Let women live freely! the posters say.

How effective is this sort of thing? It is not my general impression that men beat their partners because they are under some misguided notion that it is okay. Most beaten women also seem to realize, without being told, that they would rather not be violated. If ignorance is not the issue, then how is an education campaign supposed to work? If you are correct, that drugs and alcohol are generally involved, and that the wife-beaters feel shame and remorse without the posters telling them to feel that way, then how is this going to lessen domestic violence?

This is the new "DARE." No one is against the educational mission per se, but no one at the school is asking the relevant question -- will this effort have positive, measurable effects?

-- LynnGuelzow - 12 Dec 2006

Whatever happened to Save the whales?

Back at Dows Lane, we used to do things like Construct a Rain Forest in the upstairs lobby.

Then we saved it.

That was better.

-- CatherineJohnson - 09 Dec 2006

Hi Ben!

That's such a helpful comment.

When you put it that way, I realize that a large part of what bothers me so much about all this stuff is the very low level of "critical thinking skills" on display.

I don't think middle schools should do a lot of "opinion-mongering," because kids' opinions aren't informed; they aren't "critical"; they're just emotions put into words.

There's just no thought here....

-- CatherineJohnson - 09 Dec 2006

There is a strawman set up here, because no "sensible" person is going to be "for" domestic violence.

I think you are correct to frame the issue as you did: is this the most pressing issue facing the school today? Is this where the "extra" resources of the school should be directed?

And, were any funds expended to buy programs and materials related to domestic violence?

-- BenCalvin - 06 Dec 2006

Why can't my district focus on academics?

Why can't the halls of our schools be hung with words, sayings, and posters relating to learning and knowledge?

-- CatherineJohnson - 05 Dec 2006

Christopher: "Every 15 seconds a woman is struck by her partner."

-- CatherineJohnson - 03 Dec 2006

Do you remember back when everyone was obsessing over....Super Bowl Sunday, I think it was?

The idea was that zillions of women got beaten up by their husbands on Super Bowl Sunday.

Turned out to be complete rot.

The aggravating thing with "wife beating at the middle school" is that the Amnesty International stuff says almost nothing about wife-beating.

They've got pages up on women getting stoned in Muslim countries, women as victims in war, etc.

Those things are real, significant, and might (eventually) profit from being disapproved of by the rest of the world.

The middle school folks must have thought that cliterodectomies were a bit much for middle schoolers, so they seem to have changed the whole thing to wife-beating, as if that isn't too much!

-- CatherineJohnson - 03 Dec 2006

But young men are the most likely population group to be a victim of violent crime.

That's why I can't stand this stuff (one of the many reasons...)

Ed and I were deprogramming Christopher in the car this weekend (FIRST RESPITE WEEKEND - NO ANDREW!)

I've actually never known a man who hit his wife or girlfriend, but I have known two women who hit their husbands.

Ed knew a family in his neighborhood growing up with a dad who, when he was drinking, would hit his wife and kids, then disappear for several days in a cloud of shame. He would come back feeling horrible.

Ed said that when he wasn't drinking he was incredibly sweet and gentle; the guy was Jekyll and Hyde.

Ed thinks that when you're talking about wife beating you're genrally talking about drug & alcohol problems first and foremost.

I wouldn't be surprised.

"insider gossip": in Los Angeles that was the word on O.J. Simpson.

The instant he took cocaine he became violent; otherwise, apparently, he wasn't violent.

Don't know whether that's true, but I found over the years that a lot of those rumors were.

-- CatherineJohnson - 03 Dec 2006

On 25 November it was apparently the day in NZ to wear a white ribbon if you were opposed to violence against woman.

Nothing on which colour of ribbon to wear if you're opposed to violence against anyone, regardless of gender.

But young men are the most likely population group to be a victim of violent crime.

-- TracyW - 03 Dec 2006

If I had a daughter I would be seriously on the rampage.

I don't think this stuff is great for Christopher to look at....it's more boy-blaming, and I'm sick to death of it.

But no girl just coming into sexuality should be reading cr** like that.

-- CatherineJohnson - 02 Dec 2006

Our district needs a serious lesson on people who live in glass houses.

-- CatherineJohnson - 02 Dec 2006

PLUS WHICH WE HAVE PROBLEMS RIGHT HERE IN IRVINGTON WHICH HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH WIFE-BEATING AND EVERYTHING TO DO WITH THE FACT THAT NO WORKING CLASS KIDS CAN TAKE ALGEBRA IN 8TH GRADE, JUST FOR STARTERS.

-- CatherineJohnson - 02 Dec 2006

I don't want them talking to my 12 year old about wife beating.

I'd never even heard of wife-beating when I was 12.

-- CatherineJohnson - 02 Dec 2006

Mark

This is why I'm learning math....I would like some kind of defense against the b*s

-- CatherineJohnson - 02 Dec 2006

As with a host of problems: poverty, hunger, racism, domestic violence, and even global warming, I want to be supportive and help solve the problems, but I don't like having the agenda shoved down my throat. I don't like having others define the problems and the solutions and then tell me to get on the bus as if it's some sort of litmus test.

-- SteveH - 02 Dec 2006

Running a simulation (easier for me than doing the closed-form math calculation) shows that you need about 2,500 beatings per year (randomly distributed with no correlation) to have at least one beating every day in Liechtenstein.

Seems high for a country with only ~17,000 males and ~17,000 females.

-Mark R.

-- KtmGuest - 02 Dec 2006

Every day, in every country in the world, women and girls are beaten and sexually assaulted by husbands, fathers, and other family members.

I'll be a smart-ass and ask, "Every" country? Liechtenstein only has a population of about 34,000. Assuming 1/2 are female, this is a female population of 17,000. Since the beaters probably don't have a coordinated schedule, I think you would probably need well over 10,000 assaults per year (I haven't done the math, but this is kinda the reverse of the birthday paradox problem). This seems high for a population so small.

-Mark Roulo

-- KtmGuest - 02 Dec 2006

not age appropriate

at the middle school...

Possibly for the next 16 days.

Unless somebody complains.

I would really like that person not to be me for once.


So...the kids can't figure a 10% tip on a pizza delivery, but they do know that 34% of all men who beat their wives do so at least 3 times.

Also, every 15 seconds (or is it 16) another woman is beaten.

They know this because the halls of the middle school are apparently plastered with posters trumpeting this data.

Let women live freely! the posters say.

Bonne idée!


Maybe I'll throw everyone a curve and fire off an email urging them to adopt a Violence Against Women in the Earth Sciences course for kids who don't make it into the Regents class.

Violence at Home

For countless women home is not a refuge but a place of terror. Every day, in every country in the world, women and girls are beaten and sexually assaulted by husbands, fathers, and other family members.