On my way to work this morning, I heard a radio piece about a new domestic violence program in Brooklyn and thought it worth sharing with the Feministing Community. Transcript can be found here.
Men who have been convicted of domestic violence may be ordered to attend a "Domestic Violence Accountability Program" for 6 months as an alternative to serving jail time. The program looks at domestic violence as the outgrowth of extreme sexism (although I would call it misogyny) and tries to tackle the abusers' attitudes towards and ideas about women. So, the sessions are run by both a woman and a man, so the abusers see a woman in an authority position. The men are challenged when they refer to women as girls, or when they try to defend cat-calling as a compliment, among other things.
What I found most interesting about the program is it's insistence on reframing the issue as a men's issue, because so often the emphasis is layed on the victims rather than the perpetrators. For example, the program director is seeking to start the nonprofit "A Call to Men," and he talks about reframing domestic violence statistics to say "the leading cause of injury to women is men’s violence," rather than "domestic violence is the leading cause of injury to women".
Another key tactic is comparing sexism to racism, since most of the men are black or Latino. For urban men who have constantly experienced racism, this seems to be an effective way to give them a sense of what women go through - obviously sexism and racism are different and have different nuances that shouldn't be ignored, but the basic feeling of being harassed or injured by a member of a privileged group is probably comparable (although as a white woman, I admit I've never experienced racism and I can't speak to that experience).
Unfortunately, the program staffers assume that the men won't actually stop being abusive and so they warn women to expect that their partners will be the same as before. I'm unsure, then, what the goals are - if the men's attitudes won't change sufficiently to stop abusing women, is this having any effect? Moreover, by letting them take this class as an alternative to jailtime, are we putting more women at risk? Then again, jail doesn't mean the end of abuse, and it may in fact breed more abusive behaviors thanks to the prison environment. Maybe this class won't stamp out the abusive behaviors, but it might lead the men to change some of their opinions regarding women, or raise their sons to be a bit more respectful of women. I don't honestly know - I haven't been in an abusive situation and I can't speak to what would work here. But taking a fresh approach to this problem, seeing it as a men's issue that needs to be confronted at the root of men's attitudes towards women, may be part of the answer.
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I think it's an interesting program and hopefully some of the men will benefit from it. What I disagree with is that this program is a subsitute for jail time. I know that jail is not known for breakng cycles of crime but I resent that a perpetrator of domestic violence gets a lighter sentence (no jail time, just go to this class). If any of these guys assaulted a stranger on the street they way they assault their partners they'd do jail time. I don't think the identity of the victim should reduce the severity of the sentence. A program like this in conjunction with prison time is a good idea, I think.
DEFINITELY agree that language is a major problem here. It should be explicitly framed as a men's issue, it's a men's problem. Men should also not be invisible in the statistics and articles written about it, so it's essential we rephrase things like '1 in 4 women are victims of domestic violence' to 'men abuse 1 in 4 women', a'la the progressive online men's magazine 'XY', which has done just that.
I think you make really good points about seeing domestic violence as a man's problem and that the perpetrators are the ones who need to change, not the victims.
However, I also have STRONG objection to people being offered this class instead of jail time. There are times when rehabilitation is an appropriate substitute for punishment (teenaged drug users for instance). However, taking a class in which men simply talk about viewing women differently is an incredibly soft response to an act of domestic violence. If I were a women who were beaten by my husband and I was one of the few whose cases were brought to court and the guy convicted, I'd be pretty upset if his punishment was to sit in group therapy for six months.
Sure, many violent acts can be traced to attitudes of sexism and racism and discrimination in many forms. But people are also ultimately responsible for their actions and to switch out punishment with a few conversations about treating women properly I just think is a totally inappropriate societal response.
The criminal justice system is pragmatic, it has to be due to its scares resources (officers, prosecuters, judges, jail space).
If you have a prosecutor with so much time in the day he could tank maybe a week on one DV assault trial or he could plea the suspect out, and maybe plea out 20 more.
The plea is guaranteed, the trial is not. The plea forces them to admit guilt, the trail does not (even if they are convicted)
FURTHER THAT, if they mess up after receiving treatment, with a prior conviction and a new assault the prosecution can make a strong arguement for an increased sentence.
The situation sucks...
This does sound like a very interesting way to approach domestic violence. I especially like that it places the blame squarely on the perpetrator and not the victim. However, being that these actions are a crime and cause bodily harm to another human being I think that they avoid jail.
Perhaps a better way would be that they are sentenced to jail time, to emphasize that these actions are a CRIME but also must complete this program while behind bars as a means of hopefully altering their views, attitudes and behaviors towards women.
How about this...
You take a guy who is already violent, and you put him in a situation where he is completly surrounded by other violent people, some of them sexually violent.
What kind of notions and preconceptions is this abuser going to have re-enforced? Is the time in jail more or less likely to reinforce positive or negative messages/thoughts towards women and violence?
The arguement that prison makes criminals worse is not intellectual.
How to properly punish ANYBODY is a complicated public policy question.
"Perhaps a better way would be that they are sentenced to jail time, to emphasize that these actions are a CRIME but also must complete this program while behind bars as a means of hopefully altering their views, attitudes and behaviors towards women."
