Domestic violence is an aspect of everyday life for many people worldwide. It is the physical, emotional, verbal, economic, spiritual, or sexual abuse of an individual by an intimate partner, parent, or close associate (usually in the same household). As ministers, it’s something we will inevitably see. Whether a member of our congregation, someone who reaches out for help, or someone we know personally, domestic violence is difficult to confront, and even more challenging to understand.
When faced with the challenge of educating both ourselves and others on domestic violence, where do we turn? Obviously there are the clinical responses. These are important for professionals, especially those who must assess situations and offer aid as appropriate. But how do we teach the average person about domestic violence?
Here I present a list of excellent programs, songs, videos, and other pop culture examples of domestic violence education. In honor of Domestic Violence Awareness Month, let’s do our part to educate on this topic.
The Burning Bed, based on the book by Faith McNulty (1984)
- Starring: Farrah Fawcett, Paul Le Mat, Richard Masur, Grace Zabriskie, Penelope Milford, and James T. Callahan
When films portray domestic violence from fact rather than fiction, it is often hard for viewers to swallow. In the case of The Burning Bed, viewers embraced the story, making it the 17th highest rated movie to air on network television.
The movie is based on the real-life story of battered housewife Francine Hughes. She went on trial for murdering her abusive husband, James “Mickey” Hughes. After 13 years of physical abuse, while he was drunk and passed out, Francine Hughes set his bed on fire on March 9, 1977. She then piled her children into the car and turned herself in to her local police department. She is tried for first degree murder, but found not guilty by reason of temporary insanity.
Hazel Moran: “If you make a hard bed, you have to lay in it.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKJmE9zLz1M&list=PLmROHLKPoemB5u26ZnXQ45ymM_kwOm7Nd
Submission, produced by Theo Van Gogh (2004)
A sobering look at the oppression women face in many Islamic states and sects, every person in the world needs to see this short-film and realize the difficulties women experience under extreme Islamic systems. The first minute and a half shows a woman praying in Arabic, and then narrative is in English. It’s subtitles are in Dutch. The film’s producer was killed on his way to work in the Netherlands by a radical Muslim for the contents of this film.
“Two years ago, on a sunny day, while at the Sook, my eyes were caught by those of Rahman…After that day, I couldn’t help but notice his presence whenever I went to the market…One day he suggested we meet in secret…and I said yes. And as the months went by, our relationship deepened. What is more, out of our love, a new life started to grow. Our happiness did not go unnoticed, and before long, envious eyes gave way to malicious tongues. Let’s ignore these people, Rahman and I said to each other, and trust in Allah’s mercy. Naive, young, and in love, perhaps. But we thought your holiness was on our side…Then when I was 16, my father broke the news to me in the kitchen: you are going to marry Aziz.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxu5D0eX_k8
For Colored Girls, directed and produced by Tyler Perry, based on the play, For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When The Rainbow Is Enuf by Ntozake Shange (Film, 2010; play, 1975)
- Starring: Janet Jackson, Whoopi Goldberg, Phylicia Rashad, Thandie Newton, Loretta Devine, Anika Noni Rose, Kimberly Elise, and Kerry Washington.
It is my own opinion that For Colored Girls is the most powerful and important movie of Tyler Perry’s career. The story follows the lives of eight women (each known by a color, which they wear throughout the movie) and their struggles: spousal abuse, rape, unplanned pregnancy, self-respect, promiscuity, alcoholism, men living on the down-low, HIV infection, manipulative and abusive men, child abuse, fails of the system, and distractions on the job as a result of so many difficulties.
Every woman needs to see this important movie. It is difficult to watch at points, but accurately showcases the specific difficulties of life as a result of abuses and problems unique to the female experience.
“Save your “sorry.” One thing I don’t need are anymore apologies. I got sorry greeting me at the front door. You can keep yours. I don’t know what to do with them…I’m not even sorry about you being sorry.” (Jo/Red, played by Janet Jackson)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sDWU_cFU9ZA
Never too Late by Three Days Grace (from the album One-X, 2007)
Most of us forget to include sexual abuse and assault when we talk about domestic violence. Such does happen. As sexual abuse is always rape in one form or another, it qualifies as domestic violence when it is perpetrated by a family member, close friend or domestic partner. The video vividly depicts child sexual abuse without being graphic in nature.
The song, Never Too Late is not specifically about abuse, but about being in a dark place and not feeling like one can get out. The powerful imagery of the video depicts what living with sexual abuse is like, long into adulthood, long after the abuse might stop. It’s not something that someone can just “shake off” because it is now over, because it is something that doesn’t go away. Between the lyrics and the imagery, Three Days Grace showed what such abuse is like for those who live with it, both as children experiencing it and later as adults.
“No one will ever see
This side reflected
And if there’s something wrong
Who would have guessed it
And I have left alone
Everything that I own
To make you feel like
It’s not too late
It’s never too late
“Even if I say
It’ll be alright
Still I hear you say
You want to end your life
Now and again we try
To just stay alive
Maybe we’ll turn it all around
‘Cause it’s not too late
It’s never too late”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lL2ZwXj1tXM
Damaged by TLC (From the album 3D, 2002)
Most of us remember TLC for their varied hits. There is a little-known song by TLC that was most important: Damaged, which only hit #53 on the contemporary charts in 2003. In this vivid music video, we see a woman’s world literally falling to pieces due to her cheating boyfriend and his subsequent physical beatings upon her. Video shows the vivid consequences of domestic violence go beyond the physical, into the emotional and spiritual realm as well.
