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Why Janay Rice stayed

Short answer: We don’t know, and it’s not for us to know or judge.

[Trigger warning for domestic violence]

An untoward amount of discussion, following Ray Rice’s February domestic violence arrest for beating then fiancee Janay Palmer (now wife Janay Rice) in a casino elevator, strayed to the fact that she stayed with him after the assault. How bad could it really have been, some asked, if she stayed with him? Married him? After all, we only saw the video of him dragging her unconscious body out of the elevator — we don’t know what when on inside that could explain what happened.

Now, of course, we do have video that explains what happened inside: He hit her twice and knocked her unconscious. And while much reaction ranges from a public That monster! to the NFL’s anemic Well, that changes everything, still some people feel the need to point out She stayed with him. It couldn’t have been that bad. She should just leave. Obviously she’s getting something she wants, or else she’d leave.

Janay Rice’s reaction to her assault is her own. The only person who knows why she made the choices she’s made is Janay Rice. And making a judgment on the seriousness of Ray Rice’s actions based on her reaction is basically implying that there is, in fact some “other side of the story” that could justify him abusing her. I’m not saying she deserved it, but… Always a “but.”

To quote a friend of mine, “Bless y’all who have no idea what an abusive relationship looks like. You are the lucky ones. Your daughters, I worry about.”

The trending hashtags #WhyIStayed and #WhenILeft offer heartbreaking answers (many collected at Vox.com) from women who have, like Rice, been in and stayed in relationships with abusers — He told me no one would ever love me. I had nowhere to go. Because I thought if I could just be a better wife, he would stop. And then, of course, there are the women whose stories will never make it to Twitter, because they aren’t around to tell them.

At ForHarriet, therapist and doctoral candidate Racine Henry talks about the cycle of abuse, in women in general and concerning Rice specifically (albeit speculatively).

[I]f you think about what keeps you in a relationship people to your life that are healthy relationships: your friends, your family, your coworkers, all of those components whether it’s money, love, history, you’re related to this person, you have kids with this person because you live together, because they care about you, because they were there for you, etc, etc. All those things are the very same reasons why women in those situations won’t leave. The good things can also be the reasons why you stay in a bad relationships. So it’s not about, “Well, she should’ve just left.” It’s never that simple or that easy if they have children together, if he’s the only source of income in the family, if she has strong religious beliefs about marriage or what it means to be a good girlfriend or wife, all these things, which you can’t really separate out from the others, play a role.

So I’m not surprised that she’s with him. I’m not surprised that they’re married. I’m not surprised also that she’s getting a lot of the flack when no one’s really talking about Why did he do this? What made him hit his wife or his future wife? Why did he then marry someone who obviously is a trigger for him rather than seeking his own mental health help?

She also comments on the stereotype of the “angry black woman” and how, for instance, it turned Rice’s motion after Ray slapped her into a violent lunge from which he had to defend himself.

Well, there’s always the image and the discourse around the angry black woman. That black women are feisty. We have a lot mouth on us. We don’t take any crap from anybody. We’re probably the ones to hit you first or hit you back, and we won’t be as docile as a white woman might be. And so I think there’s an expectation that if a black woman was hit, she either did something to cause it or she’ll be strong enough to leave. It’s almost like we can’t be victims. We can’t be innocent victims in the way that women of other races can be. We have to be either infallibly strong, meaning “I’ll leave a man before he hits me” or “You’re not gonna hit me. If you hit me, I’ll kill you.” Or we have to be the one who somehow precipitated this event by some cause of our own.

And the Guardian’s Hannah Giorgis asks us not to feed an appetite for other people’s lurid trauma by watching the video of Ray assaulting Janay Rice, but to focus on her humanity and the humanity of other survivors of partner violence, to defend them from further victimization both from their abuser and from victim-blamers and tragedy spectators.

But in a world in which one in four women is the victim of intimate partner violence and black women are disproportionately targeted, this victim blaming is not just irresponsible; it is lethal. Black women are punished when attempting to defend themselves: 94% of black female homicide victims are killed by people they know and 64% of those victims are wives, ex-wives or girlfriends of their killers. Who will support victims when abuse is not recorded and pre-packaged solely for our consumption but subtle and drawn out, or when the state itself commits violence?

