Only her hairdresser knows for sure...
December 18, 2016 11:47 AM   Subscribe

As of January 1st, Illinois will require hairstylists, barbers, nail technicians, and other aestheticians to receive one hour of training on how to recognize and report domestic violence. The law will not make them mandatory reporters.
posted by Etrigan (31 comments total) 16 users marked this as a favorite
 
That is very interesting--thank you for posting this. The comments are also well worth reading.

(At first I misread the sentence as "the law WILL make them mandatory reporters," which seemed off to me. Glad to see I misread it.)

I think it's good that people who are already on the receiving end of so much personal information will get some training on what to do...it's awful to feel powerless to help someone else who is in trouble. This happens to those of us who teach in postsecondary and it's great to get info on what to do when someone discloses because it's not something we get trained for otherwise.
posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 12:08 PM on December 18, 2016 [7 favorites]


This is very very good. Training in how to handle these things is very good.

My dental hygienist noticed a blue-ish streak on my face (a gigantic vein, actually, from pregnancy). She pointed to it and asked, kindly but bluntly, "is he hittin' you honey?" And for a few minutes I protested that no, everything is fine, it's just my veins. My husband and I are fine. Everything is fine! Then I realized I sounded defensive and clammed up, feeling self-conscious about my face and my pregnancy (women ARE more likely to be physically abused while pregnant) and, well, everything.

It was *really really* good that she asked, but the way she asked was horrible.

Training is a very good idea.
posted by erinfern at 12:10 PM on December 18, 2016 [19 favorites]


I'm kind of surprised they didn't make reporting mandatory. That seems to go hand-in-hand with laws like this. The training part, though, is a great idea.
posted by Thorzdad at 12:52 PM on December 18, 2016


I don't think it's fair to make this kind of relationship one with mandatory reporting requirements. Social workers, medical professionals and teachers -- that's a different level of (moral) duty to care for the well-being of the client/patient/child, in my judgement.
posted by tivalasvegas at 1:01 PM on December 18, 2016 [17 favorites]


But I nth that this seems to be a really good idea -- it continues to build a culture of awareness and help for people dealing with partner / domestic violence.

Gov. Rauner is a bastard, but he got this one right, I think.
posted by tivalasvegas at 1:02 PM on December 18, 2016 [2 favorites]


Erinfern, As someone who used to be black and blue from doing farm work and working with horses, and who is even now thanks to taking warfarin, I get those kinds of comments on occasion. It used to make me feel a bit weird--and when I'd say it was just because I was clumsy, or walked into a door, or fell off the step, that sounded like the kind of excuse an abused wife would make. Except I AM freakin' clumsy, and eventually I learned not to explain in detail.

I generally laugh, and say I have horses, and leave it at that. Then I just say, "Thank you for your concern. It's important that women support each other." I think that's the response that reassures people, as well as telling them they are doing a good thing. And it's true!!
posted by BlueHorse at 1:12 PM on December 18, 2016 [41 favorites]


It's a running joke with horse people, everytime one of my friends gets a good bruise we ask "do you feel safe at home?" (That's what the ER people ask you when you show up with broken ribs and a frankly unbelievable story about a pony and a new plastic lawn chair).

Hairdressers already know most of the gossip and scandal. I think this kind of training is great on case they want to do something but I'd never blame them for not getting involved. Being made a mandatory reporter would be way too much.
posted by fshgrl at 1:17 PM on December 18, 2016 [9 favorites]


Plus it would introduce legal repercussions.
posted by rhizome at 1:22 PM on December 18, 2016 [5 favorites]


(At first I misread the sentence as "the law WILL make them mandatory reporters," which seemed off to me. Glad to see I misread it.)