Ditto this. Honestly, I am not a huge fan of the way our criminal "justice" system works, and I definitely do NOT think jail time is a productive thing. However, I think there needs to be a level of accountability that really makes those convicted of DV and other violent crimes AWARE of the fact that what they did WILL NOT BE TOLERATED. Regardless of whether it is actually a way to rehabilitate people [I would argue it is not] it sends a pretty unequivocal message of wrong-doing and punishment. I don't see the course doing that; in fact, I would imagine many of the men in the program really don't understand the point of what the program is trying to do.
Perhaps my view is colored by my experience with compulsory "programs" designed to educate/reform/change people who have done something wrong in lieu of another type of punishment. I would be willing to bet money that the people enrolled in this program consider themselves to have gotten off "easy" by not having to go to jail and thus do not take the program seriously in the least.
I agree completely with Steven, and I think this program is a really good idea. It's a more difficult and complicated way of dealing with the problem but in the long term it may lead to an actual solution as well.
That this kind of critical education work is only linked with criminal prosecution makes it real limited and gets us stuck in these law and order kinds of debates. It would be great to see men promoting these kinds of educational programs for men in general in workplace, union and community settings, as part of 'health & safety' training &/or as consequences for complaints that don't go through a criminal process. What we often get in those settings is in response to localized complaints of harassment or discrimination, in the form of anti-harassment 101 that is as watered down as 'managing diversity' types of anti-racism trainings.
Instead we need connect the private(ized) with the public. Also, I'm wondering about their integrated analysis in these sessions: if any of these guys are abusing working class women of colour it would be good too if the 'learning' was framed around the women's lived experience of racialized sexism and exploitation, and how that has so much to do with how their 'choices' and the limits to their social power in relation to violent men...
I've got to say, I'm actually quite uncomfortable framing sexual assault as solely a men's issue. While I think putting the onus on the perpetrator, and not the survivor, is absolutely imperative, framing it simply as a men's issue falls back on lots of stereotypes and actually reinforces lots of negative and harmful myths (such as men always being perpetrators, women always being the survivors).
Perpetrators need to take responsibility for their actions, but it has to be remembered that perpetrators are not always men, and survivors are not always women, and regardless of gender, everyone grows up in a patriarchal, misogynistic society that we *all* have to work on.
I believe the intention is not to rehabilitate men as a whole (impossible with one method) but to enlighten at least one or two abusers. This is very likely. Not ideal, but it justifies the program, in my opinion.
SheilaT.O:
That this kind of critical education work is only linked with criminal prosecution makes it real limited and gets us stuck in these law and order kinds of debates.
I think it is fair to say that from any lesson there are going to be those who need remediation. And you need special programs to correct those individuals, as the normal lessons did not work
Raimiballa generally:
Alot of criminals are self orientated, and lack empathy for other people. The perpatrater needs to realize that they are the one who is fucked up. I don't know the best way to do that, but trying this approach out may be a good attempt (so long as they collect the data that validates their program, otherwise they are kinda wasting time).
It all ends up about effectiveness. And in the criminal justice system, and these programs, is reduced recidivisms. They could make the perps take up knitting like Sly in Demolition Man and if it works that is what the system should do.
Also, inmates get out-of-cell time to attend bible study, AA and NA meetings. I think programs such as this should be the same, only not just offered, but mandatory for DV inmates and those released from jail.
JacksonFire:
That might require a complete retooling of how most probation works. Misdo probation is generally unsupervised, and treatment requirements light, as there is only so much you can legally make some one do for a misdo conviction.
For felony probation, a lot of times felons would rather serve their time and be release without probation than have suspended time over their head.
In states that have a probation system like the Federal Probation system your propsal might be more do-able, but it is increabibly expensive to have that kind of probation system, as it requires more people, and more felons go back to jail, they need more bed spaces.
Most states don't want to pay for that. Sad facts.
a few years ago a boyfriend I was living with tried to kill me. He was arrested and this program was his sentence. He tried to kill me but was only charged with domestic violence and sent to a class. During the class he met a new woman, and abused her. His behavior continues. The class is a great idea, but the way that New York handled the case was terrible. He should have been institutionalized because he has severe mental problems, but he wasn't even charged correctly. The city gave me an order of protection which only lasted until his court date.
The system treats domestic violence like shop-lifting. If he hadn't been my boyfriend, he could have been in prison for years, but because he was it was only a misdemeanor.
I agree that this class should be in addition to and not in place of jail time. Also, while I like the idea of exploring sexism because I believe it does have a place in some abuse cases; I would hope it is not the only focus of this class because it is not the only cause of abuse. Remember, abuse also occurs in homosexual relationships and women can be abusive too. Abuse is almost always about control and while sexism can contribute to that feeling of entitlement/dehumanization it doesn't need to exist for abuse to occur. The teachers would also need to make sure that sexism doesn't become another excuse (along with alcohol, anger issues, lack of sleep, stress, etc) for why a person abuses another because in classes for abusers the emphasis needs to be on them taking responsibility for their actions which are aimed at controlling a situation or their partner.