by Garda Ghista
World Prout Assembly
May 2002

Moral Abuse –Guilt Trips and Emotional Blackmail

Moral abuse is abuse of one’s character. It convinces the victim that she is immoral or guilty of known and unknown crimes. The abuser convinces her that she is innately selfish and does not deserve to be well treated by him. The way in which this is done is by continually using every opportunity to fill the wife with guilt. According to Dr. Susan Forward,

“…emotional blackmail is a powerful form of manipulation in which people close to us threaten, either directly or indirectly, to punish us if we don’t do what they want. At the heart of any kind of blackmail is one basic threat, which can be expressed in many different ways: If you don’t behave the way I want you to, you will suffer.”

Dr. Forward describes a pattern that is repeated in cases of emotional abuse. First he makes a demand. Second, she offers some resistance. Third, he puts pressure. If he continues to meet with resistance, he makes threats. She doesn’t want to lose him. So the fifth stage is her compliance. And finally, this cycle repeats itself over and over, because it works! Forward likewise describes emotional abuse or blackmail by using the acronym FOG. Fear, obligation, guilt. The husband instills these three emotions into his wife by one means or the other, and she is at his command. Fear, and fear of abandonment are in many people, and especially in women. The man needs to only touch on this fear and he can exploit it any time. If there is no recent mistake the wife has made, then the husband will bring up anything at all from the past to throw in her face and riddle her with guilt. I knew one man who, after 34 years of marriage, told his wife that she was still in love with someone she knew 36 years before – before the marriage. It was a great crime in his mind that there was somebody else before she had met him. He convinced her also that it was a great crime. His sole sick purpose was to riddle her with guilt.

Dr. Forward further describes four main types of emotional blackmailers. There are punishers, who are of two types: active punishers who make constant threats, and passive punishers who use the silent treatment. There are self-punishers, who turn the threats inward, emphasizing what they will do to themselves if they don’t get their way. Such men will threaten suicide, quitting their job. There is the sufferer. This is the person who constantly complains of his own misery and suffering. This husband will also constantly remind the wife that she is responsible for his personal suffering. Finally there are the tantalizers. These are men who try and bribe their wives into doing what they want. Blackmailers will continually remind their wives that they themselves are wise and well-intentioned while the wives are the ‘bad guys’. The husband constructs an unreal story detailing the history of their relationship. Due to constant repetition of this story, the wife begins to accept his lies as truth.

These husbands spend their marriages minimizing their own wrong actions, denying their mistakes and blaming all problems in daily life on their women. I remember one woman who took her husband to visit her aged father, a former professor. For everything the father said, her husband would argue and contradict. Her father put him coolly in his place. After leaving, she had to bear punishment for nearly one year from her husband who almost daily would have rages, shouting at her about how badly he had been treated by her father. Though this was highly abnormal conduct, she still did not realize it. She only realized that she suffered and did not understand the reason.

Amnesty International has published a “Chart of Coercion” which outlines eight types of conduct that a controller engages in for gaining control of another person, as follows:

1. Isolation: This removes a woman’s support system, setting her up for easy brainwashing.

2. Monopolization of perception: It means eliminating outside phone calls, activities and even TV shows which would give the wife glimpses of ‘normal’ life and enable her compare it with her own.

3. Induced debility: He overworks her and allows her less sleep, as it also wears down her resistance.

4. Threats: They keep her in perpetual fear.

5. Occasional indulgences: These keep the woman confused and hopeful and in his control.

6. Demonstrating omnipotence: He can hide the car keys, deny her any money, lock the long-distance phone facility or refuse to eat her food – all to demonstrate his all-powerful control over her.

7. Degradation: It means near daily drilling into her head that she is fat, stupid, ugly, without any skills or talents, so that her self-esteem drops to nil, and she gets convinced that she doesn’t deserve better treatment. After years of this kind of abuse, when occasionally someone comes along and does a simple kindness like present her with flowers or offer praise for her cooking or hard work, she becomes overwhelmed and cries uncontrollably. Long after she has left him, his daily slander, brainwashing and hurling insults over her fatness, stupidity and worthlessness have left an indelible, near incurable stamp on her mind from which it takes years or a lifetime to recover.

