Stop Dating Violence

A couple weeks ago I was talking to a friend who I don’t see very often. We were talking about our latest dating endeavors and he was asking me about my current boyfriend. “Is he nice to you? Does he treat you right?” “ Yes Austin, of course he does.” Later I was thinking about his questions. Luckily I have never been in a position where I would have to say no to these questions and I also hope to never have to be but unfortunately for too many teens that is not the case.
Think about your 3 best friends. Picture them, very clearly in your head. Did you know that 1 in 3 teens will be involved in an abusive relationship? These are kids our age that go to our school. Everyone in this classroom is between 16 and 17. Did you know that 40% of girls ages 14-17 know someone who has been beaten by their boyfriend?
According to crisisconnectioninc.org dating violence is defined as repeated verbal, emotional, physical and/or sexual abuse used to frighten, hurt, and control a dating partner. Lets break it down into different categories. Emotional and verbal, physical, and finally sexual.
Many people think of abuse as hitting, scratching and pulling hair, but it is so much more than that. Emotional and verbal abuse are just as bad-if not worse- than physical abuse because many girls and women do not recognize it for what it truly is. Verbal abuse makes the victim feel helpless and guilty. Name-calling, threats and constant criticism are all forms of verbal abuse. Often along with emotional abuse will be threats of physical abuse used to scare the victim. Verbal abuse tends to get worse with time.
Physical abuse includes everything from slapping to biting to pushing. Physical abuse gets the most attention in the media and is most easily recognized as abuse. Physical abuse is the form of abuse that allows for restraining orders and interference by friends and family because it is most visible to people outside of the relationship.
Sexual violence is the most shocking. Rape is not only for creepy men in allies or for trashy girls who are “asking for it” 90% of collage aged girls who are raped, their rapist is someone they know. “Date Rape” accounts for 70% of reported sexual assaults. 38% are between the ages of 14 and 17. Sexual violence is a huge problem especially in teen relationships because it involves any unwanted touching or kissing.
But the most important thing to realize about dating abuse is that it can happen to anyone. Dating abuse does not pick social class, race, geographical location or even sexual orientation. It can happen to anyone at anytime pretty much anywhere. In fact a women is beaten every 15 seconds somewhere in the U.S. and 2 women die from domestic violence every week.
Now let’s talk about boys and domestic violence. While it is true that men are generally thought of as the abusers in these situations they can be the ones being abused. However this occurs less than 5% of the time. As a result men do not get nearly the publicity that women get for domestic violence. When a man is a victim to domestic violence not only does he not report it or run away but his partner was often acting in her own self-defense against him. But there is another way that domestic and dating violence can affect young men and that is through the act of protection. 63% of young boys who are currently serving time for homicide are doing so for killing their mother’s abuser. Along with this male children who witness their fathers assaulting their mothers are more likely to become abusers in their own adult lives. Witnessing abuse can make a huge impact on the lives of boys and can create a cycle that is very hard to break out of.

At this point many people begin thinking none of this sounds good or fun, obviously so why do women or men stay in violent relationships? Many reasons. The first one is love. The victim is still in love with the abuser, they may apologize and beg to be taken back. Hope of happier times, blaming yourself and staying together for the kids are also all reasons for not leaving. But is it a good idea to leave. Women who leave their abuser are 68% more likely to be victims of homicides and 75% of women and children who are homeless are in that position because they are escaping abuse. It is not easy to leave abuse but it is something that needs to happen.
Lets get back to talking about high school. I was doing some research on the resources available to high schoolers for domestic abuse and what I found was pathetic. Fayette County Public Schools offers no programs or help with dating violence, neither does Henry Clay. Dating violence affects more kids then drunk driving and cyber stalking but we have active programs for those issues. In fact we waste class time to watch iSafe videos but when was the last time you heard about dating violence?
In order to have any hope of this situation improving we need to get the word out, create prevention techniques and educate high schoolers about dating violence. There are so many outlets and ways that we could be educated about this crucial topic. Health class, videos, counselors yet none of these are being utilized Sure we can joke and laugh about rape and abuse but when it comes down to it this is an important topic that needs to be brought to our attention. This affects too many teens to be ignored.
Remember those numbers from the beginning of my speech that 1/3 of teens are or will become victims of domestic violence and that 40% of girls our age know someone who has been a victim of dating violence. Well that adds up to dating violence effecting about 75% of teens today. When was the last time you heard of something affecting 3/4ths of the population and nothing being done about it?












Sources:
www.durc-or.org
www.crisisconnectioninc.org
In Love and In Danger: A Teen’s Guide To Breaking Free Of Abusive Relationships By Levy Barrie
Interview with Eve Ensler- she has worked with violence against women and recently wrote a book on the subject
Dealing With Campus Violence Against Women-Documentary on how college campuses deal with violence across the U.S.
http://www.stayteen.org/whats-your-relationship-reality/dating-violence/default.aspx
www.kdva.org