Graphic by Michael D. Fraley

Originally published December 8, 1999 in The Evening Star

AFTER THE FALL - She just wants him to love her.

He just wants her to love him.

It sounds like a simple formula: They give their love to each other, then live happily ever after.

Yet, in some inexplicable way, in a couple's relationship where battering occurs in some form,
the messages get crisscrossed: The woman wonders what she can do to make him love her
enough not to hurt her, while the batterer wonders why she doesn't love him enough to do
things that would make him stop hurting her.

It is a vicious circle that, ultimately, has no end unless the batterer comes to terms with his need
for power and control over someone he loves.

Why an individual turns to battering to communicate his needs is not easily answered and can
vary from batterer to batterer. Every batterer does have three things in common, though, and
those things are that they have learned to batter; that battering works; and that they can.

The dynamics of domestic violence and the way it is manifested are universal, too. "Power and
control are the issues," says Joyce Wright, a trainer with the Michigan-based Violence Against
Women Training Institute.

Wright, who has trained emergency room personnel and private practice physicians as well as
judges and law enforcement personnel, says professionals have learned this from both the
survivors of domestic violence and their assailants.

"It is not caused by alcohol, stress or outside events," she says. "It is a choice, a purposeful
behavior used to achieve power and control. The intent of the tactics is to instill fear and to
degrade and to debilitate those you want to control.

"What we don't know about domestic violence is which batterers will escalate to murder and
suicide."

What professionals do know about domestic violence is that, to be effective in teaching a
batterer not to batter - and not to escalate his battering to murder and/or suicide - any
intervention program a batterer attends must address the batterer's need for power and
control.

This program must occur in the form of intensive counseling that focuses on the batterer's
assuming responsibility for his choice to batter, domestic advocate experts say.

Communication skills workshops are not the answer: "That assailants need to learn
communications skills is a misnomer," Wright says.

"They know how to communicate very well. They choose what they're doing. They believe their
partner belongs to them and they choose to engage in abusive behavior.

"Because of that it is very difficult to change them."

Because changing a batterer's behavior is so difficult - statistics show that it is more difficult for
someone in his 30s to change his behavior than for a younger person to change - effective
batterers' counseling, then, must include programs that teach the batterer first to recognize that
his need for power and control is not an element of a healthy relationship and, second, to
accept his partner as an equal and not as a possession.

The program also must reinforce the idea that the batterer's partner has a right to make certain
decisions for herself as a person and that she deserves respect as an individual as well as in the
role of a partner.

An effective batterer's intervention program does not allow the batterer to validate his behavior
with excuses of any kind, including reasoning that says "she made me do it" or "she does things
that make me angry."

It also does not allow the batterer to transfer blame with excuses such as "she hit me first."

The effective program does not give the batterer sympathy by offering him placating statements
such as "society tells us it's OK for women to hit men but not for men to hit women."

Effective batterers' programs do not promote couples' or marriage counseling as the answer to
domestic violence, either.

"The couple is not before the judge - the batterer is," says Deborah Tucker, director of the
National Training Center on Domestic & Sexual Violence. "That's why marriage counseling is
not appropriate for getting a batterer to stop."

Some treatment centers offer a few weeks or months of anger management counseling
combined with marriage counseling and a program that teaches men to make better choices.
Others offer a type of program called "pastoral counseling," which follows a no-blame line of
thinking and which may include marriage and anger management courses.

"This is not to say that pastoral counseling is bad," says Tucker. "But someone engaged in
violence requires a whole lot greater depth (than what pastoral counseling offers) to see and
define his problem."

A combination of programs that are not totally endorsed or approved by domestic violence
professionals isn't the answer either, domestic violence advocates say.

"I agree that making better choices is a real key for a batterer," says Marilyn Chandler,
executive director of Safe Haven, a shelter for domestic victims in LaGrange County. "But the
first thing batterers have to acknowledge is that the choices they made in the past have been
inappropriate and harmful to another human being.

"Batterers as a whole do not believe they have done anything wrong - so, if you made a bad
choice, how do you learn to make a better choice?"

