Intimate Partner Violence Theory

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Unfortunately, the military is a society that does not encourage the reporting of mental health issues, reducing the chance of returning soldiers receiving treatment. Also, when a spouse attempts to report a case of intimate partner violence the call is received by the military police, not the civilian police force. This is an issue because, just as a soldier fears reporting mental health issues for fear of recourse, the spouse may have the same fear. A report of intimate partner violence may not result in jail time or discharge from the military, but it may result in decrease of rank and pay, as well as additional details; both resulting in additional stress and increased possibility of additional incidents; and not addressing the underlying …show more content…

As can been seen when looking at the issue of intimate partner violence, both historically and more recent, much of intimate partner violence is gendered, meaning that men are normally the perpetrators of violence (Hattery and Smith 2017). For this reason, the feminist theory is one of the few middle range theories used to examine intimate partner violence (Hattery and Smith 2017). The assumption of the feminist theory is that patriarchy undergirds everything in human society and allows for the abuse and oppression of women through inequality of power and privilege (Hattery and Smith 2017). Patriarchy shapes individual power within the household, playing on culturally gendered norms and expectations, and institutional power, such as the criminal justice system; the main structures of society (Hattery and Smith 2017). For this reason, this theory focuses on the structural nature of the issue rather than the individual nature of intimate partner violence (Hattery and Smith 2017). Distribution of power allows male partners to abuse their partners and “get away” with it if the injury is not physically visible, or life threatening, it is not considered criminal. Most times the perpetrator of violence does is not prosecuted, whether it be underreporting or lack of follow-through by either the victim or the court system (Hattery and Smith 2017). Feminist theory proposes dismantling patriarchy, or at least the reform the way that intimate partner violence is handled by the court system through accountability (Hattery and Smith 2017). The largest flaw in the feminist theory is that it is said to not address “exceptions to the rule” which are cases where the female partner is the perpetrator; and fails to address violence seen in the LBGTQ community (Hattery and Smith 2017). The assertion that the feminist theory does not adequately explain violence in the LBGTQ community is short sighted. As with any heterosexual relationship, a homosexual relationship,

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