Abusegate: Washington Post Falsehoods Have Fueled One of the Greatest Civil Rights Travesties in America

PRESS RELEASE

Contact: Rebecca Hain

Telephone: 513-479-3335

Abusegate: Washington Post Falsehoods Have Fueled One of the Greatest Civil Rights Travesties in America

WASHINGTON / February 16, 2023 – Hundreds of studies conducted in the United States and globally show men and women engage in domestic violence at similar rates. Despite this fact, the Washington Post has published a series of articles that has ignored this research, engendering a narrative of male perpetration and female victimization. This false narrative has contributed to policies that negate the rights of men for equal treatment under law.

Each year, 6.4 million men and 5.6 million women are victims of physical violence by an intimate partner, according to the Centers for Disease Control (1). Hundreds of studies conducted in countries around the world have reached a similar conclusion (2).

But over the last decade, the Washington Post has published a series of articles that systematically ignored domestic violence against men:

May 10, 2013: “Conference Shines Light on Plight of Battered Mothers Seeking Custody” (3).
December 18, 2018: “Amber Heard: I Spoke Up Against Sexual Violence, and Faced Our Culture’s Wrath. That Has to Change” (4).
December 29, 2021: “The Pandemic Caused a Global Surge in Domestic Violence. For Victims with Few Options, Abuse has Become the New Normal.” (5)
January 18, 2022: “Senators are Pushing to Reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act. Will it Help Indigenous Communities?” (6).
February 17, 2022: “More than 1 in 4 Women Have Experienced Domestic Violence in Their Lifetimes, Global Study Finds” (7).
October 20, 2022: “Domestic Violence Victim Advocates on Case Uptick During Pandemic” (8).
January 3, 2023: “Climate Change Puts More Women at Risk for Domestic Violence” (9).

The factual veracity of each of these stories has been reviewed, with serious, systematic errors identified (10). For example, the numerous false claims in the 2018 Amber Heard editorial eventually resulted in a $1 million payment to Johnny Depp for defamation (11).

The false narrative promoted by the Washington Post has resulted in a series of profound civil rights violations:

Abused men face disbelief, ridicule, and scorn (12).
Men are removed from their homes and families without objective evidence of abuse (13).
Men are subject to biased “predominant aggressor” arrest policies (14).
Men are victimized by systematic bias of prosecutors and judges (15).
Men are more likely than women to be targeted by a false allegation of abuse (16).
Divorced fathers seeking shared parenting are frustrated by false stereotypes, even though mothers are more likely to engage in child abuse (17).

Collectively, these violations amount to one of the greatest civil rights travesties in modern-day America.

The Coalition to End Domestic Violence calls on the Washington Post, in a timely manner, to run an editorial acknowledging its biased coverage of the domestic abuse issue, and to publish articles that focus on the plight of male victims of domestic violence.

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