Jealous Men but Evil Women: The Double Standard in Cases of Domestic Homicide

In 1989, Sarah Thornton killed her abusive husband with a knife, after years of abuse and threats to her daughter. She was convicted of murder and sentenced to life imprisonment. Also in 1989, Kiranjit Ahluwalia soaked her husband’s bedclothes with petrol and set them alight. He died from burns 10 days later, and she was subsequently convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison. In 1991, Joseph McGrail kicked his alcoholic common-law wife to death whilst she lay unconscious. He walked free from court, the judge telling him that “this lady would have tried the patience of a saint”. In 1992, Les Humes told a court that he “saw a red mist” after his wife admitted loving someone else. He fatally stabbed her whilst their teenage children struggled with him. He was convicted of manslaughter due to provocation and was imprisoned for 7 years. Double standards in judicial processes are notorious. Chivalric justice is the case in which women are given lighter sentences for similar offences to men. This does not apply in the case of domestic homicide, where women are seen as evil and calculating when killing a spouse, men are seen as provoked beyond reason. Women who kill husbands do so with weapons that they need to acquire, men do it with their hands or weapons that are immediately available. So it is seems the defence of crime passionnel is reserved for men; women, it is implied, premeditate the murder of abusive husbands, and are justifiably punished. This paper explores the double standard in uxoricide vs. mariticide, and why it appears that killing a wife is justified and killing a husband is evi

Perceptions of Evil from Abu Ghraib: Female Prison Guards and Sexual Violence

In 2003, the world was presented with images of sexual torture from Abu Ghraib, a U.S. military prison in Iraq. For many people, part of the shock of the images was the fact that several of the guards were women. Lynndie England, Sabrina Harman, Megan Ambuhl and Janis Karpinski quickly became the infamous face of the U.S. imperialism. The involvement of women celebrating prisoners’ sexual humiliation and pain, was extremely difficult for people to comprehend and it forced western society to realize that simply adding women to the military did not automatically make that military less prone to brutality. The aftermath of Abu Ghraib included extensive analysis from multiple perspectives. Conservatives claimed being in the military has ‘masculinized’ the perpetrators and made them violent. Some feminist theorists stated that England et al were just scapegoats who lacked any power or authority both as women in a patriarchal system and as common soldiers. Sociologists discussed the role of group dynamics and how violence towards the enemy has historically been one of the ways to increase a team’s cohesion. Others noted the connection to colonialism in the fact that all the victims were men of color while the perpetrators were Caucasian. Throughout these analyses, the focus has been on the perpetrators as soldiers, but downplayed their role as prison guards. However, as this paper will demonstrate, this role may be useful in better understanding the actions at Abu Ghraib. A large body of data shows that, in the USA, female prison guards are responsible for the majority of sexual crimes against male inmates and a large percentage of sexual crimes against female inmates. This paper will discuss how the sexual torture at Abu Ghraib can be seen as existing on the same continuum of other sexual crimes committed by female guards in civilian prisons

Evil and Superstition in Sub-Saharan Africa: Religious Infanticide and Filicide

A distinct category of women has been identified in different parts of Sub-Saharan Africa, those who commit extreme forms of violence and murder against their children in order to fulfil their religious obligations or to protect themselves from perceived magico-spiritual harms from their children. The whole of Africa is currently witnessing a heightened level of witch-hunting. Historically, some African witch-hunting incidents are triggered by witch-doctors who are keen to protect their clients from any perceived diabolical effects of witches while others are triggered by mere gossips or rumours from neighbours. However, dramatized preaching on witchcraft by revivalist Christian prophets and prophetesses whose major occupations are the ‘sale’ of exorcisms to the bewitched has become the latest trend in the region. These prophets and prophetesses are keen to teach their followers the importance of the ‘Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live’ biblical passage in their lives as well as how ‘the Kingdom of God suffereth violence’. By means of case study analysis, this paper presents a new pattern of evil that is perpetrated in the form of abandonment, torture, mutilation and murders of children by their mothers, those women who should protect their children from such evils. It also presents the cases of another group of women (prophetesses) who preach and deliver prophecies purportedly from God about particular children who are the alleged witches. This latter category also decides the nature of evil to be committed against such children – all in the name of fulfilling their religious obligations

The Power Spectrum of Rich Clusters of Galaxies on Large Spatial Scales

We present an analysis of the redshift-space power spectrum, $P(k)$, of rich clusters of galaxies based on an automated cluster catalogue selected from the APM Galaxy Survey. We find that $P(k)$ can be approximated by a power law, P(k)\proptok^{n}, with $n\approx-1.6$ over the wavenumber range 0.04\hr. Over this range of wavenumbers, the APM cluster power spectrum has the same shape as the power spectra measured for optical and IRAS galaxies. This is consistent with a simple linear bias model in which different tracers have the same power spectrum as that of the mass distribution but shifted in amplitude by a constant biasing factor. On larger scales, the power spectrum of APM clusters flattens and appears to turn over on a scale k \sim 0.03\hmpcrev. We compare the power spectra estimated from simulated APM cluster catalogues to those estimated directly from cubical N-body simulation volumes and find that the APM cluster survey should give reliable estimates of the true power spectrum at wavenumbers k \simgt 0.02\hmpcrev. These results suggest that the observed turn-over in the power spectrum may be a real feature of the cluster distribution and that we have detected the transition to a near scale-invariant power spectrum implied by observations of anisotropies in the cosmic microwave background radiation. The scale of the turn-over in the cluster power spectrum is in good agreement with the scale of the turn-over observed in the power spectrum of APM galaxies.Comment: 9 pages, 7 ps figures, two style files, submitted to MNRAS. Un-xxx-ed version available at http://www-astro.physics.ox.ac.uk/research/preprints/aug97/cluspaper.ps.g

