Workplace Violence.

Before today's ramblings I wanted to share what I think is a very charming story. A lot of us here aren't all that happy about some of Nike's policies but this is a story that shows a different side of the shoe company:

http://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2009/11/new_nike_shoes_a_collection_of.html

This has been kind of a difficult week for me. This is the week my dad died. He died on November 9th. While it has been a long time you never forget the date or lose the emotional reactions to a day that took the man that formed you away. Sometimes those emotions will lead to strong reactions to news stories. Stories that during other times might elicit the reaction of "that's terrible" and then you move on. This week I am having a hard time getting over three stories. The shooting in Tualatin that I wrote about earlier this week. The one where a husband shot his estranged wife and two of her co-workers. In a second story a man killed his wife and son, then turned the gun on himself. In a third story a twenty-seven year-old man is accused of holding his girlfriend captive, strangling her unconscious, and sexually assaulting her because he was angered that she had smoked his marijuana.

In each case there was a warning. The second couple was having financial trouble. The twenty-seven year-old had previous anger issues. And here is a follow-up story to the shooting in Tualatin:

http://www.oregonlive.com/tualatin/index.ssf/2009/11/post.html

As we found out earlier this week domestic violence is the second leading cause of death among women at work. Despite that according to an article in today's Oregonian most Oregon companies do not have specific policies in place to deal with domestic violence in their workplace. According to the article partner abuse in the workplace usually involves a long running ordeal of threats, harassment, and stalking. The annual toll in lost work time is an estimated ten million dollars for Oregon business and ONE BILLION nationwide. Nancy Glass is a nurse and social researcher for John Hopkins University who formerly worked in Oregon at OHSU. In a survey she competed in 2007 here are some statistics that boggle the mind:

86 percent of the BATTERERS interviewed said their co-workers or supervisors knew about their abusive behavior.

Two-thirds of the ABUSERS interviewed said their employers helped them keep their job after they were arrested.

Fifty-four percent of the ABUSERS interviewed said they used company time to harass or interfere with a partner's job.

Sixty-nine percent of the abused that survived the abuse said their employer knew of that abuse.

According to the article, seventy percent of companies dO not have a formal policy to deal with domestic violence. Only four percent of the companies trained employees on domestic violence and the impact it had on the workplace.

You can read the entire article here:

http://www.oregonlive.com/tualatin/index.ssf/2009/11/employers_reluctant_to_deal_with_domestic_violence_that_spills_into_workplace.html

Are there times when you will react stronger emotionally to a story than you would under normal circumstances? Do the above statistics surprise or shock you? Comments on any thing written today or any day on this blog?

TODAY'S WHO AM I?

Yesterday's answer: Oveta Culp Hobby

TODAY'S WHO AM 1?

I wrote two novels and thirty-two short stories. I was born an only child to my parents in 1925. My father died of Lupus when I was fifteen. I described myself as a "pigeon-toed child with a receding chin and a you-leave-me-alone-or-I'll-bite-you complex." When I was six I taught a chicken to walk backwards. This led to my first experience of being a celebrity. The news people filmed me with my trained chicken, and showed the film around the country. I was just there to assist the chicken but it was the high point in my life. Everything since was anti-climatic. It took me three years to graudate from college with a Social Sciences degree. In 1946 I was accepted into a prestigious Writers' Workshop. In 1951 I was diagnosed with disseminated lupus, and subsequently returned to my ancestral farm. Although I was expected to live only five more years, I managed fourteen. At the farm I raised and nurtured some 100 peafowl. Fascinated by birds of all kinds, I raised ducks, hens, geese, and any sort of exotic bird I could obtain, while incorporating images of peacocks into my books. Despite my sheltered life, my writing reveals an uncanny grasp of the nuances of human behavior. I never married relying on my close relationship with my mother and my writing for my companionship. I completed more than two dozen of my short stories while battling lupus. I died in 1964. My texts usually took place in the South and revolved around morally flawed characters, while race often appears in the background. My two novels were about blood and bears. My best friend received a weekly letter from me for more than a decade. These letters provided the bulk of the correspondence collected in a selection of my letters edited by Sally Fitzgerald. My reclusive friend was given the pseudonym "A.," and only identified after she killed herself. I was the first fiction writer born in the twentieth century to have my works collected and published by the Library of America. I share the same last name as a former Supreme Court Justice. My quote "Grace changes us and change is painful." could apply to some of the writings on The Dahn Report. Who Am I?