Thursday, July 8, 2010

Domestic Violence and Suicide...

Very interesting, but should be taken with a grain of salt:
ABSTRACT
An article in the NIJ Journal (Websdale, 2003) notes that domestic violence can provoke suicide. The 2003 Massachusetts Domestic Violence Homicide Report (Lauby et al, 2006) notes that suicide can be attributed to domestic violence incidents. Utah Domestic Violence Related Deaths 2006 (Utah Domestic Violence Council, 2006) notes that the majority of domestic violence–related suicides are not covered in their report. The report Domestic Violence Fatalities (2005) (Utah Department of Health, 2006) notes that there were 44
suicides and 21 homicide domestic violence-related deaths in Utah in 2005. Using data from the Surveillance for Violent Deaths – National Violent Death Reporting System, 16 States, 2005 (Karch et al, 2008), it is possible to extrapolate that as many as 7,832 male and 1,958 domestic violence-related suicides occur annually in the US. When domestic violence-related suicides are combined with domestic violence homicides, the total numbers of domestic violence-related deaths are higher for males than females. This paper recommends that to understand the broad scope and tragic impact of domestic violence, further research is needed concerning domestic violence-related suicide.
I said grain of salt because it is not that easy to tie a suicide to a domestic violence incident. But I suggest reading that article and forming your own conclusion like the author suggested. Especially keeping "This paper recommends that to understand the broad scope and tragic impact of domestic violence, further research is needed concerning domestic violence-related suicide." in mind. Besides that, it might be an aspect of DV that really is forgotten about and should be highlighted.

My personal highlight of that article:
Our sons are being raised in a society where the government focuses on the victimisation of our daughters while ignoring or minimising the victimisation of our sons (see www.ovw.usdoj.gov/domviolence.htm).

Our sons are growing up in a society where far more males than females are dropping out of high school
(Green & Winters, 2006).

Our sons are growing up in a society in which almost 60% of students entering college are female (National Center for Education Statistics, 2009).

Our sons are growing up in a society where males serve longer prison sentences than females (Staley, 1999).

Our sons are growing up in a society where women live longer than men (Blue, 2008).

Our sons are growing up in a society, as the NVDRS data clearly documents, where far more males are taking their own life than females.

And sadly this is only a partial list of our sons’ particular needs and concerns that are not being addressed.
So true, so true...

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