If we viewed victims as more than a link to be tweeted, more than statistics to be reported to a broken criminal justice system, we would have to grapple with their complex humanity. We would have to offer meaningful solutions to violence, holistic responses to trauma, and accountability for abusers whom we may love. We would have to do more than just watch.


38 thoughts on Why Janay Rice stayed

  1. I don’t care to armchair analyze anybody who stays in an abusive relationship, but I do view it as part of my job as a parent to make sure — to the best of my ability — that my daughters view domestic violence as an immediate and irrevocable deal-breaker. (I don’t have any sons, but there’s plenty to teach there, as well — both by word and by modeling appropriate behavior.)

    1. Sounds good to me, as long as it has “but remember that I will always love you and respect you and be here to help you no matter what you do or when you decide to do it.” You don’t ever want a daughter to be too ashamed to tell you that she’s been staying with an abuser, because then she’ll just be more isolated.

    2. Aaron, by all means, do instill that into your children. And take EG’s advice. I was raised with both by my own parents, and it was helpful.
      But, just so you understand, the advice that “DV is a dealbreaker”, won’t help the majority of people whose partners turn out to be abusers.

      Because here is the shit you do NOT here, on your first date with potential Darth Vader Partner:

      “Ok, so things are going to be GREAT for a while. JUST GREAT! I will memorize your favorite band/color/flower. I will tell you how wonderful you are, introduce you to my people, make hints about our future. It’s gonna be SO GOOD BABY!

      But, in a few months time, I’m going to start *subtly* criticizing your dress and hair. Shortly thereafter, I’m going to start picking fights with SOME of your friends, or maybe getting sick if you make plans without me. WATCH OUT if I start telling you I love you – because if you SAY IT BACK, the SHIT is gonna get REAL!

      THAT is when I’m gonna start socially isolating you, taking control of your money, being there when you get out of school or work. If you try to break up with me, I’m going to say and do whatever it takes to make you stay, and ease up on the gas pedal. Get our mutual friends to work on you a little, or maybe just turn up the charm to 11. And if you stay after that? Then, OH THEN, I will have you in my power!”

      If my Darth Vader Boyfriend had told me on our first date that a year later he’d be quitting his job, living off my money, controlling my interactions with my friends, threatening my CAT because he was jealous of the attention the cat required, breaking my shit, calling my friends c**ts, fighting with my father every time they saw each other, and berating me on a daily basis? There would have been NO CHANCE for Date #2.

      My point is, abusers know what they are doing, and how to get and keep their victims in the relationship. Once you are in one, and ready to get out, it’s not easy. In fact, it’s downright dangerous. Statistically speaking, a woman is at the highest risk of being killed by her partner, when she is leaving the relationship. When you come to the realization that this relationship is toxic, it often goes hand-in-hand with understanding just how trapped and vulnerable you are.

      For me, it had nothing to do with poor self esteem (it was FINE when we first dated!), or having no role models. I will say that I was young, and being naive played a part. Darth made me the center of his universe, and I did not know at 19, how fucked up that was. Girls are socialized to be the ones responsible for the emotional state of those around them – THAT was one tool Darth exploited.

      Girls are taught to value themselves vis-a-vie their roles in RELATIONSHIPS (just think how many times you’ve heard a politician say some variant of “our wives, mothers, daughters”). This also provides cover for abuse – you don’t leave, because that is admitting failure. If you’re a feminist (or being raised as an Exceptional Woman), you can’t even admit to *yourself* that “you’ve become a victim.” It’s very hard NOT to have this stuff internalized, and your abuser will use it against you.

      One more thing – abusive relationships don’t require hitting. My Darth never even got there – though I have no doubt that he would have if we had ever married, and probably went on to violence with subsequent partners. Abusive relationships require inappropriate boundaries – like I said, he didn’t start with bossing me around, he started with making ME responsible for HIS bubble.

    3. I’ve had multiple relatives in DV relationships. It’s not that simple. Irishup explained the gradual escalation and even after you know it abusive it’s hard to get out. Even with video evidence the court system finds it difficult to press adequate charges and find people guilty. In my experiene, DV that’s primarily emotional or mental abusive is even worse. The victim is always wondering if it’s real. Add children to the situation and guilty about becoming a single a family.

