{"id":315,"date":"2020-07-24T11:01:23","date_gmt":"2020-07-24T15:01:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/westmichiganregional.com\/?p=315"},"modified":"2020-11-03T10:06:24","modified_gmt":"2020-11-03T15:06:24","slug":"five-things-we-can-do-to-reduce-domestic-violence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/westmichiganregional.com\/index.php\/2020\/07\/24\/five-things-we-can-do-to-reduce-domestic-violence\/","title":{"rendered":"FIVE THINGS WE CAN DO TO REDUCE DOMESTIC VIOLENCE"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
  1. Keep trying prevention programs, scale up the most promising ones, and study how well they work.<\/strong><\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    Many researchers believe the best way to deter abuse is to stop people from becoming abusers in the first place. And several approaches have shown promise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Broad, cultural messages appear to make a difference\u2014not just what young children see and hear, from their families and neighbors but also from their role models on television and in sports arenas, may have an impact. In addition, many researchers think it\u2019s possible to reach kids more directly, through schools or through their parents. According to these researchers, themes should include how men treat women\u2014and how they express their own emotions. \u201c[We should] raise boys and men so they know it\u2019s fine to cry and to show fear or other \u2018weakness,\u2019 and that expressing anger is not the only acceptable emotion for males,\u201d says Nancy Lemon, Boalt Lecturer at the University of California-Berkeley Law School and author a leading textbook on domestic violence law. Among the ideal targets for the interventions are the kids most at risk of becoming abusers later in life\u2014the ones who, while very young, are victims of or witnesses to abuse in their homes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    It all sounds very plausible. And there\u2019s sporadic evidence that some programs have produced positive results on a small scale\u2014for example, 2000 California high-schoolers who participated in a program called \u201cCoaching Boys Into Men\u201d said they were less likely to engage in abusive behavior and more likely to stop a friend from showing abusive behavior. But overwhelming social science evidence, the kind that under girds other successful government and private sector programs, doesn\u2019t really exist\u2014partly because nobody has had the funds or opportunity to do the necessary, long-term research. \u201cWe don\u2019t really know for sure what works,\u201d says Richard Gelles<\/a>, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania and author of The Violent Home<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    That\u2019s why, in addition to scaling up the most promising programs, there needs to be intensive study of them. That means so-called longitudinal studies, in which researchers follow participants over long periods of time, as well as experiments that create the equivalent of randomized experiments. \u201cWe shouldn\u2019t wait for the perfect research to act,\u201d says Kiersten Stewart, director of public policy and advocacy at Futures Without Violence. \u201cWe have programs for very young children that have shown improvements, and programs that target older kids too. \u2026 But it\u2019s true we don\u2019t have data that goes very far out. We absolutely need more research.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Of course, that kind of research requires funding\u2014and that funding hasn\u2019t been easy to find. \u201cI started doing research 40 years ago and there\u2019s never been a lot of money,\u201d Gelles says. \u201cAnd there\u2019s inevitably intense competition for what money is available, between those who provide services and those who want to conduct research.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    2. Make penalties for domestic violence consistent and firm.<\/strong><\/h5>\n\n\n\n

    The Ray Rice case was fairly typical in one sense: It\u2019s customary to offer first-time offenders an opportunity to choose counseling, and avoid charges. There are a few reasons for this. One is that some abusers really will respond\u2014either because they have so much to lose by risking jail time, or because they feel enough regret to be open to what counselors will tell them. \u201cMost of these programs have about a 21, 22, 23 percent success rate at 12 to 18 months,\u201d says Gelles. \u201cAnd that has to do a great deal with readiness to change, plus receptiveness to intervention.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    But precisely because the success rate is relatively low, experts think it\u2019s important that penalties be tough\u2014and consistent. That\u2019s true for the courts. And it\u2019s true for private organizations, like professional sports leagues. \u201cForcing batterers into treatment works for some, but not for most,\u201d says Tania Tetlow<\/a>, a former federal prosecutor, a law professor at Tulane, and director of the Domestic Violence<\/a> Center there. \u201dWe should offer all the treatment in the world in case it helps, but not instead of punishment as we tend to do now.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \u201cSwift and serious sentencing is important to decrease the incidents of domestic abuse,\u201d says Lisa Smith, a former prosecutor who is now an assistant professor clinical law at Brooklyn Law School. \u201cSevere punishment by the NFL in this case with the attendant publicity will definitely send a message to abusers.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    3. Increase funding for support services.<\/strong><\/h5>\n\n\n\n

