Full Frontal Feminism_ A Young Women's Guide to Why Feminism Matters - Jessica Valenti [23]
The problem is, too many “solutions” put the impetus for change on women—like safety measures. A woman in South Africa, for example, invented an anti-rape device for women in response to the high rates of sexual assault in her country. The device, which is kind of like a female condom (you have to wear it inside your vagina), will fold around the perpetrator’s penis and attach itself with microscopic hooks.9 It’s impossible to remove without medical help. Now, sounds like justice for a rapist asshole, I know. But the problem is this: It’s up to the woman to protect herself against a rapist. It’s our job to make sure that we don’t get raped, not men’s responsibility to make sure that they don’t attack women. (And, of course, the device is problematic because women can be raped orally and anally, and I’m guessing putting hooks in a guy’s dick will probably make him pretty violent.) Women across the United States will take self-defense classes or carry safety whistles. They’ll put pepper spray in their purses and walk fast through parking lots. All good things, I guess. But we can’t keep running away. We should be able to walk the streets—or stay at home, for that matter—without fearing violence.
The South Carolina House Judiciary Committee voted in in 2005 to make cockfighting a felony, but tabled abill that would have done same for domestic violence.
Intimate Partner Violence
Most people are familiar with the term domestic violence, but intimate partner violence (IPV) is a newer term. When people think of domestic violence, they generally think of a boyfriend and girlfriend or a husband and wife. But violence can happen in any kind of relationship. IPV broadens the definition. It’s physical or emotional abuse by a partner, wife, husband, boyfriend, girlfriend, an ex, or a date.
IPV affects both men and women, but women are disproportionately the victims of violence in relationships. Women make up 85 percent of the victims of IPV, and one-third of American women report being physically or sexually assaulted by a partner (husband, boyfriend, whoever) at some point in their lives. Again, the numbers are even scarier for young women. One report says that 40 percent of teenage girls say they know someone their age who has been hit by a boyfriend. That’s just out of control.
And the truly scary thing about IPV is that it’s rarely an isolated incident. Violence in relationships tends to follow a pattern—a cycle of abuse. Sounds technical, I know. Most people think of domestic violence in kind of a stereotypical way—a guy slapping around his girlfriend when he’s had too much to drink, for example. But the truth is a lot more complicated than that.
The cycle starts with a “tension-building phase,” where—duh—tension builds between the couple. There could be emotional and verbal and physical abuse during this time. When the tension reaches a climax, there is an incident of physical abuse on a larger scale—the tension is so high at this point that anything can trigger it. After the incident, the batterer moves on to the “honeymoon” phase, where there are apologies, excuses—“I’ll change” and such (cough, bullshit, cough). Then the cycle begins again. And again. Often, the violent incidents will get worse over time.
There’s also a pattern when it comes to those who abuse their partners. There are definite warning signs. The weird thing? A lot of potentially abusive men initially come off as the “perfect” guy. They are immediately superromantic and want to spend all their time with you. But this is often the abusers’ setting the stage so they