8. Enforcing trivial demands: By doing this, he is conditioning her to obey bigger demands.

Emotional Abuse

The bottom line is, she could never do enough. He was always unhappy with her. Her husband abused her emotionally, verbally, by humiliating her. To criticize and refuse to eat the food cooked by his wife is a clear example of emotional abuse. From there he would add other things like telling her she is too dumb to do anything right. Or he would constantly run her down for gaining weight. Later he may begin accusing her of having a lover, and may start stalking her whenever she goes out. In such cases, if the woman works, it will be a tremendous relief for her to get out and reach the office, where smiling faces and kind people are there to surround her. She will often not understand why the workplace seems like heaven and the home like a living hell. However the husband will often start social abuse by talking to her boss and yelling at her colleagues or even making private visits to the homes of his wife’s friends to discuss the wife’s failings and mental instability. The husband will say that he is doing this merely to help solve the situation when all along his real intention is purely sadistic. This can cause friends to avoid or judge the wife, which causes her deep emotional pain. Then with relish the husband will tell the shamed wife that no one likes her, that she cannot maintain any lasting friendship with anybody. The husband will say this in a way calculated to emotionally hurt the wife. This will reduce the wife to chaotic sobbing and will eliminate any outside competitors to the husband’s emotional resources that the wife represents. All of the other types of abuse discussed here can be viewed as means of emotional violence. Joan Zorza, director of the National Center on Women and Family Law, has noted that while women in shelters will talk easily about their broken noses, black eyes and swollen faces, it is when the talk turns to the emotional abuse that they break down sobbing, becoming riddled with feelings of worthlessness and ‘badness’ – all the ideas their spouse has been feeding them for years. Often the husband will convince the wife that she is crazy or has psychological problems, and then he takes concrete steps to prove it. Such an abuser – emotional or physical – will fight hard against his wife divorcing him, because he cannot bear to lose the control. He will tell the judge that he loves her. But, this ‘love’ will be in total contrast to his conduct, which tells the real story. The real story is, he was an emotional bully. This was the role he played in the life of his wife. Typically, such men will make mountains out of molehills. It is a clear warning to a woman that something is not right in the marriage, that something is wrong with the man. It starts over the smallest of issues, and then his anger grows into rages. The result of emotional abuse is that women lose their integrity and their dignity. They lose their self-respect.

Emotional abuse is inflicted not merely to reduce a woman to a state of psychological dependency, but for the sadistic purpose of emotional violence. Hence emotional abuse like physical abuse is done not merely to protect one’s ego but because of the pleasure the emotional violence brings. Emotional violence is designed simply to use intimate knowledge of the wife’s heart to commit emotional battery. Emotional violence, like physical violence, very easily spirals out of control because like physical violence it is so easy to do and the results are so immediate. Here the goal is simply to inflict emotional pain. This is the reason why emotional abuse along with physical abuse is the most destructive form of abuse. The goal here is to eliminate the existence of the wife emotionally as a separate being with rights and dignity. The wife facing this violence on a daily basis is deprived of any real existence emotionally except as a resource for the husband’s emotional needs. Thus using emotional violence the husband eliminates any sense of responsibility towards the wife as a separate emotional entity with rights and needs, because by his emotional beating she is stripped of all self-identity. What women need to realize is that just like the bullies on the school-ground who used to beat up the weak boys in class, emotional bullies are in reality emotional cowards. Confident people have no need to bully others. Cowards do, because it makes them feel big and strong temporarily.

Materialists reduce the human psyche to a bundle of sensations, thoughts and emotions. Just like materialism is always connected with imperialistic conquest of other peoples and their lands, so the reduction of the wife to merely a collection of physical and emotional services is essentially a form of domestic imperialism. It is important to understand that emotional violence, even if not accompanied by physical violence, is an innate evil just as much as macro-imperialism is. Hence fighting against emotional violence in the home is just as much a required human duty as protesting imperialism in the global home. Fighting against emotional violence through awareness programs must forcibly remind abusers that no one has the right to inflict emotional violence on another human being and that just as we can no longer commit physical violence behind closed doors, so also will society no longer tolerate emotional violence behind closed doors. It is especially important that young people be taught a zero tolerance attitude towards emotional violence.

Social Abuse

Social abuse comprises of slandering, shaming, ostracizing and isolating the wife from her close family members and friends. The husband will not allow her to even speak to them on the phone, let alone see them. He will ridicule and deride her relatives, calling them every name he can think of, insulting their characters or personal habits, making up slander about them. One can call it called family-bashing. This is the definition of social abuse. Some women live completely isolated, always in the house, speaking to no one except their husband and children, for ten, fifteen or twenty years – nearly their entire adult life. Is it not similar to the life of a prisoner? Yet, if she expresses reluctance to mix with the husband’s ‘friends’, he will attack her forthwith and call her anti-social. Only rarely, if it is financially required, will such a husband allow his wife to work, where she has the chance to escape her virtual prison. Still more rarely will he allow her to develop herself intellectually by taking courses. If such a wife gets the chance to do either, she lives in a world of heaven and hell – hell at home and heaven for the few hours she can escape the home. Isolation is a horrible weapon wielded by men to make their women desperate and helplessly dependent on the one person in their life – their abuser. He forces her to retreat not only from her family members but from the entire community of human beings. Another tactic used by abusers is to bring in other people – family members, friends, anyone – and use them to outnumber his already exhausted victim on issues of conflict.

It is common in some Middle Eastern and Asian countries when men leave for work to lock their women inside the house from the outside. It is shocking, however, to find out while doing research into domestic violence that here in this advanced, supposedly more civilized United States there are some husbands who also their lock their wives inside the house while they are out! They may also make sure she has no car, thus increasing her dependence and immobility.

One of the tactics of death squads throughout history, be they in medieval Spain, communist China, or fascist Guatemala, is to initiate ordinary people into the practice of killing victims. The victims are condemned in Spain as devilish Jews, in China as American capitalist agents, in Guatemala as Cuban communist agents. By making everyone a part of the process of violence they hope that everyone will be so shamed by guilt that their crimes will never be punished. On a micro-social scale this is exactly what abusers do to their wives through society. There are different stages that relatives, friends and especially children go through as part of the drama of social abuse. They act (1) as witness to abuse, (2) as partial participant in the abuse (starting with jokes), (3) as a convert to the belief that the victim is innately stupid, evil, immoral, and (4) as an even more violent abuser than the husband himself. The end result for those who may only reach stage (1), is that they will try to block out the memory of the social abuse, thus ensuring that any kind of help or justice for the victim remains an impossible dream.

