Rural Roots: Seeing, naming and changing intimate partner violence in rural communities
We acknowledge the work of Luke’s Place in developing its resource on intimate partner violence in rural communities from which much of this content is drawn and developed. You can read Going the Distance [HERE].
What’s a rural/remote community?
A rural community is generally understood to be one with a population of less than 10,000 people. Often, rural communities are also identified by their culture and access to services.
Remote communities are isolated rural communities. Health Canada defines a remote community as one that is at least 350 kilometres from the nearest service centre with year-round road access.
Across Canada, almost one-third of people live in rural and remote communities.
What neighbours, friends and family need to know
Intimate partner violence (IPV) in rural and remote communities can look quite different than it does in urban settings. These are some of the rural realities that have an impact on IPV:
Distance
Distance is an issue for everyone who lives in a rural community, no matter what they want to do. Even for those who live in a village or small town, many services may be located in a larger centre some distance away.
This has a significant impact on victims/survivors who are in or leaving a relationship in which they are being abused by their partner. A victim/survivor who does not have their own vehicle or enough money to pay for gas will find it challenging to flee immediate danger, get to an appointment with a lawyer or meet with a counsellor or therapist. If their partner monitors their use of the car by checking the gas gauge or odometer, they will be limited even more.
In some places, the nearest police detachment may be far away, making the response time longer. Not all rural detachments are staffed 24 hours a day, in which case an emergency response will come from even farther away.
Distance affects important decisions a victim/survivor has to make if they are thinking about leaving their partner. Relocating for safety reasons may not be an option, simply because the victim/survivor would have to go too far for it to be practical. The victim/survivor may decide not to go into a shelter, even if this would increase their safety, if it is distant from their home and too far away from where they work or where the children go to school.
A restraining order or peace bond may be of little use to a victim/survivor because of the distance from their house to the closest police detachment. In that case, if the abuser is at the front door threatening a victim/survivor, calling the police is not going to be very helpful in terms of immediate safety, even if their partner is violating a court order.
Lack of public transportation
There is little to no public transportation in rural communities. Combined with the long distances, this creates a barrier for people needing to get to services and activities.
Without public transportation, victims/survivors have few options to get to appointments or to escape unsafe situations. Calling on friends for rides may mean others find out about the abuse, which can create further safety concerns. Taxis, if any are available, are likely to be out of reach financially for many victims/survivors. Uber and similar services do not generally operate in rural and small communities.
The lack of easy ways to get around, whether in an emergency, to meet with a lawyer or counsellor, to go to court or to visit with a friend creates safety challenges and can make victims/survivors feel isolated and trapped.
If a victim/survivor with children leaves the abuser, transporting the children back and forth to see their other parent can be expensive and time consuming.
Lack of Services
Small communities cannot offer the range and diversity of services for victims/survivors who are being abused by their partners that can be found in urban centres. This creates unique challenges for those with special needs, such as victims/survivors who require interpretation and cultural accommodation and those dealing with mental health or substance use issues. Victims/survivors may have no access to services at all or have no choice in the service that is available.
Often, in-person community-based counselling services are available on a part-time basis, which can mean victims/survivors may have long wait times to meet with a counsellor.
Legal issues
A victim/survivor leaving an abusive partner, especially if they have children, faces a number of important and complex family law issues and requires ready access to expert legal advice and representation. Victims/survivors may also be dealing with criminal and/or child protection issues.
The number of lawyers practising in small towns and rural communities is small and diminishing. In remote parts of the province, there are often no local lawyers at all. Where there are lawyers, most are generalists who practice in many areas of law.
As a result, a victim/survivor may have trouble finding a lawyer with family law expertise, especially if they need one who is well informed about IPV and has the skills the case requires. Lawyers who accept legal aid certificates are even harder to find.
As a result, a victim/survivor may have to settle for a local lawyer without the specialized expertise they need or work with a lawyer from an urban area who may not understand the rural realities that impact their case.
Small communities, especially in remote parts of the province, often do not have full-time courts. Sometimes, court is set up for one day a week or month in a community centre or other public building, with the judge, lawyers and court staff coming into the community from an urban location. Other times, victims/survivors must travel long distances to get to the nearest court.
Court processes are slow everywhere, but especially in rural communities. If the court sits only once a week or month or if the judge who comes into town is in a conflict of interest for some reason, delays can stretch on and on. This can put a victim/survivor in a bad situation. The victim/survivor may need the criminal case to be over before the family law case can move ahead or they may need to move for safety reasons but be unable to do so before an order permitting relocation with the children is granted. It might take months before a child or spousal support order is in place, leaving a victim/survivor and their children in poverty in the meantime.
