Comment Rescue: Day of One Billion Rising

Zic reminds us quite eloquently:

Today is Valentine’s Day. The day of love.

And the Day of One Billion Rising.

Women around the world demonstrating to end the violence against women.

I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again. It takes men.

I don’t like much about my state’s governor, but on this, he and I see eye to eye. Here’s a bit from the State of the State address he gave last week:

I honestly and truthfully believe, having been one that was brought up in an environment of domestic violence — it was very close to home. I was not the spouse, but I was a child.

And I really believe, that we need to do something about it. I think that half of the homicides in this state, are due to domestic violence. And that, we all agree, no matter what we’re from, that that’s unacceptable.

This evening, I talked a lot about family and about the American Dream. Well frankly, Domestic violence is Family violence.

It’s a heinous crime, and we need to stand up. We, the men in this room, need to stand up and shout loud and clear, that we are going to protect our women and children.

 

source

I’m going to add the rest of this part of his address, because he addresses gun control; and given how far to the right this governor is, this surprised me. I think it stands in stark contrast to the idiotic things we hear so many conservatives saying:

One of the big issues in domestic violence is having the abusers give up their guns.

Unfortunately, the enforcement is very deficient.

Because all law enforcement has to their disposal is asking whether or not you gave your guns up.

And many people will say, well, you have to get a background check. Unfortunately, when you get a background check, they don’t record that you bought the gun. And so we need to do something about getting guns away from abusers.

I am going to be signing an executive order tomorrow that’s creating a task force to address this specific issue.

Curbing domestic violence I take very seriously.

Thank you, Governor LePage. I hope other governor’s, other men, follow your example.

Edit: Some Statistics and Information Provided by zic

Some facts on women and gun violence from the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence:

• Over 90 percent of female homicide victims are killed by someone they know (VPC, p. 3, based on 2008 data).
• In 2010, at least 574 women were shot to death by a husband, ex-husband, or boyfriend (VPC, 2010). That’s more than one woman murdered every day.
• Women are more than twice as likely to be shot to death by their male intimates as they are to be shot, stabbed, strangled or killed in any other way by a stranger (Kellermann, p. 1).
• For non-fatal injuries treated in emergency rooms, women are 3.6 times more likely than men to be shot by a current or former spouse than by a stranger (Wiebe, p. 405).
• When firearms are used in a family or intimate assault, death is 12 times more likely than if another weapon is used (Saltzman, p. 3043).
• An abuser’s access to a gun is associated with an 8-fold increase in the risk of homicide (Campbell, p. 1090).
• Firearms appear to be more common in homes where battering has occurred (36.7 percent) than in the general population (16.7 percent) (Sorenson and Wiebe, p. 1412).
• In two thirds of battered women’s households that contained a firearm, the intimate partner used the gun against the woman, usually threatening to shoot/kill her (71.4 percent) or to shoot at her (5.1 percent). (Sorenson and Wiebe, p. 1412).
• Batterers threaten their victims with guns by threatening to shoot them, cleaning, holding or loading a gun during an argument, threatening to shoot at a pet or person the victim cares about, and shooting a gun during an argument with the victim (Rothman, p. 62).
• The health-related costs of rape, physical assault, stalking, and homicide by intimate partners exceed $5.8 billion each year (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2003).