Why Remain?

Why do women remain in highly abusive relationships – verbal or physical? Tragically, many women hold themselves completely responsible for their husband’s constant emotional, verbal abuse. They love him, therefore they believe what he tells them. It is a tragedy. Due to love, many remain with their husbands. Due to guilt at not making him happy, many remain with their husbands. There are more reasons. Due to fear women remain. Fear of the unknown. Fear of living alone, after perhaps living for 20 or 30 years completely dependent on the husband. Fear of how to survive. Fear of how to obtain a job, enter into the workforce with perhaps meager educational qualifications. Some women may have a positive mind, and thus remember the good times and mentally block out the times of verbal intimidation, cruel and cunning manipulation, glares, threats, rages and perhaps physical violence. Thinking in this manner, they remain with their husbands. Abused women are tremendously isolated. Usually this is carefully arranged by the husband – that she is without any friends – men or women, that she does not work, that she does not ever get a chance to meet people who could help her or give her the courage to leave. These women are buried in shame, guilt, and zero self-esteem. They have fear because they have no property of their own, no house to live in. In some cases they may have no credit history at all, in which case it becomes difficult for them to even to even rent an apartment or purchase a car. No credit history translates to bad credit in United States. Abused women once again become victims of the larger system of discrimination. Some banks will not open an account for these women. Finally, they fear they will not obtain the support they require from the police, from the courts, and from the society at large. There are some women who are solidly against divorce, who feel that those who do divorce just did not try hard enough, or did not love enough. Divorce is not a viable alternative for them. A threatening, glaring husband is better than no husband at all, they think. To remain married even to a tormenting brute is to follow a higher code of morality, they think. To such women divorce is simply not an option. It is unthinkable. Some women also feel that ending the marriage reflects a personal failure. So the wife will excuse his conduct due to his job problems or perhaps health factors. Many women are brainwashed from childhood into thinking that their own identity and value is completely contingent upon having a husband. They have no real value of their own. Their value is obtained vicariously via their husband. Laura Bush was an unknown entity. But, due to her husband’s position, she has become a household name, people stand up when she enters a room, and she is on television constantly. Mary Miller writes:

“Imagine how … difficult it is for women with invisible wounds to admit abuse even to themselves. There is no one to validate the nonphysical battering they take in the form of words and manipulation and covert actions, no one to say, ‘Oh, you poor thing. Why do you stand it?’ ….She knows how dumb and helpless and hopeless he makes her feel, but instead of recognizing her mistreatment as abuse, she questions herself, not him….she may simply refuse to see what her husband does to her. Most of us are accustomed to using denial in painful situations… a woman finds it less difficult to deny her husband’s abuse than to acknowledge it and deal with it.”

Short-Term Solutions

Women’s crisis centers are an example of an emergency, short-term solution to the problem of wife abuse. It was in 1974 that the first shelter for women in the U.S., called simply “Women’s House, was opened in St. Paul, Minnesota. Today there are shelters in every city of the country. Sadly, these shelters depend on grants for their existence. Far more shelters are required as the existing shelters do not at all meet the demand for assistance to abused women. Now, due to economic depression looming on the horizon, cutbacks to shelters have already begun.

Safe Horizon is a large women’s shelter in New York City. Along with hundreds of other crisis centers spread across the United States, they encourage the victim to make a safety plan, to be prepared in case one day they need to flee in the middle of the night. Counselors will advise the wife to keep with her important papers, money and items of sentimental value that she would want to take with her in a moment of terror. This would include any credit cards she may have, checkbook, passport, green card, welfare ID, small change, driver’s license, social security card, medical records, her children’s medical records, important legal documents such as birth certificates, medicines, and police records of earlier violence. They would further advise her to study and prepare for escape routes in her home, and to know by heart the way to the police station, fire station and nearest hospital. Safe Horizon is a superb example of a short-term solution to the problem of wife abuse. Crisis centers, shelters and safe house protect abused women when the law does not. Safe houses are a place for these women to live until they can get themselves on their feet economically and emotionally. At present such houses and centers are privately managed. They need to become a part of the federal and state budgets. There are still many legal battles to be fought in order to provide women complete physical protection under the law. Women in United States need to know about the existence of the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence. This organization works to help abuse victims. It has branches in every state, and if contacted can provide more information about people and places who can help.

The Women’s Crisis Center in Covington, Kentucky is another excellent example of the way in which women are helping other women to survive through the worst time of their lives and go on to become successful and strong human beings. It was originally established as a non-profit organization by a group of women who were concerned that no 24-hour crisis services existed in the area for victims of rape and domestic violence. The center was incorporated in 1976 and began with one staff member and eight volunteers. Today it has a budget of greater than $2,300,000 and more than 100 volunteers along with an active board of directors and many trained counselors. They offer emergency and long-term services to 13 counties in Kentucky. Their 24-hour hotline receives more than 5,000 calls a year. In addition they have presently two safe houses where battered women can stay, where they receive professional counseling to first regain their sense of self-worth and second where they are taught skills in survival: job-searching and employment. The Women’s Crisis Center personnel visit local schools and are able to reach more than 32,000 children to teach them preventive education about domestic violence and sexual abuse.

