What Is Domestic Violence?
The Cycle of Violence
Why Partners Stay in
Battering Relationships
Myths About Battering

Domestic violence, or battering, is a continuous pattern of behavior by one person against someone in a close relationship with him or her. A batterer may harm a spouse, a lover, a child, a parent, or a dating partner.

Battering is a way of maintaining control over another person. Batterers have learned that they can get what they want from people who care about them by using threats, put-downs, emotional terrorism, isolation, financial deprivation, forced sex, and physical violence. Batterers create an atmosphere of fear and intimidation in order to keep their victims "in line" and prevent them from being free individuals.

Batterers choose to abuse their partners, and can choose to act differently when they want to. They are not "out of control." Batterers have a compulsion to be in control.

Batterers use their victims. Victims of batterers may be punished for "talking back" or disagreeing with the batterer, for spending time with anyone else besides the batterer, for having interests outside the relationship, for seeking to hold a job outside the home, or even for getting pregnant or spending time with their own children. Batterers want their partners to exist only to meet the batterer's needs.

Battering occurs within the family and intimate relationships, usually between partners and spouses. In other relationships, such as at work or in community groups, the batterer will often seem like a very different person than at home. A battered partner may have trouble getting anyone else to believe what's happening in the home because the batterer may be a "model citizen" to everyone else.

The ultimate form of control over another person is power over their right to live. Violent batterers may kill their partners if they feel they are losing control over them--for example, if the partner tries to leave the relationship.