Abuse can be emotional, like hurting you emotionally, putting you down, or manipulating or blackmailing you.
It can also be ‘social’ – when someone tries to control your social life and tells you who you can or can’t see, or follows you around and checks up on you.
All forms of abuse hurt. Some of them like physical violence, sexual assault, or stalking can be criminal offences.
He used to say things about my parents, he’d put them down…And he didn’t like me going out with friends. He’d crack it with me and get in a fight for no reason.
He would always talk me into having sex with him and said that was the only way to show him that I loved him.
It also includes encouraging you to drink a lot and then having sex or being sexual with you, when you’re not able to say yes to it. This is a crime.
If you have kids, it can include making your kids think badly about you, like telling them you are a ‘bad mother’ or undermining your authority as a parent.
This includes being manipulating or pressuring you about decisions regarding pregnancy, like saying, “if you loved me you’d have my baby’, or pressuring you to have a child together because they want to trap you in the relationship.
After just a few weeks I accidentally fell pregnant to him. I was not ready for this but he talked me round with logic and charm.
Refusing to use condoms or messing around with other forms of birth control, for example, hiding your contraceptive pills.
You feel confused about whether it’s really abuse because sometimes the other person is nice and fun to be with, or because the abuse isn’t always obvious.
Images from Red Flag Campaign posters – download, print and put them up at your school, TAFE or uni.
I had a boyfriend of 3 years he was sweet and charming at first and everything was perfect but then he completely changed in just a couple of months. He became obssesed with he and was over my house everyday and didn’t like me hanging out with my guy friends and he thought I had feelings for them ..which of course I didn’t …I was 16 and a virgin and he always talked about sex to me ..I told him I wasn’t ready but he kept talking about it anyways ..and he even told me about all his sexual details with all the girls he had with that made me feel sick and I didn’t want to hear it but he said I had to cause I’m his girlfriend and that he loved me ..one time he bought condoms and I told him I wasn’t ready but he kept insisting so I said yes so that he would stop bothering me about sexual stuff but I didn’t know that once I did that things would get much worse …he made me do crazy things that I didn’t want to do but he threatened to leave me if I didn’t and that if he left me I would be all alone cause nobody else would want me …and after 3 years of torture and being miserable and crying all the time I finally had the courage to break up with him and now I have a new boyfriend that respects me and treats me right
I have a boyfriend, and he’s always telling me what to do, he never lets go out with my friends or even go outside, but he does all those things. i don’t know what to do anymore he’s always telling me what to wear and not wear, what to do with my hair and what not to do with my hair. what should i do.? i am 15 years old and he its me.
My dear, you deserve better. You know what he does is not right, which is why you sought help from others on this forum. I understand how you feel, I am in a similar situation. It’s very hard and it hurts, but you have to fight for yourself, or eventually you will lose yourself. I don’t know you and you don’t know me, but there’s strength in knowing that others care and that you are not alone. Make the right choice and break free from him. Please take care of yourself, you’re worth it.
im going to sound dumb… because i already know im not being treated right. ive been with him for almost 2 years.. and as always, he was the kind of guy evry girlwanted.. and whn he chose me i felt like i was so amazing. he still finds ways to makeme feel wonderful. but, he has shoved me, and smacked my hands, hes thrown things and ran away from me.. hes cheated “online” and we went on a break for 2 weeks.. he made me keep snding goodmornings and call him my baby. this isnt the wrst.. ive tod him several times i wnt tostop hving sex. but whn we snuggle he shoves my head dwn an guilts me into oral sex. i do wtch thngs isay or do,for arguements sake. hisparnts tret him wrng an hesay im theonly one he has… tht is honstly th only reason i cnt leave him.
