DAY THREE: Hidden In Plain Sight

Today is day three of The 16 Days Campaign to end domestic abuse and violence against women.

There is not a country, a state, a community, or a family that is not touched by domestic violence in one way or another. It happens in poor families and rich families alike. There is no guarantee that you yourself will not become a victim someday. If you have escaped the abuse and brutality up to this point, then you are blessed among us, for far too many have been victimized already.

We cannot know a person’s history or pain just by looking at them. Even so, the legal system (The Portland Police, specifically, as reported in the Oregonian, December 2, 2009) have come up with some indicators that we can all learn from. They are as follows.

Lethality Indicators (as seen in the perpetrator)

• Perceived loss of control over the victim through separation, divorce, or the victim fleeing.
• Extreme jealousy
• Escalation of abuse
• Acts of abuse in public
• Threats of suicide or homicide
• Plans to carry out either suicide or homicide
• Use of weapons, or the threat to use weapons
• Stalking
• History of mental health problems
• Substance abuse
• History of sexual abuse of the victim or children
• Violation of protective orders or restraining orders

If you are not aware of your own status (whether you are a victim or not), the following lists might help.

Do You:

• Feel afraid or your partner much of the time?
• Avoid certain topics out of fear of angering your partner?
• Feel that you cannot do anything right for your partner?
• Believe that you deserve to be hurt or mistreated?
• Wonder if you are the one who is crazy?
• Feel emotionally numb or helpless?

Does Your Partner:

• Humiliate, criticize, or yell at you?
• Treat you so badly that you are embarrassed for your friends or family to see?
• Ignore or put down your opinions or accomplishments?
• Blame you for his own abusive behavior?
• See you as property or a sex object, rather than as a person?
• Act excessively jealous and possessive?
• Control where you go or what you do?
• Keep you from seeing your friends or family?
• Limit your access to money, the phone, or the car?
• Constantly check up on you?
• Have a bad and unpredictable temper?
• Hurt you, or threaten to hurt or kill you?
• Threaten to take your children away or harm them?
• Threaten to commit suicide if you leave?
• Force you to have sex?
• Destroy your belongings?

Perpetrators use the various forms of abuse to gain and maintain total control over their victims. Along with the most obvious (physical violence), dominance, humiliation, isolation, threats, intimidation, and blame are some of the tactics a perpetrator may use.

With the gracious permission of the Domestic Abuse Intervention Program in Deluth, Minnesota (http://theduluthmodel.org/), here are some graphics to show the tactics commonly used by abusers to achieve and maintain control over their partner/victim.  

My prayer for you today is that, as a bystander, you could recognize abuse when you see it in the life of another.

In His Name,

Jennifer Joy