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Our definition of Domestic Violence
DVIP defines domestic violence as the systematic use of violence and abuse to gain power over and to control a partner or ex-partner. Domestic violence occurs across all cultures, ages, ethnic groups and social classes. As well as covering physical violence – including all forms of aggressive or unwanted physical contact and sexual violence – domestic violence includes non-physical abuse such as verbal, social, racist, psychological or emotional abuse, threats, neglect, harassment and the use of economic, structural, institutional or even spiritual abuse.
Although only physical and sexual violence and some forms of racist abuse and harassment are actually illegal, all these other forms of domestic violence also have harmful and lasting effects on the victim and on witnesses, especially children – DVIP takes them all seriously.
In a patriarchal society like ours, institutional and societal power structures support some groups’ use of abuse and violence against others – for example, men’s violence towards women and parents’ abuse of children. It is because of this institutional support for male dominance that the vast majority of domestic violence is inflicted by men on women.
Violence within same-sex relationships or violence inflicted by women on men is neither the same as men’s violence towards women nor symmetrically opposite to it. This is why DVIP’s main focus is on working with male abusers and women who have experienced domestic violence within heterosexual relationships. When we do work with other groups of abusers / abused, we work differently as appropriate.
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