I have been married for 10 years I always thought I couldnt have met such a loving person like my husband he is 10 years older than me but that has never been a problem with us. I had been married before for 12 yrs of which I had 3 children whom unfortunately my ex husband got custody of after he found out I was dating my husband anyways my children are older now my son is 20 my daughter is 22 and my other son is 14 they are all from my first marriage and I had 2 children with him, he is a wonderful dad but lately he has been really mean with my 22 yr old daughter ever since I left her babysitting her 2 younger siblings because we left out of town well he found out that she brought over her boyfriend and that he spend the night and slept in our bed he got so furious when he found out and called her up telling her that she had no respect towards us and asked her to come pickup my grandson and told her he didnt want to see her at my house anymore that if I wanted to see her for me to go to her apartment I feel that he really over did it well she still came over when he wasnt here and we have seen her so I thought he had gotten over it so yesterday she stayed alittle later and when he got home from work he immediately showed that he was mad my daughter had gone out to the store when he got here but my 2 grandkids were here anyways he went in the room and slammed the door so I asked “why are you mad” I kinda had a feeling he thought I was babysittin so I told him she had just left but that wasnt it he just didnt want her here we are in the process of buying a house and he said to forget about it he told me to put my conditions because he was tired that I wouldnt respect his desisions. To top it off got even more mad when he found out I had reported one of our credit cards lost since that was the 2nd card that I had lost .this mornin he woke up late for work the alarm didnt sound cause I turned off the volume so he was really furious I stil got up to make him his coffe and make his lunch of which he didnt take as he walked out the door he told me “decide if you are going to live with your daughter or if Im going to have to look for a place to stay”I just cant believe he is taking it so serious Ive told him several times not to make me choose because He puts me in a bind I accept my daughter Has done several bad things she is married and her husband got deported to mexico 3 yrs ago she used to come and go but lately she has said she is going to leave him she has been going out with other guys and to clubs ever since he was sent to mexico and now she is pregnant again from another guy, she got caught steeling and was put in jail, she had me babysittin for 3 months makin me think she was goin to work and she had already quit workin so yes I accept she has done bad things but I dont think that he has any right for him not to want her to come over I dont know Im feeling so down right now I dont want to tell my daughter not to come anymore please give me your opinion about this matter
I think what you’ve done here is illustrate really well how complex and confusing abusive relationships can be. Relationship violence is about power and control, and from what you said, it is clear that this is what you’re experiencing. It also sounds like you have a good grasp on what’s ok and what’s not. Forcing you to perform sex acts is sexual assault, and not only is that not ok, it’s a criminal offence. I’d encourage you to watch out for excuses that allow him to absolve himself of responsibility for his abuse, for example ‘he had a rough upbringing’ or ‘it’s all your fault’. Look out for tactics of manipulation like ‘you’re the only one there for me’ or ‘I don’t have any other support’. Trust your instincts. Get support if you need it. Stay strong.
I’ve been in a relationship for more than 15 years, we have 2 boys, about 6 years ago he started non stop complaining he tells my boys that I don’t love them and I’m only using them for a free ride in life, he never buys food or house hold items says he pays the bills, I was a stay at home mom for 14 years now, a few months ago he told me to get a job, so I did get a job and I really liked it, this past sat. he told me I couldn’t use any of his cars any more, I had to quit my new job to far to walk and no bus, he yells and screams at me and my boys every day, the next he is singing, I am so hurt I let him treat me like dirt for years so my boys could have their dad.
you girls are all strong. No MAN would hurt you they say its love but whatever love IS NOT abuse i dont care what they say. I know its hard to just walk away from the relaionship but sometimes its for the best!….get treated with respect not like your worthless——>besides if they really loved you, they wouldnt even put that thought in their heads!—->wish you the best -Nika!
girls the only thing left to do after the relationship is put it behind you. some guys are just abusive others arent. be strong. akin
I was in an abusive relationship before. I was the first time it ever happened to me. I didn’t know what to do or who to tell. He used all kinds of excuses such as I’m all he’s got and his family treats him wrong and dosen’t care about him, and he’s never had anyone to care about him the way I did. Once my family found out, they tried to do everything they could to get me away from him. Yes, he begged, he pleaded, and threaten to kill hisself if I left him. Yes, I blamed myself and thought it was my fault, which is why I stayed with him. Until I realized myself that he was not the type of person to have in my life. I finally got up the courage to leave him and I haven’t looked back since. I would just like to say that there is help, even if you think you don’t want it, there is a way, even when you think there isn’t, you yourself can get out of the situation if you feel or are being abused and neglected. All of you are in my prayers.