  2. I’ve had a couple of these relationships, where arguments turn into cage fights where you’re both out to do some damage and then you’re fine for a while until the next event. You don’t leave because you don’t think it’s abuse. After all, you hit back. Sometimes, first. And there’s a stereotype of a battered woman thats cowed and submissive, and you don’t fit that mold. It’s a mutually abusive, co dependent relationship that you think is just a passionate relationship between two people with tempers. So you stay because you think that’s love. It’s ” see how much I love you, you make me want to kill you”. But it’s not love. It’s violent, possessive, abusive and causes more damage than you realize until later…if at all. Sometimes it just takes growing up. Sometimes it never happens. Very very often it goes hand in hand with hard living, hard partying lives. I don’t know if that’s their dynamic, but it sure reminds me of mine when I was younger.

  3. This is my organizations answer to domestic violence.

    Please help . . . . our fledgling not for profit group, Red4NC (red = rights, empowerment & diversity for NC) wants to put the Vagina Monologues on Main Street in Lexington, NC. Proceeds from the monologues will benefit our local women’s shelter with much needed funds and our community with important awareness of violence against women as well as a celebration of women’s experiences. Our ultimate goal in years to come is to take our monologues on the road to benefit women’s shelters in rural communities around North Carolina. Join with us to spread awareness and/or as financial supporter. Contact us at Red4NC@gmail.com and visit our Kickstarter crowd financing site http://kck.st/1tw9LE5 to watch our video and learn more about our cause.

  4. … where arguments turn into cage fights where you’re both out to do some damage and then you’re fine for a while until the next event.

    That seems to be a common pattern for feministe comment threads lolz!

  5. A good friend of mine has been in an abusive relationship for years. It’s always hard for me to get why people want to understand why a woman (sometimes men too of course) stays, as if that somehow justifies it, rather than just accepting that there is a reason and being a supportive friend/family member while she tries in her own way to get out. I don’t have to understand why she stays – just that there is a reason, and to her it’s compelling. Even if I don’t understand and worry about her, I respect her enough to know that her process/way of thinking and doing things is right for her. And who am I to pretend that I’d do anything differently, were I in her situation? It’s easy to criticize when you’ve been fortunate enough, as I’ve been, to not experience an abusive relationship. But I imagine it’s something you can’t really understand until you’ve been there.

    1. Seriously? Dropping the old “wimmenz be gold-diggerz” in a thread about DV?

      Fuck right off with that.

      Also, we need a giraffe here. [thank you for sending a giraffe alert ~ mods]

      Too much potential to skate off into misogynoir.

      1. Seriously? Dropping the old “wimmenz be gold-diggerz” in a thread about DV?

        Fuck right off with that.

        Also, we need a giraffe here. [thank you for sending a giraffe alert ~ mods]

        Too much potential to skate off into misogynoir.

        I think there is a less jerky point to be made about how the $35 million made Rice feel entitled to hit his wife, and why she actually deserves half his money for putting up with shit like that, so it’s fucked up to expect her to take the punch and NOT take the money. I have never been hit like she was hit by him, and if I was, I would feel like I deserved $35 mil from the fucker who hit me.
        Having said that, considering what’s on that recording, she probably could have gotten almost that much in a lawsuit, after the assault, so it’s silly to assume she stayed with him for the money.

        1. Tech hint: when you cut and paste somebody else’s giraffe alert, your post will go into moderation as if it was a new giraffe alert and will send out a fresh notification to the Moderator team as if it was a new giraffe alert. Probably best to not do that, please.

  6. TW: self-harm, abuse, misogyny

    Putting aside the various other reasons survivors stay, there is one very common motivation for staying: fear of change, for lack of a better term. It’s particularly common in intimate relationships and family relationships. Abuse has conditioned me to the point that, when I am actually abused, I’m so thoroughly taught to survive and endure abuse that escaping that situation seems wrong, unnatural, and even frightening. I’ve had great difficulty in even admitting that my father was abusive and mistreating me, and when I did admit that, I felt frozen and helpless. Running away from home was as difficult as it was for me purely because I was simultaneously relieved and extremely scared about the future. I was used to feeling helpless and worthless and constantly self-harming, as opposed to asserting my boundaries and taking care of myself.

