This month is promoted with much ferver and funding as Cancer Awareness Month. My local newspaper arrived on Monday — every page in PINK. October is also Domestic Violence Awareness Month. I doubt there will not be any purple pages printed providing information about “DV.” It is still a taboo topic. Victims are afraid to step forward. It took 14 years after sexual abuse was perpetrated upon boys on a prominant state college campus for victims to speak out. Justice was finally served — and the healing could begin for the victims.
The same consideration is not given to a DV victim in a marriage — a wife. There is a legal loophole that the abuser has calculated to his advantage. Police will not be worth the 911 call. The abuser will cover his tracks immediately, and no-one, including legal counsel will bother to address the seriousness of the crimes. A wife becomes “marital property.” The cops and lawyers don’t want to admit that they won’t, can’t, don’t care to address the seriousness of the abuse.
For a majority of the population, it seems to be easier to address a physical illness than it is a mental or behavioral epidemic — abuse. “Bullying” is the new catch phrase used to describe the problem rampant in schools. I’ve even heard the dismissive comment “he knows how to push your buttons” — all in denial that vebal attacks as well as financial, sexual — all fit under the term ABUSE.
“Unfortunately, rather than being a safe haven, the home remains one of the most dangerous places for many of our citizens,” says Attorney General Jim Hood from Mississippi.
I’ve experienced the CONtrol from an abusive relationship first hand. It was classic abuse — cooercive, conning, cunning. In my case, I wasn’t even safe at work.
Love has no list.
1 Corinthians 13:4–8a
Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails.
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