When discussing the Wife of Bath's Tale, it was noted in the prologue that the Wife of Bath initiates domestic violence:
Al sodeynly thre leves have I plyghtDr. Jerz brought up a statistic that he thought he heard a few years ago: that women most often hit first. Of course, he tempered that by saying that men usually have the capability to do more injury when they hit back.
Out of his book, right as he radde, and eke
I with my fest so took hym on the cheke
That in oure fyr he fil bakward adoun.
And he up stirte as dooth a wood leoun,
And with his fest he smoot me on the heed
That in the floor I lay as I were deed. (lines 790-796)
Which got me thinking -- clearly, I had to find the source of that "fact" and see if it was true or not.
But you can't really ever "prove" a fact, especially not a one-line fact like that. I at the very least wanted to know what type of sample they studied, and who conducted the research to check and see if the fact had any merit.
The first thing I pulled up when searching on "women hit" and "domestic violence" was a site attributed to "Family Resources and Research." This appears to be the work of ministers named Sam and Bunny. They claim that women do initiate most instances of spousal violence, and cite it partially to Richard Gelles:
Complete scientific citations are included in this report. Leading researchers have validated the statistics used here, "Murray Straus (a sociologist and co-director for the Family Research Laboratory at the University of New Hampshire) verified the statistics from his report . . .and Richard Gelles of the University of Rhode Island and author of Intimate Violence and other studies, also validated the statistics used by matching it to previous research." Alice Lovejoy, Brown University. "Counter Punch")However, Richard Gelles sees it differently, countering that "right of center factoids" distort that finding by leaving out pertinent information.
WOMEN ARE AS VIOLENT AS ARE MEN, AND WOMEN INITIATE VIOLENCE AS OFTEN AS DO MEN: This factoid cites research by Murray Straus, Suzanne Steinmetz, and Richard Gelles, as well as a host of other self-report surveys. Those using this factoid tend to conveniently leave out the fact that Straus and his colleague's surveys as well as data collected from the National Crime Victimization Survey (Bureau of Justice Statistics) consistently find that no matter what the rate of violence or who initiates the violence, women are 7 to 10 times more likely to be injured in acts of intimate violence than are men.Thus, there is truth to the assertion that women hit men too, simply because anyone, male or female, has the ability to hit. It doesn't matter who hits first, because any hitting at all isn't healthy. To top it off, one website mentions that women are capable of hitting men, and maybe they do. But the physical and psychological implictions [.pdf] of a woman hitting a man and a man hitting a woman are much different. First, a 130-pound woman hitting a 180-pound man will most likely be less force-filled than a 180-pound man hitting a 130-pound woman. Add to that the notion that most woman will fear a man if a man hits her, while a man will be annoyed by a woman who hits, and not afraid.
In the end, statistics are notorious for being either inaccurate or misrepresented, especially on this issue. Anyone, whether they are battered women's advocates or battered men's advocates, can twist facts and statistics to promote their own cause.