I wanted to throw something out for discussion, and at great risk of getting a beating I might add. And that discussion is Violence Against Women.

My personal thought is that it might be beneficial to drop the term "Violence Against Women" and instead crusade against "Violence" period.

I have two justifications for this:

1) Violence is not only a Man hits Woman problem. Men are violent against men, women are violent to men (we all know that females also abuse , so there is no point in denying it and finally, both men and women do abuse children.

Instead of focusing on only a narrow part of the violence epedemic, why do we not try to get at the heart of the matter. The problem is not that men are violent or women are violent, it is that humans in general tend to be violent as a species.

2) I think if we were to focus on reducing violence in all of it's forms, we would see more support from the male population. Men really do see themselves and being stereotyped and to some degree victimized. And let's face it, men who are violent to women are in the minority. Most men do not and would not hit their spouses/signicant others. The men that would, I suspect, would also quickly perpetrate violence toward other men and children as well.

Then he asks us to discuss it among ourselves.

Is this not the very quintessence of trollery?

Link here to Fact Sheet: Violence Against Women

From the link:

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Percentage of Violent Crime by Gender

According to the Canadian Crime Statistics, 2000 report:

Male on female violence accounted for the majority (46.5%) of all violent crime in Canada.

* 37.8% was attributed to male on male violence.
* Female on female crime - where women were both the accused and the victim - accounted for 8.1% of the total.
* Female on male violence accounted for the lowest percentage of all violent crime in Canada at 7.6%.

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If you understand sexism and misogyny (which I don't get from your opening post that you do) you would understand that overt violence against women (hitting, punching, etc) is one kind of violence on huge continuum of violence against women in a woman-hating world.

Some links for you:

Public Health Agency of Canada: Dating Violence

The White Ribbon Campaign

I believe "Violence Against Women" to be a massive problem, and a tragedy also. I respect women, they should be loved, not hurt.

I am always a little skeptical about the official numbers about violence commited by specific genders. I think that women hit as much as men, but men being stronger tend to do more damage (hence the emergency room visits) and will under report when they themselves are unjured, the macho thing.

I used to work ambulance, and the things I have seen committed by husbands and wives opon each other is shocking. I never will forget the two year old boy whose mom fractured his femur either.

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Originally posted by Alberta Guy:
I am always a little skeptical about the official numbers about violence commited by specific genders.

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Seriously, if stats don't convince you then I don't know what else will. Even if more men are assaulted by women, that doesn't change the numbers of women assaulted by men, now, does it?

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I think that women hit as much as men

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My experience is that violence is universal

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Originally posted by bigcitygal:
...that ending begins with men. Feminists can't do this fight on our own, we need male allies.

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You're absolutely correct, and when men get involved to try to change violence against women, it, in my experience, can happen very quickly.

We, my partner and I, back in the 90's bought a hobby farm just outside a small town in the Rockies. When we first moved there, the weekly paper was reporting, in its police report, 40-50 spousal asssualt cases where the police attended each week. This is a community of 1300.

Well, my partner and I discussed this at length, and decided that we needed to change this, if we could. As he is 6'6" and very much an intimidating to look at fellow, and the males there sort of looked at him as the new heavy weight champion, so to speak, though he wasn't, and still isn't. From this discussion forward, he went out of his way to project; equality with his partner, softness towards his child, and grandchild, and spoke often with those who were abusive towards their partners, as to why they were abusive, and why they needed to stop and become a REAL man. (Tongue in cheek using the "real", as we never used that thought form.) He role modeled behaviour that was very different from the norm here, and it worked very quickly. Within 2 years there was, and still is not, anywhere close to the numbers of spousal assaults that there were. In fact, nowadays, I see none. But I do see a bunch of men, now being great fathers and partners.

[ 28 October 2006: Message edited by: remind ]

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Originally posted by Alberta Guy:
I do take my hat off to that man.

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It would seem that we don't agree on a few items. I would like to take a moment to compliment you though. I do appreciate the fact that instead of resorting to name calling and childishness, you have presented facts, statistics and a logical arguement. My compliments.

You did make a statement about us living in a woman hating world that I am not sure I comprehend. Could you tell me what you mean? Maybe to make it a smaller subject area, frame it in terms of Canadian society.

