, and am proud of it.

I do agree with what you've said here, not so rantily maybe :p but I do agree. It is possible if one wants to make the effort.
 
thanks Leslie. I rant sometimes to stir shit. in this case-no. all I hear & read is how kids are going to pot & nobody knows why. look at the way we treat them., pump 'em out & as soon as momma's maternity leave is up, back to work she goes, passing jr & his/her siblings off to some minimum waged stranger who has too many already. it's damned hard having my wife not work. we were used to 2 L.A. salaries, then we moved closer to family when he was 9 months old. one income sucks. and it's worth ever unearned penny to the power of infinity.
 
I gave up being upset about it a long time ago, just gave up, now I shake my head sadly and go on my way with what I'm doing. I'm sure this dual income stuff is having an effect on the kids these days

One income does suck, it blows donkeys balls more like it, but when my oldest comes home from school, gives me a hug and says he's glad I don't go to work like his friends' moms, and I compare that to the defeated sadness of the boy I babysit weekends when he says goodbye to his mom, it is all worth it. :)
 
I have three kids and live on unemployment right now (which equates to roughly $5.57/hour at a full-time job). Last year I was unemployed for 5 months and only brought home about $18,000. Times have been tough... but $18,000 was enough to live on if we gave up every luxury (that included having a cold house in the winter, and a hot one in the summer... my computer hadn't been upgraded in two years :eek:)

One of my many bill collectors called me today and asked me if my wife was planning on getting a job. I wanted to tell her to take a flying leap, that my wife will never get a job as long as we have kids that need to be taken care of.

Quite honestly, we're better off than my friend who's wife works and they have no kids. Together they bring in roughly $50,000, and yet, they never have any money. When the times require, you get pretty creative with your finances. If I was making $50,000/year, I probably would never have any money either.
 
I don't know whether take that as an insult, Gonz. I thought we were seeing eye to eye here. Romen noodles rule and I love mac&cheese:D.
 
no insult intended. just a swift kick in the ass to make you remember what's important. not only can it be done, it should be required to have at least one parent home full time to raise their children.
 
Man, this is gonna be rough. How do you convince a parent who wants the kid in daycare when she grew up in daycare herself.... I grew up with my mom staying at home and I can't imagine growing up in daycare. That would be horrible.
 
Originally posted by MitchSchaft
How do you convince a parent who wants the kid in daycare when she grew up in daycare herself.... I grew up with my mom staying at home and I can't imagine growing up in daycare. That would be horrible.

Time to get tough. Why are you marring a woman who doesn't want to raise your child?

Is money more important than a happy,well rounded child?

Would she allow you to have a surrogate wife? if not, why is a surrogate mom okay?

Did she prefer her day care center over her real family?

Also, if motherhood is so tough & she can't handle it, why not abort?

more later.


55k/your portion doesn't mean you starve.
 
ok, the woman is a little nuts, but give her this:

0694521450.01.LZZZZZZZ.jpg


Editorial Reviews
Book Description

Children's welfare is the driving force behind Dr. Laura Schlessinger's mission. A devoted mother to her son, Deryk, she identifies herself as "her kid's mom" because that's her most important job.

Never one to shy away from tough truths, Dr. Laura marshalls compelling evidence for the widespread neglect of America's children and convincingly condemns the numerous rationalizations to excuse it. Parents, special interest groups, and professionals in education and psychology all contribute to a dangerous trend that places adult fulfillment above obligation to children. Parenthood by Proxy addresses the serious causes and effects of this national crisis, among them the high rate of divorce, serial marriages, single parenting, the premature sexualization of children, dual-career families, disdain for religion, the redefinition of immoral behavior as lifestyle choices, and societal intolerance for the concept of judgment.

In Parenthood by Proxy, Dr. Laura exhorts parents to make their own children their top priority and, if necessary, to change their lives to do so. In her inimitable, straight-shooting style, Dr. Laura entreats parents to involve themselves in their children's hearts, minds, and souls, to cherish and protect them, and to commit to the essential task of teaching them right from wrong. She acknowledges that parents no longer get much support from neighbors or public and private institutions, but she urges mothers and fathers to work even harder to counteract the prevailing culture of selfishness and irresponsibility.

Parenthood by Proxy covers all aspects of parenting, from childbearing to discipline, from multiple families to being role models. Dr. Laura also tackles such cultural and societal concerns as abortion, modern sexuality, drug and alcohol use, violence, discipline, and a child's right to privacy.

Parenthood by Proxy is a passionate and provocative summation of the perils of parenting and a road map to safety for America's families.

About the Author


Dr. Laura Schlessinger holds a post-doctoral certification in marriage, family, and child therapy and is licensed by the state of California as a marriage and family therapist. She is the author of the best-selling children's book Why Do You Love Me? and But I Waaannt It!, and best-selling adult books The Ten Commandments (with Rabbi Stewart Vogel), How Could You Do That?, Ten Stupid Things Women Do to Mess Up Their Lives, and Ten Stupid Things Men Do to Mess Up Their Lives. She has... read more
 
Back
Top