Chris Brown, or not, it's not okay to beat your girlfriend.

It has been disturbing and frustrating to read about people's apathetic responses to the pictures of Rihanna (girlfriend of Chris Brown) where her face was black and blue from an incident of abuse inflicted on her by Brown. The New York Times came out with an article about dating violence where young girls who are fans of Brown stated that they believed it to be Rihanna's fault for the attack. Many girls felt that perhaps she had done something to make him angry to warrant him to do such a thing. You can read the full article here.

In addition, Nickelodean stated that they will not remove Chris Brown from the nomination for favorite male singer despite a public outcry. A petition was signed which included 4600+ signatures to ask the network to take him off. Yet, Nickelodean stands by their nominee stating," Brown was nominated before the incident with Rihanna, and the honor had received little notice until the singer posted a note last week on his Facebook urging his fans to vote for him" (Seattle Times).

As I read such things I am flooded with all sorts of questions like: Why do we make concessions for celebrities when they do such horrible things? How are young girls getting the message that it is ok to blame the victim of such crimes? If young girls believe this now, what does that mean for this growing generation in terms of their intimate relationships-- will there be a growing apathy to issues of domestic violence in their personal relationships? And how do we undo the injustice of perpetuating this cycle that if you are a celebrity it is ok to do anything you want-- even physically hurt another person?

I have a friend who works in the Seattle Municipal Court. Her department is the Domestic Violence Probation unit. She shares that the problem there is as bad as ever. Most of their clients are male perpetrators who are in the system for multiple offenses. Here are some brief statistics of the problem:
*One in every four women will experience domestic violence in her lifetime.
*An estimated 1.3 million women are victims of physical assault by an intimate partner each year.
*85% of domestic violence victims are women.
*Historically, females have been most often victimized by someone they knew.
*Females who are 20-24 years of age are at the greatest risk of nonfatal intimate partner violence.
*Most cases of domestic violence are never reported to the police.
(National Coalition Against Domestic Violence)

The Washington State Coalition Against Domestic Violence found in 2008 that out of 476 deaths related to DV in the state of Washington only 2 of those deaths were results of female abusers murdering their partner, 5 of those deaths resulted from female victims who killed their abuser in self defense.

So what is the problem with our response? I think it is this: We are not angry enough about these crimes against humanity. We still fall prey to beliefs that state, "that what happens behind closed doors is not our business". We turn a blind eye to such offenses and we don't hold people accountable to their actions-- sending a message that it is ok, perpetuating the burden falling on the victim's shoulders which isolates and creates doubt. There is a cycle of domestic violence and much of it is sustained on the scales of power, control, accessibility, security and isolation. We can not stand by responding in apathy to such abuses-- even in situations involving a celebrity. There cannot be ambiguity about our tolerance of domestic violence. We must take a stand now and we must teach future generations that such abuses are unacceptable in our communities.