Shrill Rhetoric and Partisan Squabbling Doomed Violence Against Women Act, SAVE Says

Submitted by Matt on Sat, 2013-01-05 02:33

Press release here. Excerpt:

'WASHINGTON, Jan. 4, 2013 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Anti-violence advocates are disappointed after the 112th Session of Congress ended without hammering out differences in the Senate and House versions of the Violence Against Women Act renewal. Last-minute talks between Vice President Joe Biden and House Leader Eric Cantor failed to resolve differences in provisions regarding immigrants, Indians, and lesbian/gay victims of intimate partner violence.
...
"The rhetoric has been over-the-top and personal attacks only serve to harm relationships that are essential for political compromise," explains SAVE spokesman Steve Blake. "As we move into the next session of Congress, SAVE hopes all key stakeholders can work together to develop a better law that will protect all victims."

A national poll found a strong majority of registered voters are in favor of reforming VAWA: http://www.saveservices.org/campaign-2012/national-survey-on-vawa-reform/'

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Sounds like male DV victims are still off the radar. That's the biggest problem in terms of sheer numbers of victims needing services.

If 39% of DV victims are heterosexual non-Native American females, then 50% of the rest of the country's DV victims would be getting services if VAWA actually did for men what it strives to do for women.

I am all in favor of VAWA covering Native American women and also LGBT ppl of both sexes. And also, what a rad thought this is: I'd like to see it also cover men, yet even straight ones, too.

Wow, now THAT is really out there!

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Submitted by Matt on Sat, 2013-01-05 02:41

VAWA is based on the assumption that all domestic violence is something men do to women because of the evil patriarchy. In fact, DV makes the patriarchy possible, according to a lot of feminists.

But in a lesbian relationship violence cannot be blamed on the patriarchy and studies show the incidence of DV in lesbian relationships is about twice as high as in hetero relationships.That mere datum shows the falseness of VAWA's working assumptions but it also permits us to start seeing DV for what is really is: a human problem. Treated that way, we can make some progress in addressing the problem--including LGBT groups and straight men. But then we need to re-name the act to, say, "Domestic Violence Prevention Act" instead of "Violence Against Women Act." At the very least, that would prevent the law from presuming in advance who the guilty party is.

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Submitted by el cid on Sat, 2013-01-05 13:52