There has been a reported surge in intimate partner violence both in the United States and worldwide due to the quarantines and mandatory stay-at-home orders required to protect against the coronavirus. Families living with an abusive member must remain together, in the same household, 24/7, without the “break” typically provided by school or work. For the victim, there are limited means to deter the abuse and no respite from its emotional and physical effects.
Unemployment has also been found to have a strong correlation with intimate partner violence and there has been a sharp increase in unemployment due to the economic fallout of COVID-19.
If you are impacted by abuse during this pandemic, you are not alone. Understanding the problem is the first step in moving forward. An abusive relationship is marked by one partner’s need for power and control in the relationship. Power and control can be exerted in many ways, including but not limited to physical violence, and escalates over time. For example, one partner may engage in rule-making behavior, monitor his partner’s cell phone, and/or limit his partner’s independence prior to resorting to physical violence as a mechanism of control. This is called coercive control. One partner’s need to control typically does not diminish over time and the coercive tactics often become increasingly abusive as the victim becomes habituated to them. In other words, the abuse becomes normalized. Then, it escalates.
You need to know it when you see it — right from the beginning — and not dismiss it. In the United States, four women are killed each day as a result of intimate partner violence.
Over two decades ago, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court recognized that abuse by a family member is a human rights violation. “… [A]buse by a family member inflicted on those who are weaker and less able to defend themselves — almost invariably a child or a woman — is a violation of the most basic human right, the most basic condition of civilized society: the right to live in physical security, free from the fear that brute force will determine the conditions of one’s daily life.” Custody of Vaughn, 422 Mass. 590 (1996).
Home should be a haven. Do not forget it. It is your right.
Leslie M. Jordon is an attorney practicing in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.