Do you think men are more aggressive on average than women? I did ,but apparently, I, like most everyone else, have been deluded by one of our society's great myths, that men are the aggressors in violent partnership. According to the 1985 National Family Violence Survey, 20 wives per 1,000 (2%) hit or attempted to strike their spouses with an object, while 17 husbands out of 1000 admitted to same (1.7%). 46 wives per 1000 admitted to engaging in "severe violence" against their mate (4.6%), compared to 30 husbands per 1000 (3%). 24% of women hit back after being hit by their spouse (2.4%), 15% of men did the same (1.5%). In a survey of 6,002 people, 0% of women were arrested after a violent incident against the husband taht he reported. 15% of the men who were violent against their spouses were arrested after their wives called the police. And 12% of the men who were attacked by their wives were arrested when they called the police! Some stats on child abuse: 61% of all child abuse was committed by mothers (Child Maltreatment 1995: reports form the states to the Nat'l Child Abuse and Neglect Data System) 55% of murdered children were killed by their mothers (Murder in Families 1994, Bureau of Justice Statistics) 6.2 % of mothers hit their children during the interview part of a survey on corporal punishment of children (Corporal Punishment by Mother's and Child's Cognitive Development) [note: no data on the father's %] In a study titled Spouse Murder Defendants in Large Urban Communities 1995 (Bureau of Justice Statistics), it was found that 81% of women recieved prison time for murdering their spouse, while 94% of men did. The average length of the sentence given to women was ten years shorter. 27% of women were acquitted by a jury in their spous murder trials. 0% of men were. 37 % of women were acquitted by a judge during their spouse murder trial, while 17% of men were. here's some more stats in this bibliography. So, what do you think about this? How do these stats mesh with your opinions on domestic violence? Onyour opinions on female aggression in general? What do you think are the root causes of this seeming difference between the percieved notion that men are more likely to be physically abusive partner in relationships and the statistical evidence that says that women are as or more likely to be violent? I'll hold my opinions for now, I am more curious to see what the rest of us here think. I will only add this: I think that the perception that it's more acceptable for a woman to hit a man than a man to hit a woman has something to do with the general societal acceptance of aggression against men (as perpetrated by other men). My purpose here is to be a little controversial; this place needs a little fire under its ass lately. If LP was still around, I'd probably get reamed hardcore for this (I wish she hadn't flipped out, she was a lively arguer, even though I disagreed with many of her positions). I will state that I am in no way suggesting that men have it worse than women in this world, or that this is any justification for any of the crimes against humanity that are perpetrated by men. In other words, this is not intended to be another "tighty whitey male moanfest" and hopefully won't be dismissed as such (or turn into one).

i think that there is a lot of missing information what deaths are a result of self defense or long time abuse? on average, it is more likely that a man could hurt a women in a moment of loss of control than a woman could injure a man. just out of mass and strength. maybe some women don't feel like they will really do damage when they strike and therefor don't restrain themselves. don't ask me, i don't like hitting. men seem to be more possessive than women- but that might just me my personal perspective. i don't expect people to belong to me but it seems that people have expected me to belong to them. this also leads to a sense of ownership and a need to defend property (that sounds extreme, but you get the idea) the whole child abuse thing neither mentions fathers, nor what constitutes abuse, nor what percentage of children only have mothers around. child abuse is such a difficult issue- my parents were great in so many ways and yet abusive in others. is it about physical injury or threat of death?

