Time for some fiction from Scandinavia. When I read Camilla Läckberg's “The Lost Boy”, a thread appeared to be
running its course throughout the book. It was that of violence against women
(its domestic version in particular), a kind of violence that can end up
sometimes with the inevitable.
The story unfolds in
Fjällbacka, a quiet town in rural Sweden. The book is part of a series
featuring Erica and Patrick, happily married with three children, an author and
a homicide investigator respectively. When a murder stirs the calm waters in
town, the investigation commences and a curl of interwoven stories
disentangles. And it is these stories that portray fear, psychological and
physical abuse, lives gone the wrong way, insanity, and ultimately death. The reader
becomes witness of a series of crimes that expose a bitter truth: women are in
danger and no restraining order or shelter or refuge can really help them out
if the abuser is determined to reach to the extremes.
It is no secret that
domestic violence is a widespread reality, and a look into the statistics is
the proof:
1. Every 9 seconds
in the US a woman is assaulted or beaten.
2. Around the world,
at least one in every three women has been beaten, coerced into sex or
otherwise abused during her lifetime. Most often, the abuser is a member of her
own family.
3. Domestic violence
is the leading cause of injury to women—more than car accidents, muggings, and
rapes combined.
4. Studies suggest
that up to 10 million children witness some form of domestic violence annually.
5. Nearly 1 in 5
teenage girls who have been in a relationship said a boyfriend threatened
violence or self-harm if presented with a breakup.
6. Everyday in the
US, more than three women are murdered by their husbands or boyfriends.
7. Ninety-two
percent of women surveyed listed reducing domestic violence and sexual assault
as their top concern.
8. Domestic violence
victims lose nearly 8 million days of paid work per year in the US alone—the
equivalent of 32,000 full-time jobs.
9. Based on reports
from 10 countries, between 55 percent and 95 percent of women who had been
physically abused by their partners had never contacted non-governmental
organizations, shelters, or the police for help.
10. The costs of intimate
partner violence in the US alone exceed $5.8 billion per year: $4.1 billion are
for direct medical and health care services, while productivity losses account
for nearly $1.8 billion.
11. Men who as children
witnessed their parents’ domestic violence were twice as likely to abuse their
own wives than sons of nonviolent parents.
Can anything be done
at all? The answer is that there is a solution, there always is.
And it comes from
Gavin DeBecker, an expert on the issue of personal safety from violent behavior.
In his insightful book “The Gift of Fear”
he stresses out that violent acts are not unpredictable. Most important
however, Gavin DeBecker is an author who writes out of his vast personal
experience and this gives him the ability to reach an unprecedented depth into
his writings.
I’ll provide you
here with a list of pre-incident indicators associated with spousal violence
and murder, as it appears in Gavin DeBecker’s book. Here it is:
a. The woman has intuitive
feelings that she’s at risk.
b. At the inception of the
relationship, the man accelerated the pace, prematurely placing on the agenda
such things as coomitment, living together, and marriage.
c. He resolves conflict
with intimidation, bullying and violence.
d. He is verbally abusive
e. He uses threats and
intimidation as instruments of control or abuse. This includes threats to harm
physically, to defame, to embarrass, to restrict freedom, to disclose secrets,
to cut off support, to abandon, and to commit suicide.
f. He breaks or strikes
things in anger. He uses symbolic violence (tearing a wedding photo, marring a
face in a photo, etc.)
g. He has battered in
prior relationships
h. He uses alcohol or
drugs with adverse affects (memory loss, hostility, cruelty).
i. He becomes jealous of
anyone or anything that takes her time away from the relationship; he keeps her
on a “tight leash,” requires her to account for her time.
j. He refuses to accept
rejection.
k. He has inappropriately
surveilled or followed his wife/partner.
l. He believes others are
out to get him. He believes those around his wife/partner dislike him and
encourage her to leave.
m. He minimizes incidents
of abuse.
n. He tries to enlist his
wife’s friends or relatives in a campaign to keep or recover the relationship.
o. Weapons are a
substantial part of his persona; he has a gun or he talks about, jokes about,
reads about, or collects weapons.
p. He suffers mood swings or
is sullen, angry, of depressed.
To sum up, read Camilla Läckberg’s book for your
pleasure, then get a copy of Gavin DeBecker’s book and absorb it for your own
safety’s sake. After you’ve done both, think of how we should educate kids
(girls and boys) not only on solving math problems, but also on predicting and –of
course- avoiding violence altogether.
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