Posted on 05/17/2006 2:54:55 PM PDT by okiecon
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - More than 40 percent of women surveyed in the Seattle area reported they had been physically or psychologically abused by their husbands, dates or boyfriends, researchers said on Wednesday.
(Excerpt) Read more at today.reuters.com ...
A quick search shows that this group does a lot of studies. In fact that appears to be all they do. On their website they proclaim a $22 million dollar grant to conduct research on "vaccine safety, obesity & depression, colorectal cancer screening, breast cancer recurrence, and yoga for back pain"
Their site http://www.centerforhealthstudies.org/
They look to be a non-profit formed by a medical group with the intent of capturing grants to conduct "research". Their definition of research is walking around Seattle, stopping at Starbucks of course, and asking 3400 women extremely broad questions. This is a questionable use of tax dollars at best, IMO.
Let's suppose the researchers query one lesbian and she reports suffering psychological abuse from six of her lovers. The researchers then queries one of the lesbian's lovers and she reports suffering physical abuse from three of her lovers (including the first lesbian). The brilliance of it is, men get blamed all the way round, and had nothing to do with any of it.
This may not be evidence of a burgeoning problem -- only of a problem not yet solved. In my opinion, one case of abuse is one too many. But of course, none of these instances are of good, conservative Americans. They only involve liberal, drug-abusing, heathen hippy-types with poor diets. (/sarcasm)
Keep believing this if you wish . . . keep whistling in the graveyard. May God help our daughters, sisters, nieces and granddaughters.
We also have a problem of abuse of men by women. A lot of this involves treatment in divorce court and afterwards, as well as making false accusations to ruin a man's life over whatever the dispute was (Duke Lacross, anyone?)
People can be mean to each other
Well, no, you don't have to have a job......but you do manage to get yourself out of bed every morning, right? Isn't that work? Most men think so! :P
Yes that is a liberal area I hear.
You didn't pick the best source, even for popularized medicine news.
Here's a better article
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/medicalnews.php?newsid=43430
Here's a better one
http://www.webmd.com/content/article/122/114598.htm
and here's where I found them both
http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=us&ie=UTF-8&ncl=http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx%3Ftype%3DtopNews%26storyID%3D2006-05-17T174503Z_01_N17261693_RTRUKOC_0_US-ABUSE.xml%26archived%3DFalse
These articles have the name of the HMO (Group Health Cooperative), sample questions, and better analysis of the data.
You can purchase short term access to the journal for $30 at
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=JournalURL&_cdi=6075&_auth=y&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=1416902&md5=8008aa352c2bfa77723c96ab3b477f16
I've had to deal with that attitude before operating nuclear reactors: "even one gamma ray is too much radiation" or "even one gun death is too much".
I don't get emotional over statistics, because I have been trained extensively on statistics (studying experimental physics). You have certainly cited many numbers, but I don't think you get the big picture. Sure, effort should continue to be made to reduce domestic violence. The same argument applies to racism, other types of violence, etc. The key point that you need to know is that domestic violence is not exponentially growing out of control. Nor is racism or other types of crimes.
I don't think you realize that this survey was made for a political point, not to document domestic violence.
Oh, and I should mention, not all crime will ever be solved. From domestic violence to shoplifting, there will always be a certain level of crime. Unless of course you have an infinite amount of money and resources.
The questions were about more than verbal abuse, there were threats or perceived threats and coercion involved.
Here are some of the survey's questions that tracked abuse by intimate partners:
* Physical abuse: Has an intimate partner ever hit, slapped, shoved, choked, kicked, shaken, or otherwise physically hurt you?
* Sexual abuse: Has an intimate partner ever forced you to participate in a sex act (e.g., oral, vaginal, or anal penetration) against your will? Ever threatened, coerced, or physically forced you into any sexual contact that did not result in intercourse or penetration?
* Nonphysical abuse: Have you ever been frightened for your safety, or that of your family or friends, because of anger or threats of an intimate partner? Has an intimate partner ever put you down, or called you names repeatedly, or controlled your behavior?
But that doesn't mean the problem of abuse of women doesn't exist. As I wrote previously, I was a victim of acquaintance rape myself. I didn't "ask for it," I can assure you.
When I was dating my husband, one of the things that attracted me most to him was his attitude about women. He was truly disgusted by men who abused women. All decent men should be. He's 6' 3 1/2" of 100% man -- and I feel completely safe with him. Guess I have a thing for the knight in shining armor -- don't see too many around here.
I don't like questions based upon perceptions -- you may perceive I mean one thing when I don't. No doubt, this study has its flaws.
The point of the article is to suggest that women are victims and men are beaters. Happy now?
Maybe it is all the rain and Starbucks?
Thanks.
NO. None of these very important investigative questions are ever asked.
I've seen more men locked up and just because a "she" started the fight and then gets upset because HE TREATS HER LIKE AN EQUAL IN THE FIGHT.
This is right out of the Domestic Violence study of the 90s (it's most recent latest incarnation).
Gloria Steinem worked hard on groups who had been funding Straus and Gelles' work, cut. And Gloria Steinem succeeded.
Talking About ItThe researchers call for doctors to find ways of broaching the topic in an appropriate way with patients.
Thompson and colleagues write that "the risk of not asking about a major underlying condition that affects nearly half of women's lives are far greater than the risk of asking. We ask the reader to consider, if there were a major risk factor for coronary heart diseaseheart disease that affected approximately 50% of the adult population, would you not want to know about it? As a clinician, of course you would!"
Preventive strategies that "consider the influence of the family, community, and sociocultural environment in which the women are situated" are also needed, Bonomi's team writes.
Because the study only included women with health insurance in a particular part of the country, it's not clear if the results apply to other groups of women. It's also possible that some of the surveys weren't perfectly accurate; the researchers didn't check the women's medical records.
Of course, men may also experience violence by an intimate partner. However, the survey only included women.
Good post.
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