Mel Gibson Update

Mel Gibson is expected to appear in court on Friday and plead no contest to simple battery. He will probably avoid jail time altogether.

Of course he will.

The Georgia Coalition Against Domestic Violence estimates that, of total calls to the police for family violence in our state, only 40% are prosecuted, and half of those are dismissed or pled down. That means that less than 20% of men in Georgia who batter their partners will ever see a day in jail. Since most women never call the police, it is probably significantly less than 20%. When did all batterers start getting the star treatment?

Let's Talk About Mel Gibson

It always takes us a while to comment on a celebrity incident of domestic violence, because what we're really interested in is how pop culture in general reacts to the crime. Let's break down what we've heard about Mel Gibson.

First, we have reports that the couple are splitting up, but that things have turned "messy". Normally breakups that are "messy" don't involve a restraining order, but right off the bat Gibson's wife feels the need to seek legal protection. Her order against him is granted, but his legal team seeks an order against her that forbids her to speak publicly about their relationship. After all, he doesn't want to be held accountable for his actions, does he?

However, as in many cases, the details begin trickling out. He hit his wife while she was holding their child, he threatened her with violence, and he yelled racist and sexist epithets at her. He acted like every other batterer that the Women's Resource Center knows.

There are thousands of men who do exactly what Mel Gibson stands accused of doing. In the words of a sister organization, Casa Myrna Vazquez in Boston:

They don’t garner national attention like the Mel Gibsons, the Charlie Sheens or the Chris Browns. We’ll never see photos of the bruises they inflict on their victims, or hear audiotapes of their abuse. Their victims won’t be front page news unless they happen to die at the hands of their abusers. And yet the toll these abusers exact on their victims, and our society, is enormous.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, nearly 5.3 million incidents of domestic violence occur each year among U.S. women ages 18 and older. Imagine Mel Gibson’s rant repeated over 5 million times. That’s the reality on the ground. Intimidation. Insults. Physical violence. Death threats. It will happen to one in four women in their lifetimes.

The financial statistics, also compiled by the CDC, are equally alarming. The costs of domestic violence against women exceed an estimated $5.8 billion every year. That figure includes nearly $4.1 billion in the direct costs of medical and mental health care and another $1.8 billion in the indirect costs of lost productivity. Victims of domestic violence lose a total of nearly 8 million days of paid work - the equivalent of more than 32,000 full-time jobs - and nearly 5.6 million days of household productivity each year as a result of the violence they endure.

Gibson's wife is also being treated just like most victims. The media immediately dismissed the restraining order she filed as a ploy to affect their pending divorce. She had to tape record the violence and release it to the press just to to get the police to investigate her claims. And she has to face everyone under the sun, including other women, making excuses for him.

Meanwhile, his fans are waiting for any excuse to forgive and forget.

Hmmmm. This sounds so familiar.

When Do Batterers Deserve Our Forgiveness?

AKA, another Chris Brown post. We've had several requests to comment on Chris Brown's emotional breakdown during his Michael Jackson tribute at the BET awards. Many people in the media and many of Brown's fans feel that he has been punished enough and that it's time for us to forgive. Many others think that Chris Brown has never truly apologized for his use of violence and that this is another carefully constructed ploy to revive his career. As always, WRC wants to defer to the experts. We want to know what survivors of domestic violence think.

Survivors are certainly not a monolithic group, and many will have differences of opinion, but when wondering if it's time for forgiveness, Ruth from Feministing, a survivor herself, writes:

On the last day of the US Social Forum, I ran into an old friend from a campaign I had worked on a few years back. I had seen her on the first day but bee-lined in the other direction. I was dodging her because the only Rose she had ever known was a woman who felt trapped in a domestically violent relationship. I have since left that relationship. Years have passed since then, but I am occasionally haunted by memories when I see an old friend from that era of my life and they ask me the dreaded question, "Are you still with him?"

Blood on my walls. Cops at my doors. Large scars on my back from being pushed on the floor. These are the things I remember with great sadness when my memory is triggered by an old friend's concern about my present well-being or the sighting of male aggressors of violence. These are the things that ran through my mind when the BET awards showcased Chris Brown, probably one of the most infamous batterers of our generation. And if Chris's presence alone on a stage that drew 7 million viewers isn't enough of a stab in the gut, Jermaine Jackson pressed the knife by claiming that it is Chris, in fact, who needs healing.

Ann Powers over at the LA Times also used language that disarmed me. Although Powers conceded that BET airing Chris Brown was problematic, she described Chris as someone who will "forever be in recovery." It's as if there has been a pandemic of amnesia and some among us have forgotten who the victim really is here.

America's conversation about Chris' conviction of felony assault has officially been shifted to the controversy at play in Chris' tears. Adding insult to injury were the stars and fans who have been caught on camera cheering on him, his performance and calling Sunday night's performance a comeback. I can't help but ask: what about us? What about the women who relive their experiences when a man is given a platform to imply that his pain is greater than the brutality he has inflicted on a woman's body? What about Rihanna? Where is the tribute for survivors and what has BET done to change the scourge of violence in Black women's lives?

I am thankful for the presence of male allies who have the courage to stand up and remind us that African-American women ages 15 to 34 die more from the violence of a current or former intimate partner than by anything else. Than By Anything Else. This makes BET's decision to air Chris a profound act of traitor-ship against women and girls. Plain and simple it was an irresponsible action taken by BET. And this can't be wanded away by Queen Latifah serving as a host and a two-sentence plug about Dorothy Height. BET owes African American girls and women so much more than a year grace period for one of the most remorseless batterers of our time.

If a victim wants to or can forgive her batterer as part of her own healing, that can often be a healing choice for her. But please stop asking us to forgive Chris Brown. We will continue to hold him, and Charlie Sheen, and Mel Gibson, and all other famous batterers accountable for the violence they inflict on their partners. There is certainly a place for forgiveness, but until these men start actively trying to undo the harm they've done by partnering with an organization like Men Stopping Violence, we can't take their apologies seriously. After all, using violence against a partner is supposed to harm your career. That's why they call it punishment.