Rhonda Copelon’s article entitled “Intimate Terror” is really well written. She uses strong and robust comparisons to effectively convey her message. In addition to this, she offers a fairly unbiased perspective and maintains focus on the primary issue being written about. These writing tactics are powerful tools, keeping the reader interested, curious, and open-minded. Because the topic of this article is so controversial and uncomfortable, the usefulness of such writing tools increases exponentially. Through a bold and intense use of written word, Copelon presents her ideas on domestic violence within the private household very successfully. In this article, the author’s primary focus is comparing violent domestic abuse to official torture. This comparison could understandably be misinterpreted. However, Copelon is very quick to ensure that the two are not generalized and looked at as being the same. She assures that “[o]fficial torture and domestic violence are not the same; each is unique in its egregiousness” (Copelon p.117) . Because the author continues this style of unbiased text through most of the article, it is easy to read and comprehend the information in an individualized and unique way. Regarding scholarly articles, this level of impartiality is crucial and provides a heightened sense of credibility to the reader.
Once Copelon begins the actual comparison of domestic violence in the home and official torture by government entities, she begins a
Domestic violence is something that happens every day around the world. Young, old, rich or poor, this is an issue that we must look at to better ourselves as a country. One of the things that we look at is how domestic violence relates to the different social classes of the country, this being upper, middle, and lower. Some would thing that it would be more common in lower classes, but the reality of it is domestic violence is a problem across all social classes. In this paper I will discuss different articles about domestic violence and its relation to social class. It is clear to see that many of the articles on this topic focus around women as victims and men get put into a category of the only ones committing violence. From different
The best plan to solve the problem of domestic violence is to create massive awareness about domestic violence necessary to victims, policymakers and the society in general on the identification, effects, prevention, affirmative action as well as reduction of domestic violence especially between intimate couples. For the purpose of this discussion, this essay will focus on domestic violence between intimate partners. This awareness will be instrumental in making people understand that domestic violence is a predicament known to affect most families of the world, their culture, economic status, gender, age and educational background notwithstanding. Currently, there are quite a number of misconceptions and controversies surrounding the whole
Domestic violence is a crime that occurs regularly within the United States. It claims millions of victims each year. There is not a specific cause to establish why domestic violence occurs. However, it has been documented that domestic violence is a product of physical, emotional, sexual, psychological, and any other forms of torture or torment that the particular abuser wishes to employ to gain control or power over their victims (Gosselin, 2005). Due to the complexity of this crime, many criminologists and socialologists have studied its causes and the effects in order to determine social policies and additional theories to better understand the causation of domestic violence. The social policies and theories that are developed from
Domestic violence, alternatively referred to as Intimate Partner Violence, is defined by the Department of Justice as “a pattern of abusive behavior in any relationship that is used by one partner to gain or maintain power and control over another intimate partner.” While domestic violence is commonly thought of as only physical or sexual abuse, domestic violence can also be emotional, economic, or psychological. Domestic violence has remained constant in society throughout history, even though over time society’s response to the issue has changed. While domestic violence affects everyone regardless of race, gender, age, etc. it is estimated that approximately 90% of all victims are women. For the purpose of this paper, I will be focusing on
The article constructs domestic violence as an issue of gender, race and socioeconomic status. Women are identified as the “majority” of victims (Taylor 2014). Consequently, the article conceptually represents domestic violence as events of intimate terrorism where one partner violently terrorizes the other partner to gain complete control over the relationship, which is entirely perpetrated by men (Johnson 2012). With that said, Johnson (2012) points out that majority of domestic violence is situational couple violence, where both the man and the
Domestic violence wears many different masks and is even accepted in some societies. Many different cultures around the world have been and continue to be affected by the results of domestic violence. The term, “domestic violence,” was first
Walter (1969) gave a comprehensive definition of violence as “destructive harm including not only physical assaults that damage the body, but also techniques of inflicting harm by mental or emotional means” (p. 24). However, in the context of intimate relationships, the definition of violence requires more aspects to be determined. The basic questions to be asked when defining domestic violence proposed by Hegarty, Sheehan, and Schonfeld (1999) in their article A Multidimensional Definition of Partner Abuse are 1) which relationships should be included as domestic? And 2) how should violence in domestic life be defined? To answer these questions, Hegarty et al. said that it is important to choose the appropriate definition that is most relevant to the purpose of the studies. Dutton (2006) defined domestic violence in his book Rethinking Domestic Violence as “any violence occurring between intimate partners (same sex or other sex, married or unmarried) and against children” (p. 3), but further said that he will only focus on intimate
As stated by Jones (2013) Violence within the home has become commonly known as domestic violence in Britain. However feminists argue that this suggests that the private traits of this type of violence holds more importance than its gendered nature, because of this domestic violence can also be referred to as ‘intimate
This began to change in the 1980s, as women’s groups were organized locally and internationally to demand attention to the physical, psychological, and economic abuse of women (p.369-370). Domestic violence is a serious social issue that happens to many women in our world today. This type of abuse is not declining but continually rising on a daily basis. There have been issues in the past with the way these cases were being handled. Today, there has been some improvement concerning the laws that have been enforced in order to protect women from this type of abuse. There has been extensive research done on this issue in the past concerning domestic violence. Over the last ten years there have been a number of surveys on domestic violence that have been published from around the world.
