Women have been under economic assault in Washington for months. Deficit hawks have taken aim at social programs and civil rights protections that help keep women safe, healthy and able to participate in work and community life. To some lawmakers, none of that is more important than "saving" taxpayer dollars -- which is often shorthand for robbing working women of both their earnings and their safety net.
The hostility toward women crested this week as conservative lawmakers pushed legislation that would gut the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA). House Bill 4970 isn't just oppressive to survivors; it attacks the civil and social rights of all women. By raising barriers to economic assistance and legal recourse, the legislation sends the message to countless women living in violent households that their place is still in the home.
Even with protective laws on the books, a woman struggling to support a family and avoid foreclosure faces a devastating choice when the alternative to an abusive home is homelessness. The decision to break away is even harder when local service programs and battered women's shelters are themselves struggling for survival amid budget cuts.
Adding insult to injury, many states have failed to protect survivors' access to unemployment insurance, which aggravates the economic instability that often keeps vulnerable women tied to abusive partners.
The House version of VAWA would deal a blow to immigrants trapped in abusive relationships, making it harder to petition for legal status as abuse victims, and easier for abusers to terrorize partners who fear immigration authorities. Lisalyn Jacobs of the advocacy group Legal Momentum told In These Times that "immigrant women are particularly economically vulnerable and may either be relying on their abusive partner's income, or in a marginal position themselves that prevents them from being economically stable enough to leave their violent partners." The bill also erodes mandates for public housing authorities to develop policies to help abused residents relocate to safer places.
The legislation also excludes lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer people from key protections -- an exclusion compounded by poverty, homelessness and employment discrimination afflicting many LGBTQ populations. Similarly, the bill would undermine anti-domestic violence protections in Native American communities, where both poverty and gender-related violence are rampant.
The House bill comes at a time when the country's economic crisis has taken an especially cruel toll on abuse victims. Although economic troubles don't directly cause domestic violence, combined with anger and self-blame, unemployment, poverty and other social stressors can definitely excerbate family conflicts and make escape prohibitively expensive.
The economics of intimate partner violence shape the impacts of abuse as well. According to a 2007 analysis by the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence:
A 2009 study published by the National Resource Center on Domestic Violence noted that compared with other women, "women who report [domestic violence] victimization also report more days arriving late to work, more absenteeism from work, more psychological and physical health problems that may reduce their productivity, and greater difficulty maintaining employment over time." In the perverse cycle of economic oppression and violence, some abusers capitalize on women's financial dependency by harassing their partners to interfere with their jobs, or simply stealing money from them.
- The cost of intimate partner violence exceeds $5.8 billion each year, $4.1 billion of which is for direct medical and mental health services.
- Victims of intimate partner violence lost almost 8 million days of paid work because of the violence perpetrated against them by current or former husbands, boyfriends and dates. This loss is the equivalent of more than 32,000 full-time jobs and almost 5.6 million days of household productivity as a result of violence.
- There are 16,800 homicides and $2.2 million (medically treated) injuries due to intimate partner violence annually, which costs $37 billion.
Efforts to claw back protections for survivors are the tip of a widening spectrum of policies promoting gender inequality, including welfare regulations that punish single mothers, budgetary attacks on reproductive health care for the working poor, and now, abandonment of the state's basic responsibility to protect women from physical and economic abuse.
Advocates have supported the Senate version of the VAWA bill, which contains the progressive provisions absent in the House legislation. But overall, funding for related programs and services has been precarious year to year. Jacobs said, "neither bill contains the strong response to the economic needs of survivors of violence that would be appropriate given the fragile state of the economy."
The brutalization of women doesn't go on just behind closed doors. On the House floor, the nation's shame is now on full display.
Cross-posted from In These Times.
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The brutalization of men by women DOES go on behind closed doors. On the House floor, in feminist-perverted domestic violence shelters and in society as a whole the nation's shame is well hidden. VAWA is a reverse sexist travesty that needs to be thrown in the trash so that some genuinely just laws can be created for all victims of violence.
I'm not holding my breath, since I've seen too many of the usual forced-birther ranters screeching about how "unFAIR!!!" VAWA is to Teh Menz.
Who says these men aren't annoyed at what is going on regarding reproductive healthcare? I personally support males getting full inclusion and support under VAWA if they haven't, or this act changing to a gender neutral version so all are covered...But I also support women having appropriate healthcare, even for reproductive health. Maybe da womenz should reserve the snark for those who actually deserve it, instead of countless men who are worried they aren't supported under existing domestic violence laws.
Are you speaking out about selective service, male genital mutilation? Or are you expecting men to care about women's issues, without also caring about male issues? The snark, the fighting, does nothing to help and it actually loses you support as not many will want to support those who treat them with disrespect.
When 911 is abused, the Police and courts drop charges.
When your states DHHS gets involved, a Violence Against Men Act probably won't happen.