I had seen headlines about this but hadn't read the articles, and from the headlines I also thought that the law made them mandatory reporters. Training and awareness seem like net positives, and don't bring the complications and controversy of broadening the group of mandatory reporters.
posted by Dip Flash at 1:32 PM on December 18, 2016


Ah. [redacts prehistory, chicago, experience, and whatnot]

Excellent. Thank you for posting.
posted by infini at 1:58 PM on December 18, 2016


Really interesting! It sort of reminds me of the various public health initiatives that recruit barbers to talk their customers in black barbershops about hypertension and other chronic health issues. In both cases I have mixed feelings because it's a clear social good but also not paying already underpaid people for performing a public service.
posted by zokni at 2:12 PM on December 18, 2016 [5 favorites]


I don't think this is a bad idea, but I really wish it looked like this training were somehow paid. Adding additional unpaid training requirements for jobs that aren't likely to have paid-time-off benefits is not so great.
posted by asperity at 2:15 PM on December 18, 2016 [13 favorites]


I don't think this is a bad idea, but I really wish it looked like this training were somehow paid. Adding additional unpaid training requirements for jobs that aren't likely to have paid-time-off benefits is not so great.

Personally, I am astounded by the level of ongoing training required for being a hairdresser in Illinois. 15 hours re-training every two years to get a license which probably costs money for both the training and license seems excessive to me.
posted by srboisvert at 2:25 PM on December 18, 2016 [5 favorites]


They have more ongoing training requirements than police officers, nationwide.
posted by rhizome at 2:58 PM on December 18, 2016 [5 favorites]


We also have a large amount of unlicenced hairdressers for some reason.
posted by AlexiaSky at 3:08 PM on December 18, 2016 [1 favorite]


Possibly because the licensing requirements are intended to prevent women of color from running their own businesses.
posted by crush-onastick at 4:21 PM on December 18, 2016 [17 favorites]


I broke my arm in two places a while back - I literally took a freak fall. I mean, total, out of the blue, act-of-the-gods kind of thing. When I went to the orthopedist, every person from the intake person to the doctor asked me over, and over, and over if I'd been hurt by someone.

I appreciated it the first time, but it seems like they didn't record it anywhere, and as long as I went to that orthopedist, I was quizzed by everyone and their dog about whether someone had pushed me down. I SUPER WANT people to be asking these questions, but after a while I was ready to lose my mind.
posted by Medieval Maven at 4:45 PM on December 18, 2016 [1 favorite]


I generally laugh, and say I have horses, and leave it at that. Then I just say, "Thank you for your concern. It's important that women support each other." I think that's the response that reassures people, as well as telling them they are doing a good thing. And it's true!!

I really like this response, and hope you don't mind if I steal it. Thanks!
posted by MonkeyToes at 5:20 PM on December 18, 2016 [1 favorite]


My yoga teacher asked me that once. Which I guess was good, because I hadn't put two and two together and realized that my SSRI was making me bruise really easily, and I was black and blue all over. That prompted a quick call to the doctor and a prescription change. I guess that's somewhat similar, being a mostly female space, a potential confidante in a somewhat caregiving professional relationship, who is going to see more of your body than many folks,
posted by instamatic at 5:55 PM on December 18, 2016 [3 favorites]


Years ago, the week after my father died, my boyfriend and I were out blowing off some steam and playing catch with a baseball and I got distracted and took one of his tosses right to the face. I had to go to CVS and buy concealer for my black eye so I could go to the funeral and the cashier did a really good job of asking if I was okay and if I needed help. I will never forget that act of kindness and concern and I really support this law even though I despise Bruce Rauner.
posted by fancypants at 6:57 PM on December 18, 2016 [9 favorites]


Years ago, in Basic Training, I took a pugil stick to my bare head and when I was sent home on Christmas exodus leave, I had a huge bruise on my temple and two black eyes. That wasn't gonna stop me getting dressed up and going out on New Year's with my then still-new husband. Oh, how people stared at us and gave him dirty looks, but not a soul asked me about it. Except for another obvious recruit on the flight back to Basic, who just laughed and said, "You got in a fight!"

We still have an awful portrait photograph of the two of us posed terribly, my husband looking creepy and leering, and my worse black eye facing the camera. I don't know if the photographer was trying to make a point or if he was just drunk too.
posted by Hal Mumkin at 4:43 AM on December 19, 2016


The language in this thread and the article seems full of the false notion that only women are the victims. I thought Metafilter knew better.
posted by Goofyy at 4:45 AM on December 19, 2016 [2 favorites]


I bruise easily and often, and truly, don't realize most of them are there until someone points them out. But it's brought me comfort that my massage therapist always asks, kindly and gently, if there's anything we need to talk about. We couldn't be two more different people, but I'm always glad that even though I don't need it, he's there for someone who might.
posted by librarianamy at 5:05 AM on December 19, 2016 [3 favorites]


Mid-1980s, five-year-old me was in a Casualty department having a broken arm seen to, and my response to the doctor's enquiry as to how it had happened was a muttered: "It's all my parents' fault."