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Originally posted by Stargazer:
Actually you are asking her to write a book. Frankly that is not fair. Look up the word patriarchy then come back to the thread. Try reading some previous feminist threads and while you're reading these threads I think you should stay out of the feminist one. I, unlike BCG, am no where near as tolerant of men who claim to not have a clue why women might consider this world a woman hating world. Or who post BS drivel in the feminist thread, get presented with stats and then dismiss them. IMO you are a man who appears very very incapable of accepting the fact that the majority of violence is done by men. Bottom line. No if, ands or buts.

More anti-feminist crap in here and I will alert a moderator.

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I have re-read my original post, and I am not sure what I have written is anti-feminist in any way shape or form.

All that I suggested is that violence is a far reaching problem and speculated that a wide based attack upon violence in general might get better results than a focus on only one facet of violence.

I am not sure that disagreeing with statistics would qualify me as anti-feminist either.

I did very clearly state that I was ABSOLUTELY AGAINST violence against women in any way shape or form, and also against all forms of violence.

Ignorance of the theory of global patriarchy does not make me a feminist hater either.

If you feel that making the above statements is somehow against the feminist movement, then by all means call a moderator. But I think you are misrepresenting what I was trying to say.

[ 28 October 2006: Message edited by: Alberta Guy ]

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Originally posted by bigcitygal:
Seriously, if stats don't convince you then I don't know what else will. Even if more men are assaulted by women, that doesn't change the numbers of women assaulted by men, now, does it?

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Patriarchy (from Greek: pater (genitive form patris, showing the root patr-), meaning father and arché meaning rule) is the anthropological term used to define the sociological condition where fathers have supreme authority within families and male members of a society tend to predominate in positions of power; with the more powerful the position, the more likely it is that a male will hold that position. The term patriarchy is also used in systems of ranking male leadership in certain hierarchical churches or religious bodies (see patriarch and Patriarchate). Examples include the Greek Orthodox and Russian Orthodox churches. Finally, the term patriarchy is used pejoratively to describe a seemingly immobile and sclerotic political order.

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Wikipedia

A good starter read. Wikipedia is always a great place to start reading about a topic. I was once told to get a clue by certain people on this forum... anyhow, feminism is a vaster subject than you think. It's deceptively simple when you first start reading it because on a very superficial level it's common sense. I myself am mostly ignorant.

Edited to add: Saying you're against violence against women is sort of like saying you're in favour of universal suffrage.

[ 28 October 2006: Message edited by: 500_Apples ]

Having read a few of the threads, what do you think the mandate of the feminism forum should be?

I kind of think it should be this:

"Discuss feminist issues from a pro-feminist point of view."

Now if you're not sure what that means, I think a Michelle or oldgoat could suggest some required reading. That might seem really condescending. Sorry.

bigcitygal explained pretty well why feminists focus on violence against women in particular, instead of violence on both sexes. Feminists know that there are violent women out there, and that women are capable of violence. There are lots of examples of mothers committing child abuse, etc. But violence against women is a specific problem, out of many, that feminists address directly, because there is a certain dynamic, when it comes to male violence against women, that is being addressed. That doesn't mean feminists don't believe other types of violence don't exist - it means that, when talking about violence against women, we are focusing on that particular type of violence.

All you need to do is look at movements like, say, the Elizabeth Fry Society and the shelter movement to know that violence committed BY women is also addressed by feminists.

Stargazer is right, that it's not fair to come into this forum and then ask someone to answer a question like this:

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You did make a statement about us living in a woman hating world that I am not sure I comprehend. Could you tell me what you mean? Maybe to make it a smaller subject area, frame it in terms of Canadian society.

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For the record, once again, I am not anti feminist in any way shape or form, though I may disagree on a particular topic or initiative.

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Originally posted by StockwellDay:
I agree. The combined effort of generations of feminists have moved mountains. Thank goodness they didn't stick to the small crusades in their individual lives.

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They deserve all the credit in the world for what they have accomplished in a very short time span. 100 years is lighting speed when it comes to social change. I understand that the campaign for violence against women HAS been successful in dropping rates of violence.

It is not fair to expect them to shoulder all of the burden though. I think the vast majority of people area against family violence, and violence in general. So why is it that we do not see a concerted effort by all groups?