it's all about actual physical contact. You know, come to think about it, I 've been struck by women about three times aas much as I have been by men, but there was only one incident where the intent was to cause harm, and that was the one fight I was in with a guy. I don't think the times I was hit by womenhad any intent by the woman to actually hurt me. Also, in the accompanying article in Men's Health (which of course is biased towards guys -and I hate their anti-cat thing-what's up with that?), they made the point that a lot of women hit men when they don't think the man is listening to them. Another interesting thing is that the man does possess a greater potential to do damage than a woan does. Maybe that's why men do not retaliate as much as women do. There was a thing in the article about how to recoginize if a murder victim was attacked by a man or a woman, and some of the signs that indicate a female attacked include overkill (more damge done than necessary to off the victim), a lot of shallow, superficial stab wounds, indicating that the attacker did not possess a great deal of upper body strength, and bludgeoning an immobilized victim, which could indicate a lack of physical confidence (if you're going to murder someone who is physically stronger than you, it helps if they can't defend themselves). and think about child abuse (physical only): in public, when you've seen a child hit by a parent, try to remember which parent it was. I tried this and can think of a few incidents in malls or at the fair when I've seen a mom slap her kid, but I can only think of two incidences when it was a father who did it. I think this may be totally skewed by the fact that women are the primary caregivers of children in this society, and spend more time than men with their kids, so the incidence of female to child abuse would of course be higher. I just think that whatever you read into this, it goes to show that the human species as a WHOLE is aggressive and violent, not just half of it. god, I hope other folks come and discuss this. No offense, Heather, i didn't imply that I was unsatisfied or anything by your response, just that I crave a big debate, complete with wise-ass deflations by guys like droopy or swine.

Ummm. I've never doubted for a second that I'm more aggressive than most men I know. I also don't have most of the built-in conditioning (e.g., don't hit girls). But I had a violent father, and so I repress most of my aggression and channel it into psychological torture of pets, and watching hockey. Oh, and losing my shit entirely when someone calls the US a democracy. I punch people all the time, that light 'buddy punch' guys give each other on the shoulder. I got into a fight ONCE since I was an adult, and the intent was definitely to cause pain. I kidney punched my little brother repeatedly when I realized I could not kill him outright with my hands. Two facts about this encounter: (1) he totally deserved it, and (2) when I lose my temper to the point of physical violence (2x or less a year), except for this incident I take it out on inanimate objects and, more to the point, possessions which are mine and mine alone.

I would have to agree that the human race as a whole is violent--statistics are very tricky things to rely on for information, or at least I think so, since they can be presented in a biased manner and so on and so forth. As for pure phsical abuse, I see far more men be violent towards people than women--but then again, I am around more men. Adn the rationale for violent acts appears to similar regardless of the sex. Thought.

Violence in any form is unacceptable. But. In a democracy like the US, the media is perhaps the most violent form of low life scum sucking viral blackening skewed fact perpetrator of predicated violence I can think of (besides the internet commercial banners). More violent than my neighbor Hilda the Hedge Clipper. Get in HER way and she'll show you violence and possession, ten tenths of the law in my hood. In one of our more scholarly publications, yesterday, on Easter Eve for God's sake, I see that the media has resurrected another story, and convicted Jon Benet's own MOTHER of strangling her model child in the middle of a sex act. And hockey, I should be a Blues fan. Violent acts toward the whole team. Fie on them! I am going to talk to Hilda about the bastards. "Men seems to be more possessive than women." May be in your Lord and Taylor neighborhood, but down here in Auggie Busch's back yard I'd hate to get in the way of some of the purple haired ancients playing with Hilda at St. Peter's Friday nite bingo. They play your cards, their cards, and five others. Possessive? Huh. Okay; I got it out of my system now. I have my opinions on domestic violence, yes. In my practice I see no difference in the perpetrators' gender, as it is the violence toward one another which is the problem, not who does what. Or who starts what. Or who gets hurt the most. I see both men as perp's and women as perp's, but I don't work with the women, and limit my pratice to the men. There's usually the excuse that the women started it, and the man says ("and I would never hit her but I couldn't take it any longer") such bullshit, and it is true that men are usually physically able to do more damage and are more often maligned by the police. The issue is the violent acts - verbal, psychological, sexual, financial, volitional, spiritual - do in fact precede the violent act of striking another human. This makes us (humans) more culpable than say, beavers, who only attack for food, self preservation, and sparring on a Sunday afternoon on top of the dam. I've not seen any of Auggie's zebras wilfully, maliciously, and with premeditation go after another zebra (maybe a goose or two, maybe...) Actually, in the St Louis Zoological Park years ago there was built an overlook above and facing a plaza adjacent a hospitality/human gathering/area outside the new visitors center...and the overlook had a sign, like all the other signs in the zoo, listing the species and a brief history, on which the onlooker gazed. The sign read that homo sapiens was the only known species to seek wantonly and without much reason to destroy its own species. Somebody made the Zoo board take the sign down, but I thought it was appropriate and thought provoking. A large part of my work is also with religious (males who are clergy, brothers, ordained, or who live in community) who are perps, and many who are up on charges, but I cannot comment here or elsewhere on this - or child abuse/molestation in general. So, I'll leave that one to Hilda the Hedge lady. She's got mean clippers out today. Thank you for the opportunity to incriminate myself once more.