Pure, unbiased, factual research is not a perfect style of analysis, nor are personal anecdotes and stories the best way to inspect a subject. It is the marriage of the two, subjective and objective, that makes autobiographical literary criticism so powerful. By using an array of individual histories, a researcher can more widely understand the breadth of a subject. In the essay, “Somebody Must Say These Things: An Essay for My Mother,” author Melody Graulich uses academic research to investigate her family’s personal history of domestic violence.
“Domestic violence is a type of abuse by one or both partners in marriage, friends, family, dating or cohabitation” (Aziz & Mahmoud, 2010). There are many forms of abuse from verbal and emotional to physical that often escalates over time in intensity for the victim. Data from the criminal justice system, hospital patient medical records and mental health records, police reports, surveys and social services reports of thousands of women revealed that many are injured and killed as a result of violence from someone close to them. “The US Office on Violence Against Women (OVW) defines domestic violence as a pattern of abusive behavior in any relationship that is used by one partner to gain or maintain power and control over another intimate partner regardless of race, age, sexual orientation, religion, or gender” (Robertson & Murachver, 2009). Researchers and the criminal justice system have not been able to agree on a clear definition to domestic violence which can range from physical injury, stalking, verbal abuse and humiliation, denial of shelter and access to money, and intimidation through aggressive behaviors. The definition of domestic violence may vary but the results from physical injury, mental and emotional trauma, and sometimes even death can last a life time.
Domestic Violence: A Life Threatening Issue That Should Be Taken Seriously or Just an Exaggerated Problem?
Domestic Violence is a human tragedy, and has been a part of life for many individuals. It is not subjective to a particular group, race, or culture. Historically, the feminist movement preserved the theory that domestic violence is a growing matter because of the continuous power differential between the male gender and the female gender. Remarkably, this approach on domestic disputes unveiled the inner workings of barriers men, women, and children would face when in a domestic violence situation. The feminist theory emphasizes on studying “the gendered nature of all relationships…which aims at understanding how gender is related to social inequalities and oppression” (Marsigila & Kulis, 2015, p. 148). Disastrously, an ignorant notion that once dominated our culture was the belief that emotional agony was less painful than physical brutality. However,
Domestic violence is a prevalent issue that has enormous consequences for both the victimized individuals and their families. There are many injuries, deaths, rapes, and separation of families, and other fatalities which can all be interconnected to domestic violence. Which raises the question who are the perpetrators? why are they violent? Were they also abused? The answers to these questions may shed some insight on what goes on inside the mind of an abusive and violent individual.
“Every year in the United States there are over 3 million incidents of domestic violence. That means that every nine seconds a women is beaten by her domestic partner” (Findeley). There are many women that stay silent when being abuse by their partners. The consequences of staying quiet when obtaining abuse can be dangerous and can also lead to death. Many women do not recognize the importance of the fact that there is in speaking out if they are being abuse by their partner. No woman should take domestic abuse by their partners. Every woman deserves a healthy relationship; A healthy relationship involves trust, respect, and consideration for the other person. Domestic abuse has gotten worse during the past years and is still rising up. One can see that domestic abuse can occur everywhere. Domestic abuse is considered a crime and woman should not keep silent when being abuse.