LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.(Letter to the Editor)

Novel Theory Offered on Cause of Domestic Violence

The article "Domestic Violence: What Clinicians Need to Know," by Janice B. Asher, MD, in the January/February 2000 issue of Minority Health Today takes the politically correct, if misinformed, view that women are the predominant victims of domestic violence and men are the predominant perpetrators. At least one-half of the domestic violence problem is being ignored with this unrealistic and biased view. We are not going to solve this problem until we begin viewing it realistically in gender-neutral terms. Please see the following list of studies for more on this subject.

John Douglas Pappas, MD, JD

Corpus Christi, Tex

References

http://www.csulb.edu/[sim]mfiebert/assault.htm

These references are from a bibliography compiled by Martin S. Fiebert of the Department of Psychology, California State University, Long Beach, which lists 95 scholarly investigations, 79 empirical studies, and 16 reviews and/or analyses. The references purport to demonstrate that women are at least as physically aggressive as men in spousal or partnership relationships. Aggregate sample size of the reviewed studies exceeds 60 000.