Section 76 of the Serious Crime Act of 2015 created a monumental shift in how domestic abuse is addressed in the United Kingdom. It added coercive and controlling behaviors as a serious offense, essentially criminalizing coercive control. However, the Domestic Abuse Bill proposed in 2019, and still in progress, includes another important distinction. It removes the language of domestic violence and replaces it with the term domestic abuse.
Why is this meaningful? It is meaningful because it much more accurately describes what targets of abuse actually endure. The term domestic violence implies two things: 1. a crime that occurs within a family and 2. one that includes violence... physical violence. But as a survivor of said crime, I must insist that domestic violence doesn't even begin to adequately describe what was done to me... or the hundreds of other targets of abuse that I know.
As many survivors contend, the violence is not the worst part. The physical violence is a mere punctuation mark in a long series of emotional, financial and psychological indignities, a long purposeful pattern of cruel and humiliating violations of one's identity and agency. The thing that most people think is domestic violence is actually coercive control and/or domestic abuse. These terms more fully capture the entire pattern of abuses. They do not disregard or minimize emotional, financial or psychological abuse, as domestic violence does.
The problem with using the term domestic violence is that it completely misses the point from the target's perspective. Did he hit me? Yes, he did. But that wasn't what ripped my life apart. That wasn't what destroyed my business or my relationships with my family, colleagues and friends. That wasn't what destroyed my credit, foreclosed my home or made me feel so hopeless that suicide seemed the only viable option of escape. Domestic violence did not TRAP me! Domestic violence did not CRUSH me! Domestic violence was not what almost KILLED me! Coercive control and domestic abuse did that.
Domestic violence isn't necessarily an inaccurate term. It just isn't broad enough. I was physically attacked by my abuser, and domestic violence accurately describes those attacks. However, the bruises and cuts healed. But the scars from coercive control and domestic abuse are still healing... many years later. Some of those scars may never completely heal.
I am a domestic violence survivor, but from now on I will refer to myself as a survivor of domestic abuse and coercive control instead. Whether you are a survivor, or a friend, family member or service provider who serves survivors, I recommend you do the same.