Thank you all. I’m working up the courage to leave someone who has been blaming me for the verbal abuse he puts me through… very often it works. This is just the kind of reassurance I needed – this site as well as the suppotive commenters here. I’m not sure if I’m ready quite yet, but now I don’t feel nearly as alone as I did before. So again, thank you – even if you’re just reading this and wishing me luck or having me in your thoughts, it all means something.
I dated my boyfriend for around a year and a half and every time he saw me he insisted we had sex. I, of course gave in because I was in love with him and thought it was just to get closer. So, one night we went to the fair and I have major anxiety and motion sickness so I don’t really ride any of the scary, high rides. He wanted to go on some ride called ‘Speed’ and I was like okay, go ahead. So we started to walk towards the ride, but instead he got almost basically angry and pretended he was sick so we could leave. I was confused cause he was just okay a minute ago, but I went with it and he took me home. As I was kissing him goodbye he suddenly felt ‘better’ and wanted to have sex. I gave in, and he dropped me off and left. The next day he dumped me. We were apart for a month and he came back to me. I knew he would, he was all loving and stuff and I bought it. He wanted to have sex every time he saw me and didn’t text or talk to me basically at all. He would treat me like crap when we weren’t together. I was fed up with all of it but he was going into basic training so I thought he would get better. The day before he went into basic training he told me ‘I can write ANY girl I want and if you’re gonna be with me. DEAL WITH IT.’ (He was wanting to write this girl that he had some type of connection with) I was just like, whatever. I’ll deal with it. So, he went into basic training and was writing me. He never called. He NEVER said ‘ I love you or I miss you’ in any of his letters. He didn’t want me to send pictures or go to his basic graduation like we planned. I was crushed, this guy was breaking my heart from miles away. He was only keeping me probably to have sex when he got back. So I dumped him, and I think I’m doing alright.
Im in a really bad relatinship now and he does the samethings to me he hurts my feelings and control’s my money and hits on me and it hurts I tryed to help hem and I even thought it was my fult but now am getting better and I have people supporting me now and it feels great to have my life back.Good luck girls
Im 17 i have been with my boyfriend for a year, i live with him and his family. I love him so much i want us to work out But i dont like the way he treats me sometimes he takes his anger out on me. He has hit me punched me pinches me smacks me in the back over and over. Kicks me pushes me. I dont feel welcome here and i just dont know what to do. He wag amazing in the beginning and i just want that back i dont deserve to be treated like this but im not strong enough to just leave i dont want to have to pack all my stuff move out with a family member un pack im so stressed and i feel like im nothing. I do so much for him clean cook, try to make him happy all the time. He is very verbablly abusive aswell. I feel so alone:( and i dont want to tell anyone close to me about this. I feel so stuck.
[...] you should listen and back off. But if they don’t listen and keep hassling you, it could be a sign of abuse. 1 in 4 young people in a relationship say they have been called names, harassed or put down by [...]
Johannesburg’s past haunts its collective consciousness and its landscape. Most strikingly, massive gold mine dumps, pallid yellow in color, dot the periphery of the central business district. Bespeaking exploitation of both labor and resources, these toxic heaps have become an emblem of the city that was spawned by the massive gold rush of 1886. The bright tailing piles have drawn the attention of documentary photographers such as Jason Larkin and Sally Gaule, but the city’s juxtaposition of glitter and grimness is not restricted to photographs. Just south of Johannesburg last year, in an industrial park in the shadow of the Ferreira Mine dump, LA-based artist Ralph Ziman directed some fifty skilled African artisans in the task of meticulously beading nearly every external surface of a Casspir.
These hulking armored personnel carriers were one of the most visible incarnations of South Africa’s repressive apartheid government (1948–94). The Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected Vehicles (MRAPs) embodied state-sponsored violence; police and military forces used them to target African township dwellers and attack “terrorists” (aka anticolonial liberation fighters) during the 1966–88 cross-border war in South West Africa (now Namibia) and Angola. Casspirs were locally produced. Due to international sanctions, South Africa had to engineer much of its own military hardware, and the vehicle’s name combines the acronyms CSIR (Council for Scientific and Industrial Research) and SAP (South African Police).
