Verbal Abuses Vs Physical Abuses: Abuse is Still Abuse Whether it Comes from Your Fists or Your Mouth

From the time we were born, we were taught to learn the differences between right and wrong, good and evil. Therefore, we should have no doubt when it comes to abuse, whether physical or emotional, that it is wrong. But where we rest our decision in which type of abuse is worse than the other is where we define our society. As a society, we are told to choose which abuse is worse, whether it is one of a physical or emotional nature. We live in a world of both physical and emotional abuses around us daily, yet we are quick to stand confident that one is worse than the other. In deciding which victims endure worse emotions and feelings in one than the other, we should look at all aspects of respect, the amount of power and control given to the abuser, the isolation the victim takes, the healthcare required for each victim, and the legalities of each form of these abuses. Using statistics, studies, legalities, and social opinions as factors into our final decision as to which type of abuse is the worst, we then believe we know which form of abuse is worse than the others.

Abuse is actually defined with four extensions to the definition of the term. The first is to wrongly or improperly; misuse. The second is to treat in a harmful, injurious, or offensive way. Third, we have to speak insultingly, harshly, and unjustly to or about; revile; malign. Lastly, the definition of abuse is to commit sexual assault upon. This being made clear, we can now better understand how to classify abuses as to whether they are physical or emotional in nature.

Now we know the meaning of abuse, let's look adding emotion to it. Emotional is defined as pertaining to or involving emotion or emotions. Therefore, fitting we find it to be to call it emotional abuse. Many professional scholars of today prefer to call emotional types of abuse, "psychological abuse" due to the nature of psychology involved, while others prefer the term, "verbal mistreatments." Mistreatment, however, seems to rationalize the term abuse, making it appear natural and okay in society's eyes. As we have seen clearly in the definition of abuse, verbal fits in the abuse equation and is not to be undermined. There are many variations of emotional abuse besides just verbal forms. Most widely known are the verbal forms of emotional abuse such as yelling, demeaning, mocking, humiliating, cursing, and interrupting. Then there are the silent types of emotional abuse such as rejection, corrupting, exploiting, selfishness, neglecting, and even the all-famous silent treatment. We could even add when a victim is told what they can and cannot think. Emotional abuses can basically be related down to anything that causes emotional pain on a recurring basis. These examples are not one time or even a couple of time events. They are patterns that become a constant way of life to the victim, leaving the victim to think they must walk on eggshells due to the fear that is emotionally branded in the victim.

Common sense now tells us that physical abuse is a type of abuse that pertains to the physical aspect. Most popular in this list of examples would be hitting, slapping, grabbing, and choking. Also, some more examples that are pretty common would be rage, destruction, battery, and deprivation of physical matters such as shelter, food, water, and clothing. As in telling a victim what to think, telling a victim what they can and cannot do would pertain to this list. Other forms of physical abuses to add, becoming more widely known today, are sexual abuse, rape, and even sexual harassment. Now, a list that many do not know is the financial, ritualistic, or even religious forms of physical abuse. Some cultural and moral relativism suggest that some physical behaviors, such as degradation of women and even human rights, in some countries such as Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Iran, are justified based on cultural "sensitivities" pernicious and political correctness. Lastly, you have the physical abuses to where the victim(s) are drugged, to include when children are given by their abuser alcohol and drugs.

Knowing both definitions, we can see where physical and emotional abuses have common identifiers. However, physical abuses will leave marks seen to where the emotional abuses will not. Those scars are on the inside of the victim. Also, physical abuse is more recognizable for the victims going to hospitals and doctors. Rarely does a victim go to an emergency room over being called names or being demeaned, and the victim rarely speaks of being committed to a psychological facility to anyone not in the family or closely connected with the victim. Emotional abuses have been proven to have longer lasting emotional effects on their victims.

With both physical and emotional abuses, every victim takes on huge amounts of feelings and emotions for the rest of their lives. Many of the common feeling and emotions obtained from victims of abuse are fear, sadness, hatred, doubt, failure, and ashamed. At one time or another, every victim of all forms of abuse will feel these emotions. With a number of the feelings, such as fear, the victim will usually always live in the state of this emotion. Victims of all types tend to ponder upon the issues of they were to blame at some point or another during the abuse and even occurring after the abuse has subsided. Many victims think they did something to provoke or to deserve the abuse. A narrow-minded yet common view in society, called "Victimology," supports and even impels this emotional state.

In both physical and emotional types of abuses, many people believe it is the lack of respect for the victim that is to blame for the actions of the abuser; while others believe it to be a form of a power struggle in the abuser's life. Respect defined is to hold in esteem or honor, to show regard or consideration for, to refrain from intruding upon or interfering with, and to relate or have reference with. Therefore, this group of people, in regards to respect, would be politically correct. However, in some aspects, they couldn't be farther from the truth, in that a person must earn respect, and not all times, do the abusers' take the time to know their victims. These are known as non-domestic abuses, and domestic abuses are considered by someone a victim lives with and sometimes even knows.

