Have you ever been physically or emotionally dominated by a partner? Has your partner ever insulted you, called you names or shamed you in public? Do you feel isolated or cut off from friends and family? Has your partner ever threatened to hurt you or your children? Do you ever feel frightened or fearful when he or she is around? Do you have thoughts of not being good enough or blame yourself for your partner's behavior? If you said yes to any of these questions then you may be in an abusive relationship. Abusive relationships have been the hot topic lately, with pop star Rihanna speaking publicly about the violent encounter with her ex-boyfriend, R&B singer Chris Brown. She counseled young woman to get out of relationships at the first signs of violence.
"It was a wake-up call. It was a wake-up call for me. Big time," Rihanna told Diane Sawyer on '20/20,' her first television interview discussing the assault. "I will say that to any young girl who is going through domestic violence, don't react off of love. Eff love. Come out of the situation and look at it in the third person and for what it really is."
Studies reveal that domestic violence and domestic abuse are the leading cause of injury to women between the ages of 15 and 44. According to the Journal of American Medical Association, these injuries to women are more common than automobile accidents, muggings and cancer deaths combined.
If you find yourself caught up in the cycle of domestic abuse or violence, you do not have to remain a victim. You can get out. You just have to make the decision to leave and plan your escape carefully. Here are step-by-step instructions to getting out of an abusive relationship:
Step 1: Call for Help If you have made the decision to leave, you will need help to ensure your safety and the safety of your children. Call on a trusted adult to help and support you. Friends and family who love and care about you can help you break away, and reaching out shows that you are courageous and willing to stand up for yourself. If your partner is physically violent, call 911 immediately. You may need medical attention, and the police will secure your safety. Assault is illegal and so is rape, even if it is done by someone you are dating. File charges and a restraining order to protect yourself.Step 2: Get Out! The best time to leave is when the abuser is out of the house for several hours. Hire movers or call friends and relatives to help you pack your belongings as quickly as possible. Rent a van or truck so you can move everything at once. Have a friend or neighbor keep a look out for your partner, and if he or she comes home early, leave immediately, even if you haven't finished packing. If you do not have anyone who can help you pack your things, then call the police and request their presence while you remove your belongings.
Step 3: Find a Safe Haven Pick a safe place to stay and do not let the abuser know where you will be. If you are staying with a friend or relative who is known to your partner, you run the risk of putting him or her in danger, so make sure to keep your whereabouts private.
Step 4: Get Help to Begin Healing There are a host of crisis centers, violence help lines and abuse hotlines in your community that have professionally trained staff to listen, understand and help you overcome the emotional and physical scars of abuse. Reach out and get help, because abuse has no place in love.
Whether you are a housewife, lawyer, student, nurse or a global pop sensation like Rihanna, domestic abuse and violence does not discriminate. You are not alone in your struggle to overcome abuse, and you should reach out for help. The choice to leave is yours, so find the courage to put you first and get out!
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By: MYMISSION on 11/12/2009 7:17AM
This is the out of control savagery black men and women should be outraged about. Their blame the black woman/victim is what has caused the explosion in violence against black women and girls and gang rapes. Boys are not immune either. They don't care if it’s their own grandmother on her sick bed. If the gang rapist are black savages they try to excuse it away or ignore it happened. Or just maybe she soiled his gang color shirt and deserved it. When black men were lynched whites said they did something to deserve it. Many times because a white woman accused them of beating and raping them.
This was sent to Chris Brown who should shut up and get psychological counseling. If his fans care so much about him buy a bundle of his CD’s. That’s they way to show him love because Rhianna is making big money and has left him in the dust. He needs to man up and get on with his life like she has.
This is what black men are doing and these are the black women traitors who defend them as usual.This was a lynching black man style.
An Open Letter to the NAACP and Al Sharpton
To:
Al Sharpton - National Action Network
Julian Bond - Chairman - NAACP
Maude Ford Lee - President - West Palm Beach Branch NAACP
Sabu Williams - Director - Florida State Conference NAACP
I'm writing to protest the recent actions of the NAACP and the National Action Network in the Dunbar Village rape case. As you know, on June 18th, 2007, a black woman and her 12 year old son were viciously and savagely attacked by 10 black men and boys in a West Palm Beach Florida public housing project called Dunbar Village . The woman was brutally gang raped for over three hours, tortured and forced to perform oral sex on her 12 year old son at gunpoint. They were doused with chemicals, poured into their eyes and the woman's vagina in an attempt to destroy evidence. They were saved from being burned alive only because the rapists could not find matches. No one called the police during the three hour attack. No one came to their aid when the attack was over. They had to walk a mile to a hospital before they were assisted by anyone.
On Tuesday, March 11, 2008, Al Sharpton and the West Palm Beach NAACP held a press conference accusing the prosecutor of treating those arrested in this case unfairly. You demanded that the prosecutor offer bail to the boys arrested in this case and not try them as adults, because this was being done by the prosecutor in another gang rape case involving white perpetrators in a different Florida jurisdiction.
