Page 63 - Social Norms Survey

young man who leaves the TV on will be running up the electricity bill (if it is legal), but this

connection has not been explained to him.

Intimate Partner Violence and Patriarchy
Physical and psychological abuse is not the only familial

experience of violence. Many children in these communities
are witnesses to intimate partner violence (IPV). According to

the students, seeing their father or another man beating their
mother provokes very deep and violent responses in children.

They say the children feel like killing the perpetrator.

Research carried out in 2017 by the VPA in the study of
women’s safety and security in 13 CSJP communities

suggested that at least 60.0 per cent of women were
beaten in these communities. This was also the average

given in this study by students who gave figures ranging
from two out of 10 to 10 out of 10 women. Fights among young couples were estimated

at eight out of 10 by the young men and women in three groups. There was frank, to the
point of “raw” discussion on some issues in the mixed group, while there was clearly no

tension present in the uni-gender groups. In the former, all refused to give numbers on this
topic after the first man to speak said “20 out of 10”! The rural women may have found

discussion on this issue embarrassing as one of the five said she did not know, one said
zero, and the other, one out of 10. 39

Intimate partner violence is the norm. A host of “reasons” are given for the beating by both

genders: jealousy, stress, perceived cheating by the woman, peer pressure from male
friends, unacceptable provocation from the woman (women will taunt men on the taboo

practice of oral sex). Underlying all this are concepts of man as ruler
and woman as basically inferior, requiring “guidance.” The previous

study found that even some young men, who might be very positive
about sharing household tasks (except cleaning the bathroom),

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36 The average number of women nationally who have experienced physical violence from their partner is 25.2 per
cent. (Carol Watson Williams. 2016. Women’s Health Survey 2016 Jamaica. Kingston: Statistical Institute of Jamaica,
IDB, UN Women)
39