Psychological violence, the most denounced by women in Ecuador and the one that leads to traumas and dangers such as suicides

It is the most denounced in Ecuador of all the violence or aggression that a woman can suffer. And she is in second place of all the crimes exposed in the Prosecutor’s Office in the last seven years. It is second only to theft (crime), which also happens every day and everywhere.

It is about psychological violence, which affects women and their families in Ecuador and that in 2021 alone, 30,707 cases were reported to the Prosecutor’s Office. That corresponded to 10.4% of the more than 295,000 cases entered the previous year at the national level.

This without counting the 263,462 complaints of psychological violence against women or family members that the Prosecutor’s Office entered since the COIP was in force (August) 2014 until 2020.

Psychologists and lawyers specializing in Women’s Rights say that there are times when psychological violence often goes unnoticed because it is “very subtle” or because the victims cannot identify it, since they have grown up in an environment where these practices tend to normalize.

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“It begins (psychological violence) first with belittling, with control, with lowering their self-esteem. What happens is that many times the situation of violence is not yet identified until, unfortunately, the physical evidence is already there, where the greatest aggression already occurs”, says Vivianne Almeida, in charge of the Municipal Directorate for Women, an entity that also works in violence prevention and training and projects to help women in Guayaquil.

Almeida, who is also a lawyer by profession and has worked closely on gender inclusion, says that usually when a woman files a complaint or asks for help, it is because the aggressor has already gone to another level of violence, where there is physical aggression, abuse with visible injuries. But all this has been preceded by psychological and also patrimonial violence.

How to recognize psychological violence?

Insults, violent verbal expressions (including profanity), phrases or words that denigrate women or make them feel inferior, useless, second or third order, threats, among others, are part of this psychological violence.

Sometimes it is imperceptible or subtle and includes making people believe that their opinion, their feelings, their thoughts or their voice are not valid, explains Annabelle Arévalo, clinical psychologist and member of Cepam Guayaquil, an organization that deals with cases of violence against women and the family.

One of the mechanisms used by many couples is the control they want to exercise over women, and for this they tell them that they do not want them to carry out certain activities because they love them and do not want anything to happen to them, he details.

“Because I love you, I don’t want anything to happen to you, therefore, I don’t want you to go out to work, I don’t want you to go out to study, I don’t want you to go out alone (they tell them), and that’s why they are always there as very close them, supposedly ‘caring for’ and ‘protecting’ them, but rather it is control over their bodies, control over their wills, over their decisions, which is also psychological violence, very subtle, imperceptible, regarding this ‘romantic love patriarchal’ that we have as cultural, that we believe is not, we do not identify it”, details Arévalo.

This clinical psychologist and defender of women’s rights comments that as a result of the confinement due to the COVID-19 pandemic (in 2020), more cases of violence, such as psychological violence, were evidenced.

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And the common denominator of this psychological violence is that it is becoming more violent, more aggressive, “with expressions of extreme violence, systematic over time, but dangerous and risky in demonstrations,” says Arévalo.

Psychological violence even makes women end up losing track of reality, becoming dependent on men, to the point that they annul each other emotionally and psychologically. They feel that they are not useful as women, as human beings.

For this reason, their aggressors can easily manipulate them, they can decide on their children, on the responsibilities they have at home, on their bodies, among others, because they leave them with no will for anything, Arévalo points out.

This psychological violence has even made some women have suicidal ideas. Some have taken their lives for this.

To avoid this and other violence that women and their children experience and are exposed to at home, it is important to work on prevention, on education, emphasizes Almeida, since it is a deep, structural problem that concerns everyone in the community. society.

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“We have to break those normalized patterns of violence. You have to work a lot with families. Education obviously opens the doors to a better opportunity in life. With more information and education, you also aspire to a better future, but it is also important in terms of your personal life project, so that girls and adolescents have a much stronger self-esteem, that they have dreams, goals and that they have the support of their families. to achieve it”, says Almeida.

The Municipal Directorate for Women, created in 2019, works especially on plans and projects for prevention, education, health, technical training, and others so that girls, adolescents, and women have tools to get ahead and change these existing cultural patterns. Currently, according to its owner.

“It hurts a lot to see girls who for different reasons have dropped out of school and who are relegated to domestic tasks. Girls and adolescents with a lot of talent, with many dreams, but who are practically ‘resigned’ to making their lives only doing housework. Also many girls and boys, exposed to a series of unsafe environments, abuse, mistreatment, sexual abuse, and all of this is sometimes so normalized”, Almeida comments on real cases that they have seen and also treated.

psychological damage in children

Billy Navarrete, representative of the Permanent Committee for the Defense of Human Rights (HRC), on the occasion of International Women’s Day, refers that the psychological and emotional traumas that are currently experienced and seen are a reflection of the different types of violence, suffered especially by girls and women, both on the street and in the home.

She mentions that those women who manage to free themselves from circles of oppression and come to denounce their problems must have support and care protocols to repair the psycho-emotional damage.

“There is a State debt to generate community processes, especially for the repair of psycho-emotional damage caused by the effects of all types of violence,” Navarrete highlights.

It considers that the community sphere of each sector has an important role to play in prevention, in the identification of scenes of violence and in avoiding the resurgence of this violence, which escalates to the most tragic stage: femicides or the death of women in hands of their attackers.

What does the law say and what sanctions are there for psychological violence?

psychological violence (Art. 157 of the COIP). This crime is committed by anyone who threatens, manipulates, blackmails, humiliates, isolates, harasses, persecutes, controls beliefs, decisions or actions, insults or any other behavior that causes psychological damage to women or family members.

Sanctions: Jail from six months to one year. If it produces illness or mental disorder in the victim, imprisonment from one to three years.

If the infraction falls on a person from one of the priority attention groups (children, older adults, pregnant women), in a situation of double vulnerability or with catastrophic or highly complex illnesses, the sanction will be the maximum penalty (three years), increased in one third.

Expressions towards women are sanctioned as contraventions, according to the COIP:

Whoever utters expletives, expressions in disrepute or dishonor against women or members of the family, in cases where it is not a COIP crime, will be sanctioned with 50 to 100 hours of community work and psychological treatment will be provided to the aggressor and the victims, as well as comprehensive reparation measures, reads article 159 of the COIP. (I)