Following the attack, vigorous efforts were made to contact NAN and the NAACP and enlist your aid in getting help and attention for the victim of this horrific crime. An NAACP spokesman, when contacted, said they would not respond because "it was outside their mission". Despite repeated calls to the National Action Network, there was NO RESPONSE. No statement on behalf of the victim, no protest, not one single word. Contrast this to the swift and vocal response Al Sharpton and NAN exhibited to the Duke rape case. In the Duke case, loud and vocal support of the victim and calls for justice for her attackers, but in the Dunbar Village case.......complete silence. The difference between the two cases? At Duke - the alleged attackers were white men; in Dunbar Village, the alleged attackers are black men. Contrast the response in this case to the NAACP's vigorous defense of Michael Vick for merely killing dogs, but the brutal and horrific gang rape of a black woman in front of her 12 year old son provokes not a single word.
For almost a year, NAN and the NAACP had nothing to say in support of the black woman victim and her son. You made no calls for the West Palm Beach police to swiftly find these criminals, of whom six are still on the loose. You did nothing to my knowledge to offer help to this woman and her child to help them recover. In all points, you exhibited a complete moral indifference to the crime committed against this black woman. Now, almost a year later, you come rushing to the defense of....the rapists??!!!! Your actions send the clear message that crimes committed against black women are not important to your organizations unless they present an opportunity to protest perceived racism and if exploiting a poor, gang raped black woman can help you grab some media spotlight for that purpose, thats okay.
I ask, where is your moral compass? How is it that the vile nature of what you are doing is not apparent to you? You are championing rapists while deliberately, purposefully ignoring the vicious gang rape and torture of a black woman. Your actions make clear that neither you Al Sharpton as a black man, nor the NAACP, value the dignity, safety and well being of black women. Your actions make clear that the rape and violation of black women is okay depending on the race of the violator. You will protest the rape of black women by white men, but you will say nothing about the rape of black women by black men and in fact will defend the black rapists of african american women. It is a second violation of this woman and indeed of all black women as vile as the first.
Your behavior in this case is morally indefensible and despicable. There is no justification for it, no basis in morality that would support what Al Sharpton and the NAACP are doing. I demand that you reverse course. I demand that you turn the resources of your organization to providing support and aid to the innocent victims in this case, not the perpetrators. I demand that you publicly in word and deed put pressure on the West Palm Beach authorities to find and arrest the other six rapists still on the loose.
If you are unwilling to immediately and publicly acknowledge the error of your actions in regard to the Dunbar Village case, I and as many others as I can persuade to join me, will pursue every avenue available to make the public at large, the media, your membership, your financial and political supporters, your sponsors and the entire world aware of your willing and informed support and encouragement of the brutal rape and torture of a black woman. My outrage is shared by many others. NAN and the NAACP will be held accountable.
The actions of Al Sharpton and the NAACP to support rapists of black women is a moral abomination, a moral atrocity. It degrades and sullies the good the NAACP has accomplished. It should not be allowed to stand. It is non negotiable. If the NAACP and NAN must be ripped apart and rebuilt anew to restore its moral compass and establish as sacrosanct the dignity, value and safety of black women, that is preferable to organizations which knowingly support the violation and rape of black women.
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To our readers. If you agree with the above, make it a letter template for other people. Forward it, twit it, facebook it, newsvine it, digg it, and anything else you can think of. Turn it into a viral hurricane of outrage and accountability.
You can communicate directly to the organizations with the info below:
NAACP: Julian Bond -Chairman
4805 Mt. Hope Drive, Baltimore MD 21215
Toll Free: (877) NAACP-98
Local: (410) 580-5777
National Action Network
Al Sharpton
Crisis Department
106 W. 145th Street
Harlem, New York 10039
212-690-3070
877-NAN-HOJ1
crisis@nationalactionnetwork.net
revalmedia@yahoo.com
NAACP: Florida State Conference
DIRECTOR: MR. SABU WILLIAMS
ADDRESS: 230 Seneca Trail; Crest View, FL 32536
TELEPHONE: (850) 301-2095 FAX: (850) 301-2098
E-MAIL: sabu1@aol.com
West Palm Beach County Branch - Unit # 5143
President: Maude Ford Lee
Mailing Address: P. O. Box 4131 West Palm Beach, FL 33407
Telephone: (561) 655-9798
E-Mail: unit5143@naacp.org
This behavior should not be allowed to stand. Let's put a stop to it.Could be a woman you care about next.