Violent crime as old as the Bible: Boko Haram uses rape as a weapon of war

Days after Nigerian security forces freed 234 women from Boko Haram’s stronghold in Nigeria’s Sambisa forest it was reported that at least 214 (91%) of them were pregnant. The women were among nearly 700 rescued from the Islamic terrorist group in operations and have been taken to safe camps in Borno State where they will be offered medical and pre-natal care and counselling. It is not yet known whether any of the 230 girls kidnapped by Boko Haram from their school in the town of Chibok in April 2014 were among them

Farewell Terry Pratchett: a psychological analysis of Discworld

Terry Pratchett, the incredibly prolific fantasy author and creator of the bestselling Discworld series, has died aged 66. He was diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer’s disease eight years ago. Pratchett set 40 of his novels in his most famous creation, Discworld. This is a place in which magic is the natural rule and the way to deal with life and its problems. Here, the “scientist” is held in either mild disdain or open disbelief

Studying The Long-term Psychological Effects of Emotional Abuse Experienced in Childhood.

Objectives: In order to study the effect of child emotional abuse (CEA) on adult well-being, a survey was conducted to determine the links. In order to understand how the various forms of abuse are dealt with by the victim, this research examines the different coping strategies employed in both childhood and adulthood. Design: An online survey was developed including questions designed to elicit qualitative and quantitative data. The online survey method was used in order to maintain anonymity of participants and produce rich and useful data. Method: Charitable organisations who work with adult victims of child abuse agreed to help network this survey to their client groups. The data from this client group will be compared to that collected from non-client groups who may or may not have been subject to abuse. Results:Data will be analysed using both qualitative (thematic) and quantitative (correlational) analytical procedures. The results discussed in this paper are preliminary results only. Conclusions: Practical implications in terms of understanding how emotional abuse experienced in childhood impacts on mental health and well-being in adulthood will be discussed, alongside the possibility of identifying the most effective defence mechanisms/coping strategies employed which could then be utilised effectively in child and adult therapy sessions or interventions

Criminal Careers and Cognitive Scripts: An Investigation into Criminal Versatility

“Criminal careers” denotes ways in which offenders develop specialisms and versatility, but studies linking delinquency to social skills deficits have not attempted to explore cognitive, internalised processes by which such “careers” might be chosen. This study investigated criminal minds via script theory: “internal” scripts are used to guide behaviour, “situational” scripts are knowledge of everyday events, and “personal” scripts are a sequence of actions towards a desired goal. This research investigated whether criminal career offenders develop situational scripts for offending and whether such situational scripts express an internalised identity, which manifests as a personal script. Thematic analysis of data derived from “criminal career offenders” supports the notion of criminal situational scripts, with emergent themes considered evidence of personal scripts

“My Reality is Just Different From Yours, That Doesn’t Mean I’m Crazy.”:Exploring the Impact of Childhood Emotional Abuse on Adult Emotional Adjustment

Childhood emotional abuse (CEA) is a pervasive set of destructive behaviors that has negative effects lasting into adulthood.In order to examine these negative effects, it is important to determine the links between CEA and adult adjustment, i.e.,how various forms of abuse are dealt with by the recipients,and how effective different coping strategies are. A small-scale online survey was developed that included questions designed to elicit both qualitative and quantitative data, to facilitate the collection of rich and useful data, while maintaining participant anonymity. The survey was disseminated via social media and a number of charitable organizations working with adult victims of child abuse. Using qualitative and quantitative analytical procedures, research findings suggested how childhood experiences of emotional abuse impact on adulthood. The findings also exposed a potentially effective coping strategy that could be incorporated into practice settings. The identified coping strategy, reading was reported as effective when employed in both childhood and adulthood and may help clients cope with abusive experiences

A perceived gap between invasive species research and stakeholder priorities

Information from research has an important role to play in shaping policy and management responses to biological invasions but concern has been raised that research focuses more on furthering knowledge than on delivering practical solutions. We collated 449 priority areas for science and management from 160 stakeholders including practitioners, researchers and policy makers or advisors working with invasive species, and then compared them to the topics of 789 papers published in eight journals over the same time period (2009–2010). Whilst research papers addressed most of the priority areas identified by stakeholders, there was a difference in geographic and biological scales between the two, with individual studies addressing multiple priority areas but focusing on specific species and locations. We hypothesise that this difference in focal scales, combined with a lack of literature relating directly to management, contributes to the perception that invasive species research is not sufficiently geared towards delivering practical solutions. By emphasising the practical applications of applied research, and ensuring that pure research is translated or synthesised so that the implications are better understood, both the management of invasive species and the theoretical science of invasion biology can be enhanced