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National Domestic Violence Awareness MonthOctober 1999 |
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A woman is beaten every 15 seconds. Domestic violence is the leading cause of injury to women between ages 15 and 44 in the United States - more than car accidents, muggings, and rapes combined. Battered women are more likely to suffer miscarriages and to give birth to babies with low birth weights. Sixty-three percent of the young men between the ages of 11 and 20 who are serving time for homicide have killed their mother's abuser.
Domestic abuse is not the momentary loss of temper but is the establishment of control and fear in a relationship through violence and other forms of abuse. The batterer uses acts of violence and series of behaviors such as intimidation, threats, psychological abuse, isolation, and others to coerce and control the other person. The violence may not happen often, but it remains as a hidden and constant terrorizing factor. One in five domestic violence victims report they had been victimized over and over again by the same person. Victims and batterers are from all cultural and racial back- grounds, occupations, income levels, and ages. Domestic abuse victims can be either female or male but the rate of female victims is approximately five times that of male victims.
Victims who leave their batterers are at a greater risk of being stalked, attacked or even killed by the batterer than those who stay. Nationally, fifty percent of all homeless women and children are on the streets because of violence in the home, yet there are nearly three times the number of animal shelters in the United States as there are shelters for victims of domestic abuse.
From "Domestic Violence: The Facts" A Handbook to STOP violence, Battered Women Fighting Back, Boston,MA.
Let us bring this problem out from behind closed doors and into the light. To know and do nothing is a bad as the act of domestic violence or child abuse itself. Know the signs, you may save a life.
"Let's Stop Domestic Violence and Child Abuse"
"It Breaks Homes..It Breaks Hearts... It Breaks Lives..."
"Help find a missing child."
"Call 1-800-THE-LOST (1-800-843-5678)
if you've seen any of these children."
"We support the work of the National Center
for Missing and Exploited Children."
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