Domestic abuse shelters for Men help spotlight male victims
A Texas group has DALLAS » opened what’s believed to be only the second shelter in the U.S. exclusively for men who are victims of domestic violence, as advocates say more men are seeking help amid changing views about male victims.
U.S. Defense “We’re trying to help men understand Secretary Jim Mattis said that it’s OK to ask for Saturday the threat of nuclear help. It’s OK to have emotions. It’s missile attack by North Korea is OK to cry. It’s OK to be vulnerable,” accelerating. said Paige Flink, CEO of The
In remarks in Seoul with South Family Place in Dallas. Korean Defense Minister Song
Before opening the 21-bed shelter Young-moo at his side, Mattis in a two-story home in May, accused the North of illegal and Flink’s organization, like many unnecessary missile and nuclear others, housed male victims in programs — and vowed to defeat hotels. But Flink said that not any attack. only was that becoming costly as
Mattis said North Korea engages the numbers grew, it also wasn’t in “outlaw” behavior and an ideal arrangement for victims that the U.S. will never accept a to get support. nuclear North.
“They get a lot of growth from He added that regardless of being together,” Flink said. what the North might try, it is
The number of male victims overmatched by the firepower calling the National Domestic and cohesiveness of the decadesold Abuse Hotline and its youth-focused U.S.-South Korean alliance. project — loveisrespect
“North Korea has accelerated — has been growing. Last year, the threat that it poses to its about 12,000 male victims called neighbors and the world through — about 9 percent of victims who its illegal and unnecessary missile identified their gender. That’s and nuclear weapons programs,” about double the about 5,800 male victim callers from 2010, said hotline spokeswoman Cameka Crawford.
“We believe that there are likely many more men who may not report or seek help for a number of reasons,” she said.
Flink said her organization has he said, adding that U.S.South sheltered men abused by male Korean military and diplomatic partners, female partners or relatives. collaboration thus has Some men bring their children. taken on “a new urgency.” Flink believes one reason
“I cannot imagine a condition her group has seen an increase in under which the United States male victims has to do with how would accept North Korea as a Dallas police in recent years have nuclear power,” he said. been handling domestic abuse
As he emphasized throughout calls: They ask a series of questions his weeklong Asia trip, which included and if someone is believed stops in Thailand and the to be in danger, that person is immediately Philippines, Mattis said diplomacy put on the phone with remains the preferred way a shelter. to deal with the North. Some shelters house both men “With that said,” he added, and women, but Denise Hines, a “make no mistake — any attack professor at Clark University in on the United States or our allies Massachusetts who researches will be defeated, and any use domestic violence by women of nuclear weapons by the North against men, said it’s more common will be met with a massive military for men to be put up in a response that is effective and hotel. overwhelming.”
Valley Oasis in Lancaster, California, Mattis’ comments did not go says it was the first in the beyond his recent statements of U.S. to accept men into its shelter. concern about North Korea, although “It created an environment he appeared to inject a where maybe for the first time stronger note about the urgency for female victims and male victims of resolving the crisis. that they could actually talk
While he accused the North to members of the opposite sex that were not going to hurt them, that were not going to degrade them,” said CEO Carol Crabson, who said the shelter houses victims in cottages on its campus.
The first shelter in the U.S. solely for men opened two years ago in Batesville, Arkansas, a of “outlaw” behavior, he did not town of about 11,000. Patty Duncan, mention that President Donald executive director of Family Trump has ratcheted up his Violence Prevention Inc. , own rhetoric. In August, Trump said that when a three-bedroom warned the North not to make home was donated to her organization, any more threats against the her thoughts turned to United States, and said that if male victims. it did, it would be met with “fire
“I could just see that they were and fury like the world has never in the situation, but they didn’t seen.” have anybody that they thought
Song, the South Korean minister, they could call. In speaking with told the news conference them, that was what they would that he and Mattis agreed to further tell you as well: ‘Where am I going cooperation on strengthening to go? Who’s going to believe Seoul’s defense capabilities, me? Here I’m a big guy, and who including lifting warhead payload is going to think that I’m telling limits on South Korean conventional the truth?’ It just got me thinking,” missiles and supporting Duncan said. the country’s acquisition of “most
Duncan said that before Taylor advanced military assets.” He offered House opened, male victims no specifics and refused to stayed at her group’s women’s answer when asked whether the shelter. But staffers, she said, discussions included nuclearpowered have noticed that those staying at submarines. the all-male shelter seem to have
Some South Korean government more of a “freedom to be upset.” officials have endorsed the
“They don’t have to put on a nation getting nuclear-powered strong kind of ‘I’m OK,’” she said, submarines amid calls for more adding, “Their feelings can be military strength. There’s a growing hurt. They can be sad. They can be angry and they’re not seen as being aggressive. They can talk about how it felt to be physically hit and not feel emasculated.”
Hines said some men don’t even realize they’re being abused until they read pamphlets — mostly geared toward women — concern among the South Korean listing abuse signs. “If you are the public that North Korea’s expanding man, that’s a very difficult process nuclear weapons arsenal, to figure out,” she said. which may soon include an
In the U.S., about 31 percent intercontinental ballistic missile of men and 37 percent of women that could target the U.S. mainland, have experienced sexual violence, would undermine Seoul’s physical violence or stalking by decadeslong alliance with Washington. an intimate partner, according to the Centers for Disease Control
South Korea’s conservative politicians and Prevention. have also called for the
A 35-year-old man who spent United States to bring back tactical almost three months at The Family nuclear weapons that were Place’s shelter said he went withdrawn from the Korean Peninsula there after feeling threatened in the 1990s, which they by his boyfriend. Because his say would make clearer the U.S. boyfriend didn’t physically hurt intent to use nukes in a crisis. But him, he said he hadn’t necessarily Mattis and Song were strongly thought of his situation as abuse. dismissive of the idea.
“It just opened up my eyes to “When considering national realize that this isn’t the first interest, it’s much better not to time I’ve been in a situation like deploy them,” said Song, adding this and I just never thought of that the allies would have “sufficient it being an abusive relationship,” means” to respond to a said the man, who insisted that North Korean nuclear attack even his name not be used out of fear without placing tactical nukes for his safety. in the South. Mattis said current
“You never really hear about U.S. strategic assets are already males being victims or even there providing nuclear deterrence. being a male shelter,” he added.