Facing Reality on Domestic Violence
By Gordon E. Finley (07/11/08)
The very high profile case of Fort Lauderdale police Chief Frank Adderley whose wife Eleanor Leisa Adderly shot at him, missed him by inches while he lay in bed, and then continued to fire at him while he fled the house provides South Florida and the nation with a unique opportunity to face squarely three realities regarding Domestic Violence.
First, we must overcome our gender based stereotypes that men always are the perpetrators and women the eternal victims. While many similar individual cases could be cited -- including the woman who shot her husband in the back with a shotgun while he slept in bed to the wife who ran over her husband multiple times in her Mercedes --what is important for social policy are not individual cases but rather the findings of social science research. The empirical research reality is that decades of sound studies reveal that men and women initiate Domestic Violence at about equal rates with the most recent studies suggesting an increase in the initiation rates for Domestic Violence by girls and women. Further, about 40% of the physically harmed victims of Domestic Violence are men. Summaries of and the sources for this research can be found at: http://mediaradar.org/ .
Second, once we have overcome our stereotypes we must face a second reality that existing Domestic Violence programs, from the local to the federal, virtually never serve boys over the age of twelve and men (such as Chief Adderley) who unambiguously are victims of Domestic Violence.
Finally, two items about this particular case are noteworthy because they mirror national trends. First women tend to get diagnosed and released. Critically, can you imagine a man who engaged in exactly the same behavior as Eleanor Adderley being diagnosed and released? Second, whether perpetrator or victim and whether in Domestic Violence or in Divorce, women virtually always get the house.
Sadly, when it comes to gender, the words “Equal Justice Under Law” engraved above the entrance to the U.S. Supreme Court only rarely reach ground in real life.
Domestic Violence always is tragic not only for the parties involved but also for society as a whole. Even more tragic in the face of the nation’s economic downturn is the fact that our government has wasted billions of taxpayer dollars on failed Domestic Violence programs which are based on false feminist ideology and stand in direct opposition to empirical research reality. Not only do taxpayer supported programs such as The Violence Against Women Act fail to provide services for all victims who need them – including boys and men – but because the existing Domestic Violence programs are ideologically based, rather than social science based, they fail to provide the much needed social and psychological services that genuinely would help all victims of Domestic Violence – both female and male.
The national implications of Chief Adderley’s case are that we must forgo our gender based stereotypes, face squarely the empirical research reality of Domestic Violence, and completely revise Domestic Violence policy and law.
Gordon E. Finley, Ph.D. is Professor of Psychology at Florida International University in Miami.
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