Posts

What Does Safe Feel Like?

The Real Meaning of Stopping Domestic Violence: Helping Potential Victims Feel Safe By Barry Goldstein   Dara Carlin is one of the best domestic violence advocates and told Elizabeth Liu and me a story when we were working on our book to train attorneys. Dara has a friend who is literally seven feet tall and […]

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The Myth of the Battered Husband Syndrome

By Jack C. Straton, Ph.D. Department of Physics Portland State University Portland, OR 97207-0751 straton@cs.pdx.edu Reprinted with permission from masculinities 2, 79-82 (1994). The most recurrent backlash against women’s safety is the myth that men are battered as often as women. Suzanne Steinmetz [1] created this myth with her 1977 study of 57 couples, in […]

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Cooptation: Repressive Bureaucracy and its Effects on Activists and Advocates for Social Change

© October 1995, updated September 2013, and December 2014  by Rose Garrity Cooptation: Repressive Bureaucracy and its Effects on Activists and Advocates for Social Change; Why Doing Not-for-Profit Advocacy Work in the United States is so Difficult INTRODUCTION This paper will use domestic violence programs as a useful example, yet the same issues apply to […]

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Battered/Formerly Battered Women’s Caucus

STATEMENT-July 14, 2004 In order for the domestic violence movement to facilitate effective and positive social change in our society, it is imperative that Battered and Formerly Battered Women have a clear presence and a loud voice to direct and guide this movement. We have a commitment to provide compassionate,respectful support to the women we […]

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Some Major Myths about Domestic Abuse

By Ben Atherton-Zeman, 2003 (www.voicesofmen.org) Myth 1: It’s the victim/survivor’s job to stop the abuse. (Usually stated in a question: “Why don’t they just leave?” or “Why do they stay/go back to their abuser?”) Reality Check 1: Often when victims leave, the abuse increases. More than half of domestic homicides occur when a victim has […]

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Shared Custody Issues in the Context of Domestic Violence

by Barry Goldstein In a Queens New York custody case, the court appointed a prominent psychologist to evaluate a young couple.  The psychologist was frequently used as an expert in the New York courts despite a fathers’ rights bias that included a quotation in a New York Times article supporting shared parenting.  Throughout his testimony […]

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Child Custody Links and Resources

Battered Mothers Custody Conference The Conference includes presentations, round-table discussions, and question & answer sessions with nationally distinguished professionals whose work is focused on resolving the complex issues facing battered women as they strive to protect themselves and their children in and out of court during custody and visitation disputes. It is open to lay […]

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Position Statement on the harms of “treatment” models for men charged with dometic violence or abuse

A recent petition featured by change.org is of grave concern to the National Organization for Men Against Sexism (NOMAS) and advocates who understand the systemic nature of domestic violence and femicide. The petition, addressed to Roger Gooddell, was featured by change.org and gathered more than 13,200 signatures as of December 15, 2012 (http://www.change.org/petitions/nfl-take-real-action-on-domestic-violence). Drafted by […]

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Position paper on court mandated mental health treatment for men who batter

Many courts throughout the country are using mental health treatment as a penalty for men’s acts of assault against their partners. It is our strong professional determination, based on many decades of work in the field, that an order for mental health treatment as a sanction for an assault is not the appropriate response. Mental […]

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The Importance of Using Accountable Language

by Phyllis B. Frank and Barry Goldstein This article was conceived because of the frequency with which leaders of our movement and presenters at conferences use unaccountable language in our presentations and proposals, even as they deeply care about ending men’s violence against women and have devoted their lives to helping women partnered with abusive […]

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