Recognizing Dating Abuse

Like most college seniors on the cusp of graduation, Hilary's thoughts are everywhere, a clutter of graduation announcements, commencement concerns, post-bachelor's degree plans and excuses for such a rambling state-of-mind.After transferring to UCLA from PCC two years ago, the 22-year-old women's studies/English double major is receiving a degree in the traditional four years, a seemingly impossible task in this age of extended collegiate stays. She is the kind of student community college presidents and local politicians count on when they tout junior colleges as a catapult to higher education and the lifeblood of our economy.

She is not, however, the face we have come to associate with dating abuse.

"You can't tell just by looking at someone whether or not she has or will experience abuse. There is absolutely no profile of a victim. I'm white, I'm college-educated. I was warned to get my keys out when walking to my car late at night, that 'boys will be boys,' and that I better take care of myself.

"And yet, I was still assaulted - sure, there weren't any noticeable bruises, no blood or scratches or phone calls to 911. [But] abuse is abuse is abuse and a victim is a victim," Hilary said.

Hilary's resolute on speaking out about her experiences because she knows she's not alone.

According to a 2008 report by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, one in four adolescents report experiencing dating abuse each year. Dating abuse includes physical violence, such as pushing and hitting; the emotional abuse of isolating a girlfriend or boyfriend from their loved ones and obsessive behavior; and the sexual violence of rape, sexual coercion or pressure.

A study published in the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine in the same year showed that 44 percent of college graduates reported having experienced some form of dating abuse before or during college. Of that figure, sexual abuse accounted for 16 percent.

Gail Ellis, a registered psychologist at PCC's psychological services said that many students who come in don't immediately recognize the slaps and name-calling that constitute teen dating abuse as unacceptable behavior.

"There's a lot of unreported abuse and misunderstanding about what abuse is," she said. "That's part of what we find even here where a student will come in and talk about an abusive relationship, but not want to call it that."

That some students Ellis sees in her office are uncertain about whether or not what they've experienced wrong is indicative of a culture with a narrowly-defined perception of abuse, said Hugo Schwyzer, who teaches a course in women's history.

According to Schwyzer, to a certain extent, young women are taught to be watchful of overt physical abuse in romantic relationships, the kind of abuse that leaves someone bloodied and bruised in the hospital.

"But what if your boyfriend says, 'Just shut the f*** up' and he grabs your wrists and pushes you up against the wall and holds you against it in that 'I'm going to hurt you' way? You freeze and get small and tell him to stop and then he backs away. Then a second later he apologizes and he puts his arms around you. It's a very rare girl who's going to name that as abuse," he said.

Of the forms of dating abuse, sexual violence might seem the most obvious to recognize. It's certainly well-represented on college campuses. According to the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network, college-aged women are four times more likely to experience rape than women in general. Despite its prevalence, it's not an offense many of its victims readily acknowledge.

After years of immersing herself in women's studies at PCC, UCLA and outside the walls of academia, Hilary's well-versed in the real-world application of feminism. But at 16, despite having had what she called a "comprehensive sexual education," she was ill equipped to deal with the fallout of a sexual assault incident that happened at a party.

"I didn't even know it was abuse at the time. I came home and thought, 'Well, I was drunk and I had sex with him, even though it wasn't sex, because I didn't ever say, 'Let's have sex' - I didn't say anything, because I wasn't conscious - but I'm never going to see him again, because he creeps me out.' But I didn't have any language. In my mind, rapists were only in the bushes or someone you didn't know, and certainly not white, upper-class, good Southern boys," she said, noting that it's taken time, counseling, and feminism for her to rightfully label the incident rape.

Schwyzer spoke to young women's discomfort with the abuse label and their concern with being victimized. Compounding these factors is the abuse victim's need to construct a narrative where they remain in control, he said.

"They ask themselves, 'How can I have a situation where I know I wasn't raped? Well, if I know that he's not going to stop and I know that he won't respect my 'no,' how about I just go ahead and say 'yes'? And that way, when I play the tape back in my head he was just kind of out of control, but I was an agent, I participated," Schwyzer said.

Young women's concern with being victimized is tied to society's emphasis on strong women and the rejection of traditional female roles, he added.

"You're a generation of women that grew up being told you can do anything, you can be anything you want to be. Victimization disproves this myth of your own ability to control everything around you, and young women tend to oversell their own autonomy and independence, especially in intimate relationships," he said.

If legitimizing dating abuse and recognizing rape for rape is difficult, widening the concept of the kind of men who perpetrate it poses a problem in itself. In the case of rape, approximately 73 percent of rape victims know the perpetrator, according to the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network.