Bws in the Late 1970s,

BWS In the late 1970s, the United Nations convened the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and thereby "codified comprehensively international legal standards for women." Since the first countries ratified the Convention in 1980, over 185 countries have signed and ratified the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW). The Convention explicitly champions the rights of women worldwide, and ratifying CEDAW obliges participating states to put its principles and provisions into practice. One country agreed to sign but not ratify CEDAW.

That country is the United States of America. The American Bar Association urges United States lawmakers to ratify CEDAW, especially because of its pertinence to domestic violence-related law. As the American Bar Association (ABA) notes, the Convention would require unified anti-domestic violence laws and protection for women who seek help across state borders. Without CEDAW or a similar national standard of ensuring genuine gender equality, the United States is sorely lacking cohesive means to address the problem of violence against women.

One advantage of having a federal standard for domestic abuse is that women running from their abusers trust the equal application of anti-domestic violence law. Currently, women who flee across state lines to extricate themselves from an abusive relationship face uncertain futures. "Victims of domestic violence are often limited in their ability to travel because protection orders issued in one state are not always enforced by other states," (ABA).

Those women also lack the knowledge that a central support system will aid them in making the transition from a financially dependent partnership to an independent existence. Standards like CEDAW would ensure women the ability to gain support for their psychological and fiscal needs. Moreover, the ABA notes "the failure to enforce protection orders is perhaps the weakest link in the legal safeguards available to women." Women who rely on restraining orders to stave off former abusers cannot necessarily trust the efficacy of those orders.

The restraining orders are generally localized, prohibiting women from trusting that their abusers will be apprehended in states other than their place of residence. Women who run from their abusers are trying to get out of their relationships by taking proactive measures, but without a valid, reliable system of support no women is assured that her safety is a nationwide concern. Victims of abuse remain in abuse relationships for a number of reasons, but a lack of viable options is certainly one of them and especially one for poor women.

United States law does expressly condemn violence against women, but inconsistency and a lack of commitment to prosecuting domestic violence continues to frustrate all whose lives are affected. The use of battered women's syndrome or the battered women's defense in murder trials for women who kill their abusers is one of the ways the legal and justice system have offered some support for victims of abuse. Recognizing battered women's syndrome as a legitimate defense is helpful in many cases, but does not solve the underlying issues.

Battered women's syndrome is a "cluster of behaviors or traits" characterized by learned helplessness: the tendency to become submissive in an abusive relationship (text, p. 79). The syndrome explains a wide range of behaviors that might seem odd or even unacceptable to those who have never experienced or witnessed an abusive relationship. Why women choose to stay with abusive partners can at least in part be explained by learned helplessness: which begins with a genuine belief that the first sign of abuse was a fluke.

Forgiving an initial incident of violence, the woman might experience a long period of peace in the relationship. After experiencing this "temporary success," the abuse occurs again and often more severe and more frequently (text, p. 80). Moreover, women in abusive relationships may have children, may be financially dependent on the partner, or may not have any friends or family members upon which she can count on for support. With nowhere to go and no money to go with, a woman quite understandably stays with the abuser.

Federal standards like those suggested by CEDAW would ensure that no woman would have to stay with an abuser. She would instead have access to several services that promote independence and safety. Without access to social services, battered women remain too long in their abusive relationships. Battered women's syndrome is invoked in the courtroom when because women stay too long in abusive relationships and eventually kill the partner out of indirect self-defense.

The victim of abuse remains in the relationship for so long that the abuse becomes a way of life. She cannot overtake the abusive partner during one of his fits of violence because of his physical prowess. Instead, her fear, anger and pain build up to the breaking point. Viewed as a psychological syndrome, jurors and judges can better assess the context in which a murder of an abusive partner took place. A form of temporary insanity, battered woman's syndrome is not overly successful as a defense in court cases.

Most jurors are "skeptical" of the defense because of a lack of awareness about domestic violence and the social issues surrounding the abuse of women (text, p. 84). The decision to seek social services and external support for their domestic abuse problems is based largely on their availability and consistency, suggests the American Bar Association.

If support systems were socially entrenched and fully universal, such as by bearing common institutional names and respective programs, then more women might leave abusive relationships before they exhibited signs of battered women syndrome and before they killed their partners. Macy, Nurius, Kernic, & Holt (nd) sought to discover the variables that most affected the decision to seek out social services. As severity of the abuse escalates, so too does the tendency to seek social services.

In other words, women in the initial stages of an abusive relationship do demonstrate a tendency toward battered woman syndrome in which they experience a gradual escalation of violence. Macy, et al. (nd) also found that while many women seek support, most seek primarily legal support. Interestingly, demographic factors did not have a significant impact on the decision to seek services in general but a significantly greater number of women from European backgrounds and who were financially stable sought legal services vs. their non-white, poorer counterparts.

The results of the Macy et al. (nd) study therefore prove the need for a more robust, federal-level support system for all women. Currently, only women who feel comfortable with and who can afford legal counsel are likely to obtain such services. Moreover, Macy et al. (nd) note that most women who experience abuse put off seeking help until symptoms grow in intensity or diversity.

Substance abuse, psychological illness, or sustained physical injury are some of the core reasons why females seek support: but they should be encouraged to find help sooner. Severity and proximity of abuse was one of the most important factors in determining whether victims of domestic violence would seek out formal legal or social support services. Substance abuse, depression, and other psychological variables also increased the likelihood of all women, regardless of their ethnic, religious, or class background, to seek support. The majority of respondents in the Macy et al.

(nd) survey did not seek specialized services to address domestic violence issues (p. 7). Instead, women who are victims of domestic abuse -- psychological, physical, and/or sexual -- seek support for ancillary issues. The ancillary issues are likely to be symptomatic of violence such as clinical depression, physical ailments, or substance abuse. Macy et al. (nd) therefore suggest that all social.