You even suggest something preposterous: “most dv victims/survivors exhibit borderline personality disorders mostly due to the dv they have felt from their partner.” So you are proposing those abused by borderline patients are responsible for DV that produced those borderline patients! Ever considered the possibility that they might have suffered DV earlier in their lives, perhaps from their parents, relatives, or prior relationships? That it might have nothing to do with the partner at all? Your assertion simply tells a lot about your mindset: men are always the perpetrators and women never. The bar is always much, much higher for men to prove DV and always conceniently lower, even if the reasoning is inconsistent and self-serving, for women. Thank you for confirming so vividly the agenda of most DV orgs and activists.

To your other question I am convinced there is some good that comes out of the DV orgs and activists. There is some harm too (because of the above agenda). A lot more good can come out, and the harm contained if not eliminated, if assertions and claims like the one you made are thrown out the window. Society (and esp the children) will benefit when these orgs and activists help the survivor regardless of gender. You pay lipservice about men being survivors and deserving of help but reveal your bias and prejudices with preposterous claims such as the one above.

Sonia’s response showed empathy, understanding, professionalism, and a sincere desire to help those affected by DV. Your’s confirms empathy for women and apathy to men, a bias to twist everything to suit your agenda, and a desire to help those affected by DV as long as they are women (which, given your reasoning will always be the case!)

From this exchange I sense hope for the future because of folks like Sonia. I also sense it will take a long long time for they and their work will have to overcome the bias you confirm so readily.

It looks like you deal with tons of crap at work. You have a child to take care of too. An abusive partner is the last thing you (and the child) need.

You clarified what was confusing in your first posting. It is nice to see you have taken charge of your life and broken off from a dysfunctional situation. That takes awareness and courage. It also requires a belief in, and respect for, oneself. I am happy for you that you took that step. As difficult as it must have been, the alternative seems worse (especially for your young daughter growing up). It took me too a long time to act and I can’t think of a better decision I made in my life so far.

It is nice also to see you are out of a bad situation and yet mature to ensure your daughter has a healthy relationship with her father. What more can one say or want?

As I stated in my response, I don’t know YOU or the facts of the situation. I don’t think there is anything wrong in my response to what you wrote, only to show that some of the language you used are used QUITE frequently by father’s rights groups. If you think I am immature, by all means, you have the right to think that. This is not the thread to accuse one of immaturity v. maturity. Rather, I was discussing my hesistance to words you chose in your comment #30, not to your personal situation.

And, suguna, to defend anti-violence activists, I must vehmently disagree with your constant bashing of “dv agenda.” Most anti-violence, particularly anti-dv activists will say that their agenda is to help the survivor, whoever him/her is. Ironically your response to me (that there is this dv agenda) negates your idea that you think that dv organizations do good work (your conclusion in #30). Or maybe dv organizations do a little good work, eh?

“The men will put down their own wives in the inner sanctum of the locker rooms,” he reports. “They’ll call them hags or worse, say they’re terrible in bed, anything to show their dominance.” The wives, who are discouraged from attending road trips, “must know their place” if they ever do accompany them. The wives describe themselves as “non-persons” and “second-class citizens” and must play a traditional female role or their husbands will be accused of being “pussy-whipped.”… She found the players showed a statistically significant higher level of “rape-myth acceptance,” hypermasculinity, belief in danger as excitement, violence as manly, callous attitudes toward sex, sex-role stereotypes, adversarial sexual beliefs, and acceptance of interpersonal violence. The only area in which the players scored lower than non-hockey playing males was in their ability to express empathy.

btw.. here’s Laura Robinson’s bio. She’s quite the athlete herself, having represented Canada in multiple sports. She runs coaching camps up north in reservations now, and has a solid academic profile. See also her articles in the link in the sidebar.

see also Laura Robinson’s work Code of Silence – here’s an article by her.

Pushing someone qualifies as DV. In the absence of context it can seem like taking a hammer to swat a fly though there are occasions where that intervention prevented worse by making it clear what’s not kosher. DV is also verbal, emotional, psychological, etc. abuse. Sure, it would be nice if partners never disagreed, shared all likes and dislikes, and never carped or nagged. Life doesn’t work that way. We deal with many curmudgeons, don’t we? Curmudgeons aren’t abusive and their behavior isn’t DV though their behavior can trigger a person with high sensitivity, low self-esteem or with personality disorders to react in a manner that makes it seem they were abused and qualify for DV victim status. The DV orgs, 911, family court, etc are there to help those that are being abused regardless of how (physical, emotional, verbal, etc.) and I’d very much encourage using their resources judiciously.

My point remains that the DV orgs and activists have a self-serving agenda and only see what fits that and seldom distinguish between allegations and fact, victim and perpetrator. They have a tough job for they have to react to someone reaching out to them that is emotionally in a fragile state and reaction time is too short to establish full context and appraise the issue better. Having the agenda must make this tough job a bit easy I guess…

I was in Chandi’s position and didn’t know what to do. I didn’t talk to anyone and it was for any number of reasons: denial, a bias to fix the immediate problem and move on, appeasement, a male reticence to discuss personal matters?…My ex prevented me from seeing my children for two years although I begged and pleaded with her and her parents to separate their differences with me from my interactions with the kids. I didn’t know the underlying causes and realized I was totally burnt out trying to maintain a semblence of normality. I mentioned in an earlier posting that it was my doctor that recommended I divorce. Though the costs are beyond comprehension I don’t have any regrets.

I have a few questions that arose from Chandi’s and subsequent postings.

Why is the relationship Chandi described worth sustaining? It isn’t good for the child(ren) and certainly not good for the adults. I guess I am asking this fully well recognizing I slumbered for fourteen years and it took a doctor’s insistence for me to wake up.