Patricia Evans, author of The Verbally Abusive Relationship, suggests that taking a volunteer course at a women’s crisis center can be very helpful in helping women to understand the nature of battering and domestic violence. Even if women do not become volunteers, their comprehension of verbal abuse and violence in the home will be greatly enhanced. In such courses many aspects are covered, including child abuse, elder abuse, child sexual abuse, verbal spousal abuse, physical spousal violence and rape. It can sow the seeds for further study for those women who then can research and discover the real causes of domestic violence, such as the patriarchal system we all grow up in, how it permeates the educational system, how feelings of inferiority get embedded in our brains, making us prime candidates for chauvinist abusive males.

Domestic violence, constituting primarily wife, child and elder abuse, are a major concern to the healthcare profession in America. Many physicians avoid responding to and dealing with battering. This is wrong. Laws should make it compulsory for physicians and all professionals to ‘deal’ with domestic violence, and if not, measures against those professionals should be taken for neglecting their duty.

Therapy

Therapy and counseling can be a solution to marital abuse. However, the drawback can be when the therapist is him/herself not educated regarding abusive relationships and domestic abuse. Often the therapist may not recognize the relationship for what it is, and often the victim is afraid to describe the relationship in its reality for fear of further abuse. Many other women simply do not realize that what is happening in their daily lives in fact constitutes abuse. They do not believe it. They consider it a normal life. It would behoove psychologists and psychiatrists to take a minimum number of social work courses in the area of family issues in order to educate themselves on the issue of domestic violence; this will enable them to better help the victims.

If the marriage is an old one that has endured many years, it is difficult to change the abuser. If for example the wife develops awareness that she is in an abusive situation, it will be difficult to change the man. She may suddenly begin responding to him, not with fear but with solid moral defiance reflecting a new-found self-esteem and courage from within. She may say to him, she will not accept his abuse. She will not accept that it is her fault. She will not accept slurs on her intelligence. She will not accept his telling her that she is an adulteress when she is not. And if suppose she does make a mistake, as human beings do, she will not accept being abused and raged at for that mistake. If it is a young marriage, it can happen that in the face of her firm refusal to accept his abuse, the husband may change his ways. But, if many years have already passed, it is unlikely that change will occur. In this case, the wife has no alternative but to leave. Again, Patricia Evans gives the analogy that suppose a man is throwing rocks through the window of your house. Will you start to explain to him why he should not talk like that? Or will you sit and wonder what you did to deserve rocks being thrown through your window? No, you will tell him in clear certain terms to stop throwing the rocks. The same needs to be done when receiving abuse. Perhaps the most painful step in all of this is when the wife must come to terms with the fact that her spouse never loved her, for the simple reason that love and abuse / control / power are mutually exclusive.

Long-Term Solutions

Abuse and the Law: Until recently, the law was on the side of the man. Even in the seventies, a battered woman could do nothing but remain silent or take the law into her own hands. There were no shelters to flee to in the middle of the night, and the police, the church and even other women would disparage any wife who tried to say she was being battered and was in fear for her life. Just thirty years ago, it was considered to be definitely the woman’s fault. The marriage vows said that the wife promised to “love, honor and obey”. The man did not have to give this vow to his wife. Even today the courts are lenient with husbands to the point that even if it is documented that the husband has sexually abused his children, the court will give him visitation rights. In response, some wives will go underground with their children. As the law does not help them, so they help themselves. It was only in the mid-eighties that laws were passed making wife-rape a crime. Today many men still believe it is their right to physically rape their wives at their whim. American women who look to the courts for justice, however, often find that as yet there is no justice for them. The judges and the jury are not necessarily ‘bad’. But, they are appallingly ignorant on the subject of domestic violence and hence make wrong decisions that cause the battered wife to finish out her life in poverty or in prison. That is why education is the key.

Some laws have been passed to help victims of domestic violence. It is now possible for immigrant women to apply for permanent residency separate from their husbands, if they have been victims and had to flee for shelter. The Violence Against Women Act passed in 1994 provides for abused spouses and children to petition for permanent residency. Furthermore, an abused spouse can avoid deportation if she can prove abuse or cruelty, good personal moral character, three continuous years in US, and can show that deportation would result in great hardship. Another law called Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act, passed in 1996, made conviction of stalking or domestic violence grounds for deportation. Victims are also given an Order of Protection to keep violent partners away from the house. Today all 50 states have protective laws for victims of physical violence. However, only 43 states have protective orders aimed at victims of verbal abuse with the threat of physical violence. In order for a court to prosecute a nonphysical abuser, there are three requirements: (1) harassment in the second degree; this constitutes annoying, harassing or seriously annoying the victim with no other purpose. If found guilty, the abuser can be jailed for 15 days and ordered to undergo counseling. (2) harassment in the first degree; this constitutes stalking his victim and putting her in fear for her life. If found guilty, the man will be sentenced to 90 days in prison and one year of probation. (3) aggravated harassment; this constitutes harassment by telephone or by mail. If found guilty, the man will receive one year in prison and three years probation. If we talk to victims of intense verbal abuse, they will exclaim in unison that these three protective laws are woefully inadequate in protecting them from future spousal abuse – verbal or physical.