Society also tends to lean towards abuse in a cowardly manner by telling its victims of abuse that they are overreacting. This encourages the victim to hush about the abuse and try to accept it on their own accord quietly. Therefore, society promotes the worst tool a victim should have in the event of any and all type of abuses; isolation. A victim needs and deserves help and support to "escape" the pain and agony involved in recovering from an abusive event or situation. In isolation, a victim subconsciously brings about future social and interpersonal problems, as well as feeling trapped and hopeless. The real escape cannot be found in isolation which only temporarily buries the problems that a victim is facing before it explodes within the victim. In a world that supports isolation, the victim is left with the feeling of abandonment, keeping quiet and to themselves, which is the worst step to take in recovery and survival of any form of abuse. From the isolation and feelings of abandonment, we can only begin to see what kind of life the victim is now facing.

Therefore, not only physical abuse victims are hospitalized or treated by doctors. With any and all types of abuse comes death and destruction. Left with a life full of depression, anxiety, dissociation, suicidal tendencies, and hospitalizations; what victims of abuse can face after abuse without the proper healthcare, recovery tools, and support groups. From the childhood victim, who is influenced by the powerful, negative role model to interpersonal relationships, to the elderly adult who depended on the neglectful staff at the local nursing home; all victims of all types of abuses, face the same results and possibilities when they have been abused. They face psychosis, multiple personalities, loss of memory of parts of their lives, loss of coping strategies, and even stability. More common and less recognized, these victims have come from broken homes and broken childhoods and now will face their own divorces, single parenthood, and even hospitalizations. They take on physical and emotional injury during and continuously after any type of abuse. The abuse will continue to destroy their lives, ruin relationships, and change the people they become and are even around; all because society wanted them to keep quiet and quit over exaggerating.

Now, we all feel sorry and compassion for the victims and realize they all suffer no matter what form of abuse they suffered, but we still feel the need to determine which is the worst form. Lastly, we turn to the statistics and legalities to make our decision. The statistics from a 2007 study by Associate Professor of Psychiatry of McLean Hospital, a Harvard affiliated hospital, Marvin Teicher, tells us that out of 554 people, verbal abuse had as great an effect as physical and non-domestic sexual mistreatment. However, the domestic sexual abuse appeared to have the worst effects. The abusers all appeared to be unstable, angry, narcissistic behaviors, along with obsessive compulsive disorders and paranoia.

Between physical and emotional abuses alike, Marvin Teicher says both abuses cause Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and psychological collapse, as seen in recent American soldiers in Iraq. In this study, he found that victims reported the results of verbal abuse were worse than witnessing serious domestic violence or were just as serious as non-domestic sexual abuse. Outside of the study, society's role in abuse still says that verbal abuse's "good intentions" defense is still going strong. It is perceived and analyzed in relative terms. Society treats verbal abuse as the least serious form of abuse. Sexual and physical abuses are both becoming more commonly known and accepted, as verbal abuse is being ignored; an abuse unseen to the eye, therefore does not exist. On the matter of legalities, there are laws protecting children and "vulnerable" adults against verbal abuse. In all forms of physical abuses, with exception to sexual ones in marriage, there are laws prohibiting them. In marriages, sexual abuses are seen as a "family matter" and left unpunished by most courts today.

Now, we as members of this "society" still want to bother with which abuses are worse than the other. Abuse is abuse no matter what form it comes in. It is like a wrong decision, it comes with consequences usually to the victim and even regrets. No one person ever deserves to be victimized by either physical or emotional abuse, yet we still accept and punish one more than the other. We still dismiss the importance in being all types of abuse hurt the victim and alter their lives. In order to be the judge and honestly be capable of making the decision of what form of abuse is worse than the other; a person would have to experience and live through each form of abuse and all of its variations in a multitude of several different lifetimes. The real importance does not lie in which abuse is worse, which victim deserves more treatment, which abuser deserves a harder punishment, nor does lie in the people affected and touched by abusive events and situations.

It does lie in what we, as a society, are willing to do to stop it from happening to our friends, our family, our loved ones, or even our children. We don't think of the child who was verbally beaten down and bullied in school less of a victim than the elderly man at the nursing home who wasn't flipped over last night in his bed, but we do think they are more important than the woman who is verbally abused nightly with no escape, no spirit left within her body to give her hope, and a child to raise. This child, just because of hereditary alone, has the chance of becoming an abuser or a victim. But we as a society do not discuss or even punish the verbal anguish this child learns nightly. Since when are we, this perfect "society," given the title of God? All forms of abuse wrong. All forms of abuse are the worst. All are in need of attention by our society as a whole.