posted April 26, 2019 02:22 AM            

quote:

---

I have an unusual part-time occupation. I’m an expert witness for criminal cases of strangulation.

I’ve testified in several Grand Jury cases and criminal trials where a woman was strangled by a boyfriend or husband. It is sometimes fatal. It is always traumatic.

The other day I was asked to testify in yet another case.

As an emergency physician for over 30 years I have seen a lot of victims of domestic violence. Strangulation is one of the most dangerous situations I evaluate.

Many years ago I worked with the DA’s office and the hospital to train physicians and police officers (and, as an expert witness, to educate juries) how to recognize the symptoms and signs of this particular kind of assault.

Since then I have done numerous lectures and provided pro-bono services as an expert witness for strangulation cases in our county and the two adjacent counties.

This experience has got me thinking about the Kavanaugh confirmation hearings from a different perspective than I think most people have.

Some people have said that Kavanaugh’s actions are typical for a teenage male. They blow it off as ‘out of control hormones running wild in a drunk teenager’. Many people similarly downplayed Trump’s recorded boasts about his sexual assaults as “locker room talk”.

However these incidents are only the tip of a large and dangerous iceberg of sexual assaults.

In my opinion, there is a direct connection between normalizing this kind of behavior, and maintaining a society where life-threatening assaults like strangulation continue.

If women are not believed, or if society suggests that they should just put up with this “normal male behavior”, then women will continue to be beaten, strangled and killed in domestic violence incidents in the future.

Agreeing that ‘boys are just being boys’ suggests that women are just unfortunate collateral damage, and makes us complicit in preserving an environment where a woman can be strangled nearly to death. And it teaches the next generation of boys that they are not responsible for their actions.

If a President is given a free pass on bragging about sexual assault, or a judge is raised to the Supreme Court despite credible accusations of attempted rape, I will continue to have a job to do in courtrooms as I explain the anatomy and physiology of strangulation to yet another jury.

This is not normal behavior and should not be tolerated from anybody, let alone those privileged to serve at the highest levels or our society.

The other day Trump said that this is a ‘dangerous time for men’. He seems willfully ignorant that it has always been a dangerous time for women.

---

posted April 26, 2019 02:24 AM            

quote:

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Here at the 2 day long training event put on by the Training Institute on Strangulation Prevention.

Most notable quote:

"There are 2 kinds of strangulation victims: 1) dead ones and 2) near misses."

I never knew that I never knew that there was so much to know about strangulation. Among them:

*A huge percentage of cop killers and mas shooters have a history of DV strangulation; and

*DV survivors are 7 times more likely to be killed by a partner after having survived being strangled by them before.

*Strangulation survivors can think they are OK.... and then die or have a stroke related to the strangulation days, weeks or up to months later.

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posted April 26, 2019 03:37 PM            

They certainly have no issue ditching decent men for the most minor of trifles.

posted April 28, 2019 04:59 AM            

quote:

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Originally posted by aquaguy91:
Women always have the choice not to get in relationships and live with abusive men, yet many do.

They certainly have no issue ditching decent men for the most minor of trifles.

If you hate a man and you are miserable, pack your bags and leave. It's not that hard.

---

posted April 28, 2019 01:29 PM            

Abusers are disgusting. Real men want to protect women.

posted September 30, 2019 12:26 AM            

quote:

---

Originally posted by aquaguy91:
Women always have the choice not to get in relationships and live with abusive men, yet many do.

They certainly have no issue ditching decent men for the most minor of trifles.

If you hate a man and you are miserable, pack your bags and leave. It's not that hard.

---

Women have a choice? Do you know how many women are killed by their partners every year?

posted September 30, 2019 12:32 AM            

quote:

---

Originally posted by teasel:
[QUOTE]

I have an unusual part-time occupation. I’m an expert witness for criminal cases of strangulation.

