Domestic Violence: The Role Of Emotional Abuse In Relationships

Bell 1
I. Introduction

Prior to the 1800’s, most legal systems accepted wife beating as an approach to show a husband’s authority and control over his wife. In these times, women were deemed as possession to their husband’s and inferior to men in general. Women were liable to be abused by their husband’s or partner’s and received no justice in return when they were faced with such abuse. Modernly named as domestic violence, this abuse was once very common and ignored as long as it “didn’t go too far” or was done in moderation. In 1882, Maryland was the first state to pass a law making wife-beating a crime; the punishment would be either forty lashes or a year in jail (Domestic Violence Timeline). Attention to domestic violence didn’t appear until the feminist movement around 1870; women became more involved in feminism and woman’s
Emotional abuse in a relationship can be just as serious and surprisingly it is the most common form of domestic abuse in most relationships today. Unfortunately, emotional abuse is immensely overlooked, often times even by the victim. The aim of emotional abuse is to destroy the victim’s feelings of self-worth and independence; this may make it difficult for a victim to feel strong enough to leave his or her abuser. Emotional abuse can include humiliating the victim privately or publicly, controlling what the victim can and cannot do, withholding information from the victim, deliberately doing something to make the victim feel belittled or embarrassed, isolating the victim from friends and family, subliminally blackmailing the victim by harming others when the victim expresses independence or happiness, or denying the victim access to money or other basic resources and necessities. Degrading the victim in any way can also be considered psychological