October Is Domestic Violence Awareness Month

Southampton - The Retreat launches a month long campaign aimed at raising awarness on the East End about Domestic Violence,

October 2009 marks the annual observance of Domestic Violence Awareness month. Referred to by many labels - some of which include family violence, intimate partner violence, child abuse, dating violence, sexual assault and/or elder abuse, its impact is far reaching and does not discriminate. However, there is one common denominator - gender. Overwhelmingly, acts of violence in intimate partnerships, our schools and local communities, and even the media, involve male perpetrators against female victims.

Did You Know?
• One in four women will experience domestic in her lifetime.

• Fifty percent of female murder victims are killed by an intimate partner.

• One in three female high school students will be the victims of dating violence.

• Here in Suffolk County, over 25 percent of the assaults that police respond to are problems of domestic violence with male perpetrators and female victims.

The harsh reality is that even these statistics don't offer us a clear and accurate picture of the true scope of this problem. Due to stigma around intimate partner violence, tendency to blame the victim, as well as feelings of fear and shame experienced by many victims around their assault, a large number of these incidents of violence against women go unreported or undocumented.

The Retreat's Executive Director, Jeffrey Friedman, believes that outreach, prevention education, and community awareness on the issue of domestic violence is the key to ending the cycle of family violence.

The Retreat's new Director of Agency Programs, Stacey Bellem, feels strongly that "We need to examine gender in our society as well as the limitations (and risks) around our current forms of masculine and feminine identities, and how they limit the well-being of men while maintaining a culture of violence and control over women and girls."

Andrew Garbarini, a counselor at the Retreat stated, "Men must change their actions and dynamics in relationships to prevent incidents of violence from occurring." Furthermore, Garbarini shares how important it is that men represent the cause of domestic violence prevention, "it should not just be about helping women as the victims, but about men taking responsibility for promoting and modeling respectful behavior for their peers and children."

The Retreat is a 501(c)(3) non-profit, domestic violence organization. It is the only full service (with safe housing) domestic violence agency serving all five townships on the East End of Long Island. Services and programs offered through the Retreat are all free to the community and include hotline counseling, legal advocacy, emergency safe housing, individual and group counseling, educational programs and an anti-violence, re-education program for batterers.

Call the Retreat for more information at 631-329-2200, or go to www.theretreatinc.org, or call 631-329-4398.