    Of course, I’m only speaking for myself, but I think this is a really common thing in abusive relationships. Even building the motivation to leave is often a traumatic, frightening, and severely emotionally draining ordeal. Especially for a class of people socialized to suffer quietly, please everyone, serve men, never enforce boundaries, and never wish for genuine agency i.e. women.

  7. Many women don’t believe in feminism as an ideology, belief system, or practice. Some, maybe many, women like having this ‘partnership’ with a man, even if that man is abusive. It’s a horrifying concept, but some women like being physically dominated by a man. If these kinds of women see themselves as subordinate objects of a greater or superior presence and are not compelled to leave a destructive relationship, I don’t know what feminists can do to stop the tide of physical assault against women. In light of certain women who find aggressive men attractive, I’m not even sure this should be a feminist conversation.

    1. ” It’s a horrifying concept, but some women like being physically dominated by a man.”

      I hope you’re not conflating consensual BDSM with what’s happening here.

      1. I’m not. I think some women find abusive men appealing. They’re willing to put up with all kinds of crap, until they no longer want to put up with it. A couple of my girlfriends are strongly attracted to injurious men. One of those friends had her nose broken at the hands of her assaultive boyfriend. Yet, she chose to stay with him. I’ve known her most of my life. She isn’t silently suffering the trials of being female. She has a large support system, and a good career. She, as well as my other friend, has expressed a feeling of euphoria and excitement when in the company of these types of males. It’s difficult to take, but I just think some women derive a certain satisfaction and enjoyment from physical pain at the hands of men.

        1. I can’t speak for others, but this seems to be a bit too close to victim blaming for me.

          Or at the very least, I think a post like this merits a trigger/content warning.

  8. You want to argue that the money, fame, status, and excitement of being married to a star NFL player couldn’t possibly have played a role in her decision to marry him and her current position?

    The lives of sports stars and their spouses/SO’s are nothing remotely like yours and mine. It makes no sense for people to project their own experiences on her.

    1. You want to argue that the money, fame, status, and excitement of being married to a star NFL player couldn’t possibly have played a role in her decision to marry him and her current position?

      ::side-eyes::

      What I WANT is a world where 99.999999% of humanity is more moved to post on this thread by genuine concern for a fellow human being, than they are so moved by their own un-examined racist and sexist isht.

      What I WANT is to be able to read a thread on a feminist site where the OP specifically centers black women, without bracing myself for derailing crap being spewed hither and yon.

      Clearly, I am not getting what I want.

    2. You want to argue that the money, fame, status, and excitement of being married to a star NFL player couldn’t possibly have played a role in her decision to marry him and her current position?

      WHOA! Person Marries Other Person Based On Their Good Aspects While Ignoring/Accepting Their Bad Aspects Shocker!

      It’s not like that could describe every single relationship between two people.

  9. “And yet here you are projecting an assumption based on a sterotypes experience.”

    Actually I’m reacting to a projection from IrishUp from her own experience which has nothing at all in common with the life of a wife of a multi-millionaire sports star.

    Their lives are nothing like our lives.There’s not a single thing that is not made completely different by money and fame.

    1. Bloix, unless you have personally experienced being the spouse of an abusive multi-millionaire sports star, then you are relating a speculative narrative of these relationships that appears to be founded in gold-digger stereotypes.

      IrishUp speaking of her lived experience of living with an abusive partner is, by contrast, relating a narrative that runs counter to many of the stereotypes about abusive relationships.

      Your stereotyped speculations do not trump the lived experiences of multiple survivors of abusive relationships talking about why they stayed and/or why they left.

    2. How the fuck would you know? Oh, wait, lemme guess. Real Housewives and Kendra whatshername.
      Rich or not they’re all human and they experience the whole range of human emotion just like the rest of us. They’re not a different species. My first husband had money. Family money like losing 43 million in the stock market was no biggie because ( and I quote) ” its play money”. And our marriage wasn’t all that different from my current husband who is working class outside labor.

