We are enraged by the continuing insanity of the NRA and the legion of gun nuts it represents. A murderous phallic-worship cult so transfixed by the object of their adoration that simple human decency, let alone humility, fall by the way. But the mass shootings by young brain-washed men with automatic rifles, which form the media focus, are a minor problem compared with the more prevalent and damaging form of domestic terrorism and murder: domestic violence.
Roughly 2,000 people die yearly from domestic violence, half of which involve guns, and some of which are familicides that also count as mass shootings. In comparison, about 300 people have been dying in mass shootings per year over the last decade, though the statistics are disparate under various definitions and research methods. The gun violence archive lists 253 so far in 2019, 340 in all of 2018; 346 in 2017, 382 in 2016, 335 in 2015, and 269 in 2014.
Mass shootings count as terrorist incidents, since they are typically driven by an ideology of hatred that is expressed explicitly as motivation, and may also target a hated group, or, out of frustration, just a vulnerable group of opportunity. The intention is evidently to instill fear in society, excite copycats, and change the culture towards the desired hatred setting. But how effective are they? Not very effective at all, since their rarity insures that we as general citizens need not have, and do not have, fear of public places or other venues where such shootings take place. Yes, we are angry about the senseless carnage made possible by military fixations and equipment prevalent in some of our not-very-mentally-healthy subcultures. Yes, we are disgusted by the ideology, such as it is, and its leaders, first and foremost our dear president. But terrorized? Not at all. The elaborate security theater introduced in airports, and increasingly in schools, is a sad and wasteful consequence, but hardly bespeaks "terror". Rather, it represents the best our bureaucracies can manage to raise increments of policing and prevention, with the end result of keeping the populace calm, if not irritated and bored out of its collective mind.
Terror is something else entirely. Terror is when you are trapped in a place with no escape. A place where, if you try to leave, your chances of being killed are higher than if you stay. A place, where if you stay, you can look forward to unending torment, vicious abuse both physical and mental. A situation where, if you leave, you can count on being hunted for years, with lethal weapons. That is the reality of domestic violence. Andrea Dworkin blamed pornography, which I do not. But pornography is part of a larger culture of dehumanization and objectification, consisting of casual rapists like our president, pimps who traffic in women and girls, dedicated patriarchies such as the Catholic and Mormon churches, even Sports Illustrated, which traffics in a yearly turn into soft porn, among many other social institutions.
Objectification is not unique to sexuality, but results from any desire. The store clerk is a mechanism to obtain what we want, and is of little personal importance to us as shoppers. War could not happen without the objectification of the enemy. Nothing personal! But it is certainly ironic and distressing that the most personal relationship of all is driven by desires that can so easily head down impersonal, even spiteful, hateful, and violent channels when thwarted and frustrated, or even if let run free, by way of ideological or psychological perversion.
It is noteworthy that much of our language around sex is violent and used to express violence. Being "screwed" is not a good thing, but a bad thing. The gun nuts mentioned above marinate in a cult of masculinity and sexualized power so divorced from reality and humanity that it should form an intrinsic "red flag". Again, it is the powerful, even existential, motivating desire of sexuality which generates a quest for other forms of power and control, leading some down a path of violence and dehumanization.
As Andrea Dworkin wrote, in her inimitable style: "Life and Death"
"These are women who thought that they had a right to dignity, to individuality, to greedom- but in fact they couldn't walk down a city block in freedom. Many of them were raped as children in their own homes, by relatives- fathers, uncles, brothers- before they were 'women'. Many of them were beaten by the men who loved them- their husbands, lovers. Many of them were tortured by these men. When you look at what happened to these women, you want to say, 'Amnesty International, where are you?'- because the prisons for women are our homes. We live under martial law. We live in a rape culture. Men have to be sent to prison to live in a culture that is as rapist as the normal home in North America. We live under what amounts to military curfew, enforced by rapists. We say we're free citizens in a free society. But we lie. We lie about it every day."
So it is a deep issue, a pressing issue of human rights, health and well-being, and continues in the age of #MeToo, which is only slowly filtering through the culture. What should be done? We can not all go back and get better upbringings, probably the single most influential causal / protective factor. A great deal has been done to set up hotlines and women's shelters, and to recognize that leaving an abusive situation is very difficult. But I think more can be done, principally by taking the position that a relationship where one person has reached out to police, or an abuse hotline, or a shelter, is already dead, and the helping institutions should do all they can to enable its parties to dissolve it and move on. That means not getting bogged down in a lot of mediation. Rather, the focus should be on setting the battered spouse into a new life, rapidly putting all the shared assets and income flows into escrow, and using them fairly, under official supervision and eventual division, to help each party live independently. Whether the batterer is charged criminally is a separate matter. The evidence in these cases tends to be poor, the parties unwilling to extend their trauma and drag their lives through the courts. Either way, separation is the more urgent and practical need, and one party's witness is quite sufficient for that.
Q: People think you are very hostile to men.
A: I am.
Q: Doesn't that worry you?
A: From what you said, it worries them.