Just picture a campaign against societal violence could potentially bring together a broad spectrum of support! A combination of tax dollars and private funds could be dedicated to preventative education and related programs. From an economic point of view, there would probably be a savings in the long run. A reduction in violence would mean less policing, less court costs, less heathcare costs, less therapy, less need for shelters... the list goes on.

On the social side of the spectrum we would see a reduction of multiple types of abuse. Less victims, less family breakup. Anything that strengthens families would definately get social conservatives on board!

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Originally posted by StockwellDay:
Thank goodness they didn't stick to the small crusades in their individual lives.

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And guys? Women know the positive effects that reducing violence against women will have. We are literally dying because of violence against women, so we know violence has to end, or be reduced, and want this for our lives, and for the lives of all women. This will change levels of violence overall in the world, as this starts to happen.

And Alberta Guy? Don't dismiss someone just because she's not able to say it all nice and pretty. That's part of the problem. (You rock as always, Stargazer. )

I asked this on another thread, and it bears to ask again: Do you understand why, after Dec 6, 1989 that feminists organized to form an organization whose primary purpose is to help women and their children escape violent homes, by providing interest-free loans? Do you see the connection? This is not meant to derail into an analysis of Dec 6 and what happened on that day, but to indicate that feminists see the larger context of violence, hell, we live it every frikkin day on various levels.

These programs only treat the symptoms of violent behavior . What is needed is a strike at the core so that abuse is prevented rather than reacted to. This is the part of the equasion that I think is currently lacking. A doctor would not give a tylenol to relieve the pain of a tumor, he would cut the cancer out!

Education that violence in any form is unacceptable. Strengthening of laws so that perpetrators of violence do not get to do it again is needed. Creating a court environment that can support this as well. Men, women and children need to be confident that abusers will be put away where they cannot hurt anyone. Courts need to be able to fairly judge between real abuse and false accuasation and deal with each accordingly.

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Originally posted by Alberta Guy:
The events of that day were a symptom of a rotton undercurrent of violence that runs through society in general

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The "rotten" under current is the patriarchial society imposed upon women.

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What is needed is a strike at the core so that abuse is prevented rather than reacted to

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Then start voting against Harper because his and base are promoting the core where abuse against women and children can regrow to former heights.

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Education that violence in any form is unacceptable. Strengthening of laws so that perpetrators of violence do not get to do it again is needed.

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How about banning orgs like Focus on the Family that teaches spare the rod and spoil the child, and that women should be subservient to men?

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conservatives would phrase it perhaps as a crime issue or a strenthing the family issue. The reality is, all political groups oppose violence, so why is so little being done about it?

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Conservatives? Perhaps true Conservatives would, what we have in Ottawa are not conservatives.

We don't seem to disagree on education, I think we both agree that women should not be subservient.

I also agree that true conservatives should be and are in strong opposition to violence against women. Conservatives are a big tent, ultra conservatives are only a small part, which I personally feel is an intolerant narrow minded group.

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Originally posted by remind:
Men, like you will not let go of that, as your insistance to keep on posting like this in feminist forum proves.

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When women kill - and they do so at astonishingly lower rates than men who commit 85% of all homicides - the vast majority kill family members, usually men who have battered them for years. As many as 90% of the women in jail today for killing men had been battered by those men. (Allison Bass, "Women far less likely to kill than men; no one sure why," The Boston Globe, February 24, 1992, p. 27)

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As a farmer and horse trainer, one knows that intact males[the ones with testicles] need to be handled more cautiously because they are more dangerous.

Even male chickens, geese, sheep, dogs, etc tend to be much, much more aggressive than females or juveniles.

We are, after all, just glorified animals so why should we keep dancing around the fact that men are more aggressive, competitive and violent????

It's really more than a little precious to keep flogging this 'argument' as if it's some unresolved mystery.

Anyone who has a problem with my observations might try working in close quarters with some stallions, boars, bulls, rams, ganders, etc.

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What to do about it? Well on the farm one has special measures in place for dangerous males and if they are still too dangerous to be around---chop, chop.

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Originally posted by Alberta Guy:
You know folks. Even a good old Alberta redneck knows better than to suggest genital mutilation / forced sterilization of the opposite sex.

A good laugh is a good laugh, but do't you think that might be a little over the top?

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Well yes, in the sense that "a little off the top" would be circumcision, so I guess you're right that "a little over the top" would be a little more than that.