Domestic Violence: Reasons and Consequences as to Why Victims Do Not Leave Their Abusers
Mitzi A. Granados
Utah Valley University
English Saturday Morning Class
1010
Marjorie Jo Ralph
Running head: DOMESTIC VIOLENCE: WHY VICTIMS DO NOT LEAVE 1
DOMESTIC VIOLENCE: WHY VICTIMS DO NOT LEAVE 2
Domestic Violence: Reasons and Consequences as to Why Victims Do Not Leave Their Abusers
One in four women in the united states are victims of domestic violence (Halket, Gormley, Mello, Rosenthal, & Mirkin, 2014, para. 2) Domestic violence is a subject that we all have heard about. Some may relate to this issue while others may know someone who is or was affected by it but in reality, no one is exempt from it. While men are not exempt from being victims, women are more targeted to be (Halket et al., 2014) therefore this essay will focus on the female side of the problem. One very common issue for a victim of abuse is to leave her perpetrator, many of us wonder why victims of abuse never leave; as easy as it may be for some who is not a victim of abuse to leave from an uncomfortable or dangerous situation, there are several factors in a domestic violence victim’s life that may contribute as barriers to abandon her abuser. My rhetorical aim for this paper is to explain what these factors are and how they act as barriers for the victim preventing her to leave from the abuser.
According to a journal published by Boston University School of Public Health domestic violence is “a pattern of coercive and controlling behaviors and tactics by one person to gain power and control over a partner” (Halket et al., 2014, para. 3); The above mentioned type of behaviors and tactics are results of physical and psychological abuse towards the victim. Manipulation is one very popular form of psychological abuse, the abuser use feelings to manipulate the victim to not leave by blaming and using guilt. Once the abuse has taken place, “the perpetrator rationalize the damage that he has done and then use blame with the victim in an effort to convince her that it was her fault for the abuse to the point where the victim is brainwashed in thinking that she can never be ‘perfect’ or enough in the eyes of the abuser”(Berlinger, RN, 1998, para. 13). In most instances abusers will apologize and show affection to the victim after the abuse, this will confuse the victim in to thinking that the situation will change and that the abuser indeed love her, this is what we call “the honeymoon phase”(Rich...
