Partnered with a Survivor: David Mandel and Ruth Reymundo Mandel - Season 6 Episode 1: "Just Leave": Examining Displacement-Based Responses to Domestic Violence

Season 6 Episode 1: "Just Leave": Examining Displacement-Based Responses to Domestic Violence

01/02/25 • 35 min

Partnered with a Survivor: David Mandel and Ruth Reymundo Mandel

In this thought-provoking first episode of 2025, David and Ruth explore how displacement-based responses to domestic violence reflect and reinforce gender double standards while often creating additional vulnerabilities for survivors and their children. Recording from the Azores, they examine how the expectation that victims must leave their homes to find safety places unfair burdens on survivors while failing to hold perpetrators accountable.

Key discussion points include:

How displacement-based responses arose historically when women had limited legal and economic rights
Why forcing survivors to leave their homes, financial assets, and support networks creates new vulnerabilities
How displacement can enable post-separation coercive control and increase risks to children
The limitations of defining "safety" only in terms of immediate physical danger or lethality
Why systems need to expand their definition of safety to include stability, wellbeing, and survivor autonomy
How child protection and other systems can inadvertently punish survivors who don't leave while failing to hold perpetrators accountable for creating unsafe conditions

David and Ruth discuss concrete ways to move beyond displacement-based practices, including:

Centering survivor choice, autonomy and definitions of safety/wellbeing
Holding perpetrators accountable for how their behavior disrupts family stability
Creating a fuller range of intervention options beyond emergency shelter
Reframing "failure to protect" to focus on perpetrators' choices that endanger children

Check out these related episodes
Season 5 Episode 12: Challenging the Gospel of Sacrifice: Faith, Domestic Abuse, and Institutional Transformation
Season 5 Episode 9: Partnering vs. Practicing: The Hidden Bias in Professional Crisis Work

Join us in-person or online 18-20 March 2025 for the Safe & Together Institute Coercive Control and Children Conference. The event includes a family law track featuring judicial leadership, survivors and lawyers. Whether in Australia or across the globe, you will gain 12 month access to recordings of every session. Register now!

Now available! Mapping the Perpetrator’s Pattern: A Practitioner’s Tool for Improving Assessment, Intervention, and Outcomes The web-based Perpetrator Pattern Mapping Tool is a virtual practice tool for improving assessment, intervention, and outcomes through a perpetrator pattern-based approach. The tool allows practitioners to apply the Model’s critical concepts and principles to their current case load in real

Check out David Mandel's new book "Stop Blaming Mothers and Ignoring Fathers: How to transform the way we keep children safe from domestic violence."
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Key discussion points include:

How displacement-based responses arose historically when women had limited legal and economic rights
Why forcing survivors to leave their homes, financial assets, and support networks creates new vulnerabilities
How displacement can enable post-separation coercive control and increase risks to children
The limitations of defining "safety" only in terms of immediate physical danger or lethality
Why systems need to expand their definition of safety to include stability, wellbeing, and survivor autonomy
How child protection and other systems can inadvertently punish survivors who don't leave while failing to hold perpetrators accountable for creating unsafe conditions

David and Ruth discuss concrete ways to move beyond displacement-based practices, including:

Centering survivor choice, autonomy and definitions of safety/wellbeing
Holding perpetrators accountable for how their behavior disrupts family stability
Creating a fuller range of intervention options beyond emergency shelter
Reframing "failure to protect" to focus on perpetrators' choices that endanger children

Previous Episode

Season 5 Episode 13: Coercive Control & Children Conference Podcast: The Role of Language in Global Responses to Domestic Abuse

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What if understanding power dynamics could transform the way we approach domestic abuse and trauma? Join us for this special live recording of the "Partner with a Survivor" podcast, where we invite you to explore the delicate intricacies of relationships alongside hosts David Mandel and Ruth Reymundo from the Safe and Together Institute.
Ruth, known for her "Cranky Survivor" persona, opens up about how this unique character serves as both a personal expression and a strategic response to the challenges faced by victim survivors when dealing with institutional behaviors & professional biases. Together, we navigate the critical importance of embracing survivor feedback—anger and all—while we unravel the deeply ingrained social and gender biases within professional practices.
Dive into the heart of coercive control and break down the complex layers of what is called "mutualized" violence, which we call 'acts of resistance' to a perpetrator's coercion & harm. Our conversation challenges the status quo by examining who truly holds power and control in relationships, especially in contexts riddled with bias against marginalized women. We don't shy away from the difficult but necessary task of confronting systemic issues and weaponized responses to survivor anger, urging professionals to recognize anger as a healthy and natural response to boundary violations. In this episode, we champion the importance of safe environments for survivors to express their emotions and set boundaries, particularly in the face of systemic challenges.
As we wrap up, we shift our focus to the evolving language within the Safe and Together framework. By moving away from North American-centric jargon, we aim to align with global conversations and maintain core principles through adaptable language. The episode concludes with a discussion on fostering healthy professional relationships, emphasizing collaboration across genders to ensure child and community safety.
Reflect with us on how these insights can be applied in your own life, and help us continue our mission by sharing your feedback and suggestions for future topics.
Listen to prior episodes about professionals, victim blaming, acts of resistance & power dynamics:
https://safeandtogethe

Next Episode

Season 6 Episode 2: Coercive Control and Children

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In this episode, David and Ruth explore why coercive control must be at the center of how we understand the impact of domestic abuse on children. Moving beyond just focusing on physical violence or whether children "witnessed" abuse, they discuss how perpetrators' patterns of behavior can devastate children's wellbeing in multiple ways.

David and Ruth examine how coercive control by perpetrators can rob children of vital resources including economic stability, healthcare, education, family connections, and safety. They discuss how these patterns intersect with systemic oppression and vulnerabilities, creating additional layers of harm that perpetrators exploit.

The conversation highlights how a coercive control framework helps professionals better assess perpetrators' harmful parenting choices, understand survivors' protective efforts, and make more informed decisions about child safety. The hosts emphasize the importance of documenting specific harms to children and challenging perpetrators who use culture or religion to justify control.

They emphasize that the costs of not addressing these issues - in terms of children's wellbeing and broader societal impact - are too high to ignore.

Related Episodes

Season 2 Episode 12: How Coercive Control Harms Child Safety & Wellbeing: An Interview With Researcher Dr. Emma Katz

Season 2 Episode 10: Trauma-Informed Is Not The Same As Domestic Violence-Informed: A Conversation About The Intersection Of Domestic Violence Perpetration, Mental Health & Addiction

Season 1 Episode 1: Coercive Control And Consent