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By: Zora123 on 11/12/2009 11:53AM
No, I don't believe that you actually think that black women are lost! Ok, maybe some but not all and the ones that are lost is because of men like you sorry arrogant ass!!! And if you are a woman so god help you! No white or Hispanic woman on earth is better than a black woman especially for a black man did you not see the movie Obsessed with Beyonce? If any body want to go down on a man acting like a chicken head oops!! I think you better leave that to the white woman! Most white women will do anything to get with a high profile successful black man as if she has more to offer or as if she is entitled to....not even a hispanic woman is better either because nine times out of ten she stinks and other language barriers exist, you have to be making money in the ball park of Michael Jordan in order to be with her and for the record most hispanic females who do end up with a black man is very arrogant,deceiving,and have nasty attitudes as if she is so much better than a black women but she is considered black as well because she is in the same category as a black woman maybe even lower and probably have to work harder at achieving what a black already have! Get your thoughts together this is about character not the color or race of a woman. You can have a Asian woman and still have drama maybe drama like you wouldn't believe!!!
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By: Zora123 on 11/24/2009 2:58PM
As far as Rhianna goes. I am glad she woke and smelled the coffee and spoke out about what she was going through no man wether he is black, white or whatever has the right to dominate and hit or belittle his spouse or wife because he has the issues of whatever. Much respect to Rhianna!!! You are brave and I love it! And I love you!! more on domestic violence......
If you are in an abusive relationship it is time to Stand Up and Let Go just like J.K.Bunn said!!
www.lulu.com/content/paperback-book/stand-up-and-let-go/7214569 5 star rating book of 2008-2009 read on....
If you decide to take a look at this book and order give feedback to Readersguide123@yahoo.com
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By: phyllis po on 11/12/2009 12:28PM
You have been reported!
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By: PJD120 on 11/12/2009 2:19PM
phyllis po, I have reported him/or her too. Sad, very sad.
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By: Mary on 11/12/2009 2:30PM
Domestic violence does not discriminate. Enough said!!
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By: Mary on 11/12/2009 3:56PM
It is not that easy to get out unless you have money!!
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By: midbluehungry on 11/12/2009 4:12PM
The good black male is the true victim here, without question. Today's black females are ill-equipped to handle an intimate man and wife partership /relationship without bringing their forever packed luggage of self-hatred, inferiority, and other neck-whippin' bullshit.
Stop castigating the honorable good black males. The black females of today are no where near deserving of them.
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By: Male DV Survivor on 11/13/2009 12:06AM
The Willie Lynch letter prophecy has come true. Black females are lost and turning on their natural African partners. But so are women of other races and cultures who are driven by radical feminist beliefs and cultures. In the letter Lynch says: "You must use the DARK skin slaves vs. the LIGHT skin slaves, and the LIGHT skin slaves vs. the DARK skin slaves. ""You must use the FEMALE vs. the MALE, and the MALE vs. the FEMALE.""
When female are impowered to violence, and the law sides only with the female, stripping the male of family leadership, wealth and delivers him to jail and incarceration, NO FAMILY STRUCTURE can survive, enter divorce, separation and social destruction. Female lie in court and the judges are trained to believe everything the female say, even if there is not tangible evidence. I survived a jury trial, found innocent and the female was never charged with manufacturing evidence, making false statements, perjury or malicious prosecution. THE STATE gave her immunity.
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By: Mike on 11/12/2009 6:52PM
Ladies, this is totally out of hand with you. Your estrogen isn't allowing you to see the error of your ways. You women are the catchers, and us men are the pitchers. You can't ask for certain sexuals favors, and deny us when we ask.
All one has to do is look at black male incarceration rates and black male/female college rates. 85% of black male inmates report NEVER knowing the bio-fathers.
Are you women so deluded and fearful, that you would actually claim all those guys were simply products of rape - or did you willingly sleep with those men?
Do you not know that queen is as queen does?
Do you not realize that EVERYONE knows you're all bark and no bite. You women are full of unreasonable neurosis (it's your estrogen) and thus are ill equipped and more precisely, NOT equipped to produce a healthy community.
Keep bad mouthing black men and I'm gonna expose your historic use of prostitution as a way to get money. I'm also gonna expose you women can't even explain to your 12 - 18 yo daughters to keep there legs closed or to at least use birth control.
I'm gonna expose that you black women are the biggest abortionists in this land (killing babies). Any idiot woman should realize you'll NEVER be right after you kill apart of yourself.
But not these women.
Hey - time to stop and get a grip and have some self respect and lets save our community - the women and the men.
It's estrogen vs testosterone. Those hormones direct your reactions and your actions.
Last message to you egotistical women. Men have always ruled and that's the way it's supposed to be. Look at the animal kingdom. You ladies - get a grip and accept the limitations of your biology.
You people are just so annoying - how can you be this f-ng clueless? The white man is really taking this community down and it's because women are the heads. You women are naturally scared of your own shadows - and that's no recipe for leadership, but followership.
As a black man, I'll only lead you correctly. You're not biological equipped to lead correctly.
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