Doctor's ears pricked up, and he fixed my poor father with a blistering glare, before asking me gently why exactly this was the case.

"They wouldn't buy me a climbing-frame..."

(Subsequent conversation between us clarified that that was the entirely logical reason why Poor Climbing-Frame-Deprived Me had been clambering up the radiator instead, from which I had [unsurprisingly] fallen, and thus sustained said injury.)

On a more serious note, I went through some hellish years in adulthood when my partner at the time was being physically violent towards me on a regular basis. I remember every single one of the few people who clocked the situation and were willing to offer help - or even just commiserate and sympathise - with great gratitude, because it all helped me feel that little bit less alone and ashamed and undeserving. In that situation, I would really have appreciated something like this from a hairdresser.
posted by Morfil Ffyrnig at 5:45 AM on December 19, 2016 [6 favorites]




I didn't think mandated reporter laws applied to adult women victims anyways, just to dependents. I wasn't being abused but when a male physical therapist told me he was legally obligated to report me to the police as a potential abused women due to bruises on my legs, I was so upset. I'm still furious about this two years later. Never went back and saw him again! So a program like this that teaches hairdressers good ways to gently ask and offer resources seems way better to me than making a system where women know if they go to the salon with bruises, the police will show up at their house.
posted by carolr at 7:28 AM on December 19, 2016 [2 favorites]


The language in this thread and the article seems full of the false notion that only women are the victims. I thought Metafilter knew better.

My first though was that many more women (and children) tend to be the victims of violence than men. Second thought was that this was a post about women in women's spaces (beauty salons) rather than being about men. Third, fourth, etc....

I've seen certain men with frequent bruises and cuts--Of the ones that I'm acquainted with, they are either in work that causes these types of injuries--breaking horses, working with cattle, etc. or they are drinkers and bruisers, frequently getting into fights. Of the men that I've seen that I don't know, I would assume the same. Intellectually, I know that men can be victims of abuse, but I guess my assumption is that men can defend themselves so much more than a woman (or child) can.

And the final thought was that while woman find it difficult to find succor, men find it almost impossible. In part this is true because of the same assumptions I hold. Not good. :(
posted by BlueHorse at 2:37 PM on December 19, 2016 [1 favorite]


BlueHorse: Since when are barbershops women's space? They were in the list, too. Battered men are so invisible, most folks assume they don't exist. A recent post in the blue pointed out statistics that show vastly more males are battered than anyone thought.
posted by Goofyy at 4:20 AM on December 20, 2016


Just once, I'd love to see a discussion of men as victims of domestic violence that didn't start out as an attack on an already-occurring discussion that was insufficiently concerned about teh menz.
posted by Etrigan at 6:41 AM on December 20, 2016 [5 favorites]


Battered men are so invisible, most folks assume they don't exist.

A few years ago, my husband was recovering from a bad fall on his bike, and I was recovering from surgery to remove a small tumor from inside my lip. His face was bruised, and I had a fat lip. To a casual observer, it certainly might have looked like we'd had a fight (and that I'd beat him pretty good too.) Several people asked if I was okay or if things were okay at home. My spouse did not receive any similar support. One night at dinner, the waitress looked at him and joked "Next time she says to take out the trash, you take out the trash." It drove home for me how invisible abused men are. It was heartbreaking.

Having more people trained to spot abuse and trained to get people to safety is a good thing. Hopefully, it includes training on how to identify and help male victims as well.
posted by 26.2 at 9:08 AM on December 20, 2016 [6 favorites]


Goofyy, Ah, you're right. I spaced right out with that. As I said, my assumptions are showing.

Etrigan, I dunno, maybe we should be more concerned about abuse victims rather than what particular sex is being abused? I do feel that women nearly always get the short end of the stick, but I also feel I am obligated to concern myself with any person of little or no power, being abused by the system, that may have few resources at hand. They can be male, also. In the long run our society is the poorer for allowing any abuse.
posted by BlueHorse at 9:24 AM on December 20, 2016


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