Police Cooperation: In the last decade particularly, there has been a concerted effort to educate police officers regarding domestic violence, and give the officer more power to make an arrest. What is really required of the officer is for him to: (1) conduct a thorough, on-the-scene investigation, (2) listen carefully to the victim, (3) provide the wife printed information regarding shelters and advocacy groups, (4) provide immediate help to the physically abused victim by removing her to a shelter or hospital, (5) remain at the scene until the victim feels safe. (6) offer to call a hotline counselor for the victim, (7) make regular follow-up calls and visits to the victim every two-three days to ascertain that her situation is stable and that she is physically safe. Today not all these steps are undertaken by police in the United States, particularly with regard to follow-up calls. Federal laws must be passed to make these steps mandatory everywhere.

Corporate and Institutional Cooperation: Domestic violence does not occur only at home. A good majority of it happens at work or on the campus where the wife may be studying. Corporations as well as universities need to become more conscious of the role they must play in protecting such potential victims by additional training for their security staff and holding workshops on the topic to raise the consciousness of all employees and students.

Education: Domestic violence needs to become a required university course, as part of the general studies requirement while being cross-listed with Nursing, Social Work, Women’s Studies, Sociology and Psychology. It should be a mandatory course, just like first year math or biology. This could save the lives of many young women, and could save many marriages. Education about domestic violence must begin, not just in university, but in the sixth grade of elementary school, as a one semester course, and continue every year thereafter as a one-semester course. Knowledge of domestic violence, wife abuse and battering should be as common to students as algebra and geometry. This course should continue compulsorily from sixth grade right through senior year of high school.

Questionnaires

In this course on domestic violence, a checklist needs to be given to every student starting from the sixth grade onwards. It needs to be given annually. The BBC recently aired a segment about AIDS and interviewed a young college boy in Miami, Florida who was HIV positive. He told the reporter, ‘I didn’t have a clue. Nobody told me it could happen.’ The reason for this is that while in the eighties and early nineties the mass media gave maximum attention to AIDS, at present that focus is down to practically nil. However, statistics and deaths due to AIDS are continuing to rise, with some experts predicting it as the new ‘plague’ of the 21st century. In the very same way, it is too easy to forget the questions on that questionnaire. It is too easy to fall in love and let all guards down. The questions must be asked again every single year. They must remain in the forefront of every young person’s mind.

While reading the sample questions, one can keep in mind that abuse is when one person scares, hurts or continually puts down the other person. This is abuse. It stems from the desire to completely control the woman – a desire existing only in highly insecure men.

Please answer Yes or No to the following questions.

(1) Did he grow up in a violent family? (If he did, he will feel violence is normal and he will be violent also.)

(2) Does he use violence to ‘solve’ his problems? Does he get into fights with others? (It means, he will do the same later with his wife.)

(3) Does he have a quick temper? Does he over-react to small problems?

(4) Does he punch walls or throw things when he’s upset? (It means, later, you will be the target of that violence.)

(5) Does he abuse alcohol or drugs? (There is a big link between alcohol, drugs and violence. Do not think he will change.)

(6) Does he have strong traditional ideas about what a man should be and what a woman should be?

(7) Does he think a woman should stay at home, take care of her husband (cooking, cleaning) and obey his wishes and orders?

(8) Is he jealous of your other relationships – not just with other men but with your women friends also, and your family members?

(9) Does he keep tabs on you? Does he want to know where you are at all times? Does he want you with him all of the time?

(10) Does he have access to guns, knives or other weapons? Does he talk of using them?

(11) Does he expect you to follow his orders or advice?

(12) Does he become angry if you do not fulfill his wishes or if you cannot anticipate what he wants?

(13) Does he go through extreme highs and lows – almost as if he is two different personalities.

(14) Is he extremely kind at one time and extremely cruel at another time?

(15) When he gets angry, do you fear him?

(16) Do you find that not making him angry has become a major part of your relationship?

(17) Do you do what he wants to do rather than what you want to do?

(18) Does he treat you roughly? Does he physically force you to do what you do not want to do?

(19) Does he regularly embarrass you or make fun of you in front of your friends or family or in-laws?

(20) Does he put down your accomplishments and goals?

(21) Does he make you feel as if you are unable or incapable of making your own decisions?

(22) Does he use intimidation or threats to gain your compliance?

(23) Does he tell you that you are nothing without him? As an example, does he tell you that he picked you up from the gutter – implying you were nothing until he came along?

(24) Does he treat you roughly – grab, push, pinch, shove or hit you?

(25) Does he call you several times a night or show up to make sure you are where you said you would be?

(26) Does he use drugs or alcohol as an excuse for hurting or abusing you?

(27) Does he blame you for everything? For how he feels and acts? Does he say it’s your fault?

(28) Does he pressure you sexually for things you aren’t ready for?

(29) Does he make you feel like there is ‘no way out’ of the relationship?

(30) Does he prevent you from doings that you want to do – like spending time with your friends or family members?

(31) Does he try to keep you from leaving after a fight, or does he abandon you somewhere after a fight to ‘teach you a lesson’?

(32) Do you sometimes feel scared of how your partner will act?

(33) Do you constantly make excuses to other people for your spouse’s behavior?

(34) Do you believe that you can help your partner change, if only you could change some things about yourself?

(35) Do you always try not to do anything that would cause conflict or make your partner angry?

(36) Do you feel like no matter what you do, or how hard you try, your partner is never happy with you?

(37) Do you always do what your partner wants instead of what you want?

