What I’ve learned about domestic violence in my year reporting on it | Jess Hill | Comment is free | The Guardian
▻http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/sep/11/most-people-dont-get-domestic-violence-because-it-doesnt-make-sense
But the more you learn about the nature of domestic violence, the more sense you can make of it. For me, a big penny-dropping moment was reading Trauma and Recovery, Judith Herman’s landmark book on understanding psychological trauma. In it, she equates the experiences of domestic violence victims to those of prisoners of war. In both situations, establishing control over the other person is achieved through the “systematic, repetitive infliction of psychological trauma” designed to instill fear and helplessness.