ABUSE: NO ONE DESERVES IT

How do you know when you are in an abusive relationship? LOVE DOES NOT HURT.  


Are you being hurt? If you answer “YES” to any of these questions, you are likely to be in an abusive relationship.

• Do you feel like you are walking on eggshells to keep peace?
• Do you feel like a prisoner in your own home?
• Does your partner hurt you with bad names and put downs?
• Does he/she threaten or harass you?
• Give you "the look"?
• Shove, slap or hit you?
• Abuse your children?
• Keep you from seeing friends or family?
• Destroy your property?
• Hurt your pets?
• Does your partner follow you, spy on you, or show up at your job, school, or friends' homes?
• Listen to your phone calls, secretly records your calls or keeps you from using the phone?
• Does he/she force you to have sex when you don't want to?
• Accuse you of having affairs?
• Control all the money and give you little or none?
• Keep you from getting or keeping a job?

Adapted from the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence




FACT: Domestic Violence is a deliberate pattern of abusive tactics used by one partner in an intimate relationship to obtain and maintain power and control over the other person. Women are a "significantly greater" risk of intimate partner violence than men. By conservative estimates, 1.5 million women in the United States are assaulted by their intimate partners every year. (Findings from the National Violence Against Women Survey, National Institute of Justice and Centers Disease Control and Prevention, July 2000)



SOME ALARMING STATISTICS

African Americans African Americans, especially African American Women, suffer deadly violence from family members at rates decidedly higher than for other racial groups in the United States. However, it is observed that research concerning family violence among African Americans is inadequate.

• Overall, African Americans were victimized by intimate partners a significantly higher rates than persons of any other race between 1993 and 1998. Black females experienced intimate partner violence at a rate 35% higher than that of white females, and about 22 times the rate of women of other races. Black males experienced intimate partner violence at a rate about 62% higher than that of white males and about 22 times the rate of men of other races.

  Callie Marie Rennison. and Sarah Welchans, U.S. Dep't of Just., NCJ 178247, Intimate Partner Violence (2000)

• African-American women experience significantly more domestic violence than White women in the age group of 20-24. Generally, Black women experience similar levels of intimate partner victimization in all other age categories as compared to White women, but experience slightly more domestic violence. (Estimates are provided from the National Crime Victimization Survey, which defines an intimate partner as a current or former spouse, girlfriend, or boyfriend. Violent acts include murder, rape, sexual assault, robbery, aggravated assault, and simple assault.)

  Callie Marie Rennison, U.S. Dep't of Just., NCJ 187635, Intimate Partner Violence and Age of Victim, 1993-1999, at 4, (2001)

• Approximately 40% of Black women report coercive contact of a sexual nature by age 18.

  Africana Voices Against Violence, Tufts University, Statistics, 2002

• The number one killer of African-American women ages 15 to 34 is homicide at the hands of a current or former intimate partner.

  Africana Voices Against Violence, Tufts University, Statistics, 2002

• In a study of African-American sexual assault survivors, only 17% reported the assault to police.

  Africana Voices Against Violence, Tufts University, Statistics, 2002 

  
  Why is our community suffering abuse at such an alarming rate? Could our socioeconomic position predicate our diminished ability to resolve challenges in a healthy fashion? We profess to be the most Biblically sound people; why are we noted as the most abusive people? Is this an adequate reflection of our community? When will we stop turning a blind eye and a deaf ear to what ails us? How do we stop this vicious cycle of teaching our young girls and boys of WHAT IS WRONG and be an example of WHAT IS RIGHT?
  
  When will we BEGIN to END the VIOLENCE? ABUSE......NO ONE DESERVES IT.
  
  Lady Alana