Socially, historically family courts have always sided with the mother on custody issues. In the past the fathers put up with whatever custody was dished out to them. And in societies across the world and in every species in the animal kingdom, the mother can get furious and react in unimaginable ways when her relationship with the children is at risk. It is only recently that Family Court and specialists are recognizing the value of the father in the children’s lives. And fathers are beginning to respond to their role in the kids lives too. Why is it considered a loss for the mother if she doesn’t get full custody? why is it a win for the father if he only gets visitation? If the father asserts his rights he is seen as an uppity POS. If material is presented confirming it is best for the children to spend good time with the father it is dismissed as junk science and pseudo-mumbo jumbo. See rversde’s posting…This only creates a self-perpetuating cycle of claiming the fathers don’t care and therefore the mothers need all the time with the children. Anything that disturbs the equilibrium (e.g. fathers historically relegated to the backbenches on custody matters insisting their rights be respected) have the DV orgs and activists (read into rversde23′s postings) claiming junk science and hopping mad. Funny thing is, if those same professionals said something similar about the father the DV orgs and activists will be spouting that until they froth. Sad, sad….

In this exchange I felt affirmed by Sonia’s mature response. Chandi, I hope everything works out for you in the best possible way.

Some more context so you can understand my experience and what led me to post, in the first place. I was recommended to the divorce by the family physician who knew my ex and me for over twelve years. In the face of my reluctance and confusion he even stepped up and found me the attorney to begin the process. The disorders I mentioned in my earlier posts were diagnosed in my ex by a clinical psychologist of her own (and her attorney’s) choosing. The judge who had ordered the evaluation considered the choice of psychologist as excellent as she came with twenty+ years of experience and had worked with the Family Court for twenty five years+. Family Court in prior intervention ordered my ex to therapy for DV and parental alienation.

Is it normal to engage in disorderly conduct whenever you FELT DV from your partner? The operative word here is felt , exactly what rversde23 used in her posting. For most of us a hallmark of maturity and normal behavior is to separate feelings from fact, and to manage our lives based on reason and not feelings and emotions. We learn, through life experiences sometimes, to manage sometimes conflicting emotions and feelings that run their course every day and not let them affect or interfere with our lives. And we get by with that (mostly). For those with disorders feelings are fact and reality. You can imagine the consequences: accusations, allegations, turmoil, volatility and so on. Now we have someone purportedly helping victims of DV support and espouse behavior (produced by disorders) because the victims FELT DV from their partner. That, I fear and know, will only encourage the abusers and punish the victims. It also says a lot about the agenda of DV orgs and activists out there.

Oh, please don’t try spinning this into my making a mountain of a molehill. And here we have someone explaining abusive behavior, as is typical from someone suffering from borderline and equivalent disorders, because they felt DV from their partner.

The irony here is that I agree those with borderline and other personality disorders suffered trauma somewhere in their lives. They are surely a victim and survivor in that sense. I am sure there is something they see or perceive in their partner that is catalytic and brings out behavior that is to protect them but ends up destroying everyone. They need all the help they can get. Their partners can’t be held responsible for the past trauma and consequent scars nor can they cure it. Their trauma and experience also does not license them to abuse others because of prior trauma or to unleash the beast at every feeling or emotion. And when DV activists can’t distinguish between feeling and fact, allow emotions, feelings and consequent allegations and accusations to drive issues, and fail at separating projection from actual behavior it only furthers the confirms their skewed agendas and the need for better methods.

Limiting myself to my experience rversde23 raises the possibility the health-care and family court individuals (and many of them, all independent) relied on junk science now discarded by professional organisations, couldn’t distinguish between victim and perpetrator, and if they had known better wouldn’t have issued the recommendations and court orders that they have. I am afraid the painful cycle of DV will be self-sustaining as long as the DV orgs and activists take the position rversde23 has in her posting.

to therapy for DV against me and the children and for alienating the children against me. She was diagnosed by a clinical psychologist she chose to have numerous personality disorders (borderline, histrionic, passive/aggressive in case you care) which manifest in emotional manipulation/blackmail, rage, anger, projection (wherein her feelings and behavior are presented as that of others around her). And so on…

Working in the domestic violence field, these words that you have used are trigger words used by fathers rights movement. I don’t want to downplay the dv that you may have felt (emotionally, physically, and/or mentally), I don’t even know you or the facts. I do agree with your stance that a) dv happens to men and women, b) men and women can be aggressors, and c) that most dv groups do not have a sufficient way of assessing the batterer and victim.

However, it is important to note that most dv victims/survivors exhibit borderline personality disorders mostly due to the dv they have felt from their partner. This is a common argument used against pepetrators (not saying you are one) particularly in child custody disputes. A junk science disorder called Parental Alienation Syndrome, created by a NY social scientist over his personal observations, made this theory. The theory is that the mother (in most cases, victim) is alienating her children from the father (in most cases, batterer) on purpose. That way the children have no desire to see the father. It has been totally disregarded by the ABA, APA and other major organizations. Unfortunately, father rights groups are still using this junk science in legal arguments. Not that this is the right forum to get into the legal argument, how it is faulty, and why it should not be used, but needless to say the words used by commentator suguna #30 made me get goose bumps.

I have seen way too many mothers lose their parental rights to the batterer based on this junk science. Divorce is a messy legal, emotional, and social monster. However, coupled with domestic violence, it becomes a beast. Becoming wary of jumping on the band wagon that “domestic violence happens to heterosexual men too!!” should be a carefully and deliberately assessed. Again, I am NOT saying that it cannot happen, but the words used by suguna are words I have read in several legal briefs that do not mean anything more than “I am dealing with the beast (divorce coupled with domestic violence).”