The topic is Crime and Violence. For this assignment there needs to be an examination of contemporary social issue using sociological lenses. Explain what is happening with the social issue? what is the impact? Who is affected? What do people think about it? Are there any debates surrounding the issue? Provide a brief history of how the issue began.

Answer:

Introduction 

Unfortunately domestic violence is still a prevalent part of the society. It is a type of violence that is expressed against one intimate partner by the other one. In United States the issue of domestic violence is considered to be a major social issue by the nongovernmental and governmental organizations. There are various acts that have been passed by the government to take effective actions against the violent activities; however there are still several instances of domestic violence on a regular basis (Devries et al., 2013). The reports have shown that more than ten million of Americans are the regular victims of physical domestic violence. This essay triggers to address this issue and evaluate it using the sociological perspectives.  

Discussion 

This issue has been visible since the colonial time in America; however the English laws have taken effective steps against the crime. The Puritan had entirely banned the domestic violence yet the laws had lacked a firm enforcement. However, during 1870s the government had banned the right to hit the family members. However during 1960s the feminist movements in America had brought the issues with domestic violence to a severe attention of the American media (Donohoe, 2016). Furthermore by the year 1980s the states had implemented legislations against the domestic violence.

This issue has is present across all the socio economic class in America and the reports refer that the intimate violence is more prevalent among the poor class of America, however these do not involve serious violence. Moreover the socio economic standard of living, ethnicity and other societal factors have also influenced the rates of family violence. Even if most of the incidents of domestic violence happen between the intimate partners, the children are also affected by the violence. The reports show that around twenty percent of American children witness the domestic abuse of their caregiver or the parents (Breiding, Chen & Black, 2014). As a result to this they also experience and abuse at home, they tend to fail in their academic career, also tend to have failure in nervous system. The children who start to face domestic violence in a vulnerable age can also be subject to more instances of the behavioral and emotional issues. Therefore it can be indicated that couples with issues regarding domestic violence tend to compromise their parenting quality. Therefore it brings higher risks to the behavioral and emotional difficulties for the children.

However, reports also show that most of the times the victims who are mostly women tend to stay in the abusive relationship as the law provides less ways of escaping. Traditionally after marriage the women looses the right to sue her partner and they tend to fear the direction of lives once they leave their husbands 9García-Moreno et al., 2015). Also many of them tend to blame themselves as they have a serious lack of resources.

Conclusion

This social issue has a huge impact on the lives of children and women and they tend to grow several psychological problems. However, the government and the other nongovernmental associations organize various programs against domestic violence and solutions to potential abuses. However, the government requires to be more effective so that this tide can be cut at its stem.

Reference List 

Breiding, M. J., Chen, J., & Black, M. C. (2014). Intimate partner violence in the United States--2010.

Devries, K. M., Mak, J. Y., Garcia-Moreno, C., Petzold, M., Child, J. C., Falder, G., ... & Pallitto, C. (2013). The global prevalence of intimate partner violence against women. Science, 340(6140), 1527-1528.

Donohoe, M. (2016). Individual and societal forms of violence against women in the US and the developing world: an overview. Current Womens Health Reports, 2, 313-319.

García-Moreno, C., Zimmerman, C., Morris-Gehring, A., Heise, L., Amin, A., Abrahams, N., ... & Watts, C. (2015). Addressing violence against women: a call to action. The Lancet, 385(9978), 1685-1695.