|
By Ted German, Director of Training
Those of us who work with abusers know that many
abusers often receive direct and indirect support
for their harmful behavior from their social network
(friends and family). Here, I will briefly discuss
how abuser education programs can productively
address issues related to abusers and their friends.
Issues related to family support will be
addressed at another time.
Research has shown that there is a correlation
between abusive behavior and having friends who are
abusive and/or endorse attitudes which encourage
abusive behavior (Dekeseredy and Kelly [1],
Williamson and Silverman [2]).
Both research and anecdotal information from
counseling experience suggest that victims often
believe the abuser’s friends directly and indirectly
support and encourage his abusive behavior. As part
of the counseling process we suggest that group
leaders ask clients about their friendship networks.
We ask clients whether they have disclosed their
abusive behavior to friends. If so, we ask how their
friends have responded to them.
There is another reason for counselors to
investigate sources of outside support for their
clients. Abusers need other positive sources of
social support outside of their intimate
relationship. Many are overly reliant, if not
emotionally dependent, upon their partners in ways
that are integral to their pattern of abuse.
Currently, at the end of our Second Stage groups,
group members are encouraged to tell a (hopefully)
positive friend the details of their abusive
behavior, and the ways in which they have explicitly
or indirectly undermined their partners to others in
their social network. The clients are also expected
to ask these people to check in about future
behavior in the abuser's relationship. We hope that
this interaction between abusers and their friends
will be part of the abusers' accountability process.
Abusers who are significantly invested in
maintaining a positive public image may be motivated
by this involvement of a friend from their larger
social network.
While we hope that the exposure of past abusive acts
to friends serves as a deterrent for future abuse,
we also hope that this friend can be a positive
source of support in other ways. Optimally, these
friends would understand, accept and support the
goals of the abuser education program and have the
knowledge of how to best support the abuser in the
future. But we don’t think this is likely to happen
without program outreach to the abuser's friends.
We are developing a new program component in which
clients will be asked to choose a friend or other
important member of their social network to be part
of their group experience. This will give us the
opportunity to educate this friend on how to
constructively support the abuser during and after
the program.
Men Stopping Violence (in Atlanta, GA) has been
asking group members to bring a friend into their
groups as a regular part of their evaluation
process.
However, we know that a significant percentage of
men who come to Emerge do not have a positive male
support in their life. These men will need program
encouragement to find new, positive sources of
support.
When working on self-care issues in the group, we
ask men to examine their current friendship networks
and look beyond friends who support abuse or other
harmful behaviors. Some possible sources of
healthier friendships might include volunteering,
attending religious services, 12-step groups,
meeting people through their partner's network of
friends. However, Emerge does not encourage group
members to associate with each other outside of the
program. This is because partners of abusers are
justifiably wary of having their partner associate
with other abusers.
[1] DeKeseredy W.S. & Kelly, K. (1993) Woman abuse
in university and college dating relationships: The
contribution of the ideology of familial patriarchy.
Journal of Human Justice, 4, 25-52.
[2] Williamson, G.M. & Silverman, J.G. (2001).
Violence against female partners: Direct and
interactive effects of family history, communal
orientation, and peer-related variables. Journal of
Social and Personal Relationships, 18(4), 535-549.
|