The name is key to one of William Kentridge’s most disquieting works, Casspirs Full of Love (1989/2000), a hallucinatory drypoint etching that depicts seven human heads crammed onto shelves. The image’s enigmatic title comes from a radio broadcast in which an anxious mother once sent this bizarre greeting to her soldier son. In the 1980s, Casspirs were routinely foregrounded on posters designed for the End Conscription Campaign, part of the national anti-apartheid struggle. One noteworthy example, featuring a spot-on rendering in the style of Roy Lichtenstein, shows a bewildered soldier standing over a body, while his thought bubble reads, “He doesn’t look like a terrorist . . .”
Ziman’s venture—encompassing design, fabrication, and display—is known as the “Casspir Project.” A small rectangle just below the beaded vehicle’s radiator reads “Spoek 1.” Ziman explains that an Afrikaner wandered into the workspace one day and reported that he had driven a Casspir while on active duty. The man claimed that soldiers dubbed these personnel carriers spoeks, which means “ghosts” in Afrikaans, as a riff on Casper the Friendly Ghost. Ziman believes, however, that the choice was clearly meant to increase the MRAPs’ intimidating effect, since the shades of ancestors—sometimes benevolent and sometimes malicious—constitute an important element in the cosmology of many black South Africans.1
The looming four-wheel-drive Casspirs weigh approximately eleven tons, stretch over twenty-two feet long, and stand more than nine feet high. Ziman’s vehicle is emblazoned with swatches of color extending from the cab roof down to the tires, spanning the shooting ports to the axles, and enveloping the steel outer body as well as portions of the interior troop compartment. His goal was to generate a Pan-African style, thereby indigenizing a reviled symbol of tyranny. Some of the beaded panels echo traditional Zulu, Ndebele, and even East African Maasai patterns and hues; other sections display three-dimensional motifs in a more contemporary palette. Imagine a mash-up of American artist Odili Donald Odita’s bright geometric murals and M.C. Escher’s perceptual experiments. For a militaristic parallel, one might think of Venezuela-born artist Carlos Cruz-Diez’s contribution to the 2014 Liverpool Biennial—a pilot cutter repainted in the “dazzle ship” mode of glaring camouflage first developed during World War I.
Ziman’s crew of female South African beaders and male Zimbabwean wire fabricators worked six days per week for about six months. Ziman created the original design using a 3D computer model whose schema remained posted on a wall at the production site. But the team continually reworked the plan as both practical and artistic challenges arose. The project consumed over 1,300 pounds of small-gauge imported glass beads. It thus recalls, in some ways, the artistic efforts of American artist Liza Lou, who moved to Durban, South Africa, in 2005 and now works with a group of approximately fifty local women beaders (see A.i.A., “Backstory,” January 2017). Particularly germane is Lou’s huge sculpture of chain-link fencing covered with silver beads, Maximum Security Fence (2007–08). The sparkly beauty of the piece partially distracts viewers from the terror of enclosure and the bodily danger posed by the barbed wire that tops the work.
In attention to detail and sheer density of decoration, Ziman’s Casspir is like a magnified version of an object-encrusted memory jug, a Western folk art form of African origin. The entire fabrication process has been recorded by cinematographer Nic Hofmeyr, who previously filmed Miners Shot Down (2014, directed by Rehad Desai), a powerful documentary about the Marikana Massacre, in which South African police opened fire on striking platinum miners in 2012, killing thirty-four. Hofmeyr now intends to travel to each site where the work is exhibited in order to capture reactions from three audience segments: soldiers who previously commanded or rode in Casspirs, Africans who once confronted the vehicles, and those who are too young to have ever encountered these fortresses on wheels.
Ziman is South African by birth but left the country in 1981 after being called to report for military service, which was mandatory for all white men. A pacifist, he refused to support the racist state. Although he eventually made a new home in the United States, he has not acquired American citizenship and adamantly resists being labeled a “former” South African, asserting emphatically: “I’m always an African no matter where I am.”