Supervised parenting time locations are few and far between in rural communities; creating transportation and accessibility issues for victims/survivors who need to bring their children to a supervised visiting centre so they can spend time with the other parent.
Lack of privacy
The anonymity of urban centres can make it easier for a victim/survivor whose partner is abusive to have the privacy needed to seek help. Such privacy is not an option for most victims/survivors in rural and remote communities. The hairdresser who notices bruising on a client’s neck may be their in-law. The police officer who responds to the 911 call may be the their neighbour. The victim/survivors parent in-law may see their car parked outside the family lawyer’s office. The abuser’s sibling may coach the kids’ soccer team.
Anything the victim/survivor does that’s outside their usual pattern of activity will be noticed by someone and may be reported back to a partner/former partner. This can make it very difficult to take any steps to leave or even to gather the information they need.
Isolation
Lack of privacy is one issue; isolation is another. Unlike in an urban setting, where help is often nearby, a victim/survivor living in a rural area can’t just run to a neighbour or a nearby public space to get away from a dangerous situation. The lack of public transportation contributes to feelings of isolation.
The abuser’s power and the victim/survivor’s feeling that they are alone in the world are reinforced when they can’t easily drop in on a friend or neighbour, or even a nearby store, for casual conversation or support.
Communication
People in urban areas take internet and cell phone access for granted, but those who live away from the main transportation corridors have no such luxury. The cost of such services can be prohibitively high. Many parts of rural and remote Ontario continue to have no, limited or unreliable internet and cell service access.
The lack of reliable cell phone access places victims/survivors with abusive partners at risk when they need to call for help. Lack of internet access makes it difficult for them to gather information about services and their legal rights and responsibilities. It also creates challenges if some or all of the children’s contact time with their other parent is virtual or by telephone.
Animals
Animals are a significant presence in many rural families, whether as pets or livestock. A victim/survivor who has been isolated from family and friends by an abusive partner may get great emotional support from pets. Livestock is a significant financial asset for the family and, often, farmers are emotionally attached to these animals. It’s not uncommon for an abuser to threaten to harm or kill animals as a way to control their partner’s behaviour and to keep the victim/survivor from leaving. If the victim/survivor can’t take pets when leaving and can’t find somewhere to house livestock, they might stay with an abusive partner, even if it is not safe to do so.
Economics
Poverty is a reality in many rural communities. Jobs that pay a living wage are scarce, as is affordable housing. The lack of public transportation means people bear the cost of car ownership and operation. Food is likely to be more expensive, as there are fewer discount grocery store options.
If a victim/survivor decides to leave their abusive partner, they will likely have trouble finding a job that pays adequately, especially if the victim/survivor needs to support children. Low-cost safe housing is hard to find. If the victim/survivor and their partner operated a family farm together, leaving means leaving housing, employment and income behind.
Guns
Guns are present and used for legitimate purposes in many rural homes. A farmer may use a gun to control pest animals in the barn or fields, and many rural dwellers use guns to hunt game, which becomes the family’s meat for the year. Because of this, the presence of firearms has become normalized and taken for granted.
Familiarity can lead to careless storage of firearms, which makes it easier for an abuser to pull out a gun and use it to threaten and intimidate a partner/former partner or, in extreme cases, to kill them, members of the family or even pets. In rural communities, guns are used in domestic violence homicides at a rate more than twice that in urban domestic violence homicides (29% compared to 12%).
If the police are aware that the abuser has guns, they may have concerns for their own safety that mean they are slower to enter the home if the victim/survivor reaches out to them for help.
Even bail or other conditions that require an abuser to turn over firearms may not be effective in a rural setting. An abuser may be able to have guns returned during hunting season. An abuser also might be able to “sell” or “give” guns to a friend or relative and borrow them back or convince a neighbour to lend a gun, claiming the need to deal with animal pests on the farm. All of this makes life less safe for victims/survivors.
What neighbours, friends and family can do
There are many ways neighbours, friends and family members can support a victim/survivor whose partner is abusive at all stages: while the victim/survivor is living with the abuser, while thinking about leaving, during the leaving process and after leaving.
If the police are aware that the abuser has guns, they may have concerns for their own safety that mean they are slower to enter the home if the victim/survivor reaches out to them for help.
