Domestic Violence

I just have to rant here.

Why do all of these people blame the victim?
Abuse is not a simple process. Usually before an abuser physically assaults his or her partner it is preceded by slowly demolishing the partner's self esteem and isolating them from all support networks. By the time the actual violence happens many victims even feel as though they deserve it. It can take an abuse victim six or seven tries to before they leave their partner permanently. This is a complex psychological subject that has entangled thousands of people, and to call Rihanna stupid because she did not leave Chris Brown or to say that "she deserves him" is blaming the victim, an attitude which makes it even harder to break the circle of violence and reinforces the self esteem and isolation issues that have been created around the the victim.

To say that she deserves his violent reaction she got because she hit him first? Yes, in a loving relationship anything more than playful violence is not acceptable, but choking, punching, and biting are not in the same category as one swat. If one partner does something unacceptable that is no reason for the other partner to escalate in, especially since he was hardly defending himself.
If they were not romantically involved, would we find this situation ok? Girls are very capable of being violent, but that does not mean that women(or men!) do not need protection from this sort of thing. He beat her into a pulp and she barely swatted him. Unjustified much?
Nobody in a healthy relationship has to be afraid of their partner in any way.