(38) Do you stay with your partner because you are afraid of what he will do if you break up?

(39) Does he hit, punch, slap shove or bite you?

(40) Does he threaten to hurt you or your children?

(41) Does he have sudden outbursts of anger or rage?

(42) Does he behave in an overprotective manner?

(43) Does he become jealous without reason, without any logic?

(44) Does he prevent you from seeing family and friends?

(45) Does he prevent you from going where you want, when you want?

(46) Does he prevent you from working or attending school?

(47) Does he destroy personal property or sentimental items?

(48) Does he deny you access to family assets such as bank accounts, credit cards, or the car?

(49) Does he control all finances and force you to account for what you spend?

(50) Does he force you to have sex against your will?

(51) Does he force you to engage in sexual acts you do not enjoy?

(52) Does he insult you or call you derogatory names?

(53) Does he use intimidation or manipulation to control you or your children?

(54) Does he humiliate you in front of your children?

(55) Does he turn minor incidents into major arguments or big fights, and then hold you responsible, saying that we never get along and it’s your fault?

(56) Does he abuse or threaten to abuse pets?

(57) he restrict your use of the phone?

(58) Does he not allow you to work outside the home?

(59) Is he very stingy in giving you money?

(60) Is he always putting down your personal appearance?

(61) Does he regularly insult or shame you in front of others?

(62) Does he say things to spite you?

(63) Is he irritated with you several times a week or more?

(64) Do you generally feel depressed because you feel these issues with your husband/ boyfriend are never resolved?

(65) Do you often wonder what is wrong with you and why do you feel so bad or so guilty? For what?

(66) Does he rarely share his thoughts and plans with you? Or never?

(67) Does he almost always take the opposite view of whatever you express?

(68) Does he give you the impression that you are not to think separately from him on any issue – almost as if you are simply to be his extension and nothing more?

(69) When you try to discuss an issue with him, is he generally either angry or cuts you down by saying he doesn’t know what you’re talking about?

(70) Did you ever have the guts to tell him, “Cut it out!” or “Quit that!” ?

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There is another standard questionnaire called the PMWI (Psychological Maltreatment of Women Inventory) created by Richard Tolman at the University of Michigan in 1989. This questionnaire is considered the most comprehensive measure of emotional abuse available today.

PMWI – Psychological Maltreatment of Women Inventory

For each of the following statements, please indicate how frequently your partner did this to you during the last year by circling the appropriate number:

0 = not applicable, 1 = never, 2 = rarely, 3 = occasionally, 4 = frequently, 5 = very frequently.

Please circle the appropriate number for each statement.