    3. If you actually go and read memoirs written by women who have been married to rich, famous, and abusive men, such as Ronnie Spector’s book, you will find that the only difference between those abusive relationships and the ones of poorer people is that the richer men have more resources to bring to bear against their wives. So, nope. And try actually listening to women who have experienced these things next time.

  10. Bloix, I was not projecting jack.shit. But lemme spell it out for you back there in the cheap seats.

    What I was responding to, was the OP. Which noted how stereotypes and tropes about black women + stereotypes and tropes about domestic abuse = horrid, horrid shit show directed at Janay Rice (among others). In context, your post added yet ANOTHER misogynist trope to the current discussion – one that also plays out in specific ways for black women and WOC that are substantially differently from white women.

    This dynamic is, BTW is what I was referring to with “misogynoir”, and I use it advisedly. Not to describe others’ experiences appropriatively, but because the developing narrative around Janay Rice seems to fit square into moyazb’s definition: “used to describe the unique ways in which Black women are pathologized in popular culture”.

    You did this without making any other addition or contribution to the info in the OP, or subsequent comments. THEN you chose to respond to my calling out your choice for the crap it was, by mis-attributing MY intention, with an added whiff of “IrishUp’s experiences must be *impairing* her ability to interpret Bloix’s oh-so-rational and cogent comment”.

    And here we are, many comments in, with the central topics of the OP conspicuously absent from what you are choosing to respond to.
    Believe me, Bloix, I was smelling what you were stepping in, just fine. You are the one apparently unaware you have shit on your shoe.

  11. I’ve never watched a reality TV show in my life, and I’m not sure I know who Kendra is.

    But I’ve been close enough to real money to know that really rich people are not like the rest of us. Fitzgerald was right, and Hemingway was wrong.

    Here’s the self-reported “lived experience” of Janay Rice: She likes her marriage, she loves and supports her husband, she wants the rest of the world to fuck off, let him play, and leave them alone.

    Caperton says “we can’t know” why Janay Rice stayed. We can’t know because we refuse to accept that any self-aware person could possibly be motivated by what she claims is motivating her. We deny that she understands her own experience. We discredit her testimony. We are saying that she is a victim of false consciousness.

    Okay, I agree with that. I agree that Janay RIce is probably in in pretty deep denial, just as IrishUp on her own report was in deep denial for a long time.

    But I don’t accept that the things that kept IrishUp in a fucked-relationship are necessarily the same things that keep Janay Rice in a fucked-up relationship. Money and fame are emotionally very powerful things.

    Cars that pick you up and drop you off wherever you want to go. Private jets to beaches on other side of the world. Big houses filled with beautiful furniture. Maids, nannies, personal shoppers. The awe-filled approval or your parents and siblings. Friendly people who tell you how great you are, want you to come their parties and dinners and summer houses, give you clothes and jewelry in hopes that you’ll wear it in public. Your picture in the magazines. That is powerful stuff.

    Janay Rice was in a relationship with Ray Rice from the time she was 16, and for her entire life since then she has been the girlfriend and the wife of a football star.

    Maybe pheenobarbidoll’s life with her filthy rich husband wasn’t like that. Maybe she lived in a one-bedroom walk-up and stayed home nights to iron her blouses so she’d look presentable when she got to the office at 8:30 after an hour’s ride on the bus. But don’t tell me that that’s how NFL stars live.

    Janay Rice had options. She didn’t have to marry Ray Rice after he proposed by hiding a diamond ring in the glove box of the new car he’d just bought her. She could have found a job as an assistant trainee in a marketing department and lived on $30,000 a year. But maybe that didn’t seem like much compared to the alternative.

    I’m just speculating. As Caperton says, we don’t know.

    1. Cars that pick you up and drop you off wherever you want to go. Private jets to beaches on other side of the world. Big houses filled with beautiful furniture. Maids, nannies, personal shoppers. The awe-filled approval or your parents and siblings. Friendly people who tell you how great you are, want you to come their parties and dinners and summer houses, give you clothes and jewelry in hopes that you’ll wear it in public. Your picture in the magazines. That is powerful stuff.

      And yet none of that is why Ronnie Spector didn’t leave Phil earlier than she did. She didn’t leave because she couldn’t, and she couldn’t because of his controlling abuse.