“My heart’s at a low
I’m so much to manage
I think you should know that
I’ve been damaged
I’m falling in love
There’s one disadvantage
I think you should know that I’ve been damaged”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=reG7Iu8seos
Jeremy by Pearl Jam (From the album Ten, 1991)
Pearl Jam’s Jeremy was based on two life stories: a 15-year old named Jeremy Wade, who shot himself in front of his classmates in Richardson, Texas in 1991, and a classmate of frontman Eddie Veder’s from junior high school. The song itself is about a boy who is abused via neglect, is a problem at school, and eventually turns on himself. The graphic music video and lyrics changed music, switching the general theme of music from love to emotion. This video won numerous awards, including MTV’s Video of the Year in 1992.
“Daddy didn’t give affection
And the boy was something that mommy wouldn’t wear
King Jeremy the wicked
Ruled his world
Jeremy spoke in class today
Jeremy spoke in class today
Try to forget this…
Try to erase this…
From the blackboard.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MS91knuzoOA&noredirect=1
Crime and Punishment and War and Peace, Roseanne, Season 5, Episodes 13 and 14 (1993)
The hit show Roseanne was no stranger to controversial topics, including teenage sex, unemployment, birth control, single parenting, and the average “blue collar” life in 1980s and 1990s Lanford, Illinois. The show addressed domestic violence in a two-part episode where it’s discovered that Jackie was beaten by her boyfriend, Fisher when Darlene accidentally walks in on her while she’s changing clothes.
The two-part episode details the various excuses of a relationship gone violent: unemployment, stress, victim blame, and economic straits. It also shows the decision-making process involved in deciding to leave an abusive relationship. Dan, who despite any negative feelings he might have had toward Jackie at different points in the series, sets out to take care of Fisher himself and gets himself arrested. The show displayed strength, sensitivity, and a warm sense of humor injected into a topic that is literally life and death – all the while, making us think about the serious nature of the issue.
Dan: Bottom line Deej, it’s not okay to hit anyone, it’s NEVER okay to hit a woman, but it’s less not okay if you hit someone who’s hurt someone you love.
D.J: What if a woman hurts someone you love?
Dan: Are you at all interested in hearing where babies come from?
The Bloom is Off the Rose, The Golden Girls, Season 6, Episode 13 (1991)
When we think of domestic violence, most of us think of young women involved with loud or abusive men. The Golden Girls proved that violence can infiltrate any relationship, no matter how old a person may be, whether they live together as a married couple or family. In The Bloom is Off the Rose, Blanche Devereaux, who viewers of the show were well aware had dated her share of men, involves herself with Rex Huntington, a loud, abrasive, and abusive man. It takes no time before she is doing his laundry and he is calling her things such as “barrel butt,” giving her wrong information, showing up late for dates, and criticizing her in all sorts of ways. It takes an incident where he attacks Dorothy Zbornack, a fellow roommate and abuse survivor, to bring Blanche to her senses.
The episode proves that no matter how much experience you might have with dating, anyone can be susceptible to an abusive interaction because of how an abuser interacts. The standoffish nature and the early signs that seem intriguing and alluring, can be attractive to anyone. The Golden Girls alerts all of us, no matter how experienced or inexperienced at dating, to the warning signs of abuse.
Sophia: [about Rex] Boy, he makes Wallace Beery look like Adolphe Menjou.
Dorothy: Has been a long time since I’ve taken you to the movies, hasn’t it?
Silence is Not Golden, Full House, Season 6, Episode 17 (1993)
Full House isn’t one of those shows we think of when it came to serious topics. In Episode 17 of Season 6, they examined domestic violence. The episode did not deal with adult spousal abuse, but childhood abuse inflicted by a parent.
Stephanie is paired up for a class writing project with Charles, the class “pain,” who was always making other students miserable. In preparation for the project, Stephanie learns Charles’s father severely beats him, to which Charles makes Stephanie swear she won’t tell anyone about what she’s learned. Things go from bad to worse when Charles is suddenly absent from school due to a mysterious “accident” in which his father told the school he fell down the stairs. Through a particularly intense outburst, Stephanie tells her Uncle Jesse what happened to Charles and he reports the abuse to authorities. We learn at the end of the show that Charles was removed from his father’s household and put in foster care. Stephanie also views her own father with new appreciation because he handles the girls with fairness and without violence.
The end of this special episode featured information about reporting child abuse with the number of the Child Abuse Hotline.
Uncle Jesse: [after finding out Charles’ father is abusing him] I’m calling children’s services to handle this.
Stephanie: Why?
Uncle Jesse: Because if I don’t, I’m going over there to straighten him out myself.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WloPsjZoNbM
Final thoughts
What pop culture references can you think of that educate on domestic violence?
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