Ziman’s creative trajectory has been unconventional. An award-winning director of music videos for major pop stars, he gradually became a writer/director of feature films. His best-known movie, Gangster’s Paradise: Jerusalema (2008), is a harrowing story, based on actual circumstances, that highlights the hijacking of residential buildings in the center of Johannesburg by heavily armed gangs that force tenants to pay rent directly to them, rather than to the legal owners.
More recently, Ziman has found himself attracted by the individual autonomy of art-making. The thread that connects his work in all fields is the examination of violence. His idea to bead a Casspir evolved directly from an earlier collaborative project, “Ghosts” (2013). Profoundly disturbed by the global arms trade that nurtures conflicts throughout Africa, Ziman hired half a dozen Zimbabwean economic migrants to fashion life-size replicas of AK-47s.
These individuals, drawn from a population of two to three million displaced Zimbabweans now in South Africa, ordinarily sell touristy sculptures of animals, fashioning wire armatures on which they then thread strings of beads. Craftsmen such as these are a common sight at certain Johannesburg intersections. Before Ziman recruited them, they were selling their wares directly across the street from one of the most prestigious art galleries in the city.
“Ghosts” addressed the AK-47 as an object fetishized throughout Africa, an enduring symbol of anticolonial liberation struggles. In fact, the weapon appears on the flag of neighboring Mozambique, as well as on the coat of arms of Zimbabwe. In proxy conflicts during the Cold War, the Soviet Union and China furnished AK-47s to rebel movements in both these African countries. Ziman’s vibrantly colored facsimiles, mocking left-over “warrior” fantasies, glammed up these weapons to subvert their aura of power and menace. The artist made photos of men posing with the guns in various locales, put up street murals (some portraying the rifles as made of paper money), and eventually presented the sculptures and photographs in a gallery exhibition in Los Angeles. He apportioned the profits to Human Rights Watch, other NGOs, and his team of salaried craftsmen.
When Ziman located the rusted-out 1980 Casspir, it required a complete reconditioning, inside and out. Representatives from the South African Defence Department soon turned up to inspect the vehicle and the warehouse. Was Ziman purchasing the MRAP for ISIS? Was it roadworthy? Ziman was quickly cleared of any association with insurgents, and two of the artisans undertook intensive training that certified them to repair and drive the Casspir. In the end, the officials endorsed his project; the vehicle has been formally reclassified as a sculpture.
Casspirs were mothballed in South Africa after the first free elections in 1994, but they gained popularity elsewhere. US military forces adopted their own versions of the vehicle in Iraq and Afghanistan, and more recently giant SWAT personnel carriers have entered the arsenal of local American police forces. They now form part of the debate over the militarization of domestic law enforcement. Ferguson, Missouri, is one of the places where MRAPs have been deployed.2
On the day I got my first view of the production of the “Casspir Project,” Ziman and I later set off to eat lunch in the central business district. Even though four people were riding in the car, we were ambushed by a gang that demanded our cell phones and cash. Once we were able to move on—minus some valuables but with no injuries—we mused that perhaps the safest way to navigate downtown Johannesburg these days would be, ironically, in a gigantic military relic.
The first public showing of the “Casspir Project” was on the plaza outside the Iziko South African National Gallery in Cape Town. The work appeared from December 15, 2016, to March 31, 2017, in conjunction with the exhibition “Women’s Work: Crafting Stories, Subverting Narratives,” which included twenty-three individual male and female artists and five women’s cooperatives.
The “Casspir Project” debuted at a time when accusations of cultural appropriation—coming from a younger generation of black artists, critics, academics, and museum personnel—are plentiful in South Africa. Heated debates have erupted in the museum world, for example, over the suitability of white curators presenting and interpreting traditional African artifacts. The aestheticization of violence is an additional hot-button issue. Yet these topics remained in abeyance last winter, as the Casspir—with its joyful color scheme, imposing presence, and clear antiauthoritarian message—became a crowd-pleaser.
Casspirs in their heyday evoked anger, dread, and seething resentment. These behemoths remain formidable, although memory of them is negligible among the post-1994 “born free” generation. But Ziman’s elaborate embellishment destabilizes the brute force that this war machine once projected. Working the frontier between allure and peril, his “Casspir Project” is tantamount to forcing a bully to don a frilly frock.