1. My partner put down my physical appearance. 1 2 3 4 5

2. My partner insulted me or shamed me in front of others. 1 2 3 4 5

3. My partner treated me like I was stupid. 1 2 3 4 5

4. My partner was insensitive to my feelings. 1 2 3 4 5

5. My partner told me I couldn’t manage or take care of myself without him 1 2 3 4 5

6. My partner put down my care of the children. 1 2 3 4 5

7. My partner criticized the way I took care of the house. 1 2 3 4 5

8. My partner said something to spite me. 1 2 3 4 5

9. My partner brought up something from the past to hurt me. 1 2 3 4 5

10. My partner called me names. 1 2 3 4 5

11. My partner swore at me. 1 2 3 4 5

12. My partner yelled and screamed at me. 1 2 3 4 5

13. My partner treated me like an inferior. 1 2 3 4 5

14. My partner sulked or refused to talk about a problem. 1 2 3 4 5

15. My partner stomped out of the house or yard during a disagreement. 1 2 3 4 5

16. My partner gave me the silent treatment or acted as if I wasn’t there. 1 2 3 4 5

17. My partner withheld affection from me. 1 2 3 4 5

18. My partner did not talk to me about his feelings. 1 2 3 4 5

19. My partner was insensitive to my sexual needs and desires. 1 2 3 4 5

20. My partner demanded obedience to his whims. 1 2 3 4 5

21. My partner became upset if household work was not done when he thought it should be. 1 2 3 4 5

22. My partner acted like I was his personal servant. 1 2 3 4 5

23. My partner did not do a fair share of household tasks. 1 2 3 4 5

24. My partner did not do a fair share of child care. 1 2 3 4 5

25. My partner ordered me a round. 1 2 3 4 5

26. My partner monitored my time and made me account for where I was. 1 2 3 4 5

27. My partner was stingy in giving me money. 1 2 3 4 5

28. My partner acted irresponsibly with our financial resources. 1 2 3 4 5

29. My partner did not contribute enough to supporting our family. 1 2 3 4 5

30. My partner used our money or made important financial decisions without talking to me about it. 1 2 3 4 5

31. My partner kept me from getting medical care that I needed. 1 2 3 4 5

32. My partner was jealous or suspicious of my friends. 1 2 3 4 5

33. My partner was jealous of friends who were of his sex. 1 2 3 4 5

34. My partner did not want me to go to school or other self-improvement activities. 1 2 3 4 5

35. My partner did not want me to socialize with my same sex friends. 1 2 3 4 5

36. My partner accused me of having an affair with another man/woman. 1 2 3 4 5

37. My partner demanded that I stay home and take care of the children. 1 2 3 4 5

38. My partner tried to keep me from seeing or talking to my family. 1 2 3 4 5

39. My partner interfered in my relationships with other family members. 1 2 3 4 5

40. My partner tried to keep me from doing things to help myself. 1 2 3 4 5

41. My partner restricted my use of the car. 1 2 3 4 5

42. My partner restricted my use of the telephone. 1 2 3 4 5

43. My partner did not allow me to go out of the house when I wanted to go. 1 2 3 4 5

44. My partner refused to let me work outside the home. 1 2 3 4 5

45. My partner told me my feelings were irrational or crazy. 1 2 3 4 5

46. My partner blamed me for his problems. 1 2 3 4 5

47. My partner tried to turn our family, friends and/or children against me. 1 2 3 4 5

48. My partner blamed me for causing his violent behavior. 1 2 3 4 5

49. My partner tried to make me feel like I was crazy. 1 2 3 4 5

50. My partner’s moods changed radically, from very calm to very angry, or vice versa. 1 2 3 4 5

51. My partner blamed me when he was upset about something, even when it had nothing to do with me. 1 2 3 4 5

52. My partner tried to convince my friends, family or children that I was crazy. 1 2 3 4 5

53. My partner threatened to hurt himself if I left him. 1 2 3 4 5

54. My partner threatened to hurt himself if I didn’t do what he wanted me to do. 1 2 3 4 5

55. My partner threatened to have an affair with someone else. 1 2 3 4 5

56. My partner threatened to leave the relationship. 1 2 3 4 5

57. My partner threatened to take the children away from me. 1 2 3 4 5

58. My partner threatened to have me committed to a mental institution. 1 2 3 4 5

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According to Donald Dutton,

“The psychological seeds of abusiveness are sewn early in childhood. The full development of the abusive personality may be a gradual process that occurs over years, but the path direction – the way in which the abusive personality creates itself – is set early on.”

He further writes,

“…the borderline male has an ego held together tenuously, an arrangement that threatens at any time to fail and with much at stake – his very sense of ego integrity, of himself as whole. With a volatile combination of ego needs, an inability to communicate them, chronic irritability, jealousy and a blaming perspective, this man is programmed for relationship destruction.” …. Thus anger is an unavoidable aspect of intimacy for borderline males and carries with it a high likelihood of blaming the partner… [Such men have] tendencies to blame the women when things go wrong… and to them, things are always going wrong. By setting nearly impossible standards for others, the abusive personality ensures that things will always go wrong.”

The following questionnaire, referred to as the MAI (Multidimensional Anger Inventory, created by Siegal in 1986) can be given every year to boys from the sixth grade onwards, and results retained by the schools and later by the university.

Everybody gets angry from time to time. A number of statements that people have used to describe the times they get angry are included below. Read each statement and circle how it applies to you, from 1 (completely undescriptive of you) to 5 (complete descriptive of you). There are no right or wrong answers. So:

1 = Completely undescriptive of you.
2 = Mostly undescriptive of you.
3 = Partly descriptive and partly undescriptive.
4 = Mostly descriptive of you.
5 = Completely descriptive of you.

Please circle the number that is most appropriate to the statement.

1. I tend to get angry more frequently than most people. 1 2 3 4 5

2. Other people tend to get angrier than I do in similar circumstances. 1 2 3 4 5

3. I harbor grudges that I don’t tell anyone about. 1 2 3 4 5

4. I try to get even when I’m angry with someone. 1 2 3 4 5

5. I am secretly quite critical of others. 1 2 3 4 5

6. It is easy to make me angry. 1 2 3 4 5

7. When I am angry with someone, I let that person know. 1 2 3 4 5

8. I have met many people who are supposed to be experts who are no better than I. 1 2 3 4 5

9. Something makes me angry almost every day. 1 2 3 4 5

10. I often feel angrier than I think I should. 1 2 3 4 5

11. I feel guilty about expressing my anger. 1 2 3 4 5

12. When I am angry with someone, I take it out on whoever is around. 1 2 3 4 5

13. Some of my friends have habits that annoy and bother me very much. 1 2 3 4 5

14. I am surprised at how often I feel angry. 1 2 3 4 5

15. Once I let people know that I am angry, I can put it out of my mind. 1 2 3 4 5

16. People talk about me behind my back. 1 2 3 4 5

17. At times, I feel angry for no specific reason. 1 2 3 4 5

18. I can make myself angry about something in the past just by thinking about it. 1 2 3 4 5

19. Even after I have expressed my anger, I have trouble forgetting about it. 1 2 3 4 5

20. When I hide my anger from others, I think about it for a long time. 1 2 3 4 5

21. People can bother me just by being around. 1 2 3 4 5

22. When I get angry, I stay angry for hours. 1 2 3 4 5

23. When I hide my anger from others, I forget about it pretty quickly. 1 2 3 4 5

24. I try to talk over problems with people without letting them know I'm angry. 1 2 3 4 5

25. When I get angry, I calm down faster than most people. 1 2 3 4 5

26. I get so angry, I feel that I might lose control. 1 2 3 4 5

27. If I let people see the way I feel, I’d be considered a hard person to get along witih. 1 2 3 4 5

28. I am on my guard with people who are friendlier than I expected. 1 2 3 4 5

29. It’s difficult for me to let people know I’m angry. 1 2 3 4 5

I get angry when:

