Re: Agression: Men vs Women

On Wed, 24 Sep 2003 22:11:43 GMT, "Pmb" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

>
>"Mark D Morin" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
>news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>> On Wed, 24 Sep 2003 19:00:36 GMT, "Pmb" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>>
>> >
>> >Perhaps I need to refine what I was refering to. If somone takes a random
>> >sample from a genreal population then that's about the best way there is
>to
>> >get statistics regarding tendancies and violence.
>>
>> Granted. And in my original post I noted that I was unaware of any
>> such research.
>>
>> >However if you base your
>> >opinion on what you see from prison populations then you're going to get
>a
>> >radically different statistic (And even then you can't be sure if what is
>> >going on is what you actually witness. Prisoners would tend to hurt
>others
>> >when they have the least chance of being seen).
>>
>> You are back to how the term "violence" is defined. When I see the
>> term, I think of acts of which the consequences are visible to others.
>> So yes, unwitnessed violent acts are documentable.
>
>That was not what I meant. I was thinking along the lines of your
>experience.

Well, my experience included the witnessing of the effects of
violence--black eyes, broken bones, chunks of hair missing, scratches,
lacerations, etc.

> In American civlilization we have decent sample if we include
>everyone in America. Especially when I'm interested in the stats in America.
>
>Let me stick to acts so violent as to be criminal - just for the sake of
>arguement. When a violent act occurs and the person lives then they file a
>complaint. That will add to the statistics since quite often the gender is
>known. These violent acts rarely happen around police.

You are making assumptions. We have no way of knowing anything about
those who do not call. One thing that is consistent throughout the
literature is that the incident rate is higher than the reporting
rate. Another assumption is that the failure to report rate is the
same between the sexes. Until I started listening to some of the
unheard voices, I too assumed that men were rarely the victims of
violence by women. Since I have been listening, those assumptions have
gone out the window. Granted there needs to be research to examine the
question empiricaly but quite frankly, it seems that you have your
eyes closed to that which you don't want to see.

you can find more information about the conference at
http://www.noexcuse4abuse.org/. You might think about going; you'll
probably have a chance to talk with some of the people actually doing
the research.  

>
>In prison it's different. It one prisoner gets pounded on then they'd be
>stupid to do it in front of a gaurd. So they do it out of site of a gaurd.
>that will happen for most premeditated violent acts right? (Maybe not but
>that's what a discussion group is for huh?) 

Having worked in prisons, I can tell you that these unobserved acts
are observed in their consequences. 


>This will happen for things like
>revenge, to establish dominance etc. So these things never make it to what
>is actually seen. I'd say that random unplanned violent acts are what get
>observed.
>
>And that has little to do with definition.

Of course it does. If you are going to do the research, the terms have
to operationally defined.



====================================================
The "anti" group on any subject can stall it forever 
by asking an unlimited number of questions and feeding 
an unlimited number of fears.  And if we require that 
something be absolutely safe and absolutely understood 
before we use it, we'll never use anything,
because we'll never have absolute understanding. 
                David Wright 9/20/03

http://home.gwi.net/~mdmpsyd/index.htm