Obviously the tide is NOT turning or the man would leave her. Like we've been telling women to do for decades. Some things might change, but some things never do.

What needs to change is our tolerance of this kind of behavior and the way we rationalize it.

"For better or worse and in sickness and health." Programming errors.

Dawn,

This is not to minimize the troubles women encounter in abusive relationships, but have you considered the dilemma facing men like him? Recall that the aparment was in his name, and he is therefore responsible for the rent.

He leaves, he still has to pay. And the woman gets all his possessions. So in this case "just walk away" means losing just about everything you own, especially any good credit you may have.

Oh yes, he should be counseled to get the hell out. He even says he's going to divorce her, thank God.

Still... consider that almost ALL the literature, almost ALL the pamphlets, almost ALL the web sites, almost ALL the columns in newspapers are about men beating women. Even though a growing body of research suggests that women are every bit as violent as men are in relationships, we still have a broad social attitude that it must be the guy's fault, or just plain funny, if this sort of thing happens to him. Or they just call him a whiner and a wimp.

This poor sonofabitch has to put up with a legal situation in which the police will automatically arrest him--have done so several times. Thank God he doesn't have kids or he'd probably lose custody of them automatically in a divorce battle.

Yeah, he should get the hell out, and more men need to hear that (A) this shit is not acceptable, (B) this shit is not funny, and (C) it is not their fault and they do not deserve it.

A little help from the people who print literature and do education programs, and a little more responsibility on the part of cops and prosecutors, would certainly help the situation.

Dean, A,B and C is excellent. Cops and prosecutors are not up to speed in any domestic or abusive relationship. Take even the recent Robinson family killings here in MI. She went to the police. They turned her away. If they can't even get it right with women, who are far more abused than men..why ever would they take men seriously?

Casey, in speaking from personal experience, yes, that's what you have to do. Your mental and physical health have got to be top priority over credit ratings, material goods and even sometimes your children. Abuse is wrong, wrong, wrong...you can not take the road of rationalization. Children are the number one "excuse" people (women anyway) stay in abusive relationships. Never facing the fact of what they are teaching their children about relationships. Staying in an abusive relationship for ANY reason is sick thinking.

He needs a good lawyer who is attuned to the facts of spousal abuse of males. That way, he can file to have her evicted in a legal manner, which, in this case must be the opening salvo. Separation can thus be achieved. Then he needs to go the whole course from there. Restraining orders would be next. Practical steps that take a lot of resolve!

Well Dawn, it is not at all clear that women are far more abused than men, Dawn. An ever-increasing body of research is showing that this may just not be the case. These easy assumptions, in fact, have made it too easy for men to put up with things they shouldn't, and some evidence even suggests that abusive women get away with shooting and stabbing their husbands because they are assumed to be victims instead of perpetrators.

In any case, we know for sure that A MINIMUM of a third of abuse cases are women attacking men. And I must say, in watching a friend at my office go through losing his children to an abusive woman, it's clear that the loss of his kids has hurt him more than anything else his wife ever did to him. He's even said he'd go back to her if only he could see his children every day again.

Losing his kids is damn near killing him. It'd damn near kill me.

Dawn, I see your point. I suppose your remark about "programming errors" irked me, as if men had no independant mode of thought.

I just wanted to illustrate some of the major emotional obstacles that men face, as opposed to women, since frequently the guy holds title to the apartment/house in the first place, etc., but I think I can see my way to admitting it's a "six of one, half-dozen of the other" type of obstacle. Both men and women have serious issues they need to face in this situation.

Both you and Dean have helped me to get a better introspective on the challenges. Thanks.

I know someone at work who has come in, more than once, beat all to hell, and every time she has said that it was her fault, that she provoked him.

Every time, I want to get some guys together and just sort of wander over to this bottom-dweller's house, and "accidentally" beat the living shit out of him. But then, who do you think would get nailed in today's courts? Yep, it would be us.

Sometimes the primitive old ways worked, ya know? (sigh)

From "Saving Silverman" -

"You see coach, there's this girl..."

interrupting

Coach (Played by R. Lee Ermey): "Kill her."

Tim the Soldier