Did someone say "democarcy" and "US" in the same sentance? It does appear that humans commit the most acts of random violence. Maybe it has something to do with this evolution thing. (As I write this, my cats are going at it hammer and tongs. I figure they're going to start licking each other lovingly in about two minutes.) However, many species, when crowded, will become violent--and humans are definently crowded. It seems like when you throw a bunch of people with radically different ideas into a small space, verbal violence, at least, can result. I don't know. I think I'll go back to watching the cats and see if I can glean anything that way.

er...make that "democracy." and I already know I can't spell sentence.

men, you been lookin' around for de women, but they always been right there. nowadays a woman's gotta haul off and hit a man to make him know she's there. the other day a woman came up and hit me like i wasn't even there. Yeah, huh - dawned on me, man, that man's been doin' woman unfair. i knew i had to go out and tell all the women that i knew that they was there.

6000 people is not a very big control group. who were these people? were they truly a random sampling? i am working graveyard again. i'm trying to decide if i should hand staple 125 books, or wait for the stapler on the machine to be fixed tomorrow morning. such are the dilemmas of working at kinko's on the graveyard shift. dance with the boogie getdown, the boogie nights are always the best in town. got to keep on dancing, keep on dancing!

the key word is "admitted" no one know if women are more or less likely to admit things than men to themselves, or other people -including people with clipboards taking surveys -including surveys that come in the mail and can be returned anonymously, according to the survey or how people who admitted things felt about the things they admitted (shame, twisted pride)

i think it's interesting: -men/boys are conditioned to show restraint towards women/girls -women/girls are taught to fight back -boys are typically raised to be more aggressive typical boy toys/games:army, cowboys, GIJoe, football, I would like to know for fact: -do men have more testosterone than women from birth in essence i think i would be interesting to break this down to nature vs nurture in a modern context. like Margret, i find hockey neutralizes any violent tendencies i have.... hey danielSSS...your Blues aren't gonna last long, ...go Flyers!

I can tell you this: there was a study done studying possible genetic/biological routes for homosexuality in women, and it was discovered that there was a correlation between being lesbian and being exposed to higher than average levels of testosterone while in utero. Does that help? Other news: I read another study saying that men tend to see erupting into violence as a way of *gaining* control over a situation, while women tend to see erupting into violence as *losing* control of themselves. Help? No help? (Jeez, I'm pale. I just noticed that my fingers are about the same color as the keyboard I'm using. Yikes.)

A female friend of mine has a rather curios way of greeting people--she runs up to you and punches you in the gut as hard as she can. I am not sure why she does this, but I don't know anyone else, male or female, who greets me with an act of violence. (I'm translucent.)

I'm dirty. I think that the huge number of different tests and surveys that seem to show men and women have the same rates of performing violent acts(as demonstrated in the bibliography link) should answer concerns about sample size and what not. You get similar results from all over the world. Maybe women are naturally conditioned to act more aggressively than our culture would have us think, perhaps as an attempt to show their power in conflict situations woth more physically dominating opponents. What else is interesting about female violence is how extreme it can get from rather normal conflicts. For example,after an argument between two women in a laundromat, one of them threw a cup of bleach in the other's face. A guy would probaly use his fists in teh same situation. Another case was when, again after an argument, a woman slit her female friend's throat so deep she hit bone. Maybe this has something to do with the overkill syndrome, discussed above.

yeah I read that report Rhi....it related to index finger size.