For too long, domestic violence has been framed and understood exclusively as a women's issue. While most attention is given to women who are abused by men, men are often overlooked victims of domestic violence. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics Crime Data Brief, men account for approximately 15% of the victims of reported intimate partner violence (February 2003).

Women who abuse men are not much different than their male counterparts who abuse women. Men can be hit, kicked, punched, pushed, or bitten by women abusers. Women can also use weapons, such as knives, guns, or any object that can be used to strike.

Abused men are not necessarily smaller or physically weaker than the women who abuse them. Abused men often do not use their greater size or strength to hurt their abusive partners even when they are being hurt.

Think about domestic violence and you think of women, battered by their husband, boyfriend, or a man they used to involved with. Now, think again. Every year in the U.S., about 3.2 million men are the victims of an assault by an intimate partner. Most assaults are of a relatively minor nature such as pushing, shoving, slapping or hitting, though many are more serious - and some end in homicide.

Why Men Don’t Report Physical Abuse

Men often suffer physical abuse in silence because they are afraid that no one will believe them or take them seriously. In fact, some men who do try to get help find that they are mocked and ridiculed. No one would even think of telling a battered woman that getting beaten by her husband wasn’t a big deal, but people often don’t think twice about saying that to a battered man. Many men are too embarrassed to admit that they are being abused.

Traditional gender roles also confuse the matter. A "real man" is expected to be able to "control" his wife. Aside from the embarrassment over admitting abuse, abused men may feel that they are somehow less of a man for "allowing" themselves to be abused. But just like abused women are told when they suffer physical violence, abuse is never the victim's fault. This is no less true just because the victim happens to be male.

Intimate Partner Violence - The Stats

There are a number of difficulties in the collection of statistical data about intimate partner violence. The major problem is that the true size of IPV is unknown because of under-reporting. Statistical data are also affected by different counties and states not collecting data in the same way. This is particularly true in the case of men, probably because of the stigma and embarrassment men may feel as victims of domestic violence.

It is universally recognized that women are more likely than men to be the victims of IPV. In 2002, 24 percent of U.S. homicides that were as a result of IPV were men, compared with 76 percent involving women as victims. The National Crime Victimization Survey reported in 2003 that 85 percent of IPV victims were women.

What to do

When safe, the domestic violence system needs to treat violent couples as violent couples, instead of shoehorning them into the "man as perp/woman as victim" model. Counseling services for violent couples are unnecessarily rare.

Establish services and help for male domestic-violence victims. Denise Hines of Clark University found that when an abused man called the police, the police were more likely to arrest him than to arrest his abusive female partner. This is partly the result of primary aggressor laws, which encourage police to discount who initiated and committed the violence but instead look at other factors that make them likelier to arrest men. When the men in Ms. Hines' study tried calling domestic-violence hot lines, 64 percent were told the hot lines helped only women, and more than half were referred to programs for male domestic-violence perpetrators.

Work to ensure that male domestic-violence victims will not lose their children in custody proceedings. Ms. Hines found that the biggest reason male domestic-violence victims hesitate to leave their wives/girlfriends is concern for their children. If they leave, their children are left unprotected in the hands of a violent mother. If they take their children, when they're found, the children will be taken away and given to the mother. Moreover, the men are likely to lose custody of their children in the divorce/custody proceeding in any event.

Tips for the male victim of domestic violence

Take the violence seriously. Many men are inclined to find it amusing when the "little woman" lashes out at them. (In one survey of college students, 20 percent of men who had been attacked by their girlfriends thought it was funny.) Violence that seems harmless at first can escalate. The first time she hits you, tell her that if there's a second time, it will be the last time she sees you - and act on it.

Don't hit back. If you're an average sized man and your partner is an average sized woman, you can do major damage with a single blow. You willl feel much better about yourself if you don't retaliate in kind. However, physically restraining the batterer is ordinarily not an acceptable alternative. Criminal Confinement is also a felony criminal charge in Indiana.

Don't keep it a secret. If you cannot easily leave (because of the children, for example) let someone know what is happening. Overcome the embarrassment and call the police. Talk to a counselor, to your doctor, to family members.

Speak out about your experience as a victim of abuse. Perhaps domestic violence would no longer be perceived as merely a woman's issue.

Menweb: Help for Abused Men.