30. someone lets me down. 1 2 3 4 5

31. people are unfair. 1 2 3 4 5

32. something blocks my plans. 1 2 3 4 5

33. I am delayed. 1 2 3 4 5

34. someone embarrasses me. 1 2 3 4 5

35. I have to take orders from someone less capable than I. 1 2 3 4 5

36. I have to work with incompetent people. 1 2 3 4 5

37. I do something stupid. 1 2 3 4 5

38. I am not given credit for something I have done. 1 2 3 4 5

In his research, Donald Dutton found that this questionnaire, when given to men, shows a strong correlation between those who receive high scores for anger and high scores for borderline personality disorder. The same men tend to receive high scores for jealousy on still other questionnaires. The essential characteristics of borderline personality disorder are: (1) proclivity for intense, unstable interpersonal relationships characterized by regular undermining of the partner, manipulation and masked dependency, (2) an unstable sense of self, intolerance of being alone and abandonment anxiety; and (3) intense anger, impulsivity and a demanding nature.

Patricia Evans talks about basic rights in a relationship. We talk about human rights on a global scale. We also need to talk about spousal rights in a relationship. There is the right to expect good will from the spouse. There is the right to emotional support. There is the right to be listened to and responded to with courtesy and respect. There is the right to have one’s own view on issues, be they in the family or regarding politics. There is the right to receive an apology for mistakes made by the spouse. There is the right to clear, straight information on issues that concern both parties. There is the right to live on a daily basis free from accusations, blame, criticism, condemnation and judgment. There is the right to be encouraged in one’s endeavors and life goals. The right to live without anger and rage. And there is the right to be respectfully asked rather than commanded as a slave. Women everywhere need to be made aware of these fundamental rights in their relationships with men. It is a sad commentary on societies globally that in the year 2002 articles and books on this subject still need to be written so as to properly inform the victims and raise the consciousness of victims and abusers alike.

Preventive Measures

Educators need to teach young people about violent relationships, about domestic violence. In the same way that young people learn about cancer warning signs, about the dangers of drunk driving, about sex, contraception and AIDS, similarly they must learn from grade school onwards, in every year of school, what is domestic violence. Every year young girls should be given the first questionnaire so that they are thoroughly prepared when they reach marrying age, because the warning signs will be embedded in their minds! In this manner, young women will at least have a fair chance to escape the tragic life of a victim. The statistics for Kentucky, USA reveal that 50 percent of women in Kentucky are abused at some point in their lives. This is simply unacceptable.

Harvey Wallace in his book, Family Violence, delineates factors to watch out for and if possible avoid: (1) dating violence: continuing any relationship in which there has already been even non-physical violence; (2) premarital pregnancy: He says the combination of youth and pregnancy can be disastrous. The girl is already beginning her marriage then as a dependent, not as an equal. (3) isolation: lack of support from relatives and friends; (4) little or no knowledge about the man’s character history and history of his conduct in previous relationships. (5) dependence: lack of the girl to function on her own economically. These points and others raised in the paper need to be part of the curriculum of a one-semester mandatory course on Family Violence offered from the sixth grade onwards.

Citizens need to work with educators on changing the entire education curriculum, starting right from kindergarten, to portray boys and girls as equal, and to remove all traces of patriarchal thinking from textbooks. People need to develop strict censorship of violent films in general and specifically films showing violence against women. They need to cultivate through the education system so much respect for girls and women that the thought of abusing them physically or others does not even arise. They need to teach the small children in our schools that women are to be thought of and addressed either as ‘daughter’, ‘sister’, or ‘mother’ – as is done still today in many developing countries. People need to think of having segregated schools for boys and for girls, so that girls have greater opportunity to blossom academically without being crushed into cowering silence as so often happens in integrated classrooms. Concerned citizens need to teach the whole society along with the small children that motherhood is a celebration and the most respected of all careers. They need to demand that mothers be paid by the state or federal government for their housework, so that scope for economic abuse cannot arise. They need to destroy the pornography industry, which has made slaves and animals out of women. They need to develop long-term rehabilitation programs for those women. Along with making it a mandatory course from sixth grade onwards, the course on domestic violence must be continued in university. It must be a required course in the general studies curriculum. Domestic violence is an evil that crosses all social classes and all financial and educational levels. It makes no distinction. It strikes anywhere. It may strike any woman, irrespective of her wealth, education or status. This re-education of every U.S. citizen regarding the rights and dignity of women is the monumental task that lies before us today.

As part of education, both girls and boys can be trained in how to handle abusive intimates. If trained properly, it can save their marriages, their families and their lives. Shrii Shrii Anandamurtii has said:

“Overcome anger by patience…. Suppose someone has come to you in anger and challenges you to a fight. In that case your strategy should be that you must not be angry at all, for those who are angry have already lost control over their rational judgment. They lose control over their hands and feet and other limbs, and their whole bodies tremble with rage. No one can work rationally in such a state. If at that time you remain free from anger and keep your brain cool, you can easily vanquish that angry person in battle with your calm judgment. But if you, too, become as angry as your opponent, this will be foolishness on your part. Hence you must never become angry at an angry person; this is the strategy of battle. It is not only the policy of a decent person, it is also an effective strategy of war.”

This statement was spoken in a general context. It can be applied to any violent situation, including intimate violence and including between young boyfriend and girlfriend, or between mother and daughter or father and daughter.

Continued in Part 3