Therefore, to be effective, a batterers' program must contain the following components:

¤ the program must be a minimum of once-a-week sessions for at least one year;

¤ it must be a behavior-based model;

¤ it must have sanctions for failure to comply; and,

¤ the program must include regular contact with the partner to ensure that the victim remains
safe.

This means that if the batterer fails to attend counseling sessions or refuses to comply with
probation rules, the immediate consequence is jail.

"We have to get the message out that non-compliance will result in immediate incarceration,"
says Tucker. "Jail is useful, but a lot of people just don't get it.'

"A good program, therefore, must put the emphasis on the batterers, who are absolutely
shocked the first time they are arrested. Some of them have been using these tactics for 13 or 14
years and are stunned that they can't get away with it."

Offering a batterer a choice of counseling programs is not a good thing, either, says Chandler,
because a batterer inevitably will choose the easiest, least confrontational program.

The M.E.N.'s program (for "Men Embracing Nonviolence") in LaGrange County is a
court-ordered program. It is a minimum one-year-long, intense program. It focuses on the
men's need for power and control. It forces them to acknowledge and admit their abusive
behavior and to make concerted efforts to change that behavior.

And - if the men choose not to attend, the consequence is jail.

"A batterer allowed to choose is never going to choose our program," Chandler says. "This
program is much too (confrontational), too intense and too long.

"Allowing a batterer to choose his treatment is as bad as no consequence at all. They've been
able to choose their behavior all along - what's any different if they get to choose their
treatment program?"

Even with counseling, the community, courts and the batterer must be aware that a batterer
always will be a batterer. "All they do is become aware of their tendencies to batter, and then
it's a lifelong process to make nonviolent choices, similar to an alcoholic's choosing not to
drink," Chandler says.

The M.E.N.'s program meets in a group setting and consists of three phases. In the first phase
the men must admit that they are batterers and list specific behaviors that demonstrate how
they have battered their partners.

In the second phase the men are expected to understand that all their abusive behaviors were
choices to control their partners. They also must come to an understanding of something
domestic violence professionals call the "Power and Control Wheel," especially their own use of
tactics described on the wheel.

The men also must have stopped blaming other people, events or circumstances for their
behavior. Additionally, they must review the lists they made in Phase 1 and expand and
expound on them.

"You can tell throughout the group process where each man is in the program," Chandler
says. "They have to almost memorize the Power and Control wheel, what tactics they used and
then get feedback from the group members."

Next: Phase 3, the Power and Control Wheel and why this wheel is important to combating
domestic violence

Where to call if you need help

If you are in immediate danger, call 911

If you are safe at the time call:

(517) 278-7432 (Branch Co., Mich., Coalition Against Domestic Violence)

(219) 463-8700 (Elijah Haven Crisis Intervention Center Inc., LaGrange)

(219) 925-3365 (DeKalb County Sheriff - this office will contact a nearby shelter for you)

(800) 567-9596 (Noble County Answer Line)

668-0262 (Steuben County)

(800) 441-4073 (YMCA Women's Shelter and Outreach Services, Fort Wayne)

Or call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at (800) 799-SAFE.

Originally published Januanry 4, 2000 in The Evening Star

AFTER THE FALL - Power and control. The circle of acts that defines domestic violence centers on the batterer's need for power and control over his victim.

Within that circle are numerous acts that the batterer uses to exert his power to control the victim. Those acts may include:

- Emotional abuse: putting her down, making her feel bad about herself, calling her names, making her think she's crazy, playing mind games, humiliating her, making her feel guilty, using things that matter to her against her, negatively comparing her to others, unreasonable demands or expectations, honeymooning her, perfectionism;

- Use of isolation: controlling her access to resources such as birth control, reproductive choice, medical attention, money, education, employment opportunities, family/friends, transportation, phone use, using jealousy to justify actions, embarrassing her in front of others, kidnapping her, convincing her that seeing her family or friends is harmful to the relationship;

- Attempts to confuse the issue: denying or minimizing the existence of domestic violence in the relationship, severity or impact of abusive behavior, lying about, concealing, withholding or omitting information, situations or behavior to gain advantage, pretending to be a victim, himself, to gain sympathy, support or allies, using intoxication as an excuse;

