When Women Use Force

Key Takeaways

1. Gender Differences in Intimate Partner Violence
   While men are more frequently perpetrators of intimate partner violence, women can also engage in abusive behaviors, often using nonphysical tactics such as emotional, psychological or financial abuse. These behaviors are sometimes linked to unresolved trauma, self-defense or attempts to gain autonomy in relationships with abusive partners.
2. Challenges in Recognizing and Reporting Abuse
   Male survivors often struggle to report abuse due to societal stereotypes about masculinity and a lack of recognition of nonphysical forms of violence as abuse. However, increased mental health awareness and online resources have empowered more individuals, regardless of gender, to recognize and address abusive behaviors.
3. Legal and Social Complexities
   The distinction between self-defense and aggression can be blurred, especially for women reacting to abuse. Legal definitions of self-defense may disadvantage women in relationships with abusers, and societal misconceptions about "mutual abuse" often misrepresent the dynamics of power and control in such situations.

It’s a well-known fact that men are more likely than women to perpetrate violence against their partner, though it’s hard to accurately quantify the number of both male and female abusers since domestic violence is vastly underreported. Yet, we know that women can use harm against their partners. We’ve spoken to male survivors of domestic violence who say that their female partners used force, coercion, threats and manipulation to control or intimidate them. Yet very few abused men report intimate partner abuse, usually out of shame or embarrassment due to harmful stereotypes about masculinity. 

Men may not report intimate partner violence because they feel they should be the stronger person in a heterosexual relationship. They also may not recognize non-physical forms of violence as abuse.

Jennifer Vincent, a licensed mental health counselor with Therapy for Cycle Breakers in Largo, Fla., says she’s seeing more people reporting intimate partner violence, regardless of gender. She credits that change to a bigger focus on mental health in the years since the COVID pandemic: “People are feeling more comfortable talking about it.” 

Plus, there’s more information about intimate partner violence online now, so survivors are educating themselves and recognizing abuse. “Men shy away from using terms like ‘abusive’ because they may feel embarrassed or ashamed,” she says. However, they may recognize that behavior is belittling or unacceptable.

The Reasons Women Cause Harm

“Women might [cause harm] for a variety of reasons similar to men, but it looks a little bit different for women as [perpetrators],” Vincent says. 

“There’s not one kind of woman and not one kind of use of force,” says Lisa Young Larance, an assistant professor of social work at Bryn Mar College who has worked with survivors of domestic violence for more than two decades. She is also the author of Broken: Women’s Stories of Intimate and Institutional Harm and Repair.

There’s another reason men may not report harm by women partners: they know that their female partners are reacting to abuse perpetrated by them. 

“Women who use force,” as Larance puts it, often do so “because they feel broken by the systems they became a part of. Typically, cisgender women in hetero relationships are seeking autonomy.” In other words, a predominant reason women use force in intimate partner relationships is because they, themselves, are being abused. Or sometimes, says Larance, “It’s unresolved trauma and harm from previous relationships. It becomes a domino effect.”

Studies have shown men are more likely to make false reports of abuse by female partners, often as a retaliation during child custody cases. In a Canadian study by Nicholas Bala, researchers found mothers make deliberate false reports less than 2 percent of the time but fathers involved in contested custody are 16 times more likely to make false reports of abuse.  

Systems put in place to protect women who are being abused don’t always do what they promise. Survivors may face discrimination, are not believed by police or the courts, or may suffer additional trauma in the family court system, even losing custody of their children. Their abusive partners rarely face consequences unless their harm is visibly apparent, or they’ve committed murder. Survivors may be arrested and face harsher consequences than their abusers when they try to defend themselves. Using force may be the only way a woman feels she can have safety in her relationship.

Women Who Cause Harm Are More Likely to Choose Nonphysical Violence

When women are using harm to control a partner, they’re more likely to use nonphysical tactics of harm, such as emotional, verbal and psychological abuse, rather than physical violence, based mostly on size and strength differences. These nonphysical types of harm can still trigger feelings of shame, fear or worthlessness in their partners. 