I’ve testified in several Grand Jury cases and criminal trials where a woman was strangled by a boyfriend or husband. It is sometimes fatal. It is always traumatic.

The other day I was asked to testify in yet another case.

As an emergency physician for over 30 years I have seen a lot of victims of domestic violence. Strangulation is one of the most dangerous situations I evaluate.

Many years ago I worked with the DA’s office and the hospital to train physicians and police officers (and, as an expert witness, to educate juries) how to recognize the symptoms and signs of this particular kind of assault.

Since then I have done numerous lectures and provided pro-bono services as an expert witness for strangulation cases in our county and the two adjacent counties.

This experience has got me thinking about the Kavanaugh confirmation hearings from a different perspective than I think most people have.

Some people have said that Kavanaugh’s actions are typical for a teenage male. They blow it off as ‘out of control hormones running wild in a drunk teenager’. Many people similarly downplayed Trump’s recorded boasts about his sexual assaults as “locker room talk”.

However these incidents are only the tip of a large and dangerous iceberg of sexual assaults.

In my opinion, there is a direct connection between normalizing this kind of behavior, and maintaining a society where life-threatening assaults like strangulation continue.

If women are not believed, or if society suggests that they should just put up with this “normal male behavior”, then women will continue to be beaten, strangled and killed in domestic violence incidents in the future.

Agreeing that ‘boys are just being boys’ suggests that women are just unfortunate collateral damage, and makes us complicit in preserving an environment where a woman can be strangled nearly to death. And it teaches the next generation of boys that they are not responsible for their actions.

If a President is given a free pass on bragging about sexual assault, or a judge is raised to the Supreme Court despite credible accusations of attempted rape, I will continue to have a job to do in courtrooms as I explain the anatomy and physiology of strangulation to yet another jury.

This is not normal behavior and should not be tolerated from anybody, let alone those privileged to serve at the highest levels or our society.

The other day Trump said that this is a ‘dangerous time for men’. He seems willfully ignorant that it has always been a dangerous time for women.

---

Posting as someone who was strangled, and almost died, when I was a small child. [/QUOTE]

Quoting, even though it's above, because I was FIVE. I couldn't just get up and leave. My mother didn't marry him, but almost did.

posted September 30, 2019 12:33 AM            

quote:

---

Originally posted by StubbornVirgo:
Thank goodness that all of the cops I've met and spoken to do not feel this way about domestic violence. Rather, they understand just how domestic violence is committed and how partners can be trapped in abusive relationships for years before they see their chance to escape.

---

posted September 30, 2019 12:33 AM            

quote:

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Originally posted by LuckyLeo:
Teasel - thanks for posting this. I'm sorry for what happened to you when you were young.

Abusers are disgusting. Real men want to protect women.

Thanks to any man out there who stands up for an abused woman or anyone weaker than himself that needs him. You are the men who demonstrate what it really is to be a man.

---

posted September 30, 2019 07:33 PM            

I think that what the Ohio legislature did is terrifying.
Sounds religiously~familiar and antiquated..

In some of the more dogmatic-narrow religious groups, males are puffed-up with a sense of superiority and machismo. If they are not truly godly men who LOVE their wives 'as Christ loved the church', they turn to perverting bible verses.

{Their fave for doing that is quoting new testament writer Paul, out of context!!}.
.. When you marry, you have pledged to each other your body-- your body, your flesh, is 'not' your own but belongs to 'the other' in sexual matters.

That in a marriage bed nothing is defiled..
Some twist that as meaning you own NO RIGHTS over what happens to your own body.

.. Rape?
is WRONG.

Psychologically? ..
It can be shocking to find out that you had married a different person than you expected. Wind up with an abuser without having seen any of the signs. They suddenly 'changed' on you. {You were a 'trophy'.}

In that case, a woman without solid-backing and support from her family and friends {even church or faith group, coworkers}, especially when vulnerable and tight in a low income job or financial way, can suddenly find herself having a really hard time coming up with a Plan and the Right Timing to leave.