Even bail or other conditions that require an abuser to turn over firearms may not be effective in a rural setting. An abuser may be able to have guns returned during hunting season. An abuser also might be able to “sell” or “give” guns to a friend or relative from and borrow them back or convince a neighbour to lend a gun, claiming the need to deal with animal pests on the farm. All of this makes life less safe for victims/survivors.
See it, name it, check it
See it: be aware of common warning signs of intimate partner violence so you know it when you see it
Name it: for what it is, to yourself and to the person you are concerned about
Check it: for danger, for yourself and reach out for community expertise
Once you see it, name it and check it, you can think about how you can help.
Providing practical help:
- Gather information about services for victim/survivors and their children in your community so you have this at your fingertips if you are talking to a neighbour, friend or family member who is being abused.
- Can you provide rides to appointments or lend your car?
- Can you take care of the children while the victim/survivor goes to appointments?
- If long-term assistance with transportation is needed, can you help with that?
- Can you care for a pet or farm animals if the victim/survivor needs to leave home?
- Can you store important items for the victim/survivor? This could include documents (copies of birth certificates, health cards, driver’s licence), financial records (copies of the deed to the house/farm, bank statements, credit card bills, car insurance, workplace benefits forms) and medical information (health cards, prescriptions
- Can you help the victim/survivor find a lawyer? [Here in Finding Help]
Keeping everyone safe
Victims/survivors need to both be and feel as safe as possible when they are dealing with an abusive partner/former partner. While a safety plan cannot eliminate all risk, it can significantly reduce the risk of future harm. You can help a victim/survivor make a safety plan as well as think about what role you can play in that plan.
Survivor’s safety plan
- Refer the victim/survivor to the shelter in your community, where a counsellor will be able to work with them to develop a safety plan. Victims/survivors do not have to be a resident of the shelter to get this support. Find the shelter in your area: [HERE].
- Encourage the victim/survivor to read this safety planning resource developed by Luke’s Place, and read it yourself, too: [HERE].
- If the victim/survivor you are concerned about doesn’t have a vehicle, can you provide a key to one of your vehicles so they can use it in an emergency?
- Can you put a key to your house in a safe place that the victim/survivor can easily get to so your house can be a safe place for them in an emergency?
- Connect the victim/survivor with the Luke’s Place virtual legal clinic so they can talk to a lawyer and a support worker about steps they can take to keep as safe as possible: [HERE].
- Talk to the victim/survivor about the importance of online safety and steps that can be taken to keep online activity as safe as possible: [HERE].
- Make sure you keep yourself safe while you are helping the victim/survivor you know who is being abused. The abuser may target you if they think you are creating trouble in his relationship with their partner.
Safety for neighbours, friends, and families
In rural communities, because everyone – including service providers – may be a neighbour, friend or family member of someone who is being subjected to intimate partner violence or who is causing the harm, safety for those people also needs to be considered:
- Take the time to put together a joint response among agencies so no one person is identified as the sole intervenor.
- Support positive relationships with all first responders especially when the situation is volatile and high risk.
- Navigate communication carefully: the person you call for help on behalf of the victim/survivor may be a relative or friend of the abuser.
- If you have made a connection with a community worker as part of the support you are offered a victim/survivor, be mindful of their need for privacy: when you encounter them in a public setting (grocery store, children’s athletic event, church), wait to see if they approach you rather than approaching them yourself. Be careful with phone numbers, email addresses etc. Don’t identify a community worker’s car to anyone.
- Always remember that everyone knows and is connected with everyone else and keep personal information to yourself, checking with the victim/survivor before you share it with anyone.
- Do not approach the victim/survivor you are supporting in public or when they are with their partner; let them decide whether they want to acknowledge your presence.
- Find “spontaneous” ways you can meet up with the victim/survivor: at the dog park, if you both have dogs; at a store; by joining a running or craft group, and so on.
When we work collaboratively in our communities and we see it, name it and check it, we are taking an important step not just to keeping individual victim/survivor’s safe but to seeing, naming and changing intimate partner violence in rural communities: See it, Name it, Change it.
The creation of this page was a collaboration between NFF, Pam Cross (Luke’s Place) and Erin Lee (Lanark County Interval House). We acknowledge the work of Luke’s Place in developing its resource on intimate partner violence in rural communities from which much of this content is drawn and developed. You can read Going the Distance [HERE].
Download the Rural Roots pamphlet [HERE].