      Here’s the self-reported “lived experience” of Janay Rice: She likes her marriage, she loves and supports her husband, she wants the rest of the world to fuck off, let him play, and leave them alone.

      Gee, just like every other abused woman. How very unique to the rich.

    2. So is having a roof over your head, approval of your peers and stability for your children. That’s powerful too. And outside approval, plus the desire to not be viewed as foolish or a failure are commonalities shared between rich abused wives and poor abused wives. The trappings might be a home vs a private jet, but the root emotion is THE SAME. Plenty of abused women seek to maintain the facade of having the perfect life, the envy of her friends and family even if they aren’t married to an NFL player. Dirt poor women also think being slapped around is a small price to pay for having a ” good” man who keeps a roof over her head and food on the table. Same mentality, just a difference in the price of the house and caviar instead of hamburger helper. And there are enough friends and family who would straight up confirm that for her. Girl he works hard to put food on your table is the same as girl he can buy you a mansion. The price is your dignity and safety and thats equal in cost.

  12. This sounds about right to me:

    “Tracy Treu, a former Mother Jones employee who is married to former Oakland Raiders center Adam Treu … explained what life is like when you’re the wife of an NFL player…

    “While the team doesn’t officially say this to wives, Treu explains, veteran wives will absolutely sit down with rookie wives and lay out how much their lives are going to be about the team winning games, and that everything else is secondary…

    “But for an NFL wife who is expected to wrap up her entire identity in her husband and his team, and to not screw anything up for either of them, walking away means not just leaving behind the money and the marriage, but also the very source of your identity…

    “[T]he idea is, as Treu puts it, “He’s making great money, so you support him and shut your mouth. You’re put in a subservient position financially. He’s the star. Keep him happy.” …

    “Despite all this, most female partners feel “gratitude and happiness,” Treu says, because “pro football was a dream.””

    http://www.slate.com/all.fulltext.amanda_marcotte.rss

    1. So the NRL, just like conservative religious groups, promotes a culture of feminine submissiveness where any objection to the status quo is met with community disapproval, not just spousal disapproval. How better to discourage calling the police or walking away, let alone any interest in examining whether the culture as a whole is toxic?

      Yeah, sounds like a nutrient-rich petri dish for abuse culture to fester away in.

    2. Bloix, here are some serious questions for you.

      Why are you dismissing / ignoring the main substance substance of the OP, the bulk of which focuses on how the public discourse on DV, and how racism against black women *specifically*, creates an even more ugly public discourse? Why do you find it necessary, why does it catch more of your attention, to focus on this “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous” angle? Isn’t the former a more important systemic problem to address than the latter?

      I’m just speculating. As Caperton says, we don’t know.

      Caperton also specifically and rather pointedly, invites us NOT to speculate when she wrote:

      Short answer: We don’t know, and it’s not for us to know or judge.

      which is the VERY FIRST FUCKING LINE OF THE OP! Not to mention where she repeats it:

      Janay Rice’s reaction to her assault is her own. The only person who knows why she made the choices she’s made is Janay Rice.

      Why are you choosing to force this story into one kind of box, instead of spending the time unpacking how the racist and sexist narratives we’ve all been indoctrinated in, are affecting your reactions and judgement? Your line of thinking here is part of the fucking problem. It is part of what makes life MUCH harder than it has to be for people struggling within a racist and sexist culture.

      Fuxake.

    3. Dude, can you stop? What are you getting out of arguing with women who have said they’ve been abused by their partners? You think they can’t possibly relate to Janay (used, as in the OP, not out of familiarity) because she married rich. Good for you. You don’t somehow have special insight into her life and thought processes that is more correct than anyone else who doesn’t personally know Janay. You said your piece with literally nothing to support your claim (because you HAVE nothing to support your claim), so move on.

    4. Not one thing you quoted contradicts anything said here, except for your assumptions. Women who base their identities on being MRS. NFL player are literally no different than women who base their identities on being MRS. Plumber or MRS. police officer or MRS. water hauler. Wrapping your identity around being the wife of someone is NOT unique nor is it unique to the wealthy. And the last two quotes are exactly what I said in my last post.

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