- Using others: using the children to relay messages, using visitation to harass her, threatening to take the children away, using custody of the children as leverage, abusing the children, sexual abuse of the children, kidnapping the children, degrading her about her relationships, using her job, family, friends religion as leverage;

- Using "male privilege": defining what men's and women's roles are, defining what is and isn't "important," controlling the decision-making process, making and enforcing self-serving rules, treating her as an inferior, acting like the "master of the castle," believing or saying, It's my right as a man to behave this way," acting like God;

- Using economic abuse: concealing or denying information about finances, using family/her assets without her knowledge or permission, preventing her from getting, keeping or leaving a job, damaging her credit, making her ask for money, destroying checkbooks, credit cards, money or property, giving her an allowance;

- Using coercion and threats: threats are statements which promise negative consequences for certain behaviors or actions. For example, "I'll kill you if you ever leave me." Coercion is making statements or committing acts that imply indirectly negative, or positive, consequences for certain behaviors or actions, such as cleaning the house or buying her flowers the day after abuse;

- Using intimidation: making her afraid by using looks, actions, gestures, intoxication, "silent treatment," smashing things, destroying property, harming pets, displaying weapons, yelling, stalking her, slamming doors, driving recklessly, acting "crazy," invincible or like "I have nothing to lose."

On a graph, these issues are charted into something domestic violence advocates call the"power and control wheel." The outside wheel containing the above-listed power and control methods shows how different types of domestic violence acts run into and even overlap each other.

Power and control are at the heart of the wheel, the issues around which the violence revolves.

In LaGrange County, an intense, once-a-week, year-long batterers' intervention program called the "M.E.N.'s Program" (for men embracing nonviolence) addresses these power and control issues and teaches the men to recognize the ways they abuse their partners to achieve power and control.

The men attending these sessions must go through a three-phase process as they work toward changing their behaviors. In the first phase they must admit that they are batterers and list specific behaviors they use to control their victims.

They are not allowed to include excuses or validations for the behaviors. This is called accepting accountability for the actions. In some cases it takes several months for a batterer to get to this point, says Marilyn Chandler, executive director of Safe Haven, a shelter for domestic victims in LaGrange County and a co-facilitator for the M.E.N.'s group.

Once the men admit they are batterers and accept responsibility for their actions, they move into Phase 2 of the program, where they examine their needs for power and control and the behaviors they use to achieve it.

In this phase the men must learn to understand exactly what domestic violence is, Chandler says: "the purposeful, instrumental, strategic behavior conducted for the purpose of control and domination for personal benefit."

In this phase, each batterer also must come to understand all of his abusive behaviors and the choices he makes to control his partner.

He basically memorizes the Power and Control Wheel, Chandler says, using that knowledge to understand his own use of tactics described on it.

By this time he also has stopped blaming other people or circumstances for his actions. Additionally, he has reviewed his "Do I Have a Reason" sheet - a list he made in Phase 1 detailing why he committed each act of abuse - with a self-evaluation of all the harmful, hurtful things he did to his partner, including psychological abuse.

Before he can move to Phase 3, the abuser also must have shown consistent compliance with all the rules of the program, including having his fees paid and having no additional criminal violations.

To move out of each phase, a batterer must face a no-holds-barred review by his peers. They will tell him whether they think he has met all the criteria for each phase and send recommendations and comments with him as he moves to the next phase.

At the end of Phase 3, when the batterer no longer resorts to power and control tactics, when he treats his partner as an equal and recognizes that no one deserves to be abused, he does not "graduate," Chandler says.

In a rough analogy, at the end of Phase 3 batterers are similar to recovering alcoholics who choose not to drink.

"They don't ever graduate. They are batterers. They will always be batterers," Chandler says. "All they do is become aware of their tendencies to batter.

"It's a lifelong process to make nonviolent choices, similar to choosing not to drink."

Next: Prosecutors from Noble, LaGrange, DeKalb and Steuben counties discuss how they are
working to combat domestic violence.

Copyright Kendallville Publishing Company