“Women typically aren't quite as [physically] strong, so with women you may see things like name-calling, belittling and putting down,” Vincent said. “Women [who cause harm] can also be very controlling. They may not allow certain things to happen within the relationship.” They may pressure the survivor to stay home and restrict their access to friends and family. They may also threaten to evict their partner from a shared home, or keep their partner away from the children or pets if the partner leaves. They could threaten to spread lies about their partner, sometimes known as toxic triangulation. 

Financial abuse may also come into play when women attempt to have power over their partners. “We don't talk a lot about financial abuse, but that is definitely a factor. That could involve spending money that either they don't have or haven't talked to their partner about, as well as controlling or taking money,” Vincent says. 

Abusers may mismanage money, lie about it and destroy a survivor’s credit score. Those tactics can make it harder for a survivor to leave the relationship.

Women Labeled as “Abusive” May Be Using Self-Defense

How can you tell the difference between a woman who is an aggressor in a relationship and one who is trying to defend herself against abuse from a partner?

Some harm caused by women may fall under the somewhat controversial definition of “mutual abuse,” meaning two partners are equally abusive toward each other, and which domestic violence experts call false and say is an irresponsible term to perpetuate. 

“Mutual abuse is so rare. You’re typically going to have one party who has much more control,” Vincent says. “The whole point of domestic abuse is that one party has control over the other party. That’s where it comes from.”

If a woman’s patterns of harm are in response to her partner’s abusive tactics, used as a way to keep herself or her children safe, this could be considered self-defense. However, the legal system doesn’t always see it that way. 

A History Lesson in Women Who Kill

Barry Goldstein, nationally renowned domestic violence expert and former attorney, says that near the start of the domestic violence movement, in data from the Uniform Crime Report of 1976, an estimated 1,600 women and 1,357 men had been killed by their intimate partners. The response was to create a variety of reforms that made it easier for women to get criminal prosecution, protective orders, child custody, shelter and economic support.  

“All of these responses made it easier for women to escape abusers,” Goldstein says. “As a result, for a couple of decades, there was a steady reduction in domestic violence homicides.” By 2005, statistics showed closer to 350 men and 1,180 women killed by their partners.  

“This was a significant saving of lives in both categories, but it is surprising that practices designed to protect women resulted in saving far more men's lives than women's lives,” Goldstein mused. “Obviously, we don't want anyone to be killed, but it is worth considering why it saved more men's lives.”

What advocates found was that, before the efforts to offer survivors support, many women believed they could not get away and their abusive partners would tell them that. “Many women killed their partners because they believed it was the only way to stop his abuse. When they were given other options to escape, they didn't need to kill their partners,” says Goldstein. “This suggests that a lot of the murders were some form of self-defense even if they did not meet the legal standard of self-defense. It suggests a lot of what men want to call abuse is really defensive.”  

From a legal standpoint, self-defense is defined as protecting oneself against an imminent, or immediate harm. But in the most likely case of a female victim and male abuser, self-defense in the moment of attack is not always effective.

“Self-defense requires the victim to wait until they are attacked before responding. If we assume, in most cases, the man is bigger and stronger, there is a problem. If the woman waits until she is attacked, he has both the surprise and the strength, so she is dead. If the man waits to be attacked, she has the surprise, but he has the strength, so he has a chance to survive,” says Goldstein.

Resources Exist for Male Survivors

Many resources for survivors are aimed at women, since women are more likely to need help getting out of an abusive relationship. But men who are abused can turn to resources for help, too.

In some areas, men can find shelters that can house them. Of the completed profiles at DomesticShelters.org, 87 percent offer support to men. Men can also reach out to women’s shelters for help—even if these shelters won’t house men, they often have funds to pay for a hotel room or another form of housing.

Plus, keep in mind that reaching out for help doesn’t have to mean living in a shelter. Men can contact a domestic violence advocate near them for advice and resources, including safety planning, even if they aren’t ready to leave their partner or if they don’t need shelter support because they have a safe place they can go.

Editor’s Note: This article was rewritten to reflect the complexities of women as partners who cause harm. There are myriad differences between men and women who are accused of abusing their partners, including a significant number of fathers involved in contested custody cases who are more likely to make deliberate false reports of abuse. See “An Untrue Comparison” for more.