WAVE, or Women Against VAWA Excess, is an excellent resource for those who want to know more about the domestic violence bill, the Violence Against Women Act, which costs taxpayers roughly $500 million a year and is currently up for reauthorization by the Senate. A new version of the bill would extend benefits to illegal immigrants and homosexuals.

In the latest post at WAVE, Wendy McElroy writes about the false notion that men are the sole perpetrators of domestic violence. In fact, more than 200 studies have shown that women and men are equally guilty of verbal and physical aggression in the home. Domestic violence against women is extremely serious and women are injured and murdered by their spouses or intimates more often than men. But conflict is often initiated by women. McElroy writes: Read More »

NATASSIA writes:

I have written to you before on the topic of domestic violence and came across that old entry (September 2010) again today. I especially appreciated the wisdom of Jesse Powell’s comments, particularly his last one in that entry.

I have been facilitating for a Batterers Intervention and Prevention Program (BIPP) for nearly two years now, but I feel compelled to stop volunteering for this particular community program due to recent discoveries that give credence to the claims of a corrupt justice system. I also am disgusted with the Marxist feminism that has weaved it’s slimy way into everything in the domestic violence “industry.” I can’t attend a training seminar without being reminded of my inherent privilege due to my whiteness or heterosexuality or financial security. Read More »

GIVEN that women can be violent and often instigate domestic violence, why does society stigmatize male domestic violence more, even at the risk of punishing men wrongly? One answer can be found in the unspoken presumption of male authority. As Jesse Powell writes in this long discussion on domestic violence:

Another difference between female violence towards men in romantic relationships and male violence towards women is that there is a presumption of legitimate male authority, that male authority should be upheld and promoted, and male domestic violence against women undermines this legitimacy. This is another special harm that male domestic violence creates that female domestic violence does not. Female domestic violence does not undermine female authority, because there is no legitimacy for female authority in the first place. The societal principle that men should have authority in their relationships is undermined by male domestic violence because male authority is real.  Read More »

DAVID LEE MUNDY writes:

Is individual suffering alone a sufficient basis for legislative action? The notion that it is lies behind many questionable reforms and shows an increasingly common error in logic. In actuality, there are always competing policy interests. The tree is pitted against the forest.  

Take domestic abuse. Laws curbing violence or protecting women must be weighed against other policy goals like protecting marriage and protecting men from false allegations of domestic violence. To a man, a false accusation of domestic abuse is comparable to domestic abuse. Read More »