Yeardley Love's Death A Wake Up Call About Domestic Violence by: Dr. Dale Archer

http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2010/05/15/dr-dale-archer-yeardley-love-george-huguely-uva-lacrosse-murdered/
George Huguely and Yeardley Love were a senior couple at the University of Virginia. They were both great students and athletes with a good future ahead of them, sounds like a perfect couple right? Well on a Monday morning after Yeardley broke up with George; George broke down Yeardley's door and smashed her head against the wall over and over again until she died. When Georges friends, family, and the University of Virginia found out they were shocked. They never thought George would do something like that. Domestic violence doesn’t occur out of the blue in a vacuum. There are almost always warning signs (Dr. Dale Archer). In Georges case there were warning signs. George was involved with the police on three separate occasions, underage drinking, a public confrontation with his father, and public intoxication in which he also threatened to kill the officer and physically assaulted her. A friend of his stated that he gets violent when he is drunk. George and Yeardley would get into angry disputes which had to be broken up by friends. The night before her death he was seen breaking bottles threatening to get her back.

Dr. Dale Archer made a great point, "domestic violence doesn’t occur out of the blue in a vacuum. There are almost always warning signs." Most people just keep it hush because it is not their problem or they do not want to see the evil in the world. Dr. Archer also includes some statistics about abuse: 25% of women have been a victim of intimate partner violence. Almost 5 million assaults occur each year, less than 20% of assaulted women report the abuse or seek treatment for an injury. Over 1,000 women a year are killed by an intimate partner. Dr. Archer concludes, "That’s why education is so crucial. In the end domestic violence thrives only because we as a society turn a blind eye and prefer to believe it doesn’t exist. By shining a light on this dirty, little talked about secret, we can make a difference."

This article really opens your eyes to whats going on around you. Domestic violence is becoming a bigger issue, it can be the "Red flag," that Dr. Archer was talking about. The person who is acting abusively obviously does not think what he is doing wrong, and if they know it is wrong, then that is even a bigger problem. Dr. Archer did a good job explaining his view. He used the perfect story to show what red flags to look for when it comes to domestic violence and how people are so blind to the subject. It is hard to admit that your son, daughter, or best friend is abusive, but what if it was your friend who was killed?