Domesic Violence

7 Pages 1712 Words

Although domestic violence includes sibling abuse and elder abuse, child abuse the focus of my essay is on spouse abuse. Domestic violence has many names; family violence, battering, wife beating, domestic abuse, and so on. All these terms refer to the same thing, abuse by a marital, common law, or a dating partner in an intimate relationship. Domestic violence is not limited to physical beatings. It is any behavior that is intended to subjugate and control another human being through the use of humiliation, fear, and physical or verbal assaults, basically anything to make another person feel uncomfortable.
Domestic violence is a very important issue in today's society because it has such a profound negative affect on the abused, mentally and physically, and more needs to be done to help the abused and prevent it from happening further. Even though Domestic violence can be caused by either the male or the female it is usually caused by the male due to their controlling nature and physical advantage. History and Causes Since the dawn of time physical force has been used to keep subordinate groups in their place by dominant people in society. Men have always been physically larger than women and since most
societies are male dominated, too no surprise the woman has almost always been the most
common victim. In Roman times, a man was allowed to divorce, chastise, or even kill his wife for adultery, attending public games, or public drunkenness. All of which the husband was allowed to freely partake in. During the middle ages it was mans right to beat his wife or kill her for so much as giving her husband a dirty look. The first recorded advocates against domestic violence were two author by names of Christian Pizan and Mary Wollstonecraft.

Even though the issue was being publicized, no action was ever taken until the 1840's when the American women's movement brought up the issue while fighting for the right to vote. No state...