Spouse and What Partner Abuse—Who and When? - Definitions Of Abuse, How Much Abuse Occurs?, Who Strikes The First Blow?, Abused To Death

Although domestic violence has occurred for centuries, women have generally felt isolated, unsupported, and ashamed because of their victimization and frustrated in their attempts to deal with or escape the violence. The consciousness-raising groups that emerged during the rise of the second wave of U.S. feminism in the 1960s and 1970s provided small groups of women a place to discuss their problems as women. Their analysis of personal problems—including domestic violence—allowed them to understand women's collective oppression. This became the basis for feminist collective action.

Efforts to aid battered women arose out of this feminist consciousness. The first battered women's shelter was founded in 1971 by Erin Pizzey in London. Pizzey, the recognized founder of the modern women's shelter movement, published the first book on domestic violence, Scream Quietly, or the Neighbors Will Hear, in 1974. Authors in the United States followed suit. In 1975 Susan Brownmiller's Against Our Will, a book about the politics and sociology of rape, was published, and in 1976, Del Martin's book Battered Wives appeared, focusing specifically on violence within marriage functioning as part of male dominance of women.

In the late twentieth century, domestic violence was the subject of countless books, films, and stage plays. Of these, one of the most memorable was The Burning Bed, based on the true story of Francine Hughes, an East Lansing, Michigan, woman. After having suffered seventeen years of abuse, she burned her abusive husband to death in 1977 as he slept. Hughes was acquitted of murder based on a defense of temporary insanity caused by years of physical and psychological abuse. Her case gave rise to the "battered woman's defense," which subsequently was widely used to defend abused women who killed their partners. A made-for-television movie based on Hughes's case aired in 1984 to an audience of seventy-five million, giving momentum to the battered women's movement and significantly influencing legislative reform.

In 1978, the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights held a forum titled "Consultation on Battered Women" in Washington, D.C., considering violence against women as a civil rights issue. The testimony from that forum was published as Battered Women—Issues of Public Policy. The following year, the first Congressional hearings were held on the issue of domestic violence.

The subject dominated the media in 1995 with the highly publicized murder trial of O.J. Simpson, who was accused of the brutal slaying of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown, and her friend, Ronald Goldman. Simpson, a former football star and popular sports commentator, was acquitted of murder, but not until millions of Americans had heard a recording of Brown begging police for help and had seen a photo of her face, bruised and bloody from a beating, which was among the evidence presented at Simpson's trial.

Celebrities like O.J. Simpson from the sports and entertainment industries who have been convicted of domestic violence attract the media spotlight. According to the Family Violence Prevention Fund, a national non-profit organization, when society continues to celebrate and reward actors and athletes who are violent to their partners, it not only condones their bad behavior, but also suggests that their abusive behavior is glamorous and desirable. The organization regularly updates a celebrity "Hall of Shame" on its Web site. As of September 2004, the Family Violence Prevention Fund's Hall of Shame listed almost one hundred celebrities, including:

• James Brown. In February 2004, this singer was arrested for assaulting his wife. His lifetime achievement award from the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts had been protested in November 2003 by advocates for victims of domestic violence. They protested because Brown had been charged with assaulting his previous wife in 1988, and had settled several sexual harassment lawsuits against him since then.
• Dwayne Carswell. In July 2003, the Denver Broncos football player was arrested for assaulting his girlfriend by picking her up by the neck and biting her. He had two previous arrests for assaulting other women.
• Dale Ellis. In February 2002 the former SuperSonics basketball player pleaded guilty to domestic violence charges. He had been convicted 13 years earlier of assaulting his wife and resisting arrest.
• Joe Frazier. The former heavyweight boxing champion was arrested in February 2004 for assaulting his girlfriend in front of their twelve-year-old son in their home.
• Michael Peterson. In October 2003, the novelist was found guilty of murdering his wife, whom he claimed had fallen down a flight of stairs.
• Charlie Sheen. In June 1997, the actor was given a oneyear suspended sentence, a two-year probation, and ordered to perform three hundred hours of community service for physically abusing a former girlfriend.

In the summer of 2002, the wives of four soldiers based at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, were murdered over the course of six weeks. In all four cases, their husbands were alleged to have committed the murder; in two cases the soldiers apparently committed suicide after killing their wives. This rash of murders once again focused public and media attention on the issue of spousal violence. Three of the four husbands were special operations soldiers who had been deployed to Afghanistan, and some news media reports speculated that the murders may have been caused by stress. In September 2002 the U.S. Army and Congress launched an investigation of the crimes to determine their causes and prevent similar tragedies. In September 2004, no report had thus far been made public.