    It\u2019s hard to say exactly how much money government spends on domestic violence today, because the money comes from so many different places. The primary way that the federal government spends on domestic violence is through something called the Family Violence Prevention and Support Act,<\/a> now in its 30th<\/sup> year. FVPSA is not a huge program: it doled out $130 million last year. (That\u2019s with an \u201cm.\u201d) And that level was actually a little lower than the previous year\u2019s. Other federal programs, like Medicaid and funds from the Department of Housing and Urban Development, end up subsidizing domestic violence services indirectly. And of course states put in their own money. But it\u2019s still not enough, experts say.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Every year, the National Network to End Domestic Violence<\/a> surveys local organizations once a year, to see how many requests for services they got\u2014and how many they were able to fulfill\u2014on that day. In last year\u2019s survey, more than 9,000 requests nationally went unfulfilled. Of those, about 6,000 involved requests for transitional housing\u2014space in shelters for families escaping abusers. The survey is not exactly scientific, but, experts say, the shortage is real\u2014and maybe even getting worse, thanks to tight state budgets and federal cutbacks from sequestration. \u201cThe demand for services far exceeds the supply,\u201d says Stewart.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    4. Change the way family courts handle cases involving domestic violence.<\/strong><\/h5>\n\n\n\n

    Divorces frequently involve allegations of domestic violence. But, historically, the judicial system would handle the issues separately\u2014with one judge presiding over the divorce, another hearing the criminal domestic violence <\/a>case. This was tough on the victims, who had to deal with multiple sets of legal proceedings, each with a different process (and, sometimes, each in a different courthouse). It also meant that family court judges, hearing the divorce cases, might not have full information about the domestic violence allegations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Today many jurisdictions, though by no means all of them, use a \u201cone family, one judge\u201d approach\u2014consolidating the hearings into one place. Experts say that\u2019s a much-needed improvement, but, they caution, there\u2019s another big problem: Family courts don\u2019t always handle domestic violence well. \u201cFamily courts reward compromise and settlement, because good parents want their children to have close relationships with the other parent,\u201d says Tetlow. \u201cThe problem is that a parent protecting a child from abuse wants no such thing, and cannot agree to settle down the middle.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    And it\u2019s not just the judges. \u201cInstead of deciding the fact issue of whether abuse happens,\u201d Tetlow says, \u201ccourts also tend to punt their obligations to \u2018custody evaluators,\u2019 mental health professionals who frequently have little training on domestic violence. These evaluators have no magic ability to decide whether someone is violent\u2014it\u2019s not mental illness and there\u2019s no test for it\u2014or whether the abuser is lying. Instead, they are trained to see relationship problems as mutual.\u201d The solution, Tetlow and other experts say, is to provide family judges with more specialized training\u2014and more resources, in the form of counselors who have actual expertise in domestic violence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    5. Help women to be economically independent.<\/strong><\/h5>\n\n\n\n

    \u201cSo many women stay in destructive relationships because they will be homeless, with their children, if they leave\u2014or can\u2019t support themselves and their children,\u201d says Joan Meier, a George Washington University law professor and founder of the Domestic Violence Legal Empowerment and Appeals Project<\/a>. \u201cDivorce financial distributions need to be much fairer, taking into account the ways women give up economic capacity to raise kids. Nowadays women almost never get alimony (by a judge) and child support is often minimal, especially if the father fights and wins joint custody.\u201d Of course, policy changes that tend to help women financially\u2014raising the minimum wage, guaranteed paid family and medical leave\u2014can make a difference too.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Keep trying prevention programs, scale up the most promising ones, and study how well they work. Many researchers believe the best way to deter abuse is to stop people from… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-315","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/westmichiganregional.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/315","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/westmichiganregional.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/westmichiganregional.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westmichiganregional.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westmichiganregional.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=315"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/westmichiganregional.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/315\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":370,"href":"https:\/\/westmichiganregional.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/315\/revisions\/370"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/westmichiganregional.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=315"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westmichiganregional.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=315"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westmichiganregional.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=315"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}