{"id":1272,"date":"2008-10-27T12:00:20","date_gmt":"2008-10-27T17:00:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/girlwpen.com\/?p=1272"},"modified":"2008-10-27T12:00:20","modified_gmt":"2008-10-27T17:00:20","slug":"your-ink-wife-beating-speaking-out-and-army-wives","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/2008\/10\/27\/your-ink-wife-beating-speaking-out-and-army-wives\/","title":{"rendered":"YOUR INK: Wife Beating, Speaking Out, and Army Wives"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"I’m pleased to offer you a little Domestic Violence Awareness Month Madness from previous GWP guest poster<\/a> Madeline Wheeler. <\/em>Madeline<\/span> is a newly single mother of two and writer of the social action theater piece <\/span>Revealing Frankie<\/em><\/a>, a memoir of childhood abuse. <\/span> She is currently the Coordinator for the Palmer, MA Domestic Violence Task Force. <\/span>Madeline<\/span> earned a BA from Harvard and credits the positive changes in her life to the Woodhull Institute for Ethical Leadership<\/a> (yay Woodhull!) <\/em><\/span>–Deborah<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"Wife Beating, Speaking Out, and Army Wives<\/strong>
\nIt\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s National Domestic Violence Awareness Month. This fact is getting lost amongst the bailout and the fabulous SNL skits about Sarah Palin<\/a>. It is not an issue that the candidates address with the passion it deserves; quips and VAWA sound bites don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t cut it.\u00c2\u00a0 It seems Becky Lee\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s polite suggestion for a debate question \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Freedom from Domestic Violence: Right or Responsibility?<\/a>” on the Huffington Post went unheard by Bob Schieffer.<\/p>\n

I admit, I love the SNL skits, and recently have been distracted by the accusation that my willingness to speak out as a survivor<\/a> of abuse is a form of Munchausen<\/a>–but what has really caught my eye last week?<\/p>\n

1) The new Sunny Side of Truth ad<\/a> revealing evils of the tobacco industry.\u00c2\u00a0 Blow up figures of women resembling Weebles sway in the background as young women sing a ditty about smoking preventing men from beating their wives. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153If you smoke it may take your life, but if you don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t you might beat your wife.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d The ad claims that in 1998, according to the New York Times a tobacco executive said, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Nobody knows what you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d turn to if you didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t smoke.\u00c2\u00a0 Maybe you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d beat your wife\u00e2\u20ac\u009d.<\/p>\n

2) Last week I received an email from Lori Weinstein, Executive Director of Jewish Women\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s International (JWI), informing me that in the past four months, the deaths of three Fort Bragg-based female soldiers have resulted in murder charges brought against the victim\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s husband or lover.\u00c2\u00a0 I googled the murders and was shocked to find that in June and July 2002, four military wives at Fort Bragg were murdered<\/a> by their spouse within a six week period.\u00c2\u00a0 Officials acknowledged that three of the men had recently served in Afghanistan but that there was \u00e2\u20ac\u0153no common thread among the cases, and suggest[ed] it may simply be an \u00e2\u20ac\u0153anomaly.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

I searched several websites before I found the Baltimore Sun article about the 2008 Fort Bragg murders<\/a>.\u00c2\u00a0 Carol Darby, spokeswomen for the Army\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Special Operations Command, said the Army had no reason to be \u00e2\u20ac\u0153overly concerned for [the] personal safety of female soldiers.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u00c2\u00a0 Can this be considered an anomaly?\u00c2\u00a0 Where\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the smoking gun?<\/p>\n

3) An article on Politico<\/a> proffers that Michelle Obama\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s new focus group is military families quoting her saying \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The commander in chief doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t just need to know how to lead the military, he needs to understand what war does to military families.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u00c2\u00a0 This isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t just a political move\u00e2\u20ac\u201dit\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a necessity.\u00c2\u00a0 An October 14th editorial in The Fayetteville Observer<\/a>, a military newspaper for Fort Bragg, made the shocking comment, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153In a way, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s surprising that there aren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t more bodies piling up at military bases all over this nation.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

If this doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t catch your eye, maybe a polite stats reminder will. According to the National Committee Against Domestic Violence<\/a> one in four women will experience domestic violence in her lifetime and an estimated 1.3 million women are victims of physical assault by an intimate partner each year.<\/p>\n

I know objectors will say that women are violent too, but 85% of domestic violence victims are women.\u00c2\u00a0 I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve taken a stand with JWI, which is still in the process of spearheading a petition<\/a> to make domestic violence an important position for the candidates.\u00c2\u00a0 In addition, each day in October they feature a survivor\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s story.<\/p>\n

Barack Obama should take note, since the wife of his supporter and friend Massachusetts\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Governor Deval Patrick\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s joined with Jane Doe, Inc. and made a public service announcement revealing that she was a victim of violence<\/a> in her previous marriage.<\/p>\n

Women\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s voices are strong and powerful! A survivor\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s voice is powerful and to be respected!\u00c2\u00a0 Though I have received recent backlash, I will continue to be an advocate and continue to speak as a survivor.\u00c2\u00a0 Survivors are not to blame and should not be shamed. As the Bay State\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s First Lady, Diane Patrick exclaims, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Talk. It could save someone\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s life.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

–Madeline Wheeler<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’m pleased to offer you a little Domestic Violence Awareness Month Madness from previous GWP guest poster Madeline Wheeler. Madeline is a newly single mother of two and writer of the social action theater piece Revealing Frankie, a memoir of childhood abuse. She is currently the Coordinator for the Palmer, MA Domestic Violence Task Force. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1902,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21121],"tags":[21176,21306,21480,21535,21539,21638,21809,21832,133],"class_list":["post-1272","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-your-ink","tag-becky-lee","tag-domestic-violence-awareness-month","tag-jewish-womens-international","tag-lori-weinstein","tag-madeline-wheeler","tag-national-committee-against-domestic-violence","tag-snl-skits","tag-sunny-side-of-truth","tag-violence"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1272","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1902"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1272"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1272\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1272"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1272"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1272"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}