Scary is that some come-after her, in retaliation.

Women's organizations have set up Shelters with counseling too (in some areas) that work with the Community, with Law Enforcement and the Courts, to provide more safety for women who need to run.

Aquaguy91.. Yeh. So you're right in a way.
In a "regular" circumstance,
with a basically decent guy,
it IS as simple as making up your mind, packing your bags, and just-leaving. Absolutely.

If that woman has strong family-sibling support;
strong friend-support network that can add courage to her resolve for self-care and leaving an unhappy {harmful} situation, then success can be had. She grows by taking that kind of action.

Uncomplicated departures? ..
Yes, SURE ..
Pack and LEAVE.

Lesson Learned.

Get some personal counseling to debrief, analyze and get insight on what happened.

Learn red-flags warnings and how to see those 'in advance'!

Get some healing so you can approach a next relationship from a standpoint of wholeness. Renew a belief in your self. AND, in decent men.

(music) 50 Ways to Leave A Lover (Paul Simon, 2000) [4:47] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RTiyLuZOs1A

posted October 01, 2019 11:30 PM            

I went to one Take Back the Night event. It was okay, but it was ranting not at abuse, but at men, conflating the two. One would get the impression that women were incapable of abuse or **** shaming and victim blaming, and that men as a group acted to do all these things when it's something that is socially ingrained in many men and women, and yes men are victims however much some try to trivialize that aspect or even strawman it. It talked as if toxic masculinity was inherent rather than cultural, and only affected women. And yet it doesn't. It also affects men. This sums it up in comic form:
http://thenib.com/toxic-masculinity

Speaking of which, while women are the majority of victims in relationship violence, men are the majority of victims of violence in general, and also for suicides, and toxic masculinity does play a part in that. I know a guy who couldn't swallow right because as a boy he was strangled by his dad until he passed out, doing permanent damage to his throat, in part because he wasn't seen as manly enough. If he were to show up at that Take Back the Night rally, however, he'd be treated as an enemy who needed to be shamed and having never been hurt himself (though he also had endured sexual abuse) rather than as an ally (despite that women who LIKED men to be macho and violent sometimes were attracted to him and he pushed them away in revulsion). Instead, they'd treat him as the guilty party rather than reaching out a hand for mutual support.

It also tends to treat women as magical unicorn creatures who can never lie (despite whereas a man is more likely to turn to violence, a woman is more likely to attack reputation, and that includes against other women) or do anything wrong as that would be victim blaming. In some ways I understand given society's desire to sweep anything wrong under the carpet by inventing reasons why it's the victim's fault so they don't have to do anything, and certainly it's not a counselor's or friend's place to make someone feel worse (at the same time I will ALWAYS stand for due process in a court of law, and also the court of public opinion). While only a minority actually exploit this attitude or press false charges (and wouldn't surprise me if more who make legitimate grievances are dismissed more often than deliberate false allegations are prosecuted in the courts or social sphere), it only takes a few rotten apples to make the entire apple cart smell bad, especially if the other women are more concerned with damage control than correcting the problem, and even mocking men for having such fears.

And you also can't infantilize women (by removing all responsibility and advocating special protections and treatment) in one breath and then demand equality with the next, and I can't help but view attempts to describe our culture as a rape culture (despite how it's reviled and even mere allegations of sexual harassment can ruin someone--if anything, it's men that are laughed at for being raped in prison or mocked if claiming to have been raped by a woman) when in the next breath saying women shouldn't take any steps to protect herself with anything other than cynicism, like they WANT more victims. (I do think some feminist lawyers tried to engineer the murder of me and my mother at the hands of my father so they could use us as statistics. It's best I don't think too much of them at all or I'll get really angry.)

At times it does work out as feminist describe. If a rich white boy from a good home rapes someone, especially if from a lower class background, many don't want to see his life "ruined." On the other hand, if that same rich white boy's sister is raped by some street scum then the law will come down on that guy like a ton of bricks. (It works about the same in domestic relationships, the higher class one will get the favor and protection.)

I'm getting frustrated right now trying to find the story of Brent Brents, I believe the name of the serial rapist that plagued Denver (I can't find it so I may be remembering some detail wrong). The point is that he raped with impunity when he targeted the lower classes, but once he invaded the rich neighborhoods a full man hunt was instituted until they caught him fast. The rape kits of the rich were processed and he was sentenced to essentially several life sentences (since I can't find it I can't say for sure), but AT THE TIME OF HIS CONVICTION the rape kits of evidence taken from women he raped BEFORE the rich women were STILL WAITING TO BE PROCESSED.

This is a class issue, and one that feminists would do well to work with class issue groups on resolving. But were they? No, they wanted to turn it into a men vs women thing and that didn't serve the purpose, so instead of addressing a REAL PROBLEM worth their attention, the burning issue of the time was some BS over "manspreading." Give me a ******* break. No wonder many don't take feminism seriously and think women don't have real problems anymore.

(Speaking of which, I hate that term "manterruption" since that ignores men who interrupt women also interrupt men, and plenty of women will interrupt men and women alike, and when a phone app came out to log manterruptions it deliberately left those other variables out).

There was a Dallas judge who was a woman who **** -shamed an underage girl and let an adult male off light, even though he confessed to violently raping the minor (though they had consensual sex before this, but she then broke up with him and he violently raped her, which a female judge thought was more her fault than his when even he, the rapist, took responsibility for his actions and gave a full confession with no contest). It was male judges who responded in outrage in defense of the girl. I remember another female judge who tried to get a rapist off, because the accused was her own nephew. (I also remember news stories from beyond the USA, like when one father said his daughter was NOT to be circumcised when that was the tradition, the girl's grandmother had it done to the girl behind the father's back.)

Of course other female judges are different, and there are outrageous male judges as well who definitely should not be allowed to be judges because of their obnoxious sexist attitudes toward women. What I'm saying is that the feminist dialog doesn't match up to the real world which is far more complicated, and if it was approached as the complicated SOCIAL problem as it is then it might get more men involved, though some feminists would still complain the men were taking it over.

I also wonder how many mothers show up at child abuse rallies when most child abusers are actually mothers? Does that mean the mothers who don't show up are child abusers? I suppose one can say they look the other way, just as many men (and fathers) do, but that's a human trait, not a specifically male trait. (Also, many domestic abusers were themselves abused as children, btw. Many serial rapists were themselves sexually abused as children, and the serial rapist I mentioned above claimed to be sexually abused by both his father and mother as a child. Abused boys are even more likely than abused girls to be ignored and told to suck it up. They try and fail. Which goes back to the PTSD in addition to needing to work out what they were raised with instead of sucking it up, as Patrick Stewart did, good for him.)

That said, I'm glad Patrick Stewart does what he does. The article fails to mention that he also advocates helping men with PTSD which he believes drove his father to abuse his mother, btw. Patrick Stewart is a feminist I can get behind, but I didn't care much for the article.

We all have problems and should be building bridges to understand and help each other rather than building walls to divide us and shout from. If men's problems are ignored, then women will continue to have the same problems.

This doesn't make it the fault of women, it makes it society's fault for preferring to shake fists at each other rather than to join hands. And when men can NOT be shamed for trying to be nurturing caretakers, and when it's not a men vs women thing, then more will show up. When the PTSD men endure is better treated (and given the same care as for women with PTSD) then there will be less domestic and child abuse. Indeed, men with PTSD (which can come from childhood abuse as much as anything else) would do better to treat that (and for other people to encourage them to have it treated) rather than going to feminist rallies as treating PTSD would do a lot more to cut down on domestic abuse.

And it's a nice reminder to those feminists who, like misogynists, think that men can't be feminists, confusing a political ideology with a gender (so that they think women = feminist when that is not the case by a long shot). Or for that matter propose over simplistic solutions like making sure half of everything is half female as if females were a separate species from men (which I see with the same incredulity as when Incels refer to women as "femoids"), as if the world never had Sarah Palin, Michelle Bachmann, Ayn Rand, Ann Coulter, and that many books and movies by women for women glorify abuse as romantic, even in many rom-coms. And this overlooks that even many feminist sects hate other feminist sects (like the TERFs, that is Trans-Exclusionary Radical Feminists, as just one of many).

It also ignores how much pandering is done, from Disney to Gillette. Granted, I think most if not all of it (even by tampon companies) is a disingenuous business strategy than sincere support (but one that should make many feminists feel better since it works more often than not which means feminists aren't howling alone in the wilderness but DOES have a lot of popular support, I'm only aware of it backfiring for Gillette), but it does give the appearance of many men being supportive so that their support isn't really needed at feminist rallies as well. (Heh, anyone remember "Doritos for her"? Which was designed by a woman, I might add, though again I think it was actually a disingenuous business strategy exploiting feminist sentiments in a tone deaf way, though hilarious as it was trivial.)

Remember that the next time you see a movie trailer (which you will if you watch them) that emphasis on the word "HER" in "HERO." (And pretending that "strong female characters" is a new thing when it most certainly is not, and I can also dock some points for having their "strong female characters" either being saved all the time, or themselves displaying full blown toxic masculinity in the said strong woman, but again I see it as disingenuous by Hollywood anyway who will still defend their perverts with all the vigor they can.) While I see it as disingenuous, it gives the impression that society as a whole is now on the feminist train, so why should they feel the need to show up when it appears other problems are more important? (On top of that click bait articles burn many out as they develop a cynicism to all of it.)

ETA: one man made the mistake of inviting a feminist spokesperson to a gaming convention which turned out to be a mistake. He meant well but she obviously was not a player so many there rightfully wondered why she was a guest of honor, and she attacked about everyone as well as the hobby those who paid to attend loved, even bullying the man who made sure she got on the panel. If that's to be expected then no wonder there aren't more men involved.

posted October 03, 2019 11:50 AM            

"I'm not stupid.. I just want to live!"

Dr Phil..

posted October 13, 2019 12:50 AM            

I'm not one of those feminists who thinks that a man can't be a feminist. I have seen posts online, from women that you described above. Not many of them, but I've seen them.

I was also thinking about the women who might not be able to get away from men, if they have their child. Again, like my mother. He drove her crazy, she was pregnant, and at first he told her to have an abortion. She didn't want to. Then she made the appointment, and he begged her not to kill their baby. This is just the tip of the iceberg, when it came to everything else. She ended up having the abortion, and figuring out how to get away from him. She set up a secret bank account, saved up some money, and then moved us when he wasn't home (he would disappear, and was usually with another woman).

posted October 13, 2019 01:01 AM            

quote:

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Originally posted by Randall:

---

I know we disagree on a lot, but I appreciate this.
I've dealt with some **** , but not nearly as much as other people out there. In my own case, I usually think of it as: I was strangled, but I survived. I was okay. But occasionally, I think, "I was almost murdered! What the hell?!"

I read an article from the end of last year, that said six women every hour, are murdered around the globe, by someone that they love (most of the time, it's a man).

posted October 16, 2019 02:46 AM            

I don't think I can read any more, though, because of this: http://jezebel.com/1838953327

I opened up that comment earlier, thinking of this thread. That was two hours ago. I've since read several more stories, and finally copied the link to post it here, after reading about someone's mother who narrowly avoided being murdered by a neighbour who had taken a liking to her. When he got a job at her place of work, she decided to call it quits, and move in with her fiance. This man found out, and said, "You're all